Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
The elevator doors opened slowly, prompting Richard Fitzwilliam to rise from the hallway bench, hold aloft a six-pack of Wolf Hollow Amber, and break into his most charming smile.
“Good afternoon, sir. I’d like to talk to you about the world’s greatest vacuum cleaner…”
“Seriously?” Darcy panted, catching his breath from an early evening run. “You’re lying in wait for me? On a Saturday?”
“I’m glad to find you at home. I haven’t seen you in weeks.
Thought perhaps you’d run off to some exotic island with a pair of blondes.
” Rich grinned at the dark expression elicited by his joke.
Darcy scowled and keyed the entry code into his front door.
Walking in, he headed straight for the kitchen with Rich hard on his heels.
Darcy may not have wanted company, but his cousin was determined to get answers to his questions.
“Seriously, can’t a man come home from a run and not get ambushed by stupid jokes?” Darcy grabbed a paper towel and wiped his face. His T-shirt and running pants were damp from his five-mile run and the first drops of a late April rain.
“Hey, you didn’t return my call.” Rich set the beer on the counter. “I thought we were going to scatter Coco’s ashes today.”
Darcy’s eyes flickered over to the empty dog bed near the couch, and he winced.
“Sheep’s Meadow or the Ramble? Or England?
” Rich looked away, unsure whether Darcy was ready to actually discuss the topic.
When Darcy had called a few days before with the news of Coco’s fatal stroke, he hadn’t wanted to talk about it beyond providing the straightforward facts.
Rich knew his cousin well enough to recognize that he was still processing the loss, and he could only do that alone.
“Um, half here, I think. Some at Pemberley, of course. And the rest over there with a stone.” Darcy cleared his throat. “It takes about a week to get the ashes from the vet. They use a cremation service. Perhaps in ten days or so we can take them over to the park.”
“Okay. You’re doing all right?” Rich peered closely at Darcy. He was still breathing heavily and drinking deeply from a water bottle.
Darcy nodded.
“You know, I loved her too. She was a sweet, sweet dog. She didn’t suffer.”
Darcy sighed. It sounded a little shaky.
Rich rubbed his beard. “Channeling it all by running a lot?”
“The world of psychoanalysis is lost without your insights,” Darcy said in a soft but sharp voice.
Rich leaned back against the counter. “I stopped by the office yesterday. Sara mentioned that you’d only been in there twice in the past two weeks. She’s worried about you.”
“I talk to her four or five times a day.”
“When I told her about Coco, she burst into tears,” Rich replied, his voice hard. “You didn’t tell her? Your assistant? Do you ever talk to anybody?”
Darcy grimaced and bent over to untie his shoes. “She loves animals. She adored Coco. I just didn’t want the sympathy hugs or the cookies. Her mother bakes for me,” he said plaintively.
Rich gave him a long, appraising look. “Coco had a good life. You were great with her. But she tied you down. You’re a free man now.”
Darcy scoffed. “That’s one way to see it. You really are a diplomat, Rich.”
“For God’s sake. You look like you haven’t slept in a week. You’ve lost weight.” Rich was nearly shouting. “And two weeks of working at home? Coco died in her sleep four days ago. What were you doing the week before that?”
Darcy picked up his shoes and frowned. He carried them over to the utility room, placed them on the laundry sink, and walked back into the kitchen, saying nothing.
“Fine,” Rich said. “The Yankees have won eight straight, and you haven’t even been to a game. Just…move on. Let’s decide about the ashes and go have dinner. We could go to the game tonight.”
“I’m sure you haven’t let the seats go unoccupied. Who’ve you been watching the games with? That Italian translator?”
“No one you know, man. But maybe one or two you should get to know.” Rich crossed his arms and shook his head. “Let’s get out of town. I could use a vacation, and God knows you need one. Rio? Buenos Aires?”
“South of the equator? It’s winter there.”
“Right. So…Sardinia or Fiji?”
Darcy shrugged and headed to the shower.
Rich reached over the counter for a beer.
He walked back into the living room, rubbed his beard, and looked around.
The apartment was clean and neat as always.
Nothing out of place. He glanced over at the writing desk in the front hall.
Mail was stacked up, magazines and cards neatly piled. “What else is going on with him?”
He wandered down the hall, peeking into rooms but finding nothing to pique his interest. Hearing the shower running, he walked into the master bedroom and studied it.
It looked as it always did—darkly furnished and, besides some books and a few family photos, free of clutter.
Except on the nightstand, where a blue envelope addressed in feminine handwriting caught his eye.
