down, grasped one corner of it and tugged it out from under the flowing skirts of the blue silk ball gown. She drew the object out and stared down at the dusty cover, her chest fluttering with a strange anticipation. It was a book, bound in leather and covered with a thick film of dust.
A diary. The Marchioness of Darlington’s personal diary.
Cecilia looked from Seraphina to the diary, which had been tucked into a corner at the back of the clothes press, as if it had been hidden there, waiting for her to find it. “I can’t read this. It’s a dreadful invasion of the marchioness’s privacy.”
Seraphina yawned, as if privacy were a matter far beneath her notice.
Cecilia fell back on her heels in front of the clothes press with the heavy book on her lap, hesitating. What good would it do anyone for her to pry into Lady Darlington’s secrets? Now she’d made up her mind to leave Darlington Castle, it should be left to someone else to reveal the remaining mysteries, or keep them secret, if they chose.
Yes, yes, that was the only logical, rational response here.
But Cecilia seemed to have abandoned rational thinking, because she snatched up the diary and scrambled to her feet. She glanced down at Seraphina, who was now rubbing against her shins, as if thanking her. “Do you always get your way, you wicked thing?”
A foolish question, really, given that Cecilia was already creeping from Lady Darlington’s bedchamber to her own with the diary tucked under her arm. She took care to close the connecting door behind her, then hurried for her bed, and opened the diary to the first page.
Diary of Cassandra Elizabeth Belmore, October 1792.
It began three years ago, just after Nathanial had drowned in Darlington Lake, the year Gideon returned to Darlington Castle to see his brother laid to rest. He must have begun courting Cassandra soon after he arrived, because by February of the following year, Cassandra Belmore became Lady Darlington.
Cecilia ran a finger across the single line, admiring the elegance of Lady Darlington’s handwriting—or more properly, Cassandra Belmore’s handwriting—but she hesitated before turning the page, an odd foreboding gathering like a dark cloud in her breast.
Once she turned that page, there would be no going back.
She turned it anyway, her gaze searching out the first line at the top.
My dear friend, it began, in the manner of a letter rather than a diary entry.
Entry dated October 1792.
My dear friend,
My heart, my sweet friend, is heavy today. The Marquess of Darlington has been found this morning, drowned at the bottom of Darlington Lake. Such a young, healthy man to have met such a sudden and tragic end. Nathanial’s brother has arrived from London, overwhelmed with shock and grief. I’ve never seen a man more devastated. Lady Leanora has been taken to her bed in hysterics…
Another tragedy at Darlington Castle, another sudden, unexpected death. If Cecilia believed in such things, she would have said the Marquesses of Darlington were cursed.
Then, several months later, in a much different tone:
Entry dated December 1792.
The most wonderful thing has happened! Gideon has asked me to marry him.
Cecilia flipped through until she arrived at a page dated in 1793, the last year of Cassandra Belmore’s life. She skimmed through the entries, pausing on one dated in March of that year.
My dearest friend,
Never did I imagine I could be as happy as I am. Gideon has shown me such love, such affection, such tender care in these first months of our marriage, my heart, my body, and my soul are forever his…
Forever his. Cecilia’s gaze lingered on the word forever, written in Cassandra’s elegant, flowing hand, her chest aching for the young lady who’d written that word with such happiness, such hope. In the end, forever had been an unbearably short time for the Marchioness of Darlington.
Six months after writing these words, she was dead.
But oh, how happy she’d been, in the brief time she’d been Gideon’s wife! His devotion to her was written into every entry, breathed into every line of those few short months. Every word Cassandra had written, every page of her diary swelled with love and adoration for her husband.
A love and adoration that was generously returned. Gideon had loved his wife. No one who read these pages could ever doubt it. His love for her was right there, page after page of it, in his late wife’s own words.
April 1793. My dear friend, such a delightful morning! Gideon has surprised me