“The thieves took it.” He touched his bare finger, the skin smooth where the weight of the ring should have been.
“Did they?” Georgiana asked quietly. “Are you certain?”
“What are you suggesting?” His voice had grown dangerously low.
“Nothing,” Georgiana replied, dropping her gaze. “Only that perhaps you should consider whether your certainty about Elizabeth’s character is justified, when there is so much about your own recent past that remains unclear.”
When he didn’t reply, she curtsied. “Forgive me, Brother. I have correspondence to attend.”
Darcy made it a dozen paces before he realized his feet had carried him toward the sheep pen, where a flash of blue gown and a child’s piping laugh drew the eye as surely as a signal flag. Miss Bennet traversed the wet grass with a basket on her arm and a boy—that boy—balanced on one hip.
He needed to see her up close. He needed to understand the hold this woman had on his house, on his sister, and most maddeningly, on him.
The air smelled of damp earth, woodsmoke, and sheep. As he approached the pens, Graham Pullen looked up and gave a respectful nod. “Mr. Darcy. Inspecting the new rams?”
“Merely taking the air, Pullen,” Darcy said, his gaze sliding past the steward to Elizabeth.
“This one is a fine specimen,” Pullen said, gesturing toward a large ram. “Good fleece, strong line. He should serve the flock well.”
Darcy made a noncommittal sound, his attention fixed on the woman and child. William toddled forward a few steps, his chubby fingers reaching through the fence toward alamb. Elizabeth knelt beside him, her movements fluid and graceful, murmuring something Darcy could not hear.
The scene was infuriatingly peaceful. This troubling woman looked perfectly at home here among the dirt and the animals. She wore her exile with an unnerving poise, as if she belonged here. As if she and her son and this land were a complete and self-contained world. A world that did not need him.
Then she turned, perhaps sensing his presence, and her eyes met his across the short distance. The laughter faded from her expression, replaced by a guarded neutrality. Her chin rose, a subtle act of defiance, as if preparing for a battle he had not yet declared.
“Mr. Darcy,” she said, her voice cool and even, picking up her son, almost protectively.
“Miss Bennet.” He gave a stiff bow. He looked at the child, who was now staring at him with wide, solemn eyes. Dark eyes. Eyes that seemed to hold an unnerving familiarity. Who was his father?
His mind replayed Georgiana’s question.Where is your signet ring?The thought was an unwelcome intruder, a disruptive note in the carefully composed melody of his disdain. He looked from the boy’s face to the woman’s, and for a fleeting, terrifying moment, the world tilted on its axis. A connection sparked in the dark recesses of his mind, a flash of light so swift he could not grasp it, leaving only the afterimage of a possibility too monstrous to contemplate.
He dismissed it instantly. It was a trick of the light, a symptom of his fatigue. A consequence of his sister’s damnable insinuation. The woman was nothing to him. The child was nothing to him.
He forced himself to speak, to reassert the familiar order of things. “I trust the pastoral life agrees with you, Miss Bennet.”
Elizabeth slowly set William down on his feet, holding onto his hand. “It has its charms, sir. Honesty, for one. The sheep, you see, are entirely without artifice. It is a refreshing change.”
His eyes narrowed. Every word from her was a parry, every glance a challenge. She was fencing with him again, and he was, asshe had once accused him, an opponent who did not even know the rules of the engagement.
“Baa, baa!” the boy declared. Wriggling free from her grasp, he toddled toward the sheep pens.
“Not today, my love,” Elizabeth said, catching him. “The sheep are busy with important sheep business.”
William’s face contorted in frustration. “No! No!” His voice rose to an impressive volume, his small body rigid with indignation at being denied as he pointed repeatedly toward the pens.
“Oh my,” Lady Eleanor’s voice came from behind Darcy, startling him. He had not realized his aunt had joined them. “That expression is exactly like yours at that age, Fitzwilliam.”
Darcy turned to her, genuinely startled. “I beg your pardon?”
Lady Eleanor’s eyes widened slightly, as if realizing she had said something indiscreet. “I only meant… that is… I recall your father saying you were quite… determined… as a child. When you wanted something.”
“Did I throw tantrums in farmyards?” Darcy asked dryly, though the question triggered an odd sense of remembrance, as if this conversation had occurred before in some form.
“Not farmyards specifically,” Lady Eleanor replied with a small smile. “But the library, the stables, the breakfast room…”
Elizabeth, meanwhile, was attempting to calm her son, who had progressed from verbal protests to a full display of physical displeasure—lying on the ground, kicking his legs, and emitting a series of impressively piercing wails.
“William Fitzwilliam Bennet,” she said firmly, kneeling beside him despite the mud. “This behavior is beneath the dignity of a gentleman.”
