Miss Elizabeth Bennet.
What was she doing on this remote road to Derbyshire? Nearly a hundred miles from home when she should be marrying Mr. Collins… unless…
His heart chose that moment to leap. She’d run away from the unwanted proposal. He was an astute reader of people, a student of human nature, and he never would have expected her to submit to being the wife of a country parson.
Oh no, she was much too spirited. Much too…
The post-chaise door swung open, and a second woman emerged to assist Miss Bennet down the carriage steps. Darcy’s blood turned to ice.
Mrs. Younge.
The woman who had nearly destroyed his sister. The woman whose greed and manipulation had come within hours of ruining Georgiana’s reputation and securing Wickham’s access to her fortune. The woman he had dismissed from his employ with the harshest possible terms only months ago.
What in God’s name was she doing in Elizabeth’s company?
His muscles tensed at the impending unpleasantness. He would offer assistance, perhaps the loan of his valet to expedite repairs. He would not inquire after Miss Bennet’s health. He would not contemplate her unusual appearance away from family with the likes of Mrs. Younge. She was not yet one-and-twenty. The gossip assured Charles that her father’s permission for Mr. Collins’s suit was granted.
“Mr. Darcy!” Elizabeth’s voice carried a measure of surprise as she approached his carriage. “How extraordinary to encounter you on this particular road.”
“Miss Bennet.” He descended from his carriage with movements that felt stiff and unnatural. “I might say the same. I had understood you to be… otherwise engaged.”
Elizabeth’s brow furrowed slightly. “I beg your pardon?”
“Forgive me. I had heard rumors of a happy event in your family. Perhaps I was misinformed.”
“Ah.” Understanding dawned in her eyes, followed by something that might have been amusement. “You refer to Mr. Collins’s expectations. I fear those rumors were somewhat premature. No such understanding exists between us.”
Relief flooded through Darcy before he could question the impropriety. “I see. Then you are… unattached?”
“Quite gloriously so,” Elizabeth replied with a smile. “And what, pray tell, brings you on the road? I had thought you were to remain at Netherfield until the London Season.”
Darcy winced at her attempt to masquerade her distress as a social call. He couldn’t help noting the fine figure she cut even in a worn travel dress with hemlines stained by mud and worn half-boots.
Mrs. Younge, however, was under no such illusion. Her eyes narrowed fractionally, her lips curving into the bland smile he remembered all too well—the pleasant mask that had concealed her treachery while in his employ.
“Mr. Darcy.” She curtsied with exaggerated deference. “What a fortunate coincidence. Our wheel has broken, and Miss Bennet and I find ourselves in quite the predicament.”
Darcy’s gaze swept over the scene—Elizabeth’s bonnet was askew, she shivered in her threadbare pelisse, and her curls had escaped their pins. Mrs. Younge carried herself with the calculated humility of someone who wished to appear harmless. The post-boy looked anxious, glancing repeatedly at Elizabeth as if concerned about payment for repairs.
“May I inquire as to your destination, Miss Bennet?” Darcy asked, his tone more clipped than he intended.
“I am visiting a friend near Lambton. A last-minute arrangement.”
Lambton. His family’s estate lay less than three miles from that village.
“The wheel cannot be repaired here, sir,” his driver reported after brief consultation with the post-boy. “It requires a proper wheelwright.”
Darcy fought a wave of discomfort that threatened to overwhelm his usual composure. Elizabeth Bennet, here on the road to Derbyshire, unaccompanied save for the company of a woman he knew to be thoroughly untrustworthy. The coincidence was too extraordinary to be believed.
“May I inquire as to the identity of this friend?” he asked, his voice sounding stiff to his own ears.
“An acquaintance of my aunt,” Elizabeth replied, her chin lifting slightly in defiance despite the dishevelment of her appearance.
Darcy looked up and down the road, irrationally hoping another carriage might appear to relieve him of this unwelcome predicament. No such salvation appeared—only the gathering gray clouds that threatened imminent rain. The road stretched empty in both directions, lined by bare trees that offered no shelter should the heavens open.
“How long until repairs might be completed?” he inquired of his driver.
“Cannot say for certain, sir. The axle is damaged, as well as the wheel. Would require fetching a proper wheelwright from Matlock, and that’s a good seven miles distant. Not likely before tomorrow.”
