Page 113 of Colour My World
“What’re they doin’ back ’ere, though?”
“Nay, I’ve no notion. Long as it’s not me they’re after.”
Their chairs scraped the floor as they staggered out. Wickham shivered, but he returned to his thoughts. Thirty thousand pounds. Georgiana Darcy’s dowry. The pot of gold at the end of the Pemberley rainbow.
He deserved it. Raised alongside the Darcys, treated like family, until old Mr Darcy exiled him. No, the scales needed righting. his daughter would balance them.
He remembered her as a child, golden-haired, wide-eyed, and peeking round corners to watch him fence. Always smiling, always eager. Easy to charm. A kind word here, a wink there. That day in the garden came to mind. Georgiana, the nurse, and his deliberate attention.
He’d come closer once. Mayfair. Four years Ago. Darcy, too preoccupied with business and personal pursuits to mind his household, hired a companion without checking references. His wife—though she used her maiden name, Younge—had walked through the front door unchallenged. Within a fortnight, she controlled Miss Darcy’s routine.
Then the plan: a seaside retreat, steady doses of laudanum, a carriage to Gretna Green. Her thirty thousand pounds would be his.
He waited all night. His wife never came. By morning, there was nothing.
Back in Town, Darcy was nowhere in sight. Redcoats patrolled the streets of Matlock House. He glimpsed Georgiana, once, through a window.
Fitzwilliam had ruined everything.
Just like Lambton. Wickham sneered into his ale. He had tried to humiliate Darcy when they were lads, hinting that Georgiana longed for company, implying Darcy’s pride kept her caged. Darcy snapped. Shoved him. But it was Fitzwilliam who nearly killed him. Bare fists. Cold fury. Even now, the memory of the Lambton wall throbbed in his skull.
He shook off the memory.
Ireland had followed. Land, coin, a taste of success. He returned to Pemberley. Darcy turned him out without a word. Wickham picked the fight. Had it not been for Georgiana, he might not have lived.
Now, with Darcy fixed here in this county, his attention on a country girl, Wickham would risk desertion to finally get his due as well as his revenge. He patted the glass vial of laudanum in his coat. A few drops and she would sleep through it all. No struggle, no tears. By the time she woke, she, and her fortune, would be his.
He tipped the last of his ale and shivered despite the warmth. The rumour that the colonel was back in England—if true… He set down the tankard. His hand trembled.
“No more mistakes.”
Wickham glanced about the tavern. No one noticed him. Just another threadbare officer. He rose, pulled on his coat, tossed his last coin on the table.
Laudanum. Compromise. By the time they woke, it would be done. He would force her hand—and Darcy’s.
As he turned for the door, a pang twisted in his gut. He glanced back. Shadows.Steady, now.He stepped into the yard. The cold air stank of straw and refuse. He turned into the shadows and was wrenched off his feet, his coat yanked hard from behind.
He flailed, trying to break free but slammed into a man. Barrel-chest. Red coat. Polished black boots. Arms unusuallylong.
Wickham looked up. “I have no quarrel with you.”
Another man stepped out from the shadows to his right. Lean. Wiry.
Wickham shook his head. “Whatever this is, I suggest you leave it.”
A third figure blocked the left. A knife flashed once in the dim light.
Wickham’s mouth went dry. “Now, gentlem––”
Hands seized his arms and twisted them behind his back. A boot struck the back of his knees. He dropped hard onto the packed earth.
A fourth figure stepped into view. The cut of the coat, the finer cloth, the cold authority in his bearing. An officer. Patrician nose. Dark hair. Cold, pitiless eyes of memory.
“You.” He tried to rise. Too late.
Something slipped over his head. Rough material scratched his lips. The stench of potatoes in smothering darkness. He twisted—shouted—but a fist struck the side of his head. Stars burst behind his eyes.
A hand gripped his throat. He gasped for air.
