“Excellent advice. What brings you to Netherfield?”
“I have come to see my sister. How is she faring?”
“I do not know, but allow me to find someone who does. I would offer you my arm, but my valet would never forgive me.”
“Certainly not. It speaks well of you to show such consideration for your servant.”
“You are like no other lady I have ever met, Miss Elizabeth.”
“I do hope you are not too appalled.”
“Absolutely not. Far from it,” Mr Darcy replied quickly.
She had to chuckle at such assurance. “It does not lower you in my esteem that you are so difficult to frighten and discourage.”
Mr Darcy returned her mirth, opened the door, and held it at arm’s length to avoid her sullying his attire.
“Mrs Nicholls,” he called as soon as the door had closed behind them. Footfalls echoed down the stairs, but it was not the housekeeper who answered his summons. It was Miss Bingley, who halted abruptly at the bottom of the staircase and stared at Elizabeth before fainting with affected elegance. Mr Darcy’s shoulders heaved before he blew out a slow, deliberate breath.
“Please do not suppose my indifference in this instance implies that I am unfeeling in other matters, Miss Elizabeth, but I am so weary of Miss Bingley’s scheming antics.”
“Has she been…difficult?”
Elizabeth may have misjudged Miss Bingley as a harmless flirt, but observing to what lengths she was willing to stoop made her rethink her prior judgment.
The housekeeper arrived with Mrs Hurst. The latter cared for her sister, whilst a bath was readied for Elizabeth in the kitchen because she needed more than a basin to clean off the dirt. Once she was refreshed and dressed in a gown Mrs Hurst had been so kind as to lend her, Elizabeth was shown to Jane’s room. Her sister was not at all well, and the rest of the morning was spent caring for the patient. When the time came to depart, Jane begged her most fervently to stay, leaving Mr Bingley’s sisters with little choice but to extend an invitation.
Elizabeth kept Jane company until she fell asleep in the afternoon. A note had been sent to Longbourn about their prolonged stay, and a trunk of clothes arrived before she was required to dress for dinner. The days that followed were filled with banter that for the most part went over Miss Bingley’s head. That lady was becoming increasingly irksome as she intercepted any conversation or morning stroll Elizabeth and Mr Darcy attempted to embark upon. Everything from placing them at opposite ends at the dinner table to interrupting every dialogue, usually with thinly veiled insults directed at Elizabeth, was trying her patience. In a fit of pique, after one of Miss Bingley’s ridiculous rants about supposedly necessary accomplishments, includingallthe modern languages, Elizabeth had amused herself by answering the lady in German. The perplexed expression Miss Bingley had sported allowed a vengeful chuckle to escape its confines.
There was no doubt that Mr Darcy preferred her company above everyone else’s, a sentiment she heartily appreciated. It was therefore with startled glee that she entered Netherfield’s library and encountered the gentleman, quite alone. A single globed lamp illuminated very little but succeeded admirably in casting eerie shadows across the room. His face cracked into a joyful smile upon espying her. The expression made his handsome countenance even more striking, and she could not help but meet him in the middle of the room with undue haste that left a mere inch between their yearning bodies. For a moment, they simply stared into each other’s eyes, whilst her stomach turned somersaults.
Mr Darcy’s gaze dropped to her lips. Her heart gave one violent thump and then accelerated considerably before he finally lowered his head for a kiss.
Their lips met, the angels chorused, and a flock of cupids attacked her heart with a dozen prickly arrows. The blood loss made her dizzy, and had it not been for Mr Darcy’s quick thinking and sturdy hands, she would surely have collapsed to the floor like a sack of potatoes. Instead, her feet left the ground, the kiss deepened, and her heart raced, fixing her fate firmly to that of the gentleman clutching her in his arms. His large hands were warm on her back, spanning her waist, but she was impatient to feel them on her skin. A dangerous thought indeed! Risking her future when all she had to offer was a pretty face, a touch of charm, and her virtue.
She was dazed when he put her down and bereft when the arms that had enveloped her released their hold. For two seconds he rested his chin on the top of her head, then moved away and put a chair between them. For a brief moment, he tipped his face heavenwards and squeezed his eyes shut. After that, the only proof of his agitation was his fingers gripping the back of the chair.
“You undo me,” Mr Darcy whispered, his voice soft, husky, and hesitant.
He did not fidget, tap a foot, or hum. Whatever storm was brewing within, it was only expressed when they kissed.
It was not a dreadful trait, not really, to wield such power over a man as to leave him defenceless against her charm. No, it was rather stimulating.
“Then I suppose I must beg your pardon, although I am not repentant at all,” Elizabeth quipped.
Mr Darcy chuckled, but there was a dangerous glint in his stormy eyes. “But you will regret it if I do not remove myself from your alluring presence. A gentleman can only endure so much temptation before he no longer warrants the title…”
He bowed low before striding out of the room. Elizabeth regarded his fine figure moving up the stairs in determined steps and was delighted when he glanced back at her before disappearing at the landing.
#
After Elizabeth had kissed Darcy sweetly, hesitantly, gloriously, then in delight, he had needed a swim in the half-frozen river. How was it that when he had meant to unravel her with his compilation of skills, he ended up in pieces?
He was a fool to believe that love could be managed. Why yearn so fiercely for someone he could not have? It was a wretched, pointless endeavour. Elizabeth made every conversation vivacious; even the most common trivialities sounded interesting when spoken in her teasing, honeyed voice.
I want her!
They were the thoughts of a man who was not used to being denied, but the words were not hostile or defiant—they were earnest.
