Page 6

T he tart was nearly gone, which she considered a tragedy. Mr. Darcy was still sitting beside her, which she considered a miracle.

They had not insulted one another for at least ten minutes, though Elizabeth suspected that was only because they were still eating. She sipped the last of the lemonade from its glass and licked a bit of sugar from her thumb.

“I feel I ought to apologize,” she said at last.

Me. Darcy looked sideways at her. “Do you have some particular apology to make?”

“No, but I feel that I ought to.”

“Say the words, then. Do not mean them.”

She laughed. “What an excellent method of diplomacy. Shall we use it throughout the remainder of our picnic?”

“I insist.”

She set down the glass and leaned back on her elbows. “Very well. I am terribly sorry for buying you.”

“And I am deeply grieved that you bid so little.”

She let out a delighted sound. “So that is the standard, then. Dignity measured in pounds.”

“It is all we have left.”

They sat a moment longer. The breeze rustled through the branches overhead, and the blanket beneath her was warm from the sun.

“How old are you?” he asked abruptly.

She blinked. “What a question!”

“I ask because if you tell me you are fifteen, I will be forced to have stern words with your mother.”

She tilted her head. “Seventeen.”

He narrowed his eyes. “That explains a great deal.”

“It explains that I am clever enough to defeat Lady Millet in social warfare?”

“It explains that you should not be out in society, unsupervised, bidding on gentlemen like sheep.”

“I was supervised,” she said sweetly. “My aunt helped.”

He sighed as though this offended him more.

“And you?” she asked. “Since you are the arbiter of social graces, what is your age, Mr. Darcy of Pemberley?”

“Twenty-four.”

“My, what a gap.”

“Do not remind me. I feel positively elderly.”

“I shall fetch a parasol and some laudanum.”

He gave her a long, flat look. “I am amazed no one has murdered you yet.”

“Oh, they have tried. But I am very quick.”

Their eyes met then—really met—and for a second, neither of them smiled. Something else hovered between them. Curiosity. Appraisal. A sudden, shared awareness of proximity.

Elizabeth glanced away first.

“You do know that this picnic is my favorite scandal in months.”

Darcy grunted. “That says very little for your recent social calendar.”

“True. But I am not often seated with someone who looks so funereal. Tell me—” she turned back to him, brow raised— “do you always dress like a gothic novel, or is today special?”

He paused.

Something in his posture shifted—not embarrassed, not wounded, exactly, but quiet.

“My father died last October.”

She drew in a breath. “Oh.”

“And I—” he went on, slowly, “have not yet felt inclined to swap black for grey. I never liked grey, anyway, but less now.”

She nodded once. “You do not have to explain.”

“But you asked.”

She bit her lip. “That is true.”

He shifted again, as if to reach for something that was not there. “He was the best man I knew. Impossible. Proud. Generous in ways no one expected or understood. He taught me everything I am, and I still fail to meet it.”

Elizabeth did not know what she had expected. Something colder, maybe. Something polite. Instead, he gave her a truth that felt quietly worn, like a stone turned over in his palm too many times.

“I am sorry,” she said, and this time, she meant it.

He nodded, once.

Then, after a moment: “And your parents?”

She hesitated, just for a breath. “Oh, they are... lively.”

He waited.

“My mother thinks I am too proud to be married and too plain to be proud. And my father—” she broke off, then smiled, a little too brightly. “He thinks I am funny.”

Silence again—but not the same silence. It had softened, as if the edges of their jokes had dulled.

Then he said, “If I must be made a spectacle, I suppose I am glad it was an irreverent sprite from Hertfordshire and not Lady Millet’s nieces.”

She raised her brows. “A compliment?”

He shrugged. “Do not let it go to your head.”

“Oh, it already has. In fact, I may never recover.”

And when she laughed this time, he did not try to stop himself from laughing with her.

#

T he strawberries were gone. So was most of his dignity.

Darcy reclined stiffly on the blanket, trying to appear composed while every muscle in his back protested the entire exercise.

Across from him, Elizabeth Bennet sat with her knees drawn up, her ribbon askew, her bonnet discarded, and the sun picking out glints of copper in her hair like it was doing it on purpose.

He had almost forgot he hated everything about this day.

Until he saw Dyer.

The solicitor stood across the lawn in dull conversation with the present Lady Matlock, holding a glass of punch and wearing that same smug, impenetrable calm he always did. Darcy barely resisted the urge to mutter a curse.

Elizabeth followed his gaze. “That man owes you money?”

“No.”

“You lost a duel?”

“No.”

“Ah,” she said, drawing it out like a thread. “Romantic rival, then.”

He gave her a withering look. “He is a solicitor.”

She lifted a shoulder. “Still possible.”

Darcy sighed. “He is mine. Rather, he was appointed by the board that manages part of my father’s estate.”

“And you hate him because…?”

“Because he reminds me of things I would rather forget.”

“Such as?”

A pause. Long enough to suggest she ought to let it lie.

She did not.

“Come now,” Miss Bennet said, tilting her head. “You cannot dangle mystery in front of me and then expect I will politely look away.”

He rubbed the crease at his brow with one gloved finger. “It is personal.”

“Good. That is the interesting kind.”

His mouth quirked, then firmed again. “He is the one who reminds me that I am required to marry before I turn thirty.”

She blinked. “How theatrical! That is what made you look like you were tasting bile just now? You are but a youth. Thirty is practically ancient!”

“And you are being purposely provoking, for I already told you I am twenty-four.”

