She heard him sigh, the way he sometimes did when he moved slowly from one side to the other, burdened by pain. But this sigh was different—it had slipped from him, wrenched from his very soul.
“Elizabeth, we are not truly married—”
“How can you say that?” she cried, sitting up to see him, but the night would not allow it. “I have a piece of paper that says we are.”
“Exactly—a piece of paper. But marriage is something else entirely.”
“You are my husband,” she insisted, and as she was seated directly in the moonlight, he could see the glistening tears on her face, though he said nothing about them.
“No. You are my only love—but you are not…my wife. And marriage means that, more than anything.”
“No,” she murmured, shaking her head violently, perhaps trying to rid herself of her tears as well.
“Yes, do not resist me—you know it to be true. You feel desire.”
And she was grateful for the darkness, for it concealed the blush rising in her cheeks. It was not shame—it was longing, just as he had said. It came more frequently now, and his nearness did nothing to quell it. A mere glance, a fleeting touch upon her hands, was enough to stir within her a tempest she had no means to calm. She had learnt to still her soul, for it hadweathered many storms before—but her body had not, not until him. His eyes, his beautiful, expressive face, shifting from love to sarcasm in an instant, yet always holding within it the same unwavering truth: that he loved her. His body—she had seen it a few times, bared to the waist when his valet tended to him—strong yet harmoniously formed, so different from her own. And then, she had never seen the secret she should have discovered on their wedding night, a night that would never come for them.
“I am evolving,” she confessed, for she never deceived him. It was what he had requested of her—complete honesty—first about his condition, then it had become the way they coexisted. What was the point of lies, of wasting their precious time on anything but the truth?
“You are blossoming into a woman, my dearest,” he said, his tone affectionate, leaving no space for passion. He spoke to her as one would to a child, as though he were her father rather than the husband she knew him to be, although he saw their situation differently.
As she had done so many times before, Elizabeth shook off her thoughts almost as one shakes off tears. It was a cruelty to lead him into a territory where the suffering would be excruciating for him.
“I believe men place too much importance…on…that aspect of marriage. We women are different. Charlotte—”
“Enough,” he interrupted, laughing in amusement. “I hope you are not about to bring Mrs Collins into our conversation as an example of womanhood.”
“Darcy!” she exclaimed in that petulant yet cheerful tone he adored, for they could speak freely during such discussions.
“Do not ‘Darcy’ me, madam!” he commanded.
“Are you suggesting that Charlotte is not a woman?” Elizabeth asked, stretching out on the sofa, her eyes fixed on the ceiling, yet curious to hear his response.
“Let us say that Mrs Collins is a woman for Mr Collins. But what was it that Mrs Collins told you?”
“I thought you wished to know nothing of Charlotte,” she countered, and they both laughed in the darkness. Then she turned slightly to look at him, for she could always guess his expressions, even when she could not see him clearly.
“Let us say I am intrigued to hear what ‘wise’ words and counsel regarding marriage Elizabeth Bennet received from Mrs Collins.”
Elizabeth hesitated, though not because she wished to withhold anything she had discussed with Charlotte or with anyone else. Rather, in the brief time she had spent in his presence, she had come to realise how shallow Charlotte’s view of marriage truly was.
“Elizabeth,” he prompted her gently. “Your friend accepted Mr Collins mere days after he proposed to you—and before that, he had set his sights on your elder sister—”
“I accepted you after three minutes,” she interjected. However, it was merely in jest, a continuation of the playful dialogue between them, for every moment she spent by his side was a blessing, even in their present dramatic circumstances. And what she felt now would have made her genuinely blissful had she indeed become his wife.
“You accepted a business arrangement after refusing a marriage proposal in no uncertain terms.”
“I assure you, no matter what ‘arrangement’ Mr Collins might have proposed, my answer would have remained the same,” she replied, telling him in her own way that there had always been an unspoken attraction between them from the beginning.
“And why is that?” he wished to know.
Elizabeth fell into thought, but Darcy did not wish for her to remain silent.
“Speak every thought that crosses your mind,” he urged, his tone firm with expectation.
“Mr Collins is a servile, pompous, self-important, and self-righteous man. But that is not what matters… He is an unpleasant man, a man one could never love. I believe that is, in the end, what happened to Charlotte—she did not love him, and because of that, what…passes between them is…far from pleasant.”
In the darkness, Darcy strove to maintain his composure, to speak to her without slipping into that perilous space from which he knew he could only emerge defeated. But Elizabeth needed the truth, for no matter how difficult it was to admit, she had to understand not only what life had taught her but also what he could not offer her.
