Slighted Love

This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design. Italy Vale arrives at The Lodge like a beautiful question no one wants answered. Dark-eyed and outwardly composed, she enters the seaside mansion carrying the weight of a scandal her mother has hidden for years: her father was murdered, her mother was accused and tried, and though the law acquitted her, public suspicion never did. Now Italy has come to Massachusetts to stand on the ground where the crime occurred, determined to uncover the truth behind her father's death and the missing diary that may expose it. At The Lodge, she finds not only old grief but a house alive with tension—Francis Murray's guarded gravity, Mrs. Murray's chilly courtesy, Alys Audenreid's ambition, and the whispers of a family still shaped by secrets. What begins as a search for justice becomes a fierce emotional battle as Italy and Francis circle one another in suspicion, attraction, and dread. When the truth is finally pressed closer, Italy is forced to confront evidence that could destroy her faith in her mother, yet she refuses to abandon her loyalty. In this tense gothic drama of inheritance, betrayal, and buried guilt, Italy's grief hardens into a vow to uncover the murderer and avenge the ruin of her family.