Page 38 of Tempted (Heart to Heart Collection #2)
Chapter 38
Wyoming May 1900
“B y the power vested in me, I now pronounce thee man and wife.” Collins looked up from his Bible, grinning stupidly, and just stared at them.
“Well?” Richard asked.
“Oh! Forgive me,” he stammered. “You may now kiss the bride. I beg your pardon, it was my first marriage ceremony!” He laughed, gesturing toward the new couple, and nodding at Mr and Mrs Gardiner, but no one joined his mirth.
Richard’s gaze flitted about the assembled persons—Elizabeth’s family, all gathered round with sober expressions and eyes trained steadily upon him; a motley collection of curious onlookers, none of whom were now taunting anyone; and Elizabeth… Fitzwilliam. His lawful wife.
Her lashes twitched upon her cheeks, then lifted. Her knuckles were white in his hands, her cheeks pale, but she was looking expectantly at him.
Kissing her was a pleasure, he had to confess. In fact, for a fleeting instant, he wished that he had the luxury of staying for his wedding night.
She jumped when the train whistle blasted in their ears, jerking him back to reality. The horses were on board, his suitcase at his side, and his orders tucked in his breast pocket. He shook Mr Bennet’s hand, then Mr Gardiner’s, kissed a few of his new female relations on the cheek—he could not recall whether Lydia presented herself two or three times—and then returned to Elizabeth.
“I will write as soon as I reach New York,” he promised. “From there, I can make whatever arrangements necessary for your comfort… my dear.”
She looked him full in the face then and rested her warm fingers on his cheek before raising upon her toes to kiss him softly. “Be careful, Richard.”
He squeezed her hand once more. “I will.”
And then it was the train for him, and waving out the window as her figure blurred then disappeared.
He sank down, staring blankly at the seat in front of him. “What have I done?” he murmured to himself. “Oh, Darcy, you will not believe it when I tell you! Perhaps I should not, for I can hear you lecturing me even now. What the devil have I done?”
Then he snorted. “Done… why, I have done nothing but give that girl a second chance. At least, I hope it is so for her. Damned fine girl—would make any man a first-rate wife. I wonder if I shall ever see her again?”
As the train steamed eastward, Colonel Richard Andrew George Fitzwilliam of Her Majesty’s army sat alone. His chin sank ever lower on his chest in quiet contemplation until, at last, his head rolled back on the cushions and he dreamt the dreams of a man on his way to war.
Matlock January 1901
“I still cannot believe it.” Georgiana Darcy dropped into a chair beside Elizabeth in the sitting room. “All this time, you and my brother were… what exactly were you?”
“Nothing. We were nothing—just friends,” Elizabeth insisted.
Georgiana scoffed. “You were never ‘just’ anything. I may have been blind, but not ignorant. He was always peculiar around you, but I admit I never thought that was the cause.”
“Things were different. It would have been wrong, impossible… of course, he would not permit such a sentiment to show, even to himself.”
“Well, he certainly wasted no time changing his mind. Or, rather, he hastened to do what he really wanted all along, as soon as he got the chance. Do you know, somehow I was less surprised about Anne and your cousin than I was about you and William.”
Elizabeth smiled hesitantly. “Because I am not a worthy partner for such a grand person as Fitzwilliam Darcy of Pemberley?”
“Well, your hostessing needs some work, and I shall not even mention your entertainment skills.”
Elizabeth chuckled. “Anything else?”
Georgiana shook her head woefully. “The accent. It is a lucky thing William will deck you in diamonds and pearls, else everyone will think you are the dust maid.”
“I will take that under advisement. Do you see?” She trilled her best falsetto and lifted her nose to the air. “I shall endeavour to become so sophisticated, others will rub against me in hopes that it is catching.”
“Oh,” Georgiana added, though laughing herself, “that is the other thing. You are far too… how shall I put it? You simply cannot have so much fun. It is positively uncivilised! And what can you see in my dowdy brother, anyway?”
Elizabeth considered how to answer. “What do I see? I see him . It is not as if he checked off some magical list of requirements. Never in a hundred years would I have expected to love him when I first met him, but he just… I do not know; he just became a part of me. Jane, you know, I have never seen her so happy. She adores her Mr Bingley, but I cannot say I feel the same for William. He is air to me—life and being, joy and even sorrow, all made alive in one person. Jane smiles, but I laugh. Even through pain, I feel like Heaven is within my grasp, and I can finally be complete.”
