Page 18 of One Night with Mr. Darcy
“Mr. Darcy, what do you want from me?” she said. “You are looking at me as if you—”
“Why did you come to ask me why I hadn’t come to Longbourn the day after the Netherfield Ball?” he said.
“Oh, Lord.” She twisted her fingers together. “Youdon’tknow, after all.”
“We must have been together that night,” he said. “I was drunk and don’t remember proposing to you. Why didn’t you say that to me?”
She shook her head at him.
“Well,” he answered himself, “Caroline appeared. You couldn’t say anything about it then, not in front of her. But you could have gotten a note to me.”
“Oh, yes, it would have been so easy to do that,” she said. “Just sneak you a letter, a damning letter, that if found, would ruin me.” She got up from her chair. “Are you just thinking of this now, Mr. Darcy?”
“No,” he said. “But I always thought… whatever happened… you went straight to him. It was the next day we got news you were engaged to him, so I always assumed he was what you wanted. I told myself to accept it, but then I see you and… and…”
She surveyed him. “Oh, dear. You did mean it that night. You weren’t just saying it because you were drunk. You really were in love with me back then.”
“How could you doubt that?” he said.
She only laughed. It wasn’t her happy laugh, it was a bewildered and pained laugh, something that seemed utterly wrong coming from her lips.
He leaned toward her, his voice earnest. “I never met a woman like you. And I know that it’s wrong, that I oughtn’t feel anything towards you, especially not now, but I likely shall always love you, and I don’t knowwhyI’m saying this to you.” He was chagrined. “It can only cause you pain—us both pain. You have never felt anything for me—”
“Oh, Mr. Darcy, howdareyou?” She clenched both of her hands into fists.
“Well, perhaps you agreed to it,” he said. “That night, you thought you’d be better off with a wealthy man, even though you truly loved your cousin—”
“I don’t love him, you idiot of a man.” Her voice was trembling. Indeed, her entire body was trembling. “Why are youhere?”
“You don’t love him? So, then why did you marry him?”
Elizabeth only shook her head.
“Why not try again to talk to me back then? Why not… why immediately to him?”
“Well, I met him on the road. I was alone. You… you spoke to me in a certainway, sir, and I lost all hope of you.”
“Why?” He didn’t understand this.
“It was as if you would never have considered coming to Longbourn. As if I were beneath you. As if you couldn’t imagine such a thing.”
“Well, you are not well-connected, madam,” he said. “You could hardly have expected me to rejoice in your relations, your station in life.”
She let out a disbelieving noise. “Perhaps you should leave.”
“Ishouldleave,” he said. “I should never have come. You have done your best to stay awake from me during my entire visit, and I know this is because you don’t like me and never have—”
“I don’t like you,” she said. “But I did once. You had quite won me over when you were drunk. You made me into a fool.”
He felt this like a sharp blade to his heart. He was too stricken to speak for some time. When he finally collected himself, he stood up. “I repent of it, madam. I see now it was my own fault. If I could go back to that day and react differently when you arrived at Netherfield, I would give anything for it. But that is not what happened, and none of it matters. You are married to another man, and you have borne his child. You are his in every way imaginable, so…” He drew in a breath and let it out. “I shall take my leave of you. We shall likely never see each other again.”
She nodded. “That would be best, sir.”
He gave her a sharp nod, and he started for the closed door. When he reached it, as he touched the knob, he got another of those flashes. She was in his arms, and they were both entirely bare, and he was saying,I don’t wish to hurt you,and she was saying,Be gentle.
He turned around, leaving off the knob. “Lord, what did Idoto you?”
She stood up. “You’re leaving, sir.”
