Chapter 33 #2
“Mr Crawford, a fair warning is due before you decide to tighten your bond with our family. As I said, the more the rumours spread about London, the greater the chance of a scandal affecting us. Some unpleasant details might yet appear. Some people might consider them a taint on our family’s good name and reputation.
While we know the rumours are untrue, my wife and I would understand if you wished to distance yourself from us, at least for a while. ”
At that, Mr Darcy looked at her, and Elizabeth nodded in support.
“Mr Darcy, apparently you have not gathered enough proof to know my true character,” their guest said in a light voice.
“To distance myself from a family I have been seeking for so long is the last thing on my mind. If some people hold your family responsible for the actions of an ungrateful man with no honour, I shall be happy to call them wrong. But it certainly will not affect me. And if need be, I shall stand with you publicly against them.”
“Thank you, Mr Crawford. And again, let me welcome you into our family,” Mr Darcy said, stretching out his hand to him, while Elizabeth watched them with a warm smile.
The door opened suddenly, and Georgiana stepped into the room, then stopped with a gasp.
“Forgive me, I was looking for Elizabeth. I am sorry for interrupting you. I did not know you were entertaining guests,” she whispered, her cheeks turning pale, then crimson. Elizabeth stepped towards her and took her arm.
“Georgiana, please allow me to introduce my cousin Mr Thomas Crawford. Apart from Mr Gardiner, he is my only relative on my mother’s side, and we only met for the first time a few weeks ago.”
The girl curtseyed, her eyes to the ground, and the gentleman bowed.
“Miss Darcy, it is a great honour to make your acquaintance. I was just expressing my admiration for your wonderful performance on the pianoforte. Oh, forgive me, it is not Miss Darcy any longer…” he mumbled.
“Miss Darcy is quite acceptable,” Georgiana replied faintly. “Thank you for your kind words, sir. It was a pleasure to meet you, and I apologise for forgetting my manners and entering without… Please excuse me, I must retire now. Elizabeth, I shall talk to you later. It was nothing important.”
With that, she left as abruptly as she had entered, leaving them all in an awkward silence.
“My sister has been deeply affected by the events of the last few months, and she is not ready for company yet,” Mr Darcy said. “Please do not take offence.”
“Not at all. I just hope my presence did not distress her more. I had better leave you now. Thank you again for the invitation, Mr Darcy, Mrs Darcy.”
“It is our pleasure,” Mr Darcy assured him. “As my wife said, you are part of the family.”
“I am grateful to be considered so,” the young man declared. “I shall see you tomorrow.”
He departed, leaving Elizabeth with a large smile on her face. She took a step closer to her husband and, from an impulse she did not even try to control, she rose onto her toes and placed a quick kiss on his cheek.
“Thank you, Fitzwilliam.”
“What for? Please tell me precisely, so I know what to do to ensure myself more such kisses,” he teased.
She blushed and laughed. “I am your wife, and you may well demand more kisses, if you want.” Her answer was meant to be playful, but his countenance changed slightly, and his response was more serious than she expected.
“I have no intention of demanding anything from you, as much as I desire it. I shall wait for you to offer it freely, whenever you wish.”
Nervous and flushed, she hesitated a moment before replying.
“Perhaps demand was not the right choice of word. However, since you are my husband, I would not mind if you asked for something. I have learnt enough of your character by now to know I have the liberty to refuse. But I would certainly not mind you asking.”
He gazed at her intently for a few long seconds, and she began to feel uncomfortable. He took her hands in his own and held them, then brought them to his lips briefly.
“I might gather enough courage to ask, then, and I am depending on you to refuse whatever gives you no pleasure or comfort.”
“Excellent. We might call this an agreement, Mr Darcy.”
“Is it necessary to put it in a contract?” he teased, and she laughed, her hands still in his.
“That will not be necessary. As I said, I have learnt enough of your character. Your words are as dependable as a settlement. Now, please excuse me, I shall go and see Georgiana.”