He tamped down his shame by reminding himself that he was on a reconnaissance mission. Mrs. Reynolds was worried about “her boy,” Sara was concerned about her boss, and it was his job to solve the mystery of his cousin’s melancholy.
Fitzwilliam,
I apologize if hearing from me brings you more pain, but I wanted you to know how sorry I am about Coco. She was a lovely dog, and you were always very sweet with her. Now she is with others who loved her. I hope you are with those who love you.
I’m sorry about other things as well. I greatly misjudged you and misunderstood myself, actions I deeply regret. You deserve better. Please take care, and be well.
—Elizabeth Bennet
“What the hell are you doing in my room?”
Darcy emerged from the bathroom with a towel around his waist and another one in his hand rubbing dry his hair. Richard turned around, and Darcy’s eyes drifted to the envelope in his cousin’s hand.
“Put that down,” he said harshly. “Did you read it?”
Rich set the card back on the nightstand and shifted on his feet. “So what’s the story there?” he asked in a light voice. “Between the two of you?”
“Nothing. Not a bloody thing.” Darcy threw the bath towel over his neck and stalked over to the table. He picked up the card and carried it to his dresser where he opened a drawer, pulled out a pair of boxers, and slid the card under a stack of T-shirts. He escaped into his closet.
“Right,” Rich called after him. “You’re hiding a woman’s card in your underwear drawer, and you say it’s nothing?”
Darcy emerged in jeans, barefoot and rolling up the sleeves on a chambray shirt. “It’s nothing to you. Seriously. Sod off.”
He went to the kitchen and pulled a salad and a few labeled containers out of the refrigerator. His cousin followed a few moments later.
“We’re not going out?”
“I don’t feel like it. Mrs. Reynolds leaves meals for the weekends.”
Rich settled onto a barstool at the kitchen island. “Talk to me. It’s not just the dog, is it?”
“No, I’m fine…it was her time.” Darcy closed his eyes and leaned on the counter. He was exhausted and, suddenly, the weight of the past two weeks hit him, and he felt his eyes misting. No. Not now. He turned and wiped his hands on a towel and collected himself.
Rich cleared his throat. “Well…?”
Darcy flinched, mishearing his cousin. No…he said “well,” not “Will.” No one had called him Will since his mother died. But he yearned for that comfort and felt himself crumbling.
“I, um, I made the mistake of asking out Elizabeth Bennet,” he said softly, “only to discover that she can’t stand me.” There’s the understatement of the century.
“Why?” Rich said, undisguised surprise in his voice.
“Why did I ask her out or why does she hate me?”
“Bad news first. Why does she hate you?”
He took a deep breath. “It’s a long list. I’m a snob who sleeps with anything that moves and thinks everyone is beneath me.
I’m judgmental and stupidly wrong for thinking that she sleeps with anything that moves and has bad taste in men.
Oh, and she thinks that I’ve tried to break up Charles and Jane and that I’m not a gentleman. ”
“Wow,” Rich let out a low whistle. “You really do know how to make an impression.”
“Oh yeah, I’m gifted.”
“But you obviously don’t feel or think any of those things she accused you of.”
“No.” Darcy had a sudden realization. I should tell him about Wickham. All of it.
“But she thinks you do. Did you actually say something to her about her, um, dating habits?”
“I jumped to conclusions based on empirical observation. I neglected to ask pertinent questions.”
Rich groaned. “God, you’re a charmer.”
“I kept seeing her with different men. I didn’t know it was work related.”
“So, with all of that in your mind, why did you ask her out?”
Darcy took a deep breath and reached over to pull out a beer. He handed another one to his cousin and slowly walked past him to the darkening living room. Because I’m in love with her. He fell back into a chair.
“Because she’s smart and pretty. And fun to be around. And completely unpretentious.”
Rich, settling into the sofa, snorted. “All of that is true, but it describes a dozen women I could name. Please be more specific.”
Darcy took a long pull on his beer. “She’s…she’s somebody I want to know better,” he said quietly. “She’s so lively, but I feel comfortable around her. She makes me… I feel alive with her—happy.”
“Wow. I knew you liked her.”
Darcy shrugged. “But she didn’t.”
“Yet, she is the oil that makes your rusty locks swing open?”
Darcy looked up, annoyed. “Stop trying to use ridiculous Moldavian proverbs in America. They don’t translate well.”
Rich nodded. “Sorry, man. But why her—why does she do that?”
“I have no idea. I just like being around her. I need to be around her.”