And when the sun dipped low, he made ready to ride. Not for reconnaissance. Not for strategy.
He needed to see for himself that she was safe.
Bynightfall,theairhad turned cool and damp. Clouds veiled the stars and turned the sky to ink. The wind moved low through the fields, brushing over the grass with a hush, as if the earth itself were holding its breath.
He rode out alone.
No servant. No house crest on his saddle. Just an ordinary brown gelding and a dark riding cloak. He did not take the main road. He had no wish to be seen. Instead, he followed the edge of a copse to the west, where the trees pressed close and the fence line curved along the rise of a shallow hill.
From there, he could see the house.
Longbourn stood quiet in the distance, its sharp roofline softened by the dark. Two windows glowed gently above the parlor—golden and warm in the night. Jane Bennet’s, he guessed. And Elizabeth’s, since Collins’ arrival necessitated that they share.
She would be preparing for bed.
Perhaps she was brushing out her hair, grumbling about “those dratted curls” again—the ones that gave her a crown of so many intricate luxuries that he had yet to glance at them without losing his breath.
Perhaps she was reading by firelight, her brow drawn, her lips twitching faintly at the margin of some inner thought. Perhaps she was already asleep, her hands tucked under her cheek the way he had seen her once before, after that first mad dash out of London. He had not meant to watch her then, either.
But he watched now.
There were no figures in the windows. No movement. No sign of unrest. Just the quiet of a house at peace.
He stayed in the shadows a long time.
It was absurd, and he knew it. For tonight, at least, she was safer than she had been in weeks. The trap had worked—the letter had drawn attention. Fitzwilliam’s men and his own informants were reporting in regular intervals. Longbourn had not been breached. No stranger had been seen on the road.
And yet, he could not leave.
He had hardly slept the night before. His limbs ached from a full day in the saddle, followed by a day of idleness at his desk. His shoulders ached worse. His eyes stung, and he still carried the scent of coal smoke from the Prince’s insufferable study in his clothes.
But this—this silent vigil under a moonless sky—felt more vital than anything else he had done. More necessary than any report, any strategy, any gallows-bound theory.
She was in there—and now, at least, she trusted him.
He thought of what Bingley had told him—about Collins, about the things that had been said in that drawing room. Elizabeth was not stupid. She would begin to think things… ponder things… Egad, how had she not already put it all together?
Still, she had stayed, heeded his words, because he had asked her to.
He had no claim to her. Not as a protector, not as a suitor. Not even as a friend. He was only the man who was supposed to keep her head on top of her shoulders until another could claim her hand.
He shifted slightly in the saddle, his hands tight on the reins. The gelding snorted and shook his head.
He had no right to want her.
But want her, he did. Every time she turned her head toward him with fire in her eyes, every time she caught him staring and said nothing, every time she had stood unflinching while the world shifted beneath her feet—he had felt it pulling him closer, past reason, past restraint.
He would not act on it. Not ever. She deserved better than a man in exile from his own name, with no title, no standing, no future to offer but disgrace. She was the daughter of a marquess. He was nothing now, but a tarnished tool the Crown found convenient.
And yet—God help him—he could not rule his heart.
He watched those two golden windows from the safety of the trees, unmoving, unblinking, as if something in the candlelight might speak to him.
He knew what was coming.
The letter trap had bought them a little time, but not enough. Once Lady Catherine’s reply arrived, the story Collins had started would blaze through Meryton. Elizabeth’s false identity would not hold. His own would be dragged into the light beside it.
They would have to run. And soon.
