Concluding that nothing else could be done to get her to talk in that moment, he turned and pulled the door closed behind him.
On the landing he stood for a moment, shoes still in his hand. Down the hall, Mia's door was still closed.
He went downstairs, pulled on his shoes at the door, and stepped out into the early morning. Then, he started running, his mind fixed on nothing but the unfinished sentence.
***
Darcy Capital occupied the fourteenth floor of a building on Park Avenue that had the particular quality of quiet that came from very good soundproofing and very expensive furniture. Although he had studied engineering, and excelled at it, he had inherited the family hedge fund business, which he now ran with a level of precision that would have made even the most experienced figures on Wall Street envious.
Bingley arrived at his office at noon with two coffees and the expression of a man who had been patient for a considerable amount of time and had decided today was the day he spent some of it.
"You look tired," Bingley said after pleasantries, setting a cup on the desk.
"I am fine."
“Claiming you’re fine doesn’t mean you don’t look tired,” Bingley said, settling into the chair across from him with the ease of someone who had been sitting in it for fifteen years and considered it partially his. “How is the house?”
"It is fine."
"How is Mia?"
Darcy's expression shifted. Just slightly. "She is good. Better this week than last. She has a friend, Priya, they have been spending time together after school. It helps." He picked up hiscoffee. "She has a history essay due Friday. I will help her with the outline on Thursday evening."
"Look at you."
"It just an outline."
“You’re planning to help a fifteen-year-old with her history essay by Thursday evening instead of going to a conference or attending some tech startup pitch event.” Bingley smiled. “James would be very pleased.”
Darcy said nothing. He looked at his coffee.
"She called me Mr. Darcy the other day," he said. "In front of her friend. Her friend found it very funny."
"Do you mind it?"
"No." He considered. "It suits the dynamic, I think. She is not looking for another father. She does not need that from me. She just needs someone who shows up." He set the cup down. "So I show up."
Bingley looked at him with the warm, unhurried attention he had always had. "You are better at this than you think you are."
"I have no basis for comparison."
"That is exactly what I mean." He crossed one leg over the other. "And how is the other situation. It has been close to a month. Has anything gotten better between you and Elizabeth?"
The question landed in the office and sat there.
Darcy put down his pen. "She picks fights."
"Does she."
"Not loudly. Not in front of Mia. But there is always something. The other day, it was the radiator I fixed without asking. Then there was a wrench I moved. Or the way I load the dishwasher." He sat back. "She has an opinion about everything I do and she delivers it in this very precise, very level tone that is somehow more irritating than if she simply raised her voice."
"That does sound like Elizabeth."
"This morning —" He stopped.
"This morning what?"
"I stumbled into her room."
