**Lady Georgiana Rannoch is just back from her honeymoon with dashing
Darcy O'Mara when a friend in need pulls her into a twisted Gothic tale
of betrayal, deception and, most definitely, murder. . . .
**
I am a bit at loose ends at the moment. My cook, Queenie, is making my
new role as mistress of Eynsleigh something akin to constant torture as
Darcy is off on another one of his top secret jaunts. And Grandad is
busy helping wayward youths avoid lives of crime. So when my dearest
friend, Belinda, inherits an old cottage in Cornwall and begs me to go
with her to inspect the property, I jump at the chance.
After a heart-stopping journey in Belinda's beast of a motorcar, we
arrive at the creaky old cottage called White Sails and quickly realize
that it is completely uninhabitable. Just when I'm starting to wonder if
I would have been better off trying to get Queenie to cook a roast that
hasn't been burnt beyond all recognition, we meet Rose Summers, a woman
Belinda knew as a child when she spent time in Cornwall. Rose invites us
to stay at Trewoma Hall, the lovely estate now owned by her husband,
Tony.
Belinda confesses that she never liked Rose and had a fling with Tony
years ago, so staying with them is far from ideal but beggars can't be
choosers as they say. Trewoma is not the idyllic house Belinda
remembers. There's something claustrophobic and foreboding about the
place. Matters aren't helped by the oppressively efficient housekeeper
Mrs. Mannering or by the fact that Tony seems to want to rekindle
whatever he and Belinda once had right under his wife's nose.
Our increasingly awkward visit soon turns deadly when a member of the
household is found murdered and all clues point to Belinda as the prime
suspect. I soon learn that some long buried secrets have come back to
haunt those in residence at Trewoma Hall and I'll need to sift through
the ruins of their past so Belinda doesn't lose her chance at freedom in
the present. . . .
