10. Chapter Ten #3
“I wanted to dislike you,” she admitted.
“It became convenient. You offended me at the assembly, and afterward every disagreement confirmed my opinion beautifully. Then Mr. Wickham arrived with his dreadful stories, and I accepted them because…” She shook her head once.
“Because it pleased my vanity to think myself perceptive.”
Darcy stared into the flames.
Outside, wind moved through the trees with a low restless sound.
“You were hardly alone in disliking me,” he said finally.
Elizabeth gave a short laugh lacking humor. “That is true. Yet most people did not pride themselves upon discernment while doing so.”
Her expression held no flirtation now, merely uncomfortable sincerity. “I was unjust to you,” she said.
The apology affected him deeply, especially after everything already passed between them.
Darcy crossed slowly toward the mantel. “You were not altogether wrong.”
“Oh, I think I managed quite a remarkable degree of wrongness.”
“I behaved abominably in Kent.”
Elizabeth’s eyes widened slightly.
“There is no benefit now in pretending otherwise,” Darcy continued. “I spoke arrogantly. I insulted your family repeatedly. I made an offer no woman of spirit ought to have accepted graciously.”
Color rose rapidly in her face.
Darcy regretted the bluntness instantly.
But retreat proved impossible once spoken.
Elizabeth stared directly into the fire several seconds before answering.
“You speak of it very calmly.”
“I assure you I do not remember it calmly.”
That startled a faint laugh from her.
Darcy’s mouth curved despite himself.
Conversation became more difficult after that. Every silence carried too much perception.
Elizabeth sank back into the chair near the fire, drawing her feet beneath the skirts of her gown. “It is strange,” she murmured. “Had someone told me three months ago that I should one day sit comfortably with Mr. Darcy beside a fire at midnight, I should have laughed at them.”
“You would have mocked them mercilessly.”
“Certainly.”
“And now?”
Elizabeth faced him slowly.
The fire crackled between them.
He knew what she meant before she answered. Darcy’s attention fixed helplessly upon small things: the loosened curl near her throat, candlelight moving across her sleeve, the rain beyond the windows. His pulse had grown distinctly unreliable.
Elizabeth lowered her eyes first. “Now I think Derbyshire produces very peculiar circumstances.”
“That must be the explanation.”
“Yes. Geography is clearly responsible.”
Darcy lowered himself into the chair opposite hers. The distance between their chairs appeared much smaller than before.
Elizabeth tucked one curl behind her ear absently while studying the fire. “Your sister appears happier.”
The shift in subject surprised him slightly.
“Miss Lydia has altered the household considerably.”
“She alters every household considerably.”
A reluctant laugh escaped him.
Elizabeth brightened instantly at the sound.
“You laugh more here as well,” she observed.
Darcy leaned back slowly against the chair. “I did not realize my deficiencies had become so extensively catalogued.”
“Oh, they were discussed thoroughly in Hertfordshire.”
“I tremble to imagine it.”
Elizabeth grinned openly now. “Mrs. Phillips declared you incapable of human amusement.”
“She has been disappointed.”
“Profoundly.”
Conversation wandered so naturally that several minutes passed before either was aware of the hour.
Darcy found himself telling her stories he rarely shared outside family circles: Georgiana hiding kittens in the east wing as a child, Bingley falling into the ornamental pond at Cambridge, Horace stealing an entire roast from the kitchens two Christmases prior.
Elizabeth gave way to unguarded amusement.
Heaven help him, he might have spoken utter foolishness until dawn for the privilege of hearing that sound continue.
At one point, her composure deserted her so completely that she pressed one hand to her mouth and bent forward in her chair, shoulders trembling with mirth she could no longer contain.
Darcy stopped speaking.
Elizabeth caught him watching her again.
Elizabeth’s laughter faded, and the room felt much smaller.
“Mr. Darcy…” Her voice lowered unexpectedly over his name.
He rose and stood by the mantel before caution failed him completely.
Elizabeth remained seated, looking up at him now with an expression he no longer trusted himself to interpret safely.
“You should retire,” Darcy said.
“Yes.”
Rain continued softly beyond the windows.
Remaining sensible beside her was becoming increasingly difficult. He could feel it happening with humiliating clarity. Every instinct urged him closer still.
Elizabeth glanced down toward the discarded book beside her chair.
“I believe,” she said, “that Pemberley has become dangerous.”
Darcy’s throat tightened.
“Why?”
The question emerged lower than intended.
He knew very well why the room felt heated, and from her expression, she knew it too. The answers existed everywhere between them already.
But she said, “Because I no longer know what to expect from myself here.”
Something in him nearly gave way then.
Darcy stepped back abruptly toward the mantel.
The movement broke the moment enough for breath to return.
Elizabeth lowered her eyes afterward, color rising again across her cheeks.
They remained silent for several long moments.
Finally, Darcy cleared his throat. “You should not remain awake too late. Mrs. Gardiner may suspect I have imprisoned you among the shelves.”
Elizabeth recovered first with admirable determination. “If so, she will understand my unwillingness to escape.”
“That is a dangerous confession for a library.”
“It is the library speaking, not myself.”
“I distrust its influence.”
She smiled faintly.
The familiarity between them resumed before either attempted to stop it. Attraction alone would have been easier to manage. It was the ease with which they slipped back into companionship that Darcy found infinitely more frightening.
A clock somewhere deeper within the house struck one.
Elizabeth startled slightly. “Good heavens.”
“You have discovered the hour at last.”
“And you permitted me to sit here talking nonsense for half the night.”
“I participated willingly.”
“That was poor judgment.”
“Undoubtedly.”
She rose then, smoothing her skirts unnecessarily before retrieving the abandoned slipper from beside the hearth.
Darcy moved instinctively toward the door before she could reach it herself.
Elizabeth paused beside him once they entered the corridor.
The house had gone almost silent now. Distant rain and the occasional settling creak disturbed the darkness.
Candles flickered warmly along the walls.
“Good night, Mr. Darcy,” she said.
The words themselves were ordinary enough. The quiet that followed was not.
“Good night, Miss Bennet.”
She made it perhaps three steps before looking over her shoulder. Darcy remained standing exactly where she had left him.
Elizabeth’s expression melted into something perilously near tenderness before she disappeared up the staircase.
Darcy stayed motionless several moments afterward.
Then he closed his eyes and rested one hand against the library door.
This could not continue indefinitely.
Miss Bingley was observing too closely. Bingley noticed more than most people believed, and Georgiana and Lydia together had become alarmingly difficult to deceive.
Best of all, Elizabeth herself no longer regarded him with the same guarded dislike she once had. That thought followed him upstairs long after the rain finally faded toward dawn.