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Yours always,

Art

P.S. I have taken your coachman with me to London and given firm instructions to my staff not to let you leave the estate or take any of the vehicles.

Lydia swallowed hard, her throat thick with emotion, tears stinging the backs of her eyes.

She reread the letter, letting it wash over her, before clenching it in her fist and hurling it across the room.

“You idiot!” she cried to the empty chamber. “I agree with you! We are stronger together!”

She spun around, her hands clenching at her sides, needing—desperate—to throw something. Couldn’t he have waited for her? How dare he take this decision out of her hands? How dare he lock her away in this estate with his thieving stepmother…?

She paused, her breathing heavy.

His stepmother was still here with everything she had inherited. Lydia cocked her head to the side, chewing her lip as an idea began to form.

No.

A plan.

A better plan.

Decision made, she gave a firm nod and strode toward the door. Nobody was guarding her room. Good.

She descended the staircase and immediately halted. A footman was carrying a trunk toward the open front doors.

Lydia frowned.

What’s going on?

She stepped off the last stair, and a different footman immediately appeared before her, blocking her path.

She tried to sidestep him, but he moved with her. She tried again, but he shifted in front of her.

“Apologies, miss,” the footman finally said when she looked up at him, annoyance clear on her face. “But the marquess ordered that you are not to be let outside.”

“So you would keep me imprisoned against my will just to please his lordship?”

“Yes, miss,” came the young man’s meek reply.

Well, at least he was loyal to Art.

“I am not trying to leave, anyway,” Lydia said. “Just trying to find out what’s going on. Whose trunks are those?”

Footsteps sounded on the landing above, followed by the tittering descent of heels on the stairs.

“The marchioness’s, miss,” the footman replied before stepping aside and taking his position by the wall.

“I do not believe I’ve had the pleasure,” came the grating voice of Lady Wakefield.

Lydia turned toward her and met her gaze head-on.

Despite mourning tradition, the recent widow was dressed in an exceedingly bright gown, her hair curled into bouncy ringlets that framed her face, her entire form adorned in far too many jewels.

Almost every finger bore a ring. A tasteless diamond choker, which could likely sustain the Wakefield estates for a year, glittered at her throat. Large sapphire earrings swung from her ears.

And nestled in her arms—wrapped in an ornate collar—was a tiny, strange-looking creature that resembled a rat.