Georgiana blinked. “Wow,” she breathed.
“‘ Wow? ’” Elizabeth repeated. “Is Miss Darcy of Pemberley even permitted to know such a word?”
“Only if I pretend I learned it from you.”
“It is no good, for I just overheard you,” William said from the doorway. He entered, bestowing a dazzling smile on Elizabeth and even a wink of good humour for his sister. He caught Elizabeth’s hand to kiss it and then made a show of shaking his head in disapproval.
“She says she wishes to study music in America,” he pronounced with a click of his tongue. “I wonder what further shocks I shall have to endure after she returns.”
The girl shrugged nonchalantly as she rose to greet her brother. “After a year or two of marriage to her, you will be quite inured to anything I would be able to devise.”
“Georgiana…” he warned.
“Oh, leave off, William. Elizabeth knows I am only teasing, though I am not very good at it yet. Now, go on, I will leave you to your canoodling.”
“Georgiana! We are hardly… whatever you imply,” he protested. “Where are you going?”
She stopped and gave her brother a mischievous look. “I shall probably have to go riding. There is hardly a safe room in this house at the moment.”
He turned back to Elizabeth with a look of bemusement. “A salty maid she has become of late.”
Elizabeth captured the sides of his face between her hands. “And do not try to persuade me that you are unhappy about it. She is… easier than she used to be.”
He nodded and turned his head just enough to brush her thumb with his lips. “She is. Sassier than when she was younger, but much happier than she has been all the last year.”
“William, I know it was not my affair at the time, but I never learned what came of all that—her intent to run away with Mr Wickham, I mean. She has seemed less guarded and apprehensive of late. Are her troubles truly behind her? Is… is that man gone for good?”
His lips thinned, and he pulled her hand to his chest. “I hope so, but I did not steal precious minutes alone with you to talk about George Wickham. I have just come from telling my cousin about our engagement. You may now expect to be descended upon in a frenzy of excitement by my aunt, Lady Matlock, and probably even Anne. I do hope you have the fortitude for it all.”
Elizabeth laughed as William tugged her into an impromptu waltz across the room, one hand cupping her lower back and the fingertips of the other sliding suggestively down her inner arm from her wrist to her elbow. “The earl did not object?” she asked breathlessly.
He stopped them and drew her closer, pressing a kiss into the ticklish spot at the edge of her hairline. “Of course, he did, but I carried my way.”
“William, I do not wish to be the cause of any rift in your family. I know they hoped for a better match for you. Perhaps it would be wiser for us to wait…”
He touched his fingers to her lips. “You are not causing any rift. Reginald was at least as protective of your happiness as he was my prospects.”
“He… he was?”
“Did you not know? He thinks of you as his little sister now. If I had not caught him by surprise, he would have had a dizzying lecture prepared. He did raise one valid concern, though.”
“Hmm? What was that?” Elizabeth was finding it increasingly difficult to respond sensibly, for it seemed every third or fourth word, William discovered some new little way of caressing her—innocent teases, but one after another, they were turning her knees to jelly and her senses to mush. Was the room becoming hotter?
He bent to lightly taste her lower lip, then straightened and led her to the sofa, his expression now serious. “My love, shall you be happy when I drape you in furs and jewels and escort you to galas and balls?”
She laughed. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“That means it will be a vastly different life for you. Different even from what you have known so far. To become the new mistress of an ancestral estate, to take your place in London society—such a position is not without its charms, but with it comes an equal measure of duty and perhaps even distress.”
She reached up to caress his cheek. “I am sure that the wife of Fitzwilliam Darcy will have ample sources of pleasure to compensate for any minor irritation.”
“I will most certainly see to that. What is your first request? Flowers? Pearls?”
“A little more of this will do nicely.”
“More of what?”
She pulled his mouth down to her and showed him.
“… And of course, you will need a summer wardrobe. There is an exceptionally fine dressmaker in Chelsea, but… Elizabeth, are you listening to me?” Lady Matlock lowered her pen and gave Elizabeth a look of chagrin.
“She has not been listening to you for the past quarter of an hour,” answered the dowager. “Another moment and the girl’s eyes would have been frozen open.”
