Her normally smooth waves had transformed into a disaster, tangles escaping from her pins, loose strands sticking up at angles that defied nature. Her face was pale, smudged with fatigue, her gown wrinkled beyond repair.
She looked—dear heaven—she lookedcommon.And she did the only thing she could possibly do.
She screamed.
Darcyawokeinastate of pure instinct. His body jerked upright, muscles snapping tense as a rush of blood kicked into his muscles and propelled him into immediate alertness.
His mind instantly leapt to the worst possible conclusion—someone had broken in, they had been followed, they were in danger—his hand shot to his boot, fingers closing around the hidden blade tucked beneath the worn leather.
But instead of an attacker, instead of an intruder, instead of the reasonable cause for alarm that his instincts had anticipated…
He found Lady Elizabeth Montclair standing before the mirror, her hands in her hair, her face frozen in absolute horror.
“What is it?” he barked.
She whipped around, pointing at herself in the cracked mirror like she had just seen an actual demon. “That!”
Darcy blinked. And then dragged a slow, exhausted hand down his face. “You are screaming,” he muttered, voice hoarse from sleep, “at your own reflection.”
She whirled toward him again, her expression a mixture of indignation, disbelief, and distress. “Look at me!” she cried, flinging a hand toward the mirror.
His head fell back against the chair, and he closed his eyes again. “Iamlooking,“ he said flatly. “And yet, I see no crisis.”
“No crisis? My hair looks as though I woke in a ditch and rolled the rest of the way here!”
Darcy opened one eye, surveying her for a long moment before allowing a slow smirk to curl at the corner of his mouth. “Well,” he mused, “in that you are correct. That ispreciselywhat you look like.”
Elizabeth spun back to the mirror, gesturing violently at her head. “You do not understand.Youdo not have waist-long hair that kinks into fist-sized snarls at the slightest provocation.Youhave not had to sit by the hour letting someone work out the knots with tears in your eyes and praying you have hair left when she is done!”
Darcy sighed again, deeper this time, rubbing his temples. “I fail to see the problem,” he said, not bothering to hide his exasperation. “No one expects you to look like a marquess’s daughter today. You are in hiding. Perhaps you should refrain from screaming your distress for all of Southwark to hear.”
Elizabeth scowled. “Forgive me for not wishing to look like a street beggar.”
Darcy let his head thud back against the chair. “Your vanity,” he muttered, “is the only thing untouched by the night’s trials.”
She whirled on him. “Myvanity?You think this is about vanity? I am talking about hours of pain and forced idleness!”
He gestured vaguely toward her undone curls. “Be that as it may, I can assure you, the greater danger this morning is not your hair.”
She shot him a venomous glare, muttering something about arrogant, impossible men, then whipped the overcoat off the floor and flung it in his direction.
He caught it without blinking.
It was wrinkled beyond repair, the fabric still warm from her body, and, just as he had feared, the scent of her perfume clung to it like it had been deliberately seared into the wool.
His fingers flexed involuntarily over the fabric, and for an instant—only an instant—he lifted it to his nose.
Then he jerked it away. What a silly reflex! It was not as if he needed to confirm what he already knew. She had spent all night burrowing into the coat, rolling over it, wrapping herself in it like a blasted cocoon.
And now—it smelled like her.
His shoulders stiffened as he shook it out and threw it over the back of the chair with a bit too much force.
Elizabeth, thankfully, had already turned back toward the mirror, sighing in gloomy despair as she attempted to restore some order to her tangled curls.
Good.
He did not want to discuss it.
