Elizabeth crossed to her sister's bed and embraced her. “We are both to be happy, then. Both of us, at once. Mama will be insufferable.”
“She will be in raptures.”
“That is what I said. Insufferable.”
They laughed together, and Elizabeth thought her heart might burst from the joy of it.
The clock had just struck ten when the sound of hooves on gravel made Elizabeth's pulse leap.
She was at the window before she realized she had moved.
Mr. Darcy—Fitzwilliam—rode up the drive on his gray horse, his dark coat stark against the frost-covered landscape. He dismounted with careful grace and handed the reins to a startled groom.
He had come.
Early, as promised.
Mrs. Bennet's shriek echoed through the house. “Mr. Darcy! On Christmas morning! Hill! HILL! The good tea—fetch the good tea!”
Elizabeth watched him approach the door, her heart so full she could barely breathe. In a few minutes, he would speak to her father. And then he would ask for her hand publicly.
And Elizabeth would say yes.
Again.
The sitting-room door closed behind them, and Elizabeth found herself alone with the man she loved.
He stood in the morning light, tall and handsome and looking at her with such open adoration that her breath caught.
“Your father gave his blessing,” he said. “Rather dryly, I might add. He suggested I would need fortitude to survive your mother as a relation.”
Elizabeth laughed. “He is not wrong.”
“I told him I would consider it a privilege.” Mr. Darcy stepped closer, his voice dropping. “Any price is worth paying, Elizabeth, if it means I may call you mine.”
“You may call me yours regardless of price.” She reached for his hand. “You have had my heart for weeks now. The formalities are merely... formalities.”
“Nevertheless.” He raised her hand to his lips, pressing a kiss to her fingers. “Elizabeth Bennet, will you do me the very great honor of becoming my wife?”
She smiled—that radiant, incandescent smile she could not have contained if her life depended on it.
“Yes,” she said. “A thousand times yes.”
He pulled her into his arms, and she went willingly, her face pressed against his chest, his heart pounding beneath her cheek. For a long moment, they simply held each other—two people who had found their way through pride and prejudice and mistletoe to arrive at this perfect, impossible joy.
“I love you,” he murmured against her hair.
“I know.” She pulled back to look at him, her eyes bright with happy tears. “I love you too. I believe I mentioned that last night.”
“You did. I have thought of nothing else since.” His thumb brushed her cheek, catching a tear. “Say it again.”
“I love you, Fitzwilliam Darcy.”
His smile could have lit the room.
The sitting-room door burst open, and Mrs. Bennet's shriek announced to all of Hertfordshire that her second daughter was engaged.
The chaos that followed was everything Elizabeth had expected and more.