“I did not mean to be rude,” Elizabeth protested. “It’s just that this is all so overwhelming—you speak of fine wardrobes and fashionable neighbourhoods and taking tea with the wealthiest ladies in the country, but a mere two weeks ago I was only a case for charity.”
“You are still a case for charity,” sniffed the dowager. “But I never backed down from a challenge before. Sheila, we must take her firmly in hand if she is to be any credit to herself and to us. You are not marrying a wandering soldier this time, my dear Elizabeth. To become the mistress of Pemberley and the next Mrs Darcy is, I daresay, the aspiration of half the well-bred girls of London, and you must out-shine them all.”
“With all due respect, I have never even been able to ‘out-shine’ my own sister—nor has it been my desire.”
“Oh, think nothing of it, Elizabeth,” Lady Matlock said airily. “Darcy might have had any of them, but he took a fancy to you, so do not forget that. Besides, you have a very fetching face, a lovely figure, and a pleasing way about you. We have but to paint and drape you in the highest fashion, and… my dear, how shall I say it? I am afraid you must entirely re-learn your mannerisms.”
Elizabeth shifted in her seat; her cheeks uncomfortably warm. “I will try, Lady Matlock. I do not wish to be an embarrassment, but I cannot promise success. I do appreciate your kind efforts more than you can know.”
“Of course, you do,” the countess decided, “for you have not a vain or foolish bone in your body, but , we must somehow achieve the impression of vanity. That, my girl, is the ticket to convincing those gussied-up cats that you belong. Now about your hair—I think the frizzy, blowsy look is becoming quite fashionable, do not you? We will not touch your hair for now. Leave it to me, Elizabeth, simply everyone in Grosvenor will be dying to have an introduction to you, and I wager next year’s debutantes will be trying to emulate your way of walking by the time we are finished making you over.”
“I am not certain I wish to be made over,” Elizabeth objected weakly.
“Oh, but you will see. Why, simply trust me with the details. You will still be yourself, quite yourself, my dear, but even Darcy will be nearly faint when we present you. Just let me work my magic—I did not go to Boston’s finest finishing school for nothing, you know.”
Elizabeth made a tight smile. “I remain sceptical, but you have yet to steer me wrong, my lady.”
“Of course not, of course not. Now, has Darcy said when he will be going to London next? I am afraid it is not so simple as just hanging you on his arm and announcing your name. We must handle your introductions with care—”
She broke off at a hurried knock on the door. “Come in?”
It was Jane, looking pale and anxious. “Lord Matlock said I should come, my lady. He has just had a telegram from London. The queen—Queen Victoria has died.”
London February 1901
I t seemed the whole world had converged upon Westminster. Elizabeth clung to William’s arm, more out of a fear of becoming lost than a display of affection. The crowd fell silent as dozens of sailors pulled the queen’s funeral carriage from the train to St. George’s Chapel. Elizabeth watched it all in awe—the precision, the utter dignity and humility as noble and common alike gathered to pay final respects to England’s longest-reigning monarch.
“The queen is dead. Long live the king,” William murmured as the final honour guard passed. He replaced his hat and looked down at her. “And there we are—the end of our present age and the dawn of the next. Why is it that all new beginnings must be preceded by the death of something else?”
She considered for a moment. Richard’s death had left a void for them both—as had the loss of her home, her family—but still, there was no choice but to continue setting one foot in front of the other. To live, so long as life was given them. “I suppose,” she answered, “because we would never let go of the familiar and the beloved. It is hard turning loose of what is dear and comfortable, and trusting to something new.”
He smiled and squeezed the hand resting on his arm. “I ask one question, and you answer a different one. But come, everyone will be trying to leave at once. It will be all we can do to make it out of this crush and back to the house.”
She tightened her fingers on his arm. “I have sturdy walking boots. Which way?”
He threaded them between the other onlookers, ever considerate of her shorter strides and slighter frame amid the crowd. Elizabeth decided, for perhaps the first time in her life, that it was a fine thing to be coddled and tended in such a way. Other men had protected her, but only William could make her feel like his honoured treasure, rather than a weaker member. It was pleasant, also, that the demands of working their way through meant that more often than not, they were pressed together in far closer contact than public scenes usually permitted.
