“H-he k-k-kissed me a-and ripped m-my d-dress w-when he attempted to t-t-touch me, Papa,” Fanny sobbed out.
Before he could defend himself and explain to her father that his daughter had entrapped him, Mr Gardiner raised his hand. “I do not want to hear it! Youwillpresent yourself at my office first thing in the morning on the morrow,” Gardiner growled.
Knowing that he was well and truly trapped, all Bennet could do was to weakly nod his head as he stood in shock.
He would have remained there had it not been for his mother. Beth took her son’s arm. “Come, Thomas, we should go home,” she said sympathetically. The worst possible thing had occurred, and her poor son would have to marry the horrendous, selfish, vain girl.
All the way home, Bennet was lamenting his hubris at not following his mother’s advice to remain away from the assembly.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
Bennet was not a man who imbibed anything other than a glass of port here or there, but when he arrived home from the assembly, he went directly to his study. There he poured four fingers of brandy into a tumbler and threw it back. The burn as the liquor coursed its way down towards his stomach made him think clearly. He sat down at his desk, pulled a sheet of paper from the pile, and began to write.
His mother had allowed him his space when they arrived home, but Bennet rang for Hill and sent a request for his mother to join him.
“Thomas, I am so sorry you are stuck with such a woman,” Beth commiserated with tears pricking her eyes. “With all the witnesses, by now the embellished story is known far and wide; there is nothing you can do. It will be dishonourable not to marry her, even though it was not your fault.”
“Unless she decides she does not want to marry me,” Bennet stated calmly. Seeing his mother’s questioning look, he proffered her the sheet of paper on which he had drafted a settlement. “I will sign no other settlement than one that encompasses all of the points I have made.”
Beth read over what Thomas had laid out. “I do not know if she will, but this may cause her to rethink her decision. If she withdraws, your honour will still be intact,” Beth opined.
“I will pray for that outcome,” Bennet said firmly. He retrieved the page and placed it on his desk.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
“Bennet, surely you jest? You expect me to draw up this settlement for my daughter?” Gardiner spluttered after reading the page.
“I am as serious as can be. You did not want to hear it last night, but Miss Fanny pounced on me when I was on my way to the card room. If you ask your eldest, I am sure she will confirm this was entrapment. Your younger daughter has long attempted to put herself in my path. Since I have shown her no interest whatsoever, she took matters into her own hands,” Bennet stated dispassionately.
Gardiner knew enough about his youngest to not doubt that if Bennet showed no interest in her, it would have driven her to do something like she did the previous night. If he were honest, he would have admitted he had been suspicious as to why Hattie called him at that exact moment.
“If she does not marry you, she will be ruined,” Gardiner articulated.
“I am here, as you demanded, and if after she is made aware of theonlysettlement I will offer, she still wants to marry me, I will do as honour dictates. It will be her choice,” Bennet drawled.
Miss Gardiner and Miss Fanny were summoned. The former could not look at Mr Bennet while the latter looked like the cat who got the cream. At that moment Gardiner knew the truth.
“Fanny, if you choose to marry Mr Bennet, these are the points which will be in the settlement.” Gardiner handed the page to his youngest.
At first, Fanny was horrified when she took in what was written. However, she remembered she always got what she wanted, so she was sure this would not be different. “Of course I want to marry Mr Bennet,” Fanny sang as she handed the page back to her father. She and her sister were dismissed.
Bennet felt sick to his stomach; there was no getting out of it. It made him that much more determined to enforce every clause that would be in the settlement.
“I will have Phillips draw up the wedding contract,” Gardiner stated resignedly.
“This will be the final time I, and Longbourn, will use your law practice! Once I am sure the settlement has all of the points for which I asked, and only those, I will sign it and apply for a common licence. There is no point in drawing this out.” Bennet stood and exited the office. Now he had to go break the bad news to his mother.
Chapter 1
“What do you mean I am not the mistress of the estate?” Fanny screeched after she returned from the church with her new husband.
“You were made aware of the terms of the settlement and insisted on marrying me anyway. If you think you are able to work on me to change things to which both your father and I agreed, then you are sorely mistaken,” Bennet told his new wife without emotion. “You forced this marriage on me, one I never desired. In fact, Madam, you are the last woman in the world I would have chosen to marry. If you had more than fluff between your ears upon seeing the terms I demanded in the marriage contract, you would have cried off, which is what I had hoped you would do.”
“Can you not see that you have the best woman in Meryton as your wife? As my mother always told me, I could not be so beautiful for no reason.” Fanny forced some tears, as that had always gotten her what she desired in the past. “Surely you will not be so cruel as to enforce those draconian terms, will you?” Fanny sobbed.
“Your false tears will gain you nothing here. And yes, seeing that you are now my property, I will enforce every single clause in the settlement, as is my right. You will be given the smallest chamber; you will not be the mistress of my estate—even if my honoured mother should be called home to God—your pin money will be five pounds per quarter, and you will not be allowed to leave the estate or receive callers here without my expressed permission,” Bennet recited the main points in the settlement. “You may be aesthetically pleasing, but you have no character or intelligence. Whoever told you that beauty is all you need to catch a husband was lying to you.”
For the first time since she executed her plan to entrap Mr Bennet, Fanny began to doubt that things would go the way she had planned. How could she lord her position as the wife of a landed gentleman over her friends if she could not go to them, nor could they come to her? “What of my sister? Surely you will not be so vindictive as to keep her away from me?” she pleaded.
