Darcy made a noncommittal sound.
Charles bounded to his feet, re-energized. “Right, then! You and I both know our course. You to . . .”
“Tottenham Court Road.”
“Me to Bankside. I’d invite you to Christmas dinner, but my sisters will be there. So if I don’t see you before, Happy Christmas.”
He was grateful not to be invited. “Happy Christmas, Charles.”
Darcy sat in the quiet room long after Bingley had gone, one hand resting on Athena’s head.
That afternoon, he made his way to the electronics store. It was gleaming and modern, full of the kind of cutting-edge technology that appealed to him.
The sales assistant was enthusiastic about the headphones. They were top of the range, the best noise cancellation on the market, perfect for anyone who needed to focus in challenging environments.
“They’re quite popular with professionals,” the young man explained, demonstrating the various settings. “Lawyers, writers, anyone who works from home and needs to block out distractions.”
Darcy nodded. Elizabeth would see how much thought he’d put into understanding her needs. The headphones were sleek, sophisticated, practical. She would love them.
He had them wrapped and left the store feeling more satisfied than he had in weeks.
By the time he reached his flat, Athena greeting him with her usual three tail wags, Darcy was convinced he’d made the perfect choice.
Athena padded over to investigate, sniffing delicately at the bag before settling beside him with what he chose to interpret as approval.
“She’ll love them,” he told his dog with confidence. “They’re just what she needs.”
Athena’s expression was neutral, but then again, she’d always been exceptionally well-mannered. Unlike a certain golden retriever who would try to eat the wrapping paper and bark at the box.
The contrast made him smile. Their pets reflected their personalities, his calm and composed, hers boisterous and endearing.
But Elizabeth needed peace and quiet to flourish, and he was going to give it to her.
The fact that peace and quiet had never been what drew him to Elizabeth Bennet in the first place seemed, somehow, beside the point.
Chapter Five
Elizabeth stood holding up two different jumpers and wondering if there was a tactful way to cancel dinner with her family. Not because she didn’t want to see them—she adored her family—but because the thought of subjecting William Darcy to the full Bennet experience still made her feel a little nauseous.
She’d ridden with Charles on his way home from work the day before in the hopes of tamping down her mother’s zeal.
It hadn’t been possible.
Jane and Charles had previous plans, as it turned out, so they weren’t staying, and now, with only two hours until Darcy arrived at her parents’ house in Hertfordshire, she was wondering why she had ever allowed this to go forward.
She looked in the mirror. The navy jumper was classic, understated. The emerald-green one was prettier, but it had a small hole on one cuff that Waffles had contributed during a particularly enthusiastic greeting last week.
“Navy it is,” she muttered, pulling it over her head. “Safe and boring.”
From his spot on her bed, Waffles raised his head and thumped his tail twice against the duvet, a gesture of moral support that somehow made everything feel marginally less catastrophic.
Elizabeth had met Darcy’s sister Georgiana once, over coffee at a café in Notting Hill that served seventeen-pound salads and had waiters who looked like they’d stepped out of a magazine. She had been soft-spoken and intelligent, with an effortless elegance that saidshe’dnever owned a jumper with holes in it. She’d asked thoughtful questions about Elizabeth’s work and had seemed to care about the answers.
But Georgiana was one person. One polite, well-educated, impeccably dressed person who knew which fork to use for salad and had probably never in her life eaten cereal for dinner.
The Bennet family dinner table, on the other hand, was generally less a refined social gathering than it was a semi-controlled explosion.
“Maybe I could get food poisoning,” Elizabeth told Waffles. “Nothing serious. Just enough to justify cancelling.”