Nearly everyone was polite, the sombre occasion leaving a lingering aura of respectfulness among the onlookers, but just when Elizabeth felt they must be nearing a cross-street, someone bumped her from behind. William turned to address the matter at once, and she heard a hasty, “Beg yer pardon, Ma’am.”
William cast an unhappy eye over the heads of the crowd, then turned them another direction, threading partly back from whence they had come. Most gave way willingly enough when they saw a lady on the arm of the very tall, very determined-looking gentleman, but one person caught Elizabeth’s notice. He was not moving like all the rest—only standing to the side of the walk with arms crossed and hat pulled low over his eyes. He lifted his face, however, when she glanced his way. He was grinning.
It was only an instant—just enough to desire a second glance to verify what she had seen, but by the time she tried to turn back, he was gone.
“G eorge Wickham?” Darcy repeated. “You thought you saw him?”
“I could not be sure,” Elizabeth confessed. “I just saw a flash of someone who looked familiar, and when I tried to match a name to the face, his was the first that came to mind.”
“Wickham has brown eyes, high cheekbones and a nose that is more round than straight.”
Elizabeth’s brow pinched, and her lashes fluttered. She shook her head. “I don’t know. I only saw him for a few moments at Pemberley, and the man I glimpsed today had a hat over much of his face. I think it was the way he was looking at me, rather than his features, that made me recall Mr Wickham.”
Darcy stepped close and brushed his hand down her arm, coaxing her to lean into him. “ How was he looking at you?”
She hesitated, squinted, then said, very softly, “Like he knows something. Knows me —in a way he should not.”
Darcy’s spine stiffened, and his jaw went rigid.
“But surely,” Elizabeth protested, “that was just incidental. Like the men back home who would get drunk and loiter in the streets, sometimes staring or jeering at respectable folk and making a scene. They never really meant anything by it.”
“Elizabeth, if a man looks at you that way, he always means something by it. Drunk or sober, I will not stand for you to be made uncomfortable by the uncouth and foul.”
“It was less than a second, William,” she soothed. “For all I know, he is still out there on the street somewhere, and I am safe here with you.” She emphasised this by pressing against his chest, her fingers trailing intoxicating spirals at the base of his neck as she nuzzled his cheek.
He gently disengaged her hands. “But if you truly did see Wickham, it was no accident. He must have followed us, which means he still wants something, and that he knows…”
Elizabeth tilted her head, her arms twining stubbornly about his neck again. “Knows what? That you were escorting me instead of Miss de Bourgh? Do you suppose anyone else you know saw us in the crowds today? We shall be a terrific scandal, William,” she teased.
Darcy tried to collect his thoughts, to remain serious and address these things with all due solemnity, but when she kissed the cleft of his chin like that… when her lips feathered along his throat and her hands spread possessively over his chest, all his powers of reason melted away. She answered every thirst, awakened every buried longing. As his hands slid down the curve of her waist and his thumb stroked the strong ridge of her back through her gown, he gloried in a moment of reckless abandon and drank eagerly from the well of her love.
A moment, however, was all he could afford. “Elizabeth,” he managed to sigh between her lips, “I have an appointment with the earl.”
She gave a soft moan of resignation and, cat-like, allowed her fingers to trail down his chest as she arched away. “And the countess has threatened me with a seamstress, a shoe-maker, and a portrait artist. I hope she was teasing.”
“Probably not.”
“Then, if these are the rites of passage required to become Mrs Darcy, I begin to wonder if it is worth the trouble of marrying you, sir. Perhaps I shall reconsider the earl’s offer of that simple cottage, out of the public eye. I might even go to Boston with Georgiana—I think I could be inconspicuous enough there. Or—” she nipped her tongue between her teeth and giggled— “perhaps our Mr and Mrs de Bourgh could use a travelling companion.”
He laughed. “You are very cynical of your cousin’s prospects!”
“I speak as I find, and I believe we both know who will answer to whom in that marriage.”
He kissed her lightly, then vowed, “It would not matter where you travelled or with whom, for I would follow you wherever you went.”
Her mouth pulled to the side, setting off a tiny dimple that only appeared when she smiled just so. “Would you, now?” she whispered.
He bent to brush one more kiss to those dusky lips. “Absolutely. You still owe me a chess match.”