“If you can return my affections,” he continued, “if there is even the possibility you might love me in return—then I ask you to let me offer you what I can. My name. My protection. My devotion.”
He took a step forward, voice quieter now, almost reverent. “Elizabeth… will you marry me?”
A thousand thoughts raced through her mind. Of course she should not say yes—not now, not with so much still unknown. It was too soon. It was dangerous. It was madness.
And yet.
In his eyes, she saw everything she had ever longed for: truth, honor, tenderness. The fire that had burned through her since the moment she’d faced Le Corbeau in the nursery was matched now by another—one steadier, quieter, but no less fierce.
Still, her voice was trembling when she said, “You know that I am stubborn. That I speak out of turn. That I tease and laugh and sometimes question things no one else dares to.”
A faint smile curved his lips. “I do.”
“You also know that my family is noisy and troublesome, and that we are in the midst of a situation that would terrify most men.”
“I do.”
“And yet you still ask?”
“I do.”
She drew in a breath, and something in her chest eased, some ache she had not fully recognized until now. “Then, yes,” she whispered.
His expression changed—hope blooming into something almost disbelieving. “Yes?”
“Yes,” she said again, firmer this time, and she smiled. “I will marry you, Mr. Darcy.”
There was a moment of stillness between them, wonder and disbelief suspended in the air. Then—he let out a breath, like a man who had been drowning and had just found the surface.
He reached for her hand, lifting it to his lips. “You have made me the happiest man alive.”
She laughed softly. “I hope you will still feel this way after the ball,” she teased, “but you have mademethe happiest of women.”
“Forget the ball; I would feel this way even if the world burned around us.”
She leaned in, unable to help herself, her voice a murmur. “Let us hope it does not come to that.”
He smiled, a real, open smile, and gently touched her cheek. “No matter what happens, we face it together now.”
She nodded, hand still in his. “Together.”
And as they stood there in the quiet entryway, the morning light peeking through the windows, the world and its dangers faded into the background for one precious moment. There was only the warmth of his hands, the truth in his eyes, and the beginning of something beautiful.
Neither was ready to break the spell between them.
Elizabeth still held his hand, marveling at the quiet warmth of it, the way his fingers curved gently around hers, not possessive but protective