Once Upon a Midnight Dreary – Book Tour and Giveaway

The letter arrived on black-edged stationery at half-past nine during breakfast on a too-bright day for mourning.

Victoria Ravenwood stared down at the unfamiliar wax seal stamped with the sigil of a bird in flight. A raven, from the looks of it. A slanting, looping hand had scrawled her name across the front in black ink.

Miss Victoria Ravenwood

Care of Mr. Hubert Pembroke, Crown Hollow, Rothbridge

“What is it, dear?” Aunt Eloise peered over her teacup, her bright blue eyes alight with interest. She looked like a feral cat ready to pounce on the latest juicy gossip.

“A letter.”

She laughed. “Of course, it’s a letter, silly goose. What does it say?”

She was always a bit of a busybody. Victoria didn’t want to read the contents of the letter in front of her. She’d demand to know it word for word. As her thumb swept over the seal, she had the distinct feeling this was meant for her and her alone.

Why she felt that way, she did not know.

It had no return address, which she found curious.

“Well? What is it, dear?”

She granted her aunt a faint smile as she placed her napkin next to her half-empty plate and pushed back from the table. “I think I’ll read it in the parlor.”

Alone. She wanted to read it alone, and not with her aunt breathing down her neck.

The woman harrumphed as she hastened from the dining room. No doubt she was planning to extort the information from her later.

Aunt Eloise meant well, but she was overbearing and pushy. Victoria was grateful to her and her uncle for taking her in after her parents died, but the woman was exhausting on a good day. If there was news of any sort in the contents of the letter, she would never let it rest.

What news, though? Victoria, still in mourning, walked to the parlor and pulled the door closed. She stood in the silence of the room staring down at that raven wax seal wondering about the sender. As far as she knew, there was no one else who knew she was here. She had no family except for her aunt, who was her mother’s older sister, and her uncle by marriage. And she didn’t exactly have a lot of friends.

Moving to the sofa, she popped the seal. Perching on the edge, she unfolded the letter with a careful hand. She pulled in a deep breath when she read it and then read it again.

This couldn’t be right.

Could it?

To Miss Ravenwood,

In accordance with the last will and testament of your late parents, Abner and Eleanor Ravenwood, you are hereby named sole heir to their estate, which includes Ravenfell Manor in the village of Elderbloom, Rothbridge. You are requested to take possession immediately.

There were other instructions about inheritance, land deeds, and legal oversight. It was signed by an R. Williams, Solicitor, Brown, Williams & Davis. She had never heard of him.

Her mind drifted away from the letter and the solicitor. To her childhood home and a place she thought she’d never see again. She thought her parents had sold it when she was a child.

Ravenfell Manor.

Her nightmares of the manor had long since faded, but now, as she held the letter, they flooded back to her.

A piano that played a haunting tune when no one was about. The acrid scent of smoke drifting through the halls. A shift in temperature from warm and comfortable to cold and frightening. Sometimes during certain times of the year, a misty fog curled through the west wing corridor.

What she recalled most of all was the man in the shadows with eyes full of sorrow and despair.

Her parents had never seen him.

But she had. And she had never feared him.

When she was eight years old, they fled Ravenfell Manor under the cover of darkness. And now, twenty years later, it had returned to her.

Perhaps her fortune had changed. As the heiress of the country estate, she had a home to call her own. She no longer needed to depend upon the kindness of her aging aunt and uncle.

It was a moment of elation.

Shattered by the opening of the parlor door.

Her aunt bustled in with an expectant look on her face. Victoria wasn’t so sure she wanted to share the contents of the letter with her, but then, she also knew her aunt would badger her until she did.

“Good news, dear?” she asked, her tone hopeful.

Was it good news? She said nothing as she extended the letter. Aunt Eloise took it and read it, her face an explosion of expressions. From surprise to doubt to sorrow to something akin to envy.

“Well, this is a surprise. I thought my sister and her husband sold off that crumbling old manor years ago.” She handed back the letter.

“I suppose they didn’t.”

“Naturally, you’ll refuse to move there.” She said it flippantly, as if this were already true.

“Why would I do that?” Victoria rose, her ire suddenly raised.

“Well, my dear, you are a single lady. Alone. You can’t possibly think of running that estate all by yourself.” She chuckled, as though the thought was merely a jest.

She lifted a brow. “Why shouldn’t I?”

Aunt Eloise wrung her hands, looking confused. “You are a single lady,” she said again.

“Yes, I am. With an inheritance at my disposal. I’m sure I can hire anyone I need to help me run and take care of the estate.”

Flabbergasted, she said, “You’re considering it?”

Annoyance hit her hard and fast at her aunt’s disbelief. She understood very well that she was a young, single lady. With no prospects looming and no purpose to keep her here in Crown Hollow, Victoria saw no reason not to consider it.

“Yes,” she said, the word an icy breath.

Her aunt didn’t understand her need to find independence. Now, she had a chance—a real chance—at a life all her own. If she stayed in the city with Aunt Eloise, she’d suffocate.

Aunt Eloise remained still as a statue, rooted in the middle of the room, her chest heaving with labored breaths.

“I simply can’t allow it,” she said then, her tone stern. As though she would entertain no other thoughts on the matter.

Victoria stiffened. “The letter says I’m to take possession immediately.”

“Who’s to say this letter is valid?” Eloise snapped. “Why, I’ve never heard of this solicitor, and as far as I know, Abner and Eleanor made no mention of this in their wills.”

This was not going well. Victoria resisted the urge to crumple the letter in her fist.