Unless Miss Jennet Reed attends the All Hallow’s Eve masquerade being held at Dredthorne Hall, her family will be cursed forever.

Or so her frantic mother insists after receiving a threatening note. Jennet knows itss utter nonsense, but to appease her mother, she agrees to attend. It’s a lavish affair and a lighthearted evening until an unexpected guest arrives.

Baron Greystone, who inexplicably deserted Jennet at their wedding altar seven years ago, has returned. Though Jennet refuses to give his astonishing story any credence, her heart does otherwise. Only when lethal visitors follow in his wake does she begin to believe him.

Gwen Archer does not fear the curse of Dredthorne Hall. Instead it is the message she must deliver that gives her pause: she will inform her future brother-in-law, Christopher, that her sister has run away.

But what Gwen discovers at the Hall is far worse than being the bearer of bad tidings. She finds Christopher’s older brother, the reticent and rude Robert Sheraton, there to greet her. Now she must impart her unwelcome news to him instead.

To her shock though, the man that she meets is not the Robert that she remembers. Instead he seems the perfect host. But as her stay at the hall lengthens, and she and Robert draw close, strange accidents beset her. Soon she must watch every shadow and listen at every door, lest the Ghosts of Dredthorne envelop her in their dark embrace.