Page 10

“You jest, but I suspect they rely on you for sustenance.”

She smiled. “And you? Still stalking the city like an unpaid magistrate?”

“I am here on business,” he said. “And because the dowager Lady Matlock claims I do not laugh often enough.”

“I would not call that an inaccurate accusation.”

He narrowed his eyes. “I laugh. When appropriate.”

“And how frequently is that?”

“Twice, to date.”

“I am honored to have witnessed both.”

At that, he gave a short, quiet laugh—not the low bark she remembered from long ago, but something quieter, as though he did not wish to be caught in the act.

The music swelled. Someone cleared their throat far too theatrically nearby. Elizabeth shifted slightly, drawing out her notebook and scribbling a line.

Darcy leaned a little closer, peering at the page. “You are annotating the guests again.”

“Absolutely not.”

His mouth curved. “That was the tenor, was it not?”

“I have named no names.”

“Is that… a drawing of his boots?”

She did not answer. He laughed again, more freely this time.

Elizabeth tried not to notice the way the lamplight caught the edge of his cheekbone, or the fact that she had not quite stepped back since he offered her the wine.

Whatever this was, it was temporary.

Whatever this was, it was dangerous.

But it was warm, and it was funny, and it made her forget—for one thin, gleaming minute—that she had ever been put out with him over that silly Siege of Tyre debate. Or his poor dancing.

She flipped open her notebook again, letting her hand move lightly, automatically. She had learned long ago that if she could name a moment—shape it, pin it to the page—it could not turn on her later.

Darcy happened to glance away for a moment when some gentleman or other caught his attention in greeting. Elizabeth could not resist. She turned to a hidden back page of her notebook and scribbled.

His smiles are like eclipses. Rare. Brief. Everyone stares.

Darcy turned back just in time to notice her writing. Of course he did.

He tilted his head. “That will be in there, will it?”

She did not deny it.

“You should take care,” he said, low and not entirely unkind. “That thing will ruin you.”

She raised an eyebrow. “And you, Mr. Darcy, would ruin me by far more conventional means.”

His mouth twitched. “If I ever see my name in a satirical tract, I will know where to send the summons.”

“And I shall respond with a second edition.”

He gave a soft huff of laughter, and for once it was not guarded. It was real. Easy.

There was a pause—not tense, not weighty. Just a quiet in which neither of them moved to fill the space too quickly.

“How is Georgiana? She must be… fourteen now?” she asked.

The question must have surprised him, because he seemed to grow an inch taller. “Nearly fifteen. She is well, thank you. She has taken to the pianoforte with new seriousness.”

“I hope not the tragic sort of seriousness. I knew a girl who practiced so earnestly she wore through the ivory. And then we all had to listen to her complain about it.”

Darcy shook his head. “No, she is quite content. She prefers to play rather than perform.”

“As do I. But I lack the skill to make it sound noble.”

He looked at her sidelong. “Now I know you merely mean to be contrary. You were never fond of showing off.”

Elizabeth smiled faintly. “Not unless provoked.”

“Then I must have provoked you often.”

“You still do.”

That earned a proper laugh—quiet, low, but unmistakably his. And Elizabeth felt—dangerously—that this could be something like civility. Like sense.

He glanced around them, as if noticing only now that they were still standing at the edge of the reception.

“Are you here with family?”

“My aunt,” she said, nodding toward Mrs. Gardiner, who was speaking with a pair of silver-haired ladies near the mantle. “She seems to be faring rather well without me.”

Darcy looked at the group, then back to Elizabeth. “Might I escort you to your seat?”

He asked it with no flourish. No implication. Just a simple offer, quietly meant.

And for a moment, Elizabeth nearly forgot why that should be dangerous.

Until she heard the voice.

“Mr. Darcy! There you are. I have been positively searching.”

A figure swept in beside them, all orange silk and self-satisfaction.

Elizabeth recognized her instantly. The glare that could freeze a tropical sea. She had pointed her out not ten minutes ago, and Darcy had laughed—or emitted some equivalent sound—at the observation.

