Does it help to know that I find you equally intimidating?
He twisted the sheet of paper to face her and pushed it across the table. She picked it up, and he did not miss the small flash of surprise upon her countenance. After a moment, she gave in to a small smile. “Yes, a little. Though I cannot imagine why you should.”
Scarcely about to commit the explanation to paper, Darcy pointed instead at her book, then at himself, then cupped his ear and raised an eyebrow in question.
“You wish me to read to you?”
He smiled hopefully, and to his delight, she consented.
It was so very easy, in the cocoon of the small, remote inn, away from the complications of honour and duty, to lose himself in her voice. Here, he need not torture himself with reminders of why he may not enjoy her company, for they were marooned here and he had no choice. It could wait untilthey were rescued before he must return to pretending he did not delight in her enjoyment of reading, or the way her larynx danced up and down in her throat when she did so aloud, or the way she brushed her hair from her forehead every time she turned a page.
She reached a diverting passage and giggled slightly as she read it, and something contracted in Darcy’s chest. He closed his eyes and allowed himself, ever so briefly, to imagine they were at Pemberley. The image his mind conjured, and the warmth of Elizabeth’s tone, afforded him a greater sense of calm than he had felt since the accident. Surrendering to it was the most gratifying thing in the world—until pain ripped him from his dreams.
In confusion and panic, he opened his eyes wide in time to see Elizabeth throw her book aside and dash around the table towards him. He still had not regained his senses sufficiently to comprehend what was happening before she pushed the table away and edged between it and him to take his head in both her hands and tilt it up, holding him face to face with her, their lips mere inches apart.
“I think you must have fallen asleep,” she said gently. “Your head fell forwards.”
Darcy was transfixed—too surprised to do ought but stare into her eyes, and too overcome with pain to lie convincingly to himself any longer. Returned to laborious, rasping breaths and lightheaded for want of air, he lifted a hand to cover one of hers and squeezed it with something far more significant than gratitude.
“’Tis well,” she whispered. “Come, allow me to help you back to bed. You need to sleep.”
Chapter 11
A Lively Disposition
Darcy awoke the next morning to an empty and strangely hushed chamber. The muffled noises of the inn drifted up from downstairs, but his own surroundings were mired in quiescence. It took him a moment to fathom what marked the change. It was the want of his own clamorous breathing. The constant throb of pain was there still, but so was air, flowing into and out of his lungs without hindrance.
With great caution, he inhaled more deeply than he had dared to in almost a week. His chest filled, his windpipe made only the vaguest objection, and he was flooded with relief such as emboldened him to call for Elizabeth to inform her of the improvement. His voice did not answer the summons. His throat closed around the first syllable, and all the advancement of a moment before was lost as he was returned to the agonising spasms of the previous days.
He sat up instinctively and was almost felled by pain as the movement pulled the edges of his wound taut. He put a hand to his throat and fought against rising panic. He had beenbreathing with ease a moment ago; he ought to be able to do so again.
The door to Elizabeth’s bedchamber opened. She exclaimed upon seeing him and hastened to his side. Darcy raised a hand to assure her he was well, though the rasp of his breathing did little to substantiate the claim, and she apparently mistook the gesture, taking his hand in hers instead and sitting on the edge of the bed with it clasped in her lap.
“Try to calm yourself, sir. It will pass sooner that way. Look at me”—as if he were not already—“and let us breathe in time.” Her chest rose and fell as she took slow, exaggerated breaths.
Darcy pulled his hand from hers, turned, and fumbled with the water ewer. Elizabeth had many talents, but slowing his breathing was not among them.
“Allow me.” She reached across him to pour some water, his airways filled with the scent of whatever she had used to wash her hair, their fingers brushed as he took the glass from her—none of which was even remotely calming. He took a sip, then another and another before letting out a long sigh and allowing his shoulders to relax.
“What happened?” Elizabeth enquired.
With a wry grimace, he lifted his hand next to his mouth and made a gesture akin to a bird’s beak opening and closing.
“You spoke?”
He made an unequivocal cutting gesture with both hands to indicate his total failure to do anything of the sort.
“You are still unable to?”
Her crestfallen expression stirred an unexpected swell of self-pity in Darcy for which he did not care at all. “Excuse me,”he mouthed as he tugged the bedclothes aside, unduly angry, yet sick of Elizabeth being witness to his unabating infirmity. She stood from the bed but, to his consternation,rather than moving out of his way, held out both hands to help him to his feet. Her solicitude had quite the opposite effect to that which he knew she intended, for it made him feel such an invalid that he snarled in disgust—a discourtesy he regretted deeply when her countenance showed first surprise and then hardened into something altogether less forgiving.
“Pardon me, Mr Darcy. I was not aware you were recovered enough to stand unassisted.” She stepped back and indicated his clear path from the bed with a sweeping wave of her arm.
Darcy was caught by the steely flash in her eyes. He had never known a woman who suited angry sarcasm so well, and he wondered whether she were aware of the endearing little crease that formed at the bridge of her nose when she scowled.
Her expression grew stormier still. “You are diverted now? Truly, you are the most contrary man I have ever known!”
Ordinarily, Darcy would have ceased smiling immediately, for he was not used to his expression being under such poor regulation, but he found he did not wish it. Instead, he smiled more broadly and mouthed a rather insincere, “Pardon me.”
