His pride felt like a vise around his chest. His heart felt like a liability he could no longer control.
Late in the morning, Darcy escaped Netherfield on the pretense of delivering a message for Bingley. The walk into Meryton would clear his head, he told himself. The cold air would restore his equilibrium.
He was wrong.
He had barely reached the village when he heard them—two shopkeepers standing in a doorway, their voices carrying in the crisp December air.
“Mr. Wickham says Mr. Darcy treated him most cruelly...”
“Denied him a living, I heard. The one his father promised...”
“Poor man. Such hardship, and he bears it so gracefully...”
Darcy stopped walking.
The words hit him like a pugilist’s strike to his guts, each one a reminder of how thoroughly Wickham had poisoned the well. The shopkeepers did not notice him standing in the shadow of a doorway, did not see the way his hands clenched at his sides or the color that drained from his face.
Wickham was accelerating his campaign.
He was angling for sympathy, painting himself as the wronged innocent and Darcy as the heartless villain. And he was doing it in Meryton, where Miss Elizabeth walked and shopped and heard every word of gossip that passed through the village.
Darcy felt ill.
He moved on before the shopkeepers could notice him, his stride mechanical, his thoughts spiraling. How many people had Wickham told? How many believed him? Had Miss Elizabeth heard these lies? Did she believe them?
The thought was unbearable.
He was turning onto the high street when he saw her.
Miss Elizabeth stood outside a milliner's shop, her arm linked with Jane's, her expression animated as she spoke. The wintersun caught the dark gleam of her hair beneath her bonnet, and she was laughing at something her sister had said—that bright, surprised laugh that had lodged itself beneath Darcy's breastbone and refused to leave.
He stopped.
Every instinct urged him forward. He wanted to cross the street, take her aside, explain everything—Wickham's lies, Georgiana's near-ruin, the truth behind the charming facade. He wanted to warn her before Wickham's poison could take deeper root.
But he could not.
He could not expose Georgiana's shame to protect himself. He could not demand Miss Elizabeth trust his word over Wickham's without evidence she would accept. He could not approach her here, in public, without causing exactly the sort of speculation he wished to avoid.
He stood frozen, watching her laugh, watching her smile, watching her move through the world with a grace and vitality that made everything else seem dull by comparison.
She did not see him.
Perhaps that was for the best.
Darcy turned away, his heart twisting, and walked back to Netherfield without delivering Bingley's message at all.
THE HOLIDAY ENTERTAINMENT
Elizabeth wokeon the morning of the holiday entertainment with a riot of emotions she could not untangle.
Anticipation. Reluctance. Curiosity. And something warmer, something that fluttered beneath her ribs whenever she thought of dark eyes and quiet protection and a voice sayingyou deserve better than to be made a spectacle.
She thought of Mr. Darcy far more than she thought of Mr. Wickham now.
This unsettled her deeply.
A fortnight ago, she had been certain of her judgments. Mr. Darcy was proud, disagreeable, convinced of his own superiority. Mr. Wickham was charming, wronged, deserving of sympathy. The lines had been clear, the conclusions obvious.