Now here she was. Sweeping in like a conquering general and reaching for him without the faintest pretense of manners. And he was not shrinking in horror.

The woman was tall, striking, and draped herself across the conversation like a shawl over piano keys. Her eyes never even acknowledged Elizabeth. Just the man beside her. Possession gleamed in every line of her posture.

“You promised to help me with my Italian verse,” she said, laying a hand on Darcy’s arm with the ease of someone accustomed to getting her way.

Elizabeth waited. Just long enough.

Darcy’s silence was a physical thing—and not in the heroic, defiant way one might have hoped for.

He did not object.

He did not decline.

He merely looked… caught. Caught and cornered. And then— accommodating .

Elizabeth stepped back, her cheeks suddenly and infuriatingly warm.

“I shall not interrupt,” she said, her voice sharper than she intended.

“You are not,” Darcy said quickly, but it was too late. The woman was already drawing him away, chattering about pronunciation and delicate consonants, as though Elizabeth had never existed.

And he let her.

Elizabeth turned before he could explain. Before he could offer some bland apology. Before she betrayed the absurd disappointment welling under her ribs.

She crossed the room with dignity and speed. Sat, a touch too hard, on the edge of the velvet settee. Lifted her notebook.

And wrote without hesitation:

Some men command rooms. Others are furniture—polished, handsome, and rearranged by those with louder voices.

She underlined it.

Once.

Twice.

Her pulse slowed with each stroke. The words were not revenge. They were ballast. Then she tucked the notebook away, reached for a tart, and forced herself to chew with slow, deliberate disinterest.

She thought no more of him.

So thoroughly, in fact, that not thinking of him consumed every idle moment for the rest of the evening.

D arcy had not meant to enjoy himself.

He had come only to satisfy his aunt, who insisted he needed a break from account books and estate matters and “that expression which makes children cry.” The musicale was her compromise—civilized, quiet, and full of people unlikely to propose marriage before the second aria.

Save for Caroline Bingley, but she was no real danger.

He had not expected her to be there.

And yet—there she was. Another of his grandmother’s notions of a joke.

Elizabeth Bennet, that same old notebook tucked like a weapon beneath her sleeve, eyes bright with the kind of delight that always made him feel slightly winded. He had crossed the room before he quite realized it, drawn by the sheer inevitability of her.

And then—surprise of surprises—they had not argued.

They had spoken like people. Teased, even. She had smiled at him, not in mockery, but in recognition. The brittle wire that always sang between them had not disappeared, but it had warmed. There was a moment—brief, reckless—when he imagined that knowing her might not be a noose after all.

And then Caroline Bingley arrived.

Like a trumpet blast in a chapel.

She had appeared beside him with the timing of a feral cat, grasped his arm as if it were a bannister, and proceeded to speak at him with the velocity of a falling chandelier. Something about vowels. Something about Italian. He had nodded out of instinct, not agreement.

By the time he had extricated himself, Elizabeth was gone.

He turned sharply, searching the room. No sign of her.

He resisted the urge to swear.

Instead, he moved toward the back salon, where coats had been laid on low chairs and the house cat had claimed a shawl as its personal kingdom. He meant only to collect his gloves and retreat.

That was when he saw it.

A small, leather-bound book. Tucked just beneath a folded cloak. Familiar.

He hesitated.

Then, carefully, he opened it.

Not to snoop. Not truly.

Just to confirm.

The handwriting was unmistakable. Slanted, quick, with the kind of rhythm that suggested the author did not stop to second-guess her own wit.

He flipped to the most recent page.

Some men command rooms. Others are furniture—polished, handsome, and rearranged by those with louder voices.

He read it twice.

The line sat there, unrepentant. Amused.

He closed the book with deliberate care.

So. That was what she thought of him.

Never mind that he had not wanted to speak to Caroline Bingley. Never mind that he had been enjoying Elizabeth’s company more than he had enjoyed anything in months. Never mind the truce.

She still saw him as decorative.

As he turned to return it to the settee, a single loose page slipped out—tucked behind the back cover. He caught it before it could fall. Just one line. A scrap, unsigned. Something about smiles and eclipses…

Darcy stared at it for a long moment.

Then, without thinking, he folded it once, twice, and slid it into his coat pocket and slipped the book gently back into place.

He waited until she returned to the salon—laughing at something with her aunt, accepting her cloak from the maid. He saw the moment her eyes fell on the settee. On the book.

She crossed quickly, retrieved it.

He stepped forward.

“If I may,” he said, voice cool.

She turned, caught short.

“I do hope,” he continued, “that the sequel includes at least one moment in which your pen pauses long enough to consider whether the furniture might speak for itself.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Pardon?”

“You left your notebook.”

She took it from his hand without hesitation. “How fortunate that you found it.”

“Fortunate,” he repeated, “and enlightening.”

She clutched it close and tilted her chin. “You read it, then?”

“Only the page that fell.”

“And the one it fell from?”

His mouth curved, just barely. “Hard not to.”

Elizabeth gave a shrug that did not quite reach her shoulders. “I did not use names.”

“No. But you used voices. And some of them were easy to recognize.”

She blinked, just once. “That is hardly a crime.”

“No,” he said. “Just a very dangerous habit.”

The air between them shifted—no longer charged, just still. Her grip tightened.

“You write things,” he went on, tone deceptively mild, “that no one else would dare speak aloud. Not in the moment. Not to their faces.”

Elizabeth’s mouth twisted. “Yes, well. Someone ought to.”

He looked at her then, properly, like a man balancing a question in his palm and turning it over for the weight of it.

“You do not write like someone hoping to be clever,” he said quietly. “You write like someone who cannot help herself.”

She inhaled once. Not sharply. Not with surprise. But slowly, as if bracing for something. “You make it sound noble. It is not. It is ink and nonsense and vanity.”

“No. What you do—” his eyes flicked down to the leather-bound volume, then back to her face “—is not vanity. It is a fortress. Observations stacked like sandbags. Humor in place of gunpowder.”

She opened her mouth. Closed it again.

“You think it is tragic?” she said at last, carefully.

“I think it might have been,” he said. “Once. When it started.”

“Careful, Mr. Darcy,” she said. “That almost sounded like sympathy.”

“God forbid.”

Her eyes cleared for an instant, and she studied him—her lips parting faintly… until she laughed. “Mr. Darcy, you are grown too accustomed to being ‘right’ all the time, and now you fancy yourself insightful in this matter, too.”

He raised a brow and waited for her smile to fade, as though that confirmed something. “Bit too close for comfort? It is not vanity, then. It is armor.”

“I do not need armor.”

He frowned. “No. Only a pocket-sized arsenal?”

Her lips twitched. “You are being dramatic.”

“I believe that is your job.”

They stood in silence a beat longer, the sounds of music and conversation lilting back from the drawing room.

Then she said, very softly, “There are five of us. Girls. My mother cannot keep secrets, and my father does not care to. Do you know what that feels like?”

Darcy did not answer. She did not wait for him to.

“I learned early that the only privacy I could count on was the kind I could write down and hide under a floorboard.”

“And has it ever betrayed you?”

“Only when I let someone read it.”

“Then perhaps,” he said, almost gently, “you ought to stop leaving it on velvet settees.”

Her smile was faint. Wary. “Perhaps I was hoping someone would steal it.”

“I thought you liked your secrets.”

“I do,” she said. “But sometimes I wish someone would dare to read between them.”

Darcy permitted a smile. “Someone did. And you called him furniture.”

She lifted her chin. “I presume you disagree with my assessment.”

“Not at all,” he said. “Only that the author ought to take care. Public ruin begins with private scribbles.”

She blinked. “That sounds like a threat.”

“A warning.”

She smiled—tight and bright. “Well, then. I shall try to be more careful when comparing you to furniture. Perhaps something less antique.”

He laughed, but there was no mirth in it. “I suppose I should be flattered. At least furniture is useful.”

“To some,” she said, sweetly.

He bowed. “Enjoy the rest of the evening, Miss Bennet.”

“I intend to.”

He left without looking back.

And did not realize until much later that he had memorized the line.