The Blackmail of Mr. Darcy (Pride and Prejudice Variation)

Prologue

Caroline Bingley smiled widely.

This was the kind of information she had been waiting for. She felt quite sure that she could utilise her discovery to reach the object of her longing, the goal towards which she had assiduously worked for several years now.

When her brother first befriended Mr. Darcy, three years before, Caroline had been transfixed by his handsome face, his perfect manners, his intelligence, and most especially his body: his height, his obvious strength, his athleticism. Mr. Darcy was the ideal to which other men could only aspire.

The truth was, Caroline was very tall for a woman.

She was not prone to corpulence, but neither was she ethereal or willowy.

She had once heard a man say that she was “too brawny by half,” and she had felt devastated by the critique.

She had always despised looking down upon her dance partners and would-be suitors, but ever since the “brawny” insult, she felt especially worried about being too big and too strong to be appealing.

She had become single-minded about the search for a very tall, well-built man.

Mr. Darcy was that man.

Caroline had set out to win his regard using normal methods.

She knew she was handsome, but she put a lot of time and effort into excellent grooming, fashionable clothing, and flattering hair styles.

She had a splendid dowry and a superior education, and she made sure to subtly inform him of these.

She used flattery in an attempt to gain his interest, and she took careful note of his food preferences so that, whenever she acted as her brother’s hostess, she could order meals featuring his favourites.

She even worked to befriend his dreadfully boring sister.

Nothing had worked. Not only had Mr. Darcy not asked for her hand in marriage, he did not even seek her out.

Caroline was certainly not desperate; she was not, as her brother had once shouted, infatuated with a delusion.

However, she knew that she would have to change her tactics.

Normal methods were ineffective…. The question had been, what other options were there?

The answer now seemed to have just fallen into her lap!

Caroline Bingley had heard the old proverb, Eavesdroppers hear no good of themselves, but she had often found eavesdropping to be advantageous. And this time….

This time, the information she had gleaned would enable her to force the issue. Soon, she would find herself side-by-side with Mr. Darcy. Soon, she would be the dainty one, the feminine figure protected by his oh-so-masculine person. Soon, she would be Mrs. Darcy.