Page 14 of The Slipper Scandal
“I cannot say what colour her eyes are, but the rest is true.”
“Was she with him last night?”
“She was.”
Fitzwilliam frowned. “I ought to have accepted the invitation. Your betrothed is her friend, you say?”
“I did not say, but yes. I was not aware you knew Miss Abernathy.”
“If it is the same Miss Abernathy, yes. We met last season, but nothing came of it. I was called away to the continent, as you recall.”
Darcy did. It had been an anxious time.
His cousin took a deep breath. “So what happened when you returned to the house with Miss Bennet on your arm?”
“I stood beside her while the gossips sang.” He shook his head. “She was doomed the moment Ellington targeted her.”
“Ellington.” Fitzwilliam’s expression darkened. “Of course it was him.” He rolled his glass between his palms. “And Miss Bennet? You say she objects? How do you know?”
Darcy huffed a quiet breath, something almost like a laugh. “She fought.”
“Indeed?”
Darcy rolled his eyes. “With words, you dolt.”
His cousin smirked. “Well, that is promising too.”
“Miss Bennet does not weep or wring her hands or wish to be saved,” Darcy continued, recalling their dance. “She schemes. She plots. She is searching for a way out, for any weakness in my defences.”
Fitzwilliam laughed outright at that, then stared at Darcy. “You admire her.”
He hesitated. He did, of course, though he could not say why. She did not behave in any of the ways he might expect. She was certainly not grateful to him for his sacrifice. But there was just something about her . . .
“I respect the strength of her response to the evening’s events,” he said at last. “There is no simpering, no coy pleas for assistance. No artifice. Only determination. It is . . . novel.”
Fitzwilliam eyed him. “To novel experiences, then?”
Darcy shot him a look but did not respond.
His cousin’s smugness softened. “Are you sure she is quite sound in her mind? Why would she protest when any woman of less rank than the daughter of a duke would be grasping at you with both hands? There are many who would be pleased to exchange their place for hers even if the scandal was twice as salacious.”
“I do not understand it either.” He knew it was his position those other women wanted, not him. But given the circumstances, he could not fathom why Miss Bennet was behaving as though marrying him was a fate worse than . . . well,notmarrying him. She was clever, witty, beguiling—and mulish.
“Youdolike her.”
“I did not say that.” She was beguiling, that was all.
Fitzwilliam eyed him warily. “Darcy, forgive me for asking, but this does not have anything to do with your great uncle, does it?”
“No. Why would it?”
“You have seemed rather downcast since his death. I had not thought you two close.”
“We were not. This has nothing to do with him.”
His cousin studied him another moment before nodding and moving on. “Well then. Be warned, cousin. I have known men like this Miss Bennet. Soldiers who refuse to surrender, even when outnumbered and outmatched. A fight to the last breath might be admirable in battle, but in matters of matrimony?” Heshook his head. “You will not enjoy the war once the battlefield is your own home.”
Darcy was silent for a long moment. His entire life had been precisely planned. Nannies, tutors, university, estate. His days were predictable, his acquaintances respectable, his responsibilities paramount. But Miss Bennet was not predictable. She was colour in a colourless world, a spark of fire in a heart long dulled by duty.
