The House of Lost Wives

Copyright © 2022 Rebecca Hardy Cover design: Versha Jones Cover images © iStock and Shutterstock Author photo © Sam Butler The right of Rebecca Hardy to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published in this Ebook edition in 2022 by HEADLINE ACCENT An imprint of HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library eISBN 978 1 4722 9353 4 HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP An Hachette UK Company Carmelite House 50 Victoria Embankment London EC4Y 0DZ www.headline.co.uk www.hachette.co.uk Contents Title Page Copyright Page About the Author About the Book Dedication Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Acknowledgements Find out more about Headline Accent About the Author Rebecca Hardy was born and raised in London, England and has lived between Sussex and London all her life. Writing since an early age, she is a regular contributor to photographic publications and blogs as well as short works of fiction, and shares love for books on her Instagram profile @Rebecca_readsbooks. She now lives in West Sussex with her two lively boys, two equally lively cats and her husband. The House of Lost Wives is her debut adult novel. About the Book Secrets. Lies. And four missing wives. 1813. Lizzie’s beloved older sister Esme is sold in marriage to the aging Lord Blountford to settle their father’s debts. One year later, Esme is dead, and Lizzie is sent to take her place as Lord Blountford’s next wife. Arriving at Ambletye Manor, Lizzie uncovers a twisted web of secrets, not least that she is to be the fifth mistress of this house. Marisa. Anne. Pansy. Esme. What happened to the four wives who came before her? In possession of a unique gift, only Lizzie can hear their stories, and try to find a way to save herself from sharing the same fate. For Mamgu Who taught me to love ghosts, books and history Not necessarily in that order Chapter 1 The bell rang. Only later did I find that odd. I didn’t expect their kind to ring the doorbell and announce their arrival. The sort of people who wore crinkled suits and carried cudgels in mallet-sized fists. The men who came to call in a debt, or beat their debtors into senselessness when they couldn’t pay. Two of them marched into our house as though they owned it, and thinking about it now, they almost did, considering the amount of money my father owed them. I sat at the pianoforte in the front room, my sister at the harp, while the men crashed through the house searching for my father. It wasn’t the first time, but it was certainly the worst. Footsteps sounded past the door and up the stairs, the assailants somehow knowing that their quarry was up there rather than in the parlour. I looked at my sister uncertainly, but she only raised her eyes to the patch of damp on the ceiling, her lips moving as she prayed soundlessly. He couldn’t pay them. We knew he couldn’t. We’d been scrounging lunch from the tea room for the past week because Father hadn’t paid for groceries, having gambled a month’s wages on a very, very bad horse. Esme was a year older than me and far better at getting free food from unsuspecting tea room managers. All it took was one of her disarming smiles, a little charm and her renowned humour to acquire us sandwiches and hot tea with heaps of sugar. That she could do the same thing the next day, and the next, was a miracle. By contrast, no one looked too closely at me, or talked to me for long. I had a tendency to speak my mind in a way that displeased people – not that it bothered me. Esme was put in charge of finding us things to do, sneaking us into museums and finding new places to venture on foot during the warmer months. She had even convinced the local bookseller’s son to allow us hours of uninterrupted browsing on afternoons when his father was out, in exchange for the elusive promise of a kiss from her that would never come to pass. That we had not been turned out on the street by him time and time again was a miracle, but I imagined he found the view of her devouring books, bundled up in her winter coat and tucked into the corner between shelves, too alluring to turn away. ‘It will only be like this for a little while,’ Esme had continued to reassure me as we went hungry for weeks. ‘Father will think of something.’ She was never wrong. There was a resounding thunk from the floor above. I cleared my throat gently as the light fixture swung precariously. ‘Whatever you do, don’t say anything,’ Esme urged as the men now tore through the upstairs floors where my father was no doubt hiding in his study. I glanced from my sister to Brisley, the house ghost, who stood in the corner in his usual tatty attire. I didn’t know why I could see him and no one else could, but he had been there for as long as I could remember. As soon as I had realised he