Nicholas lives in a huge mansion and he has had no interest in it’s upkeep since Marie died, in fact, most of the rooms have been neglected for many years. Nicholas decides to fix up the library in his home, which was his wife’s favorite room in the house in attempt to face his past. Nicholas contacts Mr. Howard, his tutor while growing up and requests the help from his daughter, Lucinda. She will accept the job to fix the library with her good childhood friend and co-worker, Ben. Ben will be accompanying her on this journey to Daleford Manor look after her.
Once Lucy and Ben arrive at Nicholas’s home in Daleford Manor, they meet with Nicholas who is expecting Lucy and has recently hired 3 servants to attend to her need during the duration of her stay. After a good night’s rest, Lucy meets with Nicholas the next day and he shows her what he wants done in the library. Lucy finds a manuscript while cleaning the library and tucks it into her notebook so that she can read it later in the privacy of her own room. Things take a turn for the worse when she looks out the library window and sees a hurt fox. She takes off after the fox in an attempt to save it and notices a woman standing at the edge of the forest. Nicholas happens to see Lucy and goes outside to save her from the woman. At first Nicholas thinks that Lucy is just hallucinating and didn’t think that she really saw someone at the edge of the forest. She goes back and forth with him and he finally accepts the fact that she did see someone, when he realizes that it is Sylvia Flores, Marie’s mother.
Nicholas knows that Lucy is now endanger and he travels about three hours from home to meet with Mr. Moore, his dad’s late friend, to discuss getting rid of Sylvia. After, meeting with Mr. Moore and spilling details from the past, Nicholas realizes that Sylvia wants to kill Lucy. He knows that Lucy is almost finished with the library and will return to her home soon. In the mean time, Lucy gets a letter from her dad saying that he is having a hard time running the book store by himself. So Lucy, decides to hurry up and finish the work in the library so that she can return home to her father on Christmas day. Nicholas’s servants beg Lucy to attend a ball on Christmas eve, before she is scheduled to return home. After Nicholas returns home from his visit with Mr. Moore, he finds that Lucy has already left Daleford Manor and Carl tells him that she is at the ball. So he goes to the ball and offer’s Lucy another job, so that he can get Sylvia captured.
However, Lucy declines his offer to stay at Daleford Manor and returns home to be with her father on Christmas day. Once, she is at home she begins thinking about Nicholas and wonders if she made a mistake coming home. After she is home for a bit, Ben tries to tell Lucy how he feels about her and what he thought about their time in Daleford Manor. Ben doesn’t like Nicholas and knows that he is hiding something from Lucy but he doesn’t know for sure what it is that he is hiding. A few days go by and she receives a package in the mail from Nicholas, in the package was a new pair of glasses and a letter asking if she would reconsider the job opportunity.
She decides to return to Daleford Manor, this time without Ben’s supervision. Once she is back at Daleford Manor she feels like she is where she is supposed to be. A few days go by and Lucy is confronted by Sylvia in her bedroom. Lucy screams for help once she realizes that Sylvia is in the house and is about try and kill her. Nicholas senses danger when he hears the scream and runs towards Lucy’s room. He finds the door locked and has to kick down the door in order to get into her room. Once in the room, he sees Lucy cuddled up in the corner trembling and crying. She warns him that Sylvia is in the room. Sylvia and her small army attempt to kill Nicholas, in fact, he is heavily injured and is laying on the floor. Lucy tells him that he must get up and tells him that she needs him. Sylvia is caught and kept until she can be taken to the Assylum for the Mentally Insane. For some reason, Carl doesn’t trust Mr. Moore and decides to make sure that she arrives there safely.
After the doctor determines that Nicholas is going to survive his battle wounds, Lucy will stay with him so that she could nurse him back to health. She stays with him around the clock and reveals to him that she loves him one day while he was sleeping. A few days later things take a turn for the worse and they find themselves in trouble again when Lucy and Ben are outside talking. They are taken by a woman dressed in black by gunpoint and lead into the forest. Once they are deep in the forest, they are met with Sylvia and this strange woman in black. Nicholas isn’t too far behind and will sneak up on the lady in black. Nicholas sneaks up behind the woman and she tries to convince him that she is Marie. He told the woman that he buried Marie and knew that she wasn’t Marie. But who was she? What happens to Sylvia? Why did Ben return to Daleford Manor towards the end of the book? Will Nicholas and Lucy fall in love? What happen’s to Daleford Manor?
Disclosure: I was not compensated for this book review, I read this free book and wanted to share it. The opinions in this post are 100% my own and may not reflect your opinions.
Download this book for free: “Discovering You” by Melissa Kean.