They both turned to Elizabeth. “You?” he asked, before he could help himself.
She grinned at him. “Me. Don’t look so skeptical. Jane and I shared a spectacularly unreliable heap when we started driving. Kept it alive with duct tape and sheer stubbornness. I got quite handy at poking about under the bonnet, especially when we had to ferry our sisters places.”
There was a world in that “had to,” but he let it pass. Five minutes later they were at the little hatchback with the bonnet up, Mrs. Reynolds hovering as if the engine might bite, and Darcy fighting the managerial urge to fetch a professional anyway. Elizabeth rolled up her sleeves and leaned in with an ease that made him feel unexpectedly superfluous.
“Battery looks fine,” she murmured, more to the car than to them. “Starter . . . give me a second.” She tugged one lead, then another, hands sure, expression cheerful and intent. “Ha.” A small, victorious sound. “Loose connector.”
She reseated it, checked something else with a decisive push, then straightened. He offered his handkerchief; she took it with a quick “Thanks,” leaving a neat thumbprint of graphite across the corner like a signature. “Try it now?”
Mrs. Reynolds slid into the driver’s seat, turned the key, and the engine caught at once, an eager, merry rumble that made the housekeeper clap her hands. “Oh, bless you, dear! You’ve saved my Christmas.” She beamed at Elizabeth, then at Darcy, as if he’d done the work himself.
He blinked. Elizabeth had fixed it. No drama, no dramatic insistence he stand back, just competence, brisk and unbothered. He had no idea he could find that so attractive.
“You’re welcome,” Elizabeth said, stepping back while the exhaust steamed the cold air. “Happy Christmas.”
Mrs. Reynolds, restored to good humour, promised faithfully to take the direct route and not to speed, waved at them both as if they were children, and disappeared down the drive.
Elizabeth looked at the handkerchief, then at her palms. “I hated that old car,” she said, dabbing without much success, “but it did teach me a useful thing: not everything needs the shop.”
Darcy found himself smiling. “I don’t know the first thing about what goes on under the bonnet. You’ll have to teach me your ways.” He indicated, with a small tilt of his head, the thin streak of grease across her jumper where her open coat had failed to protect it. “Casualty of war?”
She glanced down and sighed. “I’ll change. And wash my hands before I spread engine grease across your upholstery.”
“Use the utility sink,” he said, then heard himself and amended, “Please. The water warms faster there than upstairs.”
A quarter of an hour later she was back, coat buttoned over a green jumper he had been privately partial to since the first time he’d seen it. He tried not to sound too pleased.
They set out once more in the other direction, Waffles staggering under the important work of re-collecting the estate on his fur, Athena pretending not to know him. Darcy matched his pace to Elizabeth’s, hands tucked into his coat pockets, reviewing the morning like a ledger: the near disaster of breakfast, presents mostly sorted, a car unexpectedly mended, a housekeeper sent on her way.
Under “unresolved,” he included a brightness to Elizabeth’s expression that didn’t quite balance. Not a problem, not yet.Adjustment, he reminded himself. He had felt equally foreign in the wonderful, bedlam warmth of her family’s table; she was doing the mirror exercise here. The sensible course was patience, attention, and not mistaking a single datapoint for a trend.
On the rise before the folly, the wind lifted and sent a pale shimmer across the lake. Elizabeth turned into it, cheeks pinked, eyes clear. He had the sudden, irrational thought that if the car hadn’t started, she would have simply have willed it to life. The notion warmed him absurdly.
“Georgiana will want to say goodbye,” he said, when the chill finally pressed its case. “We should head back.”
They did, looping behind the house, Waffles circling them over and over, adding miles to his outing. When they reached the back door, Darcy glanced at Elizabeth. Her smile was easy now, unforced, the same one she’d given Maggie when the engine turned over. He liked that smile.
Soon they would be on their way to Hertfordshire, dogs wedged in the back with the presents, Maggie’s mince pies in Elizabeth’s lap, the satnav arguing with his memory of the A-roads, Charles and Jane laying an ambush of hospitality.
For now, there was the clean bite of country air, Waffles’s idiot joy, Athena’s resigned dignity, and a beautiful woman who could coax sense from engines. It felt, he thought, very much like a winning run.
Chapter Thirteen
Elizabeth had imagined Charles and Jane’s first Christmas dinner as a cosy affair. Perhaps six people around their new dining table, civilised conversation about books and the weather, Waffles behaving himself for once, and everyone getting along splendidly.
She had not imagined this.
“Is that Richard Fitzwilliam’s car?” Jane asked, peering through the front window as a sleek BMW pulled up behind Darcy’s Aston Martin. She’d known the Fitzwilliam cousins were coming but hadn’t yet met them. “And who’s in the Range Rover?”
Elizabeth watched two men emerge from the BMW—both tall, though not as tall as Darcy, both carrying themselves with an unconscious authority that spoke of good breeding and expensive schools. She recognized them from the photos Darcy had in his flat.
“The one with lighter hair is Richard, the retired army officer who’s a barrister now. Malcolm is the shorter one. He does something with politics in the City.”
“They’revery . . .” Jane paused.
“Posh?” Elizabeth supplied. “Yes. Incredibly.” She was abruptly aware that her green jumper and black trousers, while flattering, were from Selfridge’s rather than somewhere that required an appointment. “Caroline’s in the other car.” The women did not get out, but rather pulled down visors and peered into mirrors as they applied more makeup.
Jane turned to Elizabeth, her eyes wide. “That’s a new car. Charles told her he won’t be bailing her out again, so I hope she’s not expecting him to help pay for it.”
