Chapter One

“YOU ARE TOO cruel, Lizzie. I cannot believe Mr. Darcy’s aunt makes faces like a swollen elephant if things do not go her way.” Jane Bingley twisted her lips into a half frown of disapproval of her sister’s antics. Elizabeth had pantomimed the observation to the laughter of her future husband and gentle chuckling of his friend, Mr. Bingley.

“But it IS true. Her face turns a wicked shade of beet red and at first, I feared she would suffer apoplexy right there, in the drawing-room, as she called me the most vile names …” Elizabeth slanted her eyes to mimic Lady Catherine de Bourgh’s harshest critique.

A few days after their arrival in London, Elizabeth Bennet had begun to heal enough from her injuries to tolerate company for longer and longer spells. Her ribs still ached. Murderous headaches plagued her in unpredictable measures. But for one night, she wished to push the attack by her cousin in Kent to the back of her mind and enjoy the visits of her intended, Mr. Darcy, and her sister, Jane, and Jane’s husband, Charles.

The romantically twined couples sat down to dine in Elizabeth’s sick room at Mr. Darcy’s townhouse. Coincidentally, the room was once the suite used by his mother as the mistress of the home. In other circumstances, the presence of his betrothed in the mistress chambers, let alone in his home without a chaperone, would provide an insurmountable scandal. Thankfully, or ironically as Elizabeth chose to reflect upon the situation, plenty of scandal remained swirling around the Darcy family from the hastily patched up marriage of Darcy’s sister to the steward’s son she ran off with the previous summer. Publicly, it was a love match bound at Ramsgate. Truthfully, the marriage did not occur until December, a union not yet six months’ old.

“Why should she be so rude? She had never met you before that day you arrived with the Colonel …” Jane furrowed her brows at such a recounting of her sister’s arrival in Kent. Certain subject matters were safe: Elizabeth’s arrival, the walks Darcy and Elizabeth enjoyed on the grounds, even the clandestine wedding ceremony between Darcy’s cousins with him no longer forced to be the groom as his aunt wished. No one brought up the last night in Kent. The last night barely saw Elizabeth escape alive to a tenant on the glebe lands after a concussion-inducing thrashing by her cousin, William Collins.

Darcy struggled to regain his composure as the image of his future wife ballooning her cheeks played over and over again in his mind. Her likeness was spot on and yet more comical than the original lady in question. Restoring his countenance with a well-timed sip of wine, the dashingly handsome man of Derbyshire gazed with love over the candlelight at the impromptu dining table.

“Elizabeth is precisely correct in her estimations of my aunt. She is known to be entirely disagreeable in my family and uncouth for well-mannered company. You sister held her own most admirably.” Darcy tilted his glass and head towards his beloved, who blushed at the compliment despite her bruised face.

“Hear, hear!” Charles Bingley found a place to interject and squeezed his wife’s hand beside him. The intimate dining experience created by three chairs, a table, and the foot of Elizabeth’s bed provided a calming repast from the strictures a formal dining room would impose.

Elizabeth involuntarily grimaced. Darcy raised an eyebrow at the small adjustments Elizabeth made with her torso.

“We have taxed you too long,” he announced with a firmness to his voice.

“No, no! We’ve only just begun to eat. See, I am well.” Elizabeth took a larger than normal bite of her meal in an attempt to persuade him.

“Lizzie, we can all see you are uncomfortable. It is early to support your weight upright without the aid of pillows. Gentlemen, perhaps if you give us a moment of privacy I might help my sister find a more comfortable position?”

The two men gallantly rose from their places at the small table usually reserved for playing cards and exited the suite in quick succession.

“Thank you, Jane. I so desperately needed relief!” Elizabeth breathed in and out very painful breaths as her gown impaired her ability to find a comfortable position.

“Perhaps we ought to change your attire, would you be in less pain in your robe and chemise?”

“I cannot! It would be indecent. Then the men would have to leave us.”

Jane giggled and left to fetch the clothing she required. “You wore the same when you were unconscious at Netherfield. Both men have seen you thus.”

“That was different; I was not awake to feel morbid shame.”

“You do play a perfect damsel in distress,” Jane said in a deadpan tone as she gingerly helped her sister lift the offending gown.

“This time, it was the furthest desire of my heart,” Elizabeth said with more emotion than she intended.

For a moment, a silence fell between the sisters as Jane tied a perfect bow in the front of the heavy brocaded robe.

“I know,” Jane whispered.

Elizabeth sniffed in pure defiance of any tears that thought twice about falling. Changing her mind’s focus, she turned the conversation on her elder sister’s sudden lack of propriety.

“When did you become so free of rules and proper manners?” Elizabeth accosted her prim sister with a heavy accusation. “If Mama could hear you encouraging me to entertain gentlemen in my bedroom, in a gentleman’s home, in my nightgown and robe …” Both women burst out laughing heartily at the escalation of ridiculous situations they now found themselves living. Elizabeth sucked in a breath as the laughter stung her ribs most fiercely.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, truly sorry,” Jane wiped the happy tears forming at the edge of her eyes. “Perhaps it is because I am now married and learned the mystery of familiarity they keep away from gentlewomen is a disservice to a happy life. Or perhaps I am finding in my new condition that new matters are of greater importance and other matters …”

“Less so?” Elizabeth finished, looking hopefully up at her sister. Jane nodded and Elizabeth felt a cheer in her heart. There were more important matters, life and death matters, matters of love, that all trumped the arbitrary rules set for men and women. Some protection made good sense in the case of complete strangers, but surely Elizabeth was safe with her sister and brother present. She and Mr. Darcy had bonded too deeply over their varied adventures to be merely an ordinary courtship.

Setting her face firm, Elizabeth gave Jane a nod and the gentlemen were invited to reenter. Only this time, Jane and Bingley took to the table, and Mr. Darcy moved his chair to eat bedside with his Elizabeth.

“I do believe after we are wed; I should like to continue this tradition of private dining in a bedroom, Miss Elizabeth.”

“You mean I won’t have to seek injury to keep your private company?”

Darcy leaned closer so that Jane and Charles might not hear his response, but the newlywed couple was already preoccupied with their own concerns. “You never needed such schemes, my dearest.”

Elizabeth caught her breath as Darcy’s voice washed over her heart like a warm brandy. The man vexed her with his ability to stir improper feelings in her body that she had spent a lifetime being told were wanton and inexcusable in a lady. The idea of marrying such a man both excited and terrified her, but there was time yet before they could leave for Scotland.

Dr. Matthews had said at least two weeks’ wait, if not more, before he wished for her to make such a journey. Elizabeth had at first protested, pointing out she made it just fine from Kent, but Dr. Matthews defended her arguments by saying she very likely cracked a rib and was lucky to have not punctured a lung. Such a possibility was grave enough to convince Mr. Darcy there was no need, nor reason, to risk her life further.

“I shall take that into consideration, sir.” Elizabeth offered her intended a small smile despite the constant pain she was in and trying her best to hide. Although it was very unchristian of her to think so, she rather wished her cousin was dead — or at the very least in thrice the amount of pain she was enduring.

Eventually, the pleasant visiting grew to be unbearable, and Elizabeth caved, making a rare request for a drop of laudanum to be added to her wine. The strong medicine made her very sleepy, but she managed to continue the meal. The evening passed in perfectly polite company as all attendees found the arrangement greatly to their mutual liking.