Darcy laughed for a long time.
A very handsome sound that Elizabeth liked.
“He has been scheming to improve our marriage,” Darcy said. “I do not know that I like to be schemed for any more than I would like to be schemed against.”
“Being schemedforis wholly superior in my view.”
“Ah, but he insisted that his motives were wholly selfish, so I do not need to worry about that question. He insisted thathe only wished us to reconcile, so that I could say a good word to you on his behalf.”
Elizabeth giggled. “Papa.” She sighed. “I do not know that I have yet lost all my angry feelings towards him.”
“And are you glad I came home?” His voice was suddenly small, the voice of a boy who wasn’t sure if his father loved him.
“Very much.”
“You wrote that you wanted to see me, but the way you wrote was restrained.”
Elizabeth nearly laughed, but instead she pressed her gloved hand against his cheek as they looked at each other.
“I did not know how much I had missed you until I saw you in the stables in that wet shirt.”
“That wet shirt, you are quite focused on the wetness of the shirt.”
Elizabeth laughed. “Come summer, I will expect to see you wandering the estate like a barbarian, only wearing a wet shirt.”
“It will dry.”
“That is what the pond is for. I shall decree that you jump back into it every time you note that the shirt has become merely damp.”
They kissed again, sweetly and for a long soft time before they took the final turn that brought them back to Pemberley.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Elizabeth greatly enjoyed the journey to the south.
The carriage ride from Pemberley to the south was taken in smaller stages than the ride north. Despite Elizabeth’s insistence that she was not particularly delicate, Darcy had a strong instinct to constantly mother her.
They made a virtue of this slowness and had lovely walks about fine old villages, frozen picnics on fine promontories — which were managed by eating whilst wearing gloves and walking around stamping their feet, and they toured several lovely old churches.
Life glowed for Elizabeth.
Darcy was home, they made love every night, and often during the day. Georgiana grew yet dearer to her heart, and Pemberley was an exquisite jewel during wintertime.
She was happy.
Happier than she’d ever been before.
Yet as they finally came deep enough into Hertfordshire that she recognized the roads, her feelings tended more to a sort of anxiety about meeting her father than anything else.
They had not spoken a word directly to each other for the five days preceding her marriage. And that was what her bones remembered now — the anger, the pain, and the fear of those days.
Part of her almost wished that they had not come south.
It would have shocked no one if they did not travel three days to be present at a wedding.
In the end, however, it was not as difficult as she had expected to meet Papa.
He was, after all, in the midst of a crowd of other dearrelations invited by Bingley to be present at Netherfield for the whole day when the Darcys were expected to arrive.
