Pride, Prejudice & Wicked Pleasure (Pride and Prejudice Variation)

CHAPTER ONE

Lizzy woke with a start, her body flushed, her heart beating in her ears, and that intimate space between her legs tingling.

To her consternation, instead of the privacy of her own bedchamber at Longbourn House, she found herself bumping along inside a chaise, seated opposite Sir William Lucas and his second daughter, Maria.

To Lizzy’s relief, her travelling companions were fast asleep, with Maria snoring away as loudly as her father.

Had they been awake, they could not have seen into her mind, but she blushed nonetheless to think they might have witnessed her in the throes of a most unladylike dream.

Winter had yet to give way to spring, but she unbuttoned her pelisse to release the warmth she felt.

Of all men to infiltrate her dreams, especially one of a most prurient nature, why him?

She could not have been more rattled and vexed had she dreamt of her cousin, Mr. Collins.

Nay, that would have been appalling. She chided herself for summoning such a revulsion to mind.

Shuddering, she looked out the window of the chaise, desperately seeking some visual fodder—an interesting formation of rocks, a remarkably tall tree, or a shapely cloud—to replace the vision in her head.

Why could she not have dreamt of George Wickham? That would have been comprehensible. Though he presently pursued another, and her own attachment had subsided, she found him no less amiable or handsome. Their farewell had been perfectly friendly.

Instead, she had dreamt of the one man whom she disliked above all others; the one man she could do without and who, despite his intelligence and articulation, offered nothing, not even the value of amusement afforded by Mr. Collins, when she was able to put aside her exasperation of his personality and observe him with the calm à la her father; this so-called gentleman, whose absence she had enjoyed through winter and whom she was not likely to ever see again, if Caroline Bingley was to be believed that they were never to return to Netherfield; and the last individual on earth to waste her thoughts upon now that she had, at least in her mind, bid good riddance to the lot of them.

Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy.

Perhaps the stress of the journey had seeped into her subconscious, though she had been in good spirits since leaving London, where they had stopped to see her aunt and uncle, the Gardiners, and her sister, Jane, who was staying with them.

Jane had looked well enough as to banish all fear for her health, and Mrs. Gardiner had invited Lizzy to tour the northern lakes later in the year.

Lizzy was all excitement and good cheer until her dream.

The reverie had begun pleasantly enough.

She was lying upon a bed in a luxurious room, a nameless young man seducing her with soft kisses upon her neck.

She could feel the ache in her nether region blooming into the most beautiful of sensations.

He began untying the top of her stays, then lowered his head to address his lips to the swell of her bosom.

What delightful shivers attended this caress!

But when he lifted his head to meet her gaze, the face of Mr. Darcy flashed before her.

It was awful. Like finding a spider in one’s pudding.

Her state of arousal coupled with his physiognomy was an unnerving pairing.

Like instruments playing in discordant keys, the two should never simultaneously occupy the same space.

She would sooner listen to Sir William recount the wonders of his presentation and knighthood for the hundredth time or suffer the many laments of her mother for having turned down the marriage proposal of Mr. Collins, thereby sending him into the arms of Charlotte Lucas, than to have that dream reoccur.

She disdained Mr. Darcy, and she was not alone in her sentiments toward him.

Though many a gentlemen had pronounced Mr. Darcy a fine figure of a man and the ladies declared him much more handsome than even Mr. Bingley, and both sexes had initially looked at him with great admiration for his fine, tall person, handsome features, noble mien and the report of his having ten thousand a year, his manners had quickly turned the tide of his popularity.

He had been discovered to be proud, to be above his company and above being pleased.

Not all his large estate in Derbyshire could then save him from having a most forbidding, disagreeable countenance and being unworthy to be compared to his friend Bingley.

Charlotte had been the only person to express his right to be proud as he was “so very fine a young man, with family, fortune, and everything in his favour.”

Mr. Darcy’s initial affront to Lizzy had engendered no cordial feelings toward him, but her lively, playful disposition, which delighted in the ridiculous, had compelled her to tell the story with great spirit among her friends:

Due to the scarcity of gentlemen at a ball, Lizzy had been obliged to sit down for two dances, and during part of that time, Mr. Darcy had been standing near enough for her to hear a conversation between him and Mr. Bingley, who had come from the dance for a few minutes to press his friend to join it.

In contrast to Darcy, Bingley was all affability and politesse.

"Come, Darcy," he had said, "I must have you dance. I hate to see you standing about by yourself in this stupid manner. You had much better dance."

"I certainly shall not. You know how I detest it, unless I am particularly acquainted with my partner. At such an assembly as this it would be insupportable. Your sisters are engaged, and there is not another woman in the room whom it would not be a punishment to me to stand up with."

"I would not be so fastidious as you are for a kingdom! Upon my honour, I never met with so many pleasant girls in my life as I have this evening, and there are several of them you see uncommonly pretty."

"You are dancing with the only handsome girl in the room," Mr. Darcy had said, looking at the eldest Miss Bennet, Jane.

"Oh! She is the most beautiful creature I ever beheld! But there is one of her sisters sitting down just behind you, who is very pretty, and I dare say very agreeable. Do let me ask my partner to introduce you."

"Which do you mean?"

Turning round he had looked for a moment at Lizzy, till catching her eye, he withdrew his own and coldly said, "She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me.

I am in no humor at present to give consequence to young ladies who are slighted by other men.

You had better return to your partner and enjoy her smiles, for you are wasting your time with me. "

His very real slight of her had produced only the briefest and most inconsequential anguish, but her most unreal dream disturbed her greatly.

She shivered as if doing so could discard the awkwardness of it all before settling back into her seat.

Though she had parted London wistfully, having much enjoyed the company of the Gardiners and Jane, and though it was unlikely Mr. Darcy would have ever ventured as far from Grosvenor Square as Gracechurch Street, she was glad she had not stayed in the city long enough for their paths to cross.

If she did not see that man for another ten years, it would be a day too soon.