Epilogue #2
“No one could ever hate you,” Darcy assured her, already swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “But I shall fetch it myself.”
Elizabeth sat up abruptly, her eyes wide. “You? In the kitchen? Fitzwilliam Darcy, have you ever entered the kitchens at Pemberley?”
His silence was answer enough.
“You do not even know how to prepare hot chocolate,” she pointed out, a hint of amusement breaking through her tears.
Darcy drew himself up with mock indignation. “I am the master of this estate. Surely I can manage to heat milk and mix in chocolate.”
Elizabeth chewed her lower lip. “You heat the milk slowly in a pan, it must not boil. The cocoa is in the blue tin in the pantry. Mix it with a little sugar, then add it gradually to the hot milk, stirring constantly.”
“That seems simple enough,” Darcy said with more confidence than he felt, reaching for his dressing gown.
“And perhaps… a few pieces of shortbread?” Elizabeth added hopefully, her hands still cradling her pronounced bump.
“Your wish is my command.” He bent to press a kiss to her forehead before slipping silently from their chamber.
The corridors of Pemberley were eerily quiet at this hour, lit only by the occasional lamp left burning through the night.
Darcy navigated the grand staircase carefully, feeling strangely like an intruder in his own home.
How odd to think he had never ventured below stairs at this hour, rarely at any hour.
The kitchen, when he finally located it, was warm even in the dead of night, the banked fire in the great hearth providing steady heat.
Darcy stood for a moment, absorbing the unfamiliar territory of copper pots hanging from hooks, mysterious implements lined on shelves, and the massive wooden table dominating the centre of the room.
“Milk,” he muttered to himself. “First, I need milk.”
The milk jug was easily found in the stillroom. He located a small saucepan after opening several cupboards and set it on the stove, carefully pouring in what seemed a reasonable amount. Now for the cocoa.
The pantry was a wonder of organisation; shelves lined with jars and tins of every description.
The blue tin proved elusive until he spotted it on a high shelf.
Stretching to reach it, Darcy knocked over a container of what appeared to be flour, sending a white cloud billowing across his dressing gown.
He stifled a curse, brushed himself off as best he could, and returned triumphant with the cocoa tin.
The lid, however, proved to be his nemesis.
Sealed tight against the damp, it refused his increasingly frustrated attempts to pry it open.
When it finally gave way with a sudden pop, cocoa powder erupted in a brown cloud, coating his hands, face, and the front of his already flour-dusted dressing gown.
So engrossed was he in this disaster that he failed to notice the smell of scorching milk until it was too late.
“Good heavens above!”
Darcy whirled around to find Mrs Evans in the doorway, her normally composed face a picture of shock as she beheld the master of Pemberley, covered in cocoa and flour, presiding over a pan of burned milk that was now sending tendrils of acrid smoke toward the ceiling.
“Mr Darcy, sir!” she exclaimed, hurrying forward to remove the ruined pan from the heat. “Whatever are you doing?”
For perhaps the first time in his life, Fitzwilliam Darcy found himself utterly without dignity or composure. “Mrs Evans, I…” He gestured helplessly at the chaos surrounding him. “Mrs Darcy desired hot chocolate.”
The housekeeper’s expression softened immediately with understanding. “Ah, the cravings have started, have they?” She clucked sympathetically. “You should have rung, sir.”
“My wife did not wish to disturb anyone at this hour.”
Mrs Evans smiled, already moving efficiently around the kitchen, gathering fresh milk and a clean pan. “It is no disturbance, sir. These midnight feasts are expected when a lady is increasing. My own sister craved pickled herring at all hours with her first.”
Darcy watched in silent admiration as Mrs Evans expertly prepared the hot chocolate, adding a pinch of cinnamon and a drop of vanilla essence that he had not known to include. She arranged shortbread on a small plate, added a napkin, and placed everything on a silver tray.
“There you are, Mr Darcy. Give Mrs Darcy my best wishes and tell her not to hesitate to ring next time, day or night.”
“Thank you, Mrs Evans,” Darcy said earnestly, accepting the tray. “And I apologise for…” he glanced around at the disaster he had created.
The housekeeper waved away his concern. “Think nothing of it, sir. It does a wife good to know her husband would move heaven and earth for her comfort, even if it means battling cocoa tins at three in the morning.”
Her gentle teasing made him smile as he carefully made his way back upstairs, mindful of the precious cargo he carried. The journey seemed much shorter returning, his step light with the satisfaction of a mission accomplished, however unconventionally.
When he entered their bedchamber, a shaft of moonlight had broken through a gap in the curtains, illuminating the bed where Elizabeth now lay in peaceful slumber, one hand still resting protectively over her belly. Her breathing was deep and even, her earlier distress completely vanished.
Darcy set the tray down silently and stood watching his wife for a long moment, his heart swelling with an emotion too profound for words. How small a sacrifice was a bit of dignity and a ruined dressing gown compared to the gift she carried.
He slipped back into bed beside her, careful not to disturb her rest. Elizabeth stirred slightly, unconsciously turning toward him, seeking his warmth even in sleep.
“Sleep well, my love,” he whispered, placing his hand once more over hers on the gentle swell of their future. “Your chocolate shall wait until morning.”
* * *
Elizabeth waddled into his study with the determined gait of a woman possessed. Her cheeks were flushed, her hair pinned up with only moderate success, and her shift was stretched within an inch of its structural integrity.
Darcy looked up from the ledger, blinked once, and straightened like a footman about to be sacked.
“Elizabeth,”
“Take off your breeches.”
He froze. “I… pardon?”
She tried to smirk. It came out more like a grimace. “I would seduce you, but I cannot bend. Or sit. Or breathe. So just, end my suffering, please.”
“Elizabeth, are you…?”
“I am nine months pregnant,” she snapped, fumbling at the knot of her dressing gown like a woman in battle. “I am done. I am swollen and sweating, I have not seen my own feet in weeks, and you”, she jabbed a finger at his chest “put this child inside me.”
Darcy blinked. “Yes. Gloriously.”
“Do not get smug.” She marched, well, waddled, forward, planting herself before him. “Now get it out. The same way you put it in.”
His eyes widened, but some part of him, some deep, traitorous part, looked absolutely thrilled. “You mean…?”
“Yes, I mean that,” she huffed. “It is meant to help. I read it in three midwifery journals and in an Italian pamphlet I am pretty sure was banned.”
Darcy nodded solemnly. “We must always trust the Italians.”
“Exactly.” She tried to reach for his shirt buttons, realised she couldn’t lean far enough, and swore under her breath. “You shall have to do it. I am like a beached whale.”
“You are magnificent.”
“Do not be charming,” she growled. “Just be useful.”
He shucked his shirt with military efficiency. “Do you want the bearskin rug?”
She glared. “Does it feel evocative to you, Fitzwilliam? Or do you want me to ride St. George while I’m huffing like a bellows and threatening to pee on the floor?”
“Right. Chaise it is.” They made it halfway to the chaise when Elizabeth let out a low moan, gripping the edge of the worktable.
“Are you well?”
She looked up, eyes wide. “If I scream, you keep going.”
“Of course.”
“If I cry, you kiss me.”
He nodded, heart pounding. “Anything.”
“If I say I hate you…”
“I shall agree. And thrust harder.”
“Good man.” She hauled herself up onto the chaise like a goddess mounting a sacrificial altar.
“Now,” she commanded, “make me feel something other than bloated.”
Darcy stripped with the speed of a man ordered into battle. He knelt between her thighs, burning.
And then…
Mrs Evans knocked. Carrying a tray. With tea. And scones. The silence was biblical. Elizabeth’s head whipped around, her breasts heaving beneath her shift.
Darcy, on his knees, naked and visibly committed, froze, his face a portrait of composure and internal collapse.
“Go Away!” they shouted in unison, breathless…
They heard the clinking of the tea things
“Is she gone?” He whispered
“Yes,” she said. “Now, take me.”
He obeyed with something close to religious fervour. Her shift stayed on. His breeches were half-shoved. It didn’t matter. She guided him into her with a hiss and a slap to his thigh.
“Hard,” she breathed. “None of the gentle teasing. Just… make it count.”
He did. He drove into her like he meant it, like the answer to every frustration, fear, and ache lived somewhere between her thighs.
“You need to bring me to completion…” She panted “… For the best effect…” His hand found her pearl without thought, circling in rhythm with his hips. She gasped again, her arms reached behind her to hold on to the back of the chaise, her breath coming in jagged bursts.
“Yes, yes! There! Right there… do not dare to change the rhythm. Oh God, yes! Do not stop, Darcy, please do not stop…”
Her head tipped back, mouth open, eyes fluttering.
“I am close, I’m so… God in Heaven! I am going to…”
Darcy groaned her name like a man possessed, the waves of her climax pulsing around his shaft as she shuddered and wept and laughed all at once, his rhythm remaining steady, taking her with abandon.
It only took a minute before he breathed out her name and spilled himself inside her with a groan and an oath under his breath.