Chapter Twenty-Eight #3
He could point out that annulment would create its own scandal, questions about what had gone wrong so quickly that they could not even manage to remain married through their wedding day.
But using social pressure to keep her trapped in vows she might not want felt wrong, manipulative in ways that made his stomach turn.
The silence stretched longer, growing heavier with each passing second. Darcy drew a breath and released it slowly, forcing himself to speak despite not knowing what words would emerge until they were already leaving his mouth.
“What do you want, Elizabeth?”
The question came out softer than he intended, his usual confidence abandoned in favour of genuine humility that left him feeling exposed. He turned slightly in his chair to face her more directly, needing to see her expression when she answered even if what he saw there might break his heart.
“I will not press you to remain married if that is not your wish,” Darcy continued, somehow speaking calmly despite the emotion that threatened to overwhelm his composure.
“I know the vows you spoke were not truly yours, that you had no say in this union. If you want an annulment, I will pursue it without argument or reproach. Your happiness matters more to me than my own desires.”
The admission cost him more than he had anticipated, each word feeling like it was being dragged from somewhere deep in his chest. But it was true.
He did want her happiness more than his own, wanted to see her free and content even if that freedom meant losing any chance of a future together.
Loving someone meant wanting their wellbeing above personal satisfaction, and Darcy had learned that lesson thoroughly.
Elizabeth remained silent for a long moment, her gaze fixed on his face with intensity that made him want to look away even as it held him captive.
She was studying him, he realised, searching for something in his expression that would help her make sense of whatever she was feeling.
Her hands had moved from her lap to rest on the table between them, close enough to his that their fingers nearly touched.
“You truly mean that,” Elizabeth said finally, her voice carrying wonder mixed with something that might have been respect. “You would let me go if I asked it.”
“Yes,” Darcy replied simply, because there was no other answer he could give with honesty. “Though I confess I hope you will not ask it.”
The addition slipped out before he could prevent it, vulnerability making him incautious. He saw Elizabeth’s expression shift, something softening in her eyes that gave him fragile hope even as his rational mind warned against reading too much into a single look.
But instead of answering his implied question, instead of stating her own desires or explaining what she wanted from their marriage, Elizabeth tilted her head slightly and asked something that caught Darcy completely unprepared.
“Why is it that you fell in love with me?” Her voice remained steady despite the directness of the question, her gaze never leaving his face. “How is it that you fell in love with me, after first judging me not handsome enough to tempt you?”
The words struck him with force of a physical blow, shame flooding through him as he remembered that night at the Meryton assembly.
He had been in a foul mood, irritated by his friend’s insistence on dragging him to a provincial gathering where he knew no one.
Bingley’s suggestion that he dance with Elizabeth had felt like one interference too many, and he had responded with cutting rudeness designed to end the conversation rather than engage with it.
Not handsome enough to tempt me. God, what a cruel thing to say, particularly within her hearing. That she had remembered the slight all these months later, had carried it with her through everything else that had passed between them, made his shame intensify until his face burned with it.
But beneath the shame lay something more important.
Recognition that this question mattered, that his answer would determine whether Elizabeth could believe in the possibility of a real marriage between them.
She was not asking out of idle curiosity or wounded vanity.
She was asking because she needed to understand what had changed, what had transformed his initial dismissal into the devotion that had led him to propose marriage not once but effectively twice.
Darcy did not look away, though every instinct screamed at him to escape her scrutiny and the vulnerability it exposed. He held her gaze and felt his heart hammer against his ribs with force that made his chest ache.
The question hung between them like something tangible, weighty with implication and possibility both.
The future of their marriage, hastily contracted and extraordinarily complicated, seemed to balance on whatever answer he could provide.
One sentence could close the door on any hope of happiness together.
Another might open it, might create space for genuine affection to develop from the strange circumstances that had brought them to this moment.
Elizabeth’s hands remained on the table, her fingers still close enough to his that he could feel warmth radiating from her skin despite the gap that separated them.
Her posture was straight but not rigid, her shoulders relaxed in ways that suggested she was willing to wait for his response however long it took him to formulate it.
There was patience in her bearing, surprising given the urgency of the decision they faced, as though she understood that some questions required time and thought to answer properly.
The clock ticked on, marking seconds that felt both too fast and impossibly slow.
Shadows continued their gradual advance across the floor, twilight drawing closer with each passing moment.
Soon they would need to make a final decision about the annulment, about whether to let their marriage stand or seek its dissolution before nightfall made that choice for them.
But first, Darcy needed to answer Elizabeth’s question.
Needed to explain how his heart had learned to see what his eyes had initially missed, how prejudice and pride had given way to admiration and eventually love.
The answer was there, waiting to be spoken, if only he could find words adequate to convey truth that felt too large and complex for mere language.