Chapter 15
Elizabeth had believed the morning air might restore her to sense, but the walk from the inn only proved that sense had become a frail thing where Darcy was concerned.
The party moved easily enough along the path he had recommended, with Mr. Gardiner and Mr. Bingley conversing ahead about the prospect, Mrs. Gardiner and Miss Darcy lingering behind over some wildflowers, and Elizabeth left, by no contrivance she could accuse anyone of making, beside the gentleman whose nearness had disturbed both her sleep and waking.
He seemed different in the morning. Less formidable, though not less himself.
His coat sat open in the mild air; the wind had touched his hair into less perfect order; his gloves were held in one hand rather than worn, and the sight of his bare fingers, long and strong around the brim of his hat, unsettled her more than gloves had ever done.
Every few steps he shortened his stride to match hers, and each adjustment seemed a silent courtesy, intimate because it was unconscious.
Those bare fingers were her undoing.
For one vivid instant the path, the trees, and the pale morning sky vanished, and she was again in the impossible chamber of her dream, with moonlight silvering his face and those same hands no longer gloved, no longer distant, but warm upon her waist through the thin linen of her nightdress.
She remembered the careful spread of his fingers there, the heat of his palms, the way his restraint had trembled through him as if touching her gently required more strength than any boldness.
His hands had not demanded; they had waited, held, asked without words, and her dreaming body had answered with a helpless arch toward him.
Elizabeth’s breath shortened.
She remembered his face above hers, shadowed and intent, the dark fall of his hair loosened from its usual severity, the heat of his breath near her mouth and then lower, near the wild pulse in her throat.
She remembered the weight he had refused to give her, the strength he had kept braced away from her even while every line of him seemed drawn toward her.
The restraint had made the wanting worse.
It had made her feel not seized, not conquered, but desired with such reverence that her whole body had softened beneath it.
And she had wanted him nearer.
The shame of that thought did not come as sharply now.
In waking life, Darcy merely walked beside her with his hat in one hand and his gloves in the other; yet the innocence of it only sharpened the recollection.
His hand flexed once around the brim, and Elizabeth felt the movement as if those fingers had closed again at her waist, patient, possessive, reverent, and unbearably near.
Her face warmed so suddenly that she fixed her eyes upon the path, while every step beside him seemed to carry the secret echo of how it had felt, in dreams, to be held by a man who wanted her and still chose restraint.
“You are certain the walk is not too steep?” he asked.
“I am not so delicate, Mr. Darcy,” she said, smiling despite the warmth that rose at his attention. “My aunt and uncle are in greater danger from admiration than I am from fatigue.”
“Then I shall blame the view if they are overcome.”
“That would be unjust. A view cannot help being admired.”
His mouth softened, and Elizabeth felt the answer in her pulse before she could look away.
She noticed too much: the movement of his throat when he laughed quietly, the breadth of his shoulders beneath the morning coat, the controlled ease of his body as he slowed for her upon the uneven path.
The sight of him in daylight ought to have steadied her, ought to have made him more ordinary than the shadowed figure who haunted her sleep; instead, it made the dream more dangerous, for now she could see the man himself in every forbidden remembrance.
His throat when he laughed became his throat above her in moonlight, close enough that she had imagined pressing her lips there, where his pulse might answer hers.
His shoulders beneath the coat became the hard line of him braced over her, every muscle held in restraint while she lay beneath him wanting, shamelessly wanting, the strength he refused to spend without her leave.
His bare hand around his hat became his hand at her waist, warm through linen, fingers spread with a patience that had felt more intimate than boldness, as if he would rather suffer desire than frighten her with it.
Elizabeth’s breath caught, and she turned her face toward the path, though there was no hiding from herself.
The dream returned in fragments, not as shame now, but as some secret language her body had learned before her judgment consented: his breath near her mouth, the almost-brush of his lips, the heat of him held just above her, the terrible gentleness of strength restrained.
She remembered the way she had lifted toward him, how her fingers had clutched at his coat, how the wanting had gathered low and sweet and unbearable because he would not take, would not press, would not forget himself even when she had wished, in sleep, that he might forget everything but her.
And now he walked beside her in perfect honour, his hand flexing once upon his hat, his stride shortening to match hers, while every innocent motion seemed to whisper of what restraint might one day become if ever it were answered by vows.
A low branch leaned across the path, thorned and heavy with leaves. Elizabeth moved to pass it, but her glove caught upon the hidden spur, tugging her hand back with a sharp little start.
“Oh!” she said, more breath than word.
“Allow me,” Darcy said.
He stepped closer. Not too close; never too close, yet the space between them altered.
His bare fingers came to her gloved wrist, not touching skin, scarcely touching her at all, while his other hand worked the fabric free from the thorn with a care so precise that her breath shortened.
It was Georgiana’s ribbon again, and not at all Georgiana’s ribbon.
This gentleness was bent over her hand. This restraint was for her.
The glove yielded slowly. His fingers brushed the edge of hers through the kid leather, light as accident, and sensation travelled up her arm with such force that she forgot the path, the birds, the others ahead and behind.
Darcy’s head was bowed; she could see the dark line of his lashes, the tension in his mouth, the discipline in every movement as though freeing her glove required more self-command than any impropriety would have done.
“There,” he said, low.
She should have withdrawn her hand at once. Instead, she let it remain one suspended moment longer, feeling the heat of his fingers near hers, the tremor in her own wrist, the almost-touch that seemed to promise more by refusing it.
“Thank you,” she said.
His eyes lifted. “You are not hurt?”
“No.” Her voice softened before she could prevent it. “Indeed, your attentions have not been unwelcome.”
The words seemed to stop him. Colour rose beneath his skin, and his hand fell slowly away from hers, empty now and yet somehow more intimate than touch.
“I am very glad to hear it,” Darcy said.
They walked on, propriety restored in every outward particular; but Elizabeth’s glove still remembered the warmth of his hand, and her heart, traitorous and newly brave, beat his name with every step.