Page 55 of One Night with Mr. Darcy

“I should like to kiss you goodbye,” he murmured. “Best not.”

“Best not,” she said, resigned to this.

He sighed, giving her one long look, and then he turned and started for the door.

She hugged her own waist, rooting to the spot, watching him leave, and feeling as if something vital was being forcibly ripped from her. She belonged with this man. She knew it. He knew it. It was cruel that she must be forbidden from touching him.

He stopped, turning to look at her. “So, your marriage isn’t consummated.”

“No,” she said.

“Hmm,” he said. “I suppose it’s not strictly legal, then, is it? You’re not truly married.”

“Mr. Darcy! If you were to get my marriage annulled on that basis, you would ruin me.”

“I didn’t mean…” He shook his head. “I don’t know that I meant anything. Good night, Elizabeth.” He opened the door.

“Good night, Fitzwilliam.”

He closed the door, and he was gone.

JANE WAS PROPPEDup on pillows. She shook her head at Elizabeth. “My poor, sweet Lizzy, what you’ve been suffering, all alone!”

“I don’t know if it’s fair to call it suffering,” said Elizabeth. “After all, I deserve it, don’t I?” She had just told Jane everything. Hitherto, her sister had never known, but Elizabeth had needed someone to unburden herself to. She could not speak to Charlotte. She couldn’t bear to tell her about her secret shame. But Jane was Jane, and she would forgive her, Elizabeth knew that. Jane saw the good in everyone. She was goodness personified.

“That’s not the way life works,” said Jane. “I used to think so. I used to wonder what I had done to have this sickness visited upon me.”

“Oh, no! Jane, of course not. You don’t deserve—”

“Well, that is the way of it, then,” said Jane. “You see? Life happens and it is not punitive.”

Elizabeth chuckled softly. “You aren’t horrified by me, by what I did?”

Jane shook her head. “No, I am not. It doesn’t seem to me that anyone was hurt.”

“Well, what about Mr. Collins?”

“Perhaps him, but he was incidental. You did not intend to hurt him, but you had to use someone if you were to save yourself.”

“But all along, Mr. Darcy loved me, and I didn’t even try to get to him!”

“Yes, tragic,” said Jane with a smile. “Life is often that way, too, full of painful little ironies that twist their knives when we think of them.”

Elizabeth’s heart went out to her sister. “Oh, Jane, what you must feel about your own life.”

“That is why I need you to tell me everything, so that I can live vicariously through you.”

“But my life is such a mess.”

“That is the sort of life I want,” said Jane. “One with a mess in it to clean. Otherwise, one would be frightfully bored, I think.”

Elizabeth chuckled at that, too. “Your perspective is the one I’ve been missing all along.”

“What are you going to do?” said Jane.

“I don’t know. Nothing, I suppose.”

“If he stays, I think it’s quite likely you’ll have some sort of affair with him,” said Jane.