“…Darcy, surely you agree?”
Miss Bingley’s sharp voice snapped him back to the present. Darcy glanced up to find her eyes fixed on him, narrowed and desperate, searching for an alliance.
“Agree with what, Miss Bingley?” he asked calmly, setting his cup aside.
“That it is utter madness for Charles to throw himself away on a country girl with nothing to recommend her but a pretty face and a tolerable manner,” she spat, her voice quivering with indignation.
Darcy considered her for a moment, feeling the weight of expectation in the room. Bingley’s hopeful gaze turned towards him, waiting, begging for a repeat of his support, whilst Caroline’s eyes gleamed with the certainty that he would side with her.
“I think,” Darcy said slowly, “that Bingley must act according to his own judgement in matters of such importance, as I already told him.”
Miss Bingley’s face fell. “You cannot mean that.”
Darcy gave a slight, cold smile. “I mean precisely that.”
Silence fell again, heavy with unspoken words. Miss Bingley’s hands tightened once more around her utensils until her knuckles turned white, but she said nothing more.
Bingley, letting out a slow breath, managed a small, grateful nod before excusing himself to send a note to Miss Bennet, eager to secure her approval for the impending ball.
Darcy turned back towards the window, letting the voices around him blur once more, his thoughts drifting not to the ball or the Bennet family’s prospects, but to a single pair of dark, searching eyes and a child’s laughter in the Longbourn garden, reminding him that some secrets were not so easily laid to rest.
“My cousin is set to arrive tomorrow,” Darcy supplied when he and Bingley were alone. After the chaos in the breakfast room, they had retreated to play billiards for the nonce.
“Wonderful. Perhaps Caroline will cease her protests once she has the opportunity to entertain the son of an earl.” Bingley frowned and took his shot, sighing heavily when none of the balls went into the pockets. The clack of the balls rolling to a stop was the only sound for a moment, the tension from earlier still lingering in the air like a stubborn fog.
“I confess,” Darcy confided, “that I hope my cousin draws her attentions away from me.” He rolled the cue stick between his hands, staring at the green felt before meeting Bingley’s eyes with a wry tilt of his lips. “I have grown weary of your sister's posturing and wish only to enjoy my time in Hertfordshire without needing to defend myself from her advances.”
Bingley chuckled, the sound warm but weary, as he leaned against the table. “Then let us both hope our wishes are granted. If I recall, Fitzwilliam enjoys a good shooting party. He also likes to dance, does he not?” Bingley looked up hopefully, brushing a hand through his hair in a gesture of distracted excitement.
Darcy leaned over the table, taking careful aim before sending the cue ball into a group of clustered billiard balls. Three of his went into pockets with satisfying clicks. “Yes, Richard is fond of company and entertainment. He rarely does so—estate matters keep him busy. I understand he has increased the Grange’s income enough now that he feels he can relax.”
“Will he ever marry?” Bingley’s innocent question made Darcy pause mid-turn. The thought had never seriously crossed his mind—Richard, with a wife, managing family life alongside his military career . It had seemed almost laughable then. But now he was justMrFitzwilliam, a gentleman with estate obligations.
“I suppose it is possible,” he replied, though his voice was quiet, reflective. His gaze drifted to the window where the late autumn sunlight filtered through, painting the floor in amber streaks. “Maybe he will find a match here. There are plenty of ladies who might draw his admiring gaze.”
“That there are.” Bingley’s grin returned, the earlier tension forgotten as he lined up his next shot. “Why, Mrs Long has two nieces! There are also Miss King, Miss Lucas, and Miss Goulding. No!” He straightened, snapping his fingers. “I have the perfect match! Miss Elizabeth! She shares Fitzwilliam’s gregarious nature.”
Darcy nearly choked as his throat tightened unexpectedly, a rush of heat flooding his chest. He coughed lightly, trying to disguise the reaction as he turned away, pretending to inspect the arrangement of the balls on the table. The thought of Richard being friendly—and perhaps marrying—Elizabeth filled him with an unmistakable feeling: jealousy. Sharp, irrational jealousy.
He forced himself to lean over the table, focusing on the next shot, but his mind betrayed him. He had no intentions towards her, did he? Darcy merely wished to know her better so he might discover if young Thomas was, in fact, a Bennet. Was that not so?
But something within him whispered to the contrary, refusing to be silenced. It was not just Miss Elizabeth’s brother and the mystery surrounding him that drew Darcy in. No, the lady was intriguing in her own right—her laughter like clear water over stones, her eyes bright with intelligence and spirit, her courage in facing the world burning bright enough to chase away the shadows that haunted him.
“Darcy?” Bingley’s voice broke into his thoughts.
He blinked, realizing he had been staring at the felt, cue stick hovering above the white ball without movement. Darcy straightened, clearing his throat. “Miss Elizabeth is… spirited,” he said carefully, every word measured, “and would make any man a lively companion.”
Bingley laughed. “That is high praise indeed, coming from you! I rather think Richard would find her refreshing.”
The wordrefreshingechoed unpleasantly in Darcy’s mind, clanging against the rising tide of possessiveness he could not understand, much less control.
“Perhaps,” Darcy said, the word tasting like ash, “but let us not wed him off before he even arrives.”
Bingley grinned, rolling his eyes. “Fair enough. Though I still think your cousin will bring a liveliness to Netherfield that will benefit us all.”
Darcy hummed, forcing a polite nod, though inside, a storm raged. He did not want to imagine Elizabeth dancing with Richard, laughing at something he said, her eyes bright with delight. The image stabbed at him in a way he could not name, the jealousy morphing into a deeper, unspoken realization he was not prepared to face.
For the rest of the game, Darcy played mechanically, sinking shot after shot with perfect precision whilst his mind remained elsewhere—on a pair of fine, dark eyes that seemed to see right through him, and the unsettling truth that perhaps the mystery of young Thomas Bennet was not the only reason he found himself unable to stay away from Longbourn.
