Then Colonel Fitzwilliam rose and grabbed a bottle of brandy off the shelf and pushed it and a tumbler towards Darcy. “Come, toss it back. You need to tell someone about your misery.”
“I am not miserable.”
“You are — here, let me help you.” Colonel Fitzwilliam poured the brandy into the glass and shoved it even closer towards Darcy.
He sipped it.
“No, not like that. Drink it all up.”
“I have not drunk more than two glasses of wine in the course of a day sincethatnight.”
“Thatnight,” Colonel Fitzwilliam echoed. “And you speak like I should knowwhichnight.”
“The one where I kissed Elizabeth and entangled all of us into this mess.”
“Ahhhhhh. And you have already told methatmuchin December. Swallow back the brandy, good fellow — I understand from my father that the man he sent to investigate your wife's connections determined that she seduced you, used arts and allurements to catch an overly drunk man. At least she is—”
“Say nothing of that sort about Elizabeth.” Darcy’s voice was hard.
The two glared at each other.
“Good,” Colonel Fitzwilliam said. “You’ve still got spirit left.”
Darcy sat straighter. “Why did I ever let you visit?”
“You did not.”
“I had not in fact forgotten.”
“What caused your argument?”
“She truly had not meant to marry me — all this time I thought she was a fortune hunter, but instead… I kissed her, we were seen by her mother and all the gossiping women of the town, and she had to marry me.” Darcy glumly looked at the dark walnut table before him. “All because I could not control my impulses.”
Elizabethshouldnever forgive him.
He picked up the drink Fitzwilliam had poured from him and drained it again.
After which he coughed harshly, and Colonel Fitzwilliam pounded his back and laughed.
“Out of practice.”
“No,” Darcy replied weakly. “Never was in practice.”
“Another.”
Darcy did as ordered.
“Mrs. Darcy did not want to marry you? That matches how she appeared to me. Poor girl.”
“What?”
“She was uncomfortable, and she did not seem the sortwho would marry for fortune without affection.”
“Was this visible to everyone?”
Colonel Fitzwilliam shrugged. “Most likely not.”
“I placed her in an impossible situation, and then I forced her to marry me against her will. I was no better than… than a man who simply forced a woman. No worse, because now she is trapped with me, and I destroyed her ability to choose.”
