Page 75

T he wind cut sharply through the narrow streets, chasing dust along the cobbles and stinging Elizabeth’s cheeks with cold.

She tightened her scarf and kept her eyes forward as Captain Marlowe offered his arm.

She hesitated—just for a moment—then took it.

His sleeve was stiff beneath her gloves.

Too stiff. Not from starch, but from unfamiliarity.

It was like linking arms with a desk chair.

One with polished manners and excellent prospects, but no heartbeat to speak of.

He did not fit.

Nor, if she were honest, did she.

He had arrived at the Gardiners’ townhouse that morning with precise punctuality and his usual handsome manners, suggesting a walk “for the nerves” before the weather turned any worse.

Elizabeth had agreed. It had seemed preferable to remaining indoors, where every ticking clock reminded her that a marriage— his marriage—was likely underway even now.

Fitzwilliam Darcy, steady and proper, would not be late to his own wedding.

Marlowe’s gait was even, his posture correct. But he kept glancing toward the church spires peeking between rooftops—St. George’s, perhaps? Or some other Mayfair monument to eternal vows. Elizabeth tried not to see it.

“I hear the Ashfords are to host a wedding breakfast of ten courses,” Marlowe remarked, nodding toward a passing carriage. “They do not seem to believe in modesty.”

Ten courses. Yes. The bride would sip something rose-colored from a crystal glass, and Darcy would stand tall beside her, quiet and correct, marrying someone else with faultless posture.

Elizabeth made a soft sound in her throat, not quite agreement.

He went on, mistaking her quiet for invitation. “I knew a man once—Lieutenant Evans—who claimed weddings were the best time to see how a family really behaved. All the stress and expense. Bring out the true natures.”

She did not laugh. She could not. Not with that tower glinting gold in the distance. The bell had not yet rung.

“You are cold,” Marlowe said, noticing the shiver that passed through her. He paused and shifted her arm closer to his side.

“I am many things,” she replied, “but never frozen.” She adjusted her scarf and added, “Besides, I have grown quite fond of discomfort. We are practically engaged. It is nothing.”

It was everything. The press of his arm felt wrong—gentle, yes, but distant. He looked straight ahead, unaware that each careful step together only made her feel more alone.

If he were Darcy, he would have said something foolish by now. Arrogant. Infuriating. But sincere.

Captain Marlowe did not speak from the heart. He spoke from habit.

Elizabeth swallowed against the dryness in her throat. She did not glance at the church as they passed it—but she felt it. The silence surrounding the building was heavy, expectant. And inside, she imagined flowers. Guests. A groom.

She kept walking.

They walked for another block in silence, their steps slow but not leisurely.

Elizabeth could feel the tension in the captain’s posture—he was preparing to say something.

She had seen it before, usually when he intended to compliment her gown or offer some stiff reassurance that “everything would turn out well in the end.” This felt different. Deliberate. Rehearsed.

At last, as they reached a low iron gate bordering the square, he stopped.

She followed his gaze toward a cluster of children chasing each other along the frozen path. Their shrieks of laughter rang oddly in the air, too sharp against the dull gray sky.

“Miss Bennet,” he began.

She turned her face toward him, though her thoughts were still adrift—wandering down a Mayfair aisle, searching for a groom who wore everything too neatly and felt too much in silence.

He cleared his throat. “There has been… a change in my circumstances.”

There always was. That was the thing about men with letters in their breast pockets—they never brought good news.

He continued, face politely composed. “I have accepted a post in Gibraltar. It is not a promotion—not yet—but it is a strategic appointment. It places me in good standing with the admiralty. Their eyes are on that region. I believe it will serve me well, in time.”

Gibraltar.

Farther than Eastbourne. Farther than Penzance. Far enough, certainly, to unmake a courtship.

“I see,” she said.

He shifted, glancing down at his gloved hands.

