She shook her head.“Miss Bingley said your family does not receive marks.”
“Normally they do not.But nearly seven years ago, one began to appear on my arm.”
She looked up at him and he gave her a crooked smile.
“It itched like the devil.”
Elizabeth smiled.“At least it is only your arm.Mine is nearly my entire back.”
His brows lifted.“Is it?I should like to see that.”
Her face heated.“Perhaps you shall,” she said so quietly he almost did not hear her.
“Do you not want to take a look?”He held his arm out again.
She tentatively touched his sleeve, pushing the fine linen further up over his elbow.There was a tree, a swing hanging from a limb, and a heart carved into the trunk, her initials engraved in it.
She inhaled shakily and swayed on her feet.He placed a hand under her elbow to steady her.
“Are you well?”he asked gently.
She nodded.“Well enough.Merely more surprised than I have ever been.”
“You had not wondered if I was your soulmate before now?”
She looked up at him, then back down, her eyes darting around the room.“I was curious about you, and I found you unusually attractive,” she said to the floor.“I suppose that should have been a clue as I had never thought of any other man in such a way.”
Darcy was inordinately pleased by that statement.“I am glad you have never been attracted to another man.”
She tilted her head back and raised a brow, her humor reasserting itself.“You are going to be impossible now, aren’t you?”
When Darcy grinned at her like that, her stomach twisted itself into a knot.
“If you do not want me to kiss you, stop looking at me like that,” he said, his voice delightfully rough.
“Looking at you like what?”she said with an impertinent smile.
He reached around her waist and pulled her against him.She slammed into him with a squeak and her hands came to rest on his chest.He was in nothing but his shirt sleeves and an open waistcoat, and she could feel his muscles beneath her palms.She let her hands rove over his chest, exploring, and rested her right hand over his heart.
“Your heart is beating fast,” she said.
“Is yours not?”
She stared up at him, a challenge and an invitation in her eyes.Darcy raised his right hand, moving slowly so she might stop him if she did not wish for him to touch her.His hand came to rest just above her left breast, her heartbeat a nervous flutter beneath his palm.
“Elizabeth,” he breathed.
“Fitzwilliam.”
They stood there for several long moments, hands on one another’s hearts, looking into each other’s eyes.Darcy moved first, sliding his hand up along her shoulder, then behind her neck.He drew her closer, slowly, and she tipped her face up to meet his.
Her breath was sweet and warm, her lips soft and pliant beneath his.Her hands fisted his shirt and held him close, then slowly slid up behind his neck as he pulled her impossibly closer.
He tasted the wine she had been drinking, opened his mouth to drink her down.She clung to him, her body pressed against his, her tongue tentatively darting out to taste him in return.
“You taste like brandy,” she said as he kissed along her jaw.
“You taste like heaven,” he replied.He was kissing her neck now, his arms wrapped so tightly about her that her ribs were in the crooks of his elbows.She could not move, could barely breathe he held her so closely, but she could not care about that.What was breathing compared to this?She laughed.
