“The dowager house,” she said softly. “I wonder we did not think of this before.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Think of it for…?”
“Well, you had your plan of how we would live together in some house on the grounds of Pemberley, and all along, there’s been this dowager house, close by, whereby we might be close enough to assure everyone we are not dead or in any danger, and yet, we could be together.”
“Permanently?” I said. “Settled permanently near my aunt?”
She shrugged. “Yes, I suppose that’s…”
Wickham laughed, grinning at me. “I’m going to get free, Fitzwilliam. Then I’m going to find you, tie you up, and I’m going to have her in front of you.”
I punched him again.
He laughed.
Elizabeth yanked on me. “I think he’s trying to get you to kill him, Will. He wishes to be free of us.”
“Well,” I said, “if we shoot him now, we could easily be to Meryton by morning when he wakes.”
“We could,” she said, “but there is no dowager house on any of my relatives’ property.”
elizabeth
We tied him with leather straps in a room on the second floor of the dowager house, locked the door and then set about seeing what we could do to make the house hospitable.
I tried to spin some sort of idea of what we might do for the long run to Fitzwilliam, telling him that we could live here, and be married, as much as we could manage, anyway. We would simply need to send a letter each day, telling everyone that we had eloped or something and that they must not worry about us.
But even as we were saying this, we were seated outside the door which Wickham was locked behind.
“We’ll have to be seeing to him all the time,” said Will quietly. “And I don’t know, Elizabeth, but keeping him locked in here alone, indefinitely, it doesn’t sound entirely humane.”
I grimaced.
“I think,” he said, “that we must go back to Meryton, and we must kill him every morning before he kills anyone else. We can find somewhere there to stay, even if it’s a room in an inn or something. We shall make it work.”
“But what about everyone here, spending each and every day worrying about us?” I said.
“Yes, what about that?” called Wickham from within.
“We should have gagged him,” seethed Will.
“I am only saying,” I said, “we are not innocent here. We have stolen so much coin and so much food and carriages and horses and—”
“Well, no, we have not.” Will shoved his hands into his pockets. “We have not, because the next morning, all is restored, and it is as if nothing has been taken.”
“Yes, and I’m not really killing anyone,” said Wickham, laughing. “So, you must let me out, and let me do as I please.”
“Hmm,” said Will, furrowing his brow.
I stood up. “You’re not listening to that argument, are you?”
“Well, he sort of has a point.” My husband shrugged.
“Yes, but that is not all he does every day,” I said. “It is not only murder. He is ravishing my sister daily, and if we leave him to his devices back in Meryton, he’ll resume that. Lord knows how many other women he might be doing the same thing to.”
My husband rubbed his chin.
I gaped at him. “No, you are not—”