“When I first approached your uncle to enquire after your hand, it was with a certain plan. A respectable alliance. A household. An impression of stability. Admirals like a man who looks settled. Engaged. Reputable.” He winced slightly. “It sounds mercenary now.”

“It sounded mercenary then,” she retorted. “You simply phrased it with better diction.”

He flushed. “I never meant to deceive you.”

“I doubt you could if you did wish to,” she replied, lifting her chin. “You only hoped I would deceive myself.”

The words landed more sharply than she intended, but he did not flinch. He nodded, once.

“This posting changes things,” he said. “It is not… convenient for a new wife. The heat. The distance. The suddenness. I had not expected the orders to come so soon.”

“And now that they have,” she asked, “do you still wish to marry me?”

His mouth opened. Closed.

It was answer enough.

He tried to salvage it, of course. “I thought… if you preferred to withdraw, I would understand.”

She almost laughed. He was offering her freedom as if it were a gift—forgetting, perhaps, that it had never been hers to relinquish in the first place.

“I think,” she said, as evenly as she could, “that I would not accompany you to Eastbourne, much less Gibraltar.”

He exhaled, the sound more relieved than pained.

They stood there, facing one another like diplomats signing a treaty neither of them quite understood. He bowed—graceful, regretful—and she dipped her head in return.

Then she turned away.

She did not look back.

Not even when the church bell finally rang.

A gust of wind tore past her, and she blinked against it, suddenly aware of the tears pricking at the corners of her eyes.

Not now.

Not in the street!

She turned toward Cheapside, the gray rooftops clustering ahead like sentinels, her shoulders drawn tight and her jaw set.

Captain Marlowe had offered her an escape. A quiet, distant life in another country. A marriage of ease, of manners, of mutual absence.

She had said no.

Not out of pride. Not even entirely from regret. Simply because she could not imagine walking another moment beside him through the park—let alone the rest of her life.

And now she was alone.

Darcy had offered her nothing.

And still, somehow, she had never wanted anything more.

Her boots struck the pavement in even, measured steps, but every breath felt jagged. She did not look back. There was no use. Captain Marlowe would not follow. He had wanted her approval, not her affection—and when she could not give either, he had taken his dignity and left.

It was, perhaps, the kindest thing he had done.

He had given her the final, polished ending to their paper-thin engagement. All good sense. No affection. A gentleman, to the end. And still—still—she could not find it in her to be sad. Not for the loss of him.

Only for the man she could not stop loving.

The one who had offered her nothing.

And she had never wanted anything more.

At the corner, a costermonger shouted prices over the heads of a gathering crowd.

Elizabeth weaved past them with her bonnet dipped low, catching the breeze.

The fine gloves she had purchased for the wedding—ivory silk with mother-of-pearl buttons—lay crumpled in her pocket, the fingers wrinkled from too much folding.

She would never wear them now.

In a nearby chapel—somewhere in Mayfair, by every scrap of knowledge she possessed—Mr. Darcy was making his vows. She did not know the hour, but the day was etched into her with cruel precision. Tuesday. The twenty-first of January.

She had once memorized it out of idle curiosity. She would not forget it now.

Perhaps there would be no bells. A quiet affair. Dignified. Ashford was a tasteful man, and Darcy would not want spectacle. But still she felt it, like a shifting of weight in the world. A new truth settling.

He would be married before the hour turned.

She stopped at a crossing, the press of the city humming around her, carriages jostling, voices rising, steam rising from the horses. And for a moment, she could hardly breathe.

Not for him, she told herself. Not for what might have been.

For herself.

For the ruin of what she had once believed—that affection, freely given, would be enough. That honesty would be rewarded. That knowing her heart, even too late, might count for something.

It did not.

The man she had wanted—ache, longing, regret—none of it had ever been enough to name.

But now, standing in the bitter air, she could not shake the shape the word took on her tongue.

Love.

Perhaps it had been that, all along.

And he was speaking vows to another.

All she had left were silk gloves and a name the world had already half-forgotten.