She took a few steps, then turned back to him. “Your behaviour towards Mr Crawford was everything I could wish for. And this,” she said, pressing another kiss, longer and more intense, on his other cheek, “is offered freely.”
She smiled at his frown and turned quickly to leave, noticing in doing so that he placed his fingers over the spot she had kissed. Her heart bursting, she left the room, amazed but overjoyed with her own boldness.
***
The door closed behind her, but the imprint of Elizabeth’s lips on his cheek remained, searing Darcy’s skin, bringing a large smile to his face and a heat that flooded his entire being.
Two spots where her lips had touched, of her own free will.
The same lips he had tasted — only for a fleeting instant — a day before and yearned for ever since.
In the last few days, something had shifted in their relationship; he sensed that with every fibre of his being.
In fact, things had changed the moment he had told her he did not need her fortune any longer.
He had feared she would leave, an agonising fear he had never felt before.
The more he thought that she might indeed depart, the more he realised how much her arrival had added to his life.
Caught in the tumult of his search for Wickham and Georgiana, he had almost failed to see what a blessing she was, until one moment that he could not name, nor remember precisely, when he knew without a doubt that he had fallen in love with his wife.
Deeply, utterly, and completely, as he never imagined he could.
Of course, he would not dare confess his feelings to her.
Not yet, since he had barely acknowledged them.
Not before he was certain she would welcome such a confession.
As a man of the world, with years of education and hour after hour of reading, but also of observing people around him, Darcy knew and sensed that she was not opposed to him, to their growing closeness.
She had not been ill-disposed towards him since the first moments of their acquaintance, but the subtle care she took of him, the way she took upon herself the smooth running of their household, and even the way his often and sudden absences and secrets upset her told him she was not indifferent but welcomed the warming relationship; she had indicated as much to him through small gestures, slipped-out words that made her blush, through smiles and glances that looked different, felt different, to him, compared to the beginning of their association.
To him, the marriage that had begun under strange circumstances had already become everything he ever wanted.
No, that was not true; she, Elizabeth, was everything he ever wanted in a woman.
Their marriage — he wished, hoped, dreamt — could become much more than it already was.
But only when she was prepared and willing for it.
And she had just said she was. She had just suggested he should demand — ask for — what he wanted.
Did she mean what he assumed? Did she understand the significance of her suggestion?
Could those kisses — brief, tender, tentative, but so alluring — innocently indicate her assent?
A difficult day would follow, with the Bennet family gathered together. He could see that, as thrilled as Elizabeth was to meet Thomas Crawford and as delighted to pursue their acquaintance, her stepmother’s forthcoming visit distressed her.
Elizabeth had not yet disclosed to him many details of her life as the stepdaughter of a coarse, demanding, uncouth, and greedy woman, so desirous of money at any cost, and the daughter of a loving yet weak and often unaware father, who would not compromise his own comfort for his children’s.
Darcy was curious to know. His interest came from a desire to better protect her, but he had not insisted on enquiries that would distress her more. He would have to wait for her to willingly offer those details, just as she had offered him those two kisses.
With a smile on his face, he finally returned to the library, to the papers he shuffled and looked at absently for a while.
Then Elizabeth returned to inform him that Georgiana was sound asleep.
She took a book and settled herself comfortably on a sofa, legs folded underneath her and covered by a shawl, and began to read, casting glances and smiles at him from time to time.
Darcy fought the temptation to approach and embrace her tightly, then claim those lips, whose deep taste he longed to uncover, to savour.
Instead, he used all his self-control to return his attention to the papers, but after a while he knew he had failed.
Elizabeth’s closeness, her company, even when it was silent, even at a distance from him, her raising her eyes every two pages to steal a look at him, was so enchanting, so captivating, that he had lost interest in everything else.
His self-control was not as dependable as he used to believe; his stirred senses made him nervous, and the temptation of asking her for more kisses became so strong that he was almost relieved when Miss Bennet returned and interrupted their interlude.