“Oh.” She tilted her head, unconvinced. “Only half a dozen years, then. Well, in that case, you are doomed.”

“Five and a half, for my birthday falls in February, and I must leave some time for the banns to be called and the ceremony to be performed.”

She frowned. “There is always Gretna Green.”

“Perhaps I will have that stern talk with your mother, after all,” he growled.

Elizabeth laughed. “And perhaps I will have to teach you what a joke is. You are so terribly serious about this! It sounds... a very specific deadline.”

He looked away. “A clause in my father's will. Or rather, in the trust that governs certain parts of the estate.”

“And you must marry to… inherit?”

“No. I have inherited. But certain holdings—investments, trusts, even portions of my sister’s future—remain tied to oversight unless I fulfill the condition. Namely, marriage. By thirty.”

“How very novelistic.”

“I assure you, it is not.”

Her lips parted. “You are serious.”

He nodded once. “Painfully.”

“Does anyone else know about this?”

He looked at her sharply. “No. And I would like it to remain that way.”

She held up her hands. “I shall tell no one. Heaven help you if the Lady Milletts of the world learned of it.”

His expression was dark. “They would be measuring themselves for wedding clothes by morning.”

She smiled. “And preparing the nursery by noon.”

“Do not joke.”

“Oh, but I must. You will not believe how quickly gossip travels among bonneted hostesses with nothing better to do than organize picnic-based courtship rituals.”

He gave her a long, level look.

Elizabeth laughed, unrepentant. “So what happens if you do not pledge yourself to a bride by the eve of your thirtieth birthday? They chain you to a spinster and lock you in a drawing room until heirs are produced?”

“The oversight shifts to my uncle. Or, God forbid, to Lady Catherine.”

Miss Bennet made a face.

“Yes,” he muttered. “Exactly.”

“I do not even know who she is, but just the name, ‘Catherine’ evokes all sorts of misery. I suppose she spells it with a ‘C’, too, does she not? At least my sister has the decency to go by ‘Kitty.’”

Darcy grunted—almost a laugh, but not quite. “I expect even your imagination would fail in this case. No, the worst is that I would lose control of my sister’s dowry and any influence over her marital decisions. Her future would become a discussion between my aunt and the Earl of Matlock.”

That sobered her.

He picked at the seam of his glove. “She is eleven. Quiet. Brilliant. She deserves better than to be used as a pawn in a marriage negotiation for her elder brother. I will not allow it.”

Elizabeth regarded him for a moment, then sat up straighter. “So marry someone. It does not matter who, does it?”

He gave her a cold look.

“ Eventually ,” she clarified, waving a hand.

“Not now. Obviously. But five and a half years? That is a century in social terms. For heaven’s sake, you were just bought for seven pounds, and I was not even trying.

Had we a dozen more ladies here, you would have surely brought ten.

I doubt you are suffering for prospects. ”

“I do not intend to waste the next few years parading around for approval.”

“No,” she said. “You intend to glower at the gentry and refuse every introduction until someone sends a matchmaker with a broadsword.”

“I intend ,” he said evenly, “to spend the next five years learning how to manage what my father left me. To honor it. Not to flirt my way into acceptable company.”

She stared at him for a moment.

Then, suddenly, she smiled.

He did not like it.

“What?” he asked.

“I have a solution.”

“No, you do not.”

“Marry me .”

He nearly choked on a piece of cheese. “What?”

“Not now ,” she said, as if speaking to a child. “But in five years. If you have not married by then, and I have not married by then, we marry each other.”

He stared. “You are serious!”

“Of course. Mama will die of apoplexy if I have failed to secure a husband by the age of two and twenty. I care nothing for you and your wealth, and you clearly find me vexing, but at least we can be honest with one another and are fairly good at sparring. That is something. And we are both hopelessly independent. So, it should be dreadful, which, I think, might appeal to your rather self-loathing character.”

“Miss Bennet—”

She held up a finger. “You will have five years to find someone else. I recommend a lovely lady with a fondness for brooding. And I will have five years to charm a man who does not wear mourning to a picnic. But if we both fail, well—why not?”

He could not think of a single reason.

He tried.

“Your father,” he said at last. “Surely your estate is—”

“Entailed,” she said breezily. “And I have but a thousand pounds, currently invested in the four percents.”

He shook his head in perfect awe. “Insupportable.”

“Oh, completely. Our future is already a tragic ballad. But you would have five years to find a better option. If I were you, I would.”

He narrowed his eyes. “And why offer me such a reprieve?”

“Because,” she said, tossing him the last of the strawberries, “you are very hard to ignore. And I would rather spend my time arguing with someone clever than listening to simpering flattery from men who think poetry is romantic.”

He caught the strawberry and stared at her. “Poetry is romantic.”

“Only the satirical kind, and even then, not very.”

He shook his head. “Now I know you are not entirely serious.”

“Of course I am.”

“You would truly bind yourself to this notion, should both of us remain—”

“Unmarried? Hardly binding myself, as we would both heartily encourage the other to seek better options before then.”

He looked down at the fruit in his hand.

Then, slowly, he nodded.

“Very well. In five years. Perhaps we should set a date, to be sure matters can be settled decently and in order. Say… oh, December of…”

“1811.”

“Yes. December of 1811. If we still remember each other’s names by then.”

“I will do my very best to forget.” She held out her hand.

He took it.

The sun glinted off the ribbon still pinned to his coat, flashing him in the eyes. And he suddenly, terribly, no longer hated the afternoon.