Then, almost at once, all three of them laughed.
“Your father,” Elizabeth said, when she could speak again, “would have found this extremely funny.”
Mia’s smile faltered for just a moment before she looked away, focusing on the edge of the counter.
“Yeah,” she said quietly. “He would have.”
The moment settled between them.
Perhaps, for a lack of diffusing the tension, Darcy broke his slice of toast in half and held one piece out. Mia took it without a word, ate a few bites, then handed the rest back.
“I’m going back to bed,” she said. “Try not to nearly kill each other before morning.”
She pushed off the doorframe and started toward the stairs, then paused.
“Oh, and Mr. Darcy—” she added, glancing back. “There is a shirt on the back of one of the sofas. Just in case Aunt Elizabeth's nerves cannot take it.”
Elizabeth opened her mouth to respond, but Mia was already halfway up the stairs before she could think of a defence.
Her footsteps continued up the stairs as she added, “Before I forget… offering me bread is not the only way to appease me. That’s to you, Mr. Darcy.”
Darcy burst into another laugh as Elizabeth set the bat against the wall and picked up her toast. She did not look at him.
“She’s taking this remarkably well,” Darcy said.
“I know.”
“I just hope she isn’t pretending for our sake.”
Elizabeth did not answer immediately. “I hope not.”
Elizabeth finished her toast. She put her plate in the sink. She picked up the bat again because it needed to go back upstairs and she was not leaving it down here for him to trip over in the dark.
“Goodnight, Darcy,” she said. “Try to make less noise.”
“Goodnight, Elizabeth.”
She went back up the stairs without looking back.
SIX
"SO," LYDIA SAID. "How is it living in the same house as your multimillionaire ex?"
Elizabeth did not look up from her mug. "He is not my ex."
"A month counts, Lizzie."
"A few dates."
"A month." She said it again, simply, because it was true and she was not moving off it. "You saw that man for a whole month. You were absolutely gone for him and then you —"
"Lydia." Jane's voice was mild but final.
Lydia subsided. Briefly.
She was the last of the five Bennet sisters, twenty-five years old, and she had arrived at the house on Hicks Street at eleven that morning with a tote bag full of snacks and no particular intention of keeping her questions to herself. Mia had left for school at seven-thirty. Darcy was not in. Lydia had understood what that meant the moment she walked through the door, kissed Elizabeth on the cheek, and made straight for the kitchen.
Jane had arrived ten minutes later with flowers she put in the vase without being asked.
