Katherine Langford is in London ready to make her debut to society when she discovers that the home next door is being rented by the "Murderous Marquess" Hayden Rowling. Always impulsive, Katy decides to sneak over and take a peek at the notorious M...
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If he was the Master of Hell, then I was now its mistress...
Katy decided the next morning that if it was a governess her husband wanted, then it was a governess he would have. Scorning the shimmering rose poplins and rich blue velvets that she adored, she unearthed a silvery gray morning gown from one of the trunks. By ripping away the striped sash and popping off the silk rosettes that trimmed the hem, she created a frock as unrelentingly gray and stark as the sky outside her window.
She tugged her hair into a painfully tight chignon, ruthlessly stripping it of its curls. Not a single tendril was allowed to escape.
She surveyed her reflection in the cheval glass that stood in the corner, her generous lips compressed into a stern line. All she needed was a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles and a fat hairy mole on her chin and she might be mistaken for Miss Terwilliger. She looked quite ancient—at least twenty- four.
While she waited for the breakfast hour to arrive, she began to dig through her boxes and trunks. Perhaps this place wouldn't feel so strange once she surrounded herself with familiar things. She had emptied two trunks and filled every nook and cranny of the walnut tallboy in the corner when she became aware of a most curious sensation. Although she'd read about it in numerous Gothic novels and even written about it a time or two in her own stories, she'd never truly experienced it.
The hair on the back of her neck actually stood on end.
The stocking she was holding slipped through her fingers as Katy slowly turned, wondering if she was about to come face-to-face with the ghost of Hayden's first wife.
Judging from the hair hanging in its eyes and the dirt smudging its slender nose, the creature peeping around the doorframe was definitely mortal. Sensing that her visitor was only a friendly smile away from bolting, Katy quickly returned her attention to the trunk.
"Good morning, Madelaine," she said coolly. "Would you care to come in?"
From the corner of her eye, she saw the girl sidle into the room, her feet dragging in their unlaced boots. Katy was thankful that the first chapter of her manuscript, finished shortly before dawn, was tucked beneath a false panel at the bottom of her writing case, safe from prying eyes.
After a moment of awkward silence, Madelaine blurted out, "Do you love my father?"
Katy couldn't have said why the question gave her pause. After all, she barely knew the girl's father.
While she was struggling to frame a suitable answer, Madelaine scuffed the toe of her boot against the floor. "I shouldn't blame you if you didn't. He's quite insufferable."
Katy was spared from either scolding or agreeing by Mirabella, who came bouncing out from under the bed like a rabid dust bunny. She pounced on one of Madelaine's bootlaces with demonical glee.
