But the banns had been called. Gowns and wedding clothes ordered, according to Mrs. Ashford. The arrangements were complete. The solicitor would come, and he would sign the papers.
And after that—
Darcy turned back to the fire, his thoughts sliding, unbidden, to another conversation. Another pair of eyes. Another voice.
Elizabeth.
No. He tightened his jaw. That door had been shut. Barred. Bolted.
All he had to do now was walk through the one that remained.
Behind him, Lady Catherine said, “At least you will not die impoverished. Unless, of course, you go careening after that country girl again. What was her name? Bennet? The one who turned your head and wrecked your judgment.”
The dowager snorted into her cup. “He will not die at all if he remembers his own mind. “Let him marry. That way when he is miserable, he can at least blame propriety instead of passion.”
Darcy ground his teeth, clenched his fists, and stared through the glass. The wind whispered at the windows.
And somewhere in the study—tucked beneath paperweights and propriety—the ink on tomorrow’s settlement crept toward dry.
Chapter Thirty-Six
20 January
The study reeked ofwax and paper. Melted seals lined the desk in regimented order, each one bearing his crest in sharp relief. The chill had not lifted despite the fire’s coaxing heat, and his coat felt tighter today—stiff in the shoulders, restrictive in the sleeves. He had not worn it since one morning when Netherfield was entertaining the Bennet ladies for tea. That felt a century ago.
“Mr. Dyer’s clerk is expected at half past eleven,” he said, without turning from the desk. “We shall sign and witness here. Ashford has stated he will arrive before noon.”
A disapproving sniff from behind him confirmed that Lady Catherine had taken the nearest chair—likely without asking. “You may yet come to your senses, nephew. Nothing obliges you to sign this morning. Every stroke of that pen tightens the noose.Delay it a day—delay it an hour—and you may still be spared the worst.”
“Catherine, please,” sighed the dowager.
“How can you countenance this?” Lady Catherine huffed, stabbing her cane into the carpet. “You sign these papers, Darcy, and you bind yourself to a family too craven to meet your eyes.”
He did not rise to the bait. Instead, he just kept staring out the window until he heard the voices from the hall.
A moment later, the door creaked open, and Mr. Dyer’s clerk stepped in, blinking against the low light. “Sir. I have the packets ready for delivery.”
The man handed them over with the precision of a man counting cannonballs. “Three sets. All ready for your inspection, sir.”
Darcy laid them out before him and he tapped the edge of the top page into place, once, twice, until it settled flush with the others. Three sets. Marriage settlement. Dowry notation. Schedule of trust inheritance, assets to be transferred upon union.
He picked up the pen.
The dowager cleared her throat delicately, knitting needles clicking. “Must we all hold our breath for this? You look like a boy at the gallows.”
Darcy signed the first page.
His hand moved with precision, but his pulse had quickened. The sound of the pen scratching across paper was intolerably loud, like a ticking clock in an empty room. The wax seal followed. Red. Perfectly centered. He reached for the next folio.
Elizabeth would have hated this. She would have scoffed at the ceremony of it all—the stamps, the witnesses, the pretence that affection required legal scaffolding to hold it upright.Affection.He had never dared to call it that aloud, not even in the privacy of his own mind.
But now the word broke through, sharp as a pinprick.
He signed again. Page two.
She would have laughed at the solemnity in this room. Called them all cowards, perhaps, for hiding their feelings behind embossed paper and duty. And yet, he was here. Signing. Stamping. Stacking each sheet like bricks in a wall that could never be torn down.
Another page. Another signature. His hand shook, but carried on with its task.
