Wentworth Hall
Authors: Abby Grahame
“YOU WERE RIGHT.”
Maggie had her back to him, her head cast down. “This … what we have.
Had
. It can never be.”
“Don’t do this Maggie,” he urged. “We belong together. I know that now.”
When Maggie turned to face him, tears brimmed in her eyes. “Don’t you see? It’s too late.”
“Tell me why!”
Maggie gazed up at him full of longing, but then she broke free, running off into the darkness outside their circle of lantern light, her gown rustling as she fled.
How desperately he wished he could take it all back. While he could never reproduce the grandeur of Wentworth Hall, he could promise her a decent life.
If only. If only.
EIGHTEEN-YEAR-OLD
Maggie Darlington has turned into an entirely different person. The once spirited teen has become passive and reserved. A change Lord and Lady Darlington can’t help but be grateful for.
It’s 1912 and the Darlingtons of Wentworth Hall have more than just the extensive grounds to maintain. They need to keep up appearances that things are as they have always been for one of Britain’s most elite families … even as whispers of secret romances and bitter betrayals threaten their facade of perfection.
Maggie has a secret. And she’s not the only one: The handsome groom, Michael, the beautiful new French nanny, Therese, even Maggie’s younger sister, Lila, are hiding something. And one of their secrets has the power to ruin the Darlingtons forever.
When scandalous satires start appearing in the newspaper with details that closely mirror the lives of the Darlingtons, they are looking over their shoulders, worrying that their scandal will be next—because at Wentworth Hall, nothing stays secret for long.
Abby Grahame
lives in upstate New York. Her interest in historical fiction and British period dramas inspired
Wentworth Hall.
This is her first novel.
J
ACKET DESIGN BY
L
UCY
R
UTH
C
UMMINS
J
ACKET PHOTOGRAPHY COPYRIGHT
© 2012
BY
M
ICHAEL
F
ROST
S
IMON
& S
CHUSTER
• N
EW
Y
ORK
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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Book design by Lucy Ruth Cummins
The text for this book is set in Goudy Old Style.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Grahame, Abby.
Wentworth Hall / Abby Grahame.
p. cm.
Summary: In 1912 England, eighteen-year-old Maggie Darlington returns from France to learn that her father hopes to restore the family fortunes through her marriage and his guardianship of two orphaned teens, but scandalous satires in the newspaper threaten to spoil his plans and reveal the family’s many secrets.
ISBN 978-1-4424-5196-4 (hardback)
ISBN 978-1-4424-5198-8 (eBook)
[1. Family life—England—Fiction. 2. Social classes—Fiction. 3. Interpersonal relations—Fiction. 4. Secrets—Fiction. 5. Great Britain—History—George V, 1910–1936—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.G7587Wen 2012
[Fic]—dc23
2011051461
To Julia Maguire and Zareen Jaffery,
with thanks for all their creative and editorial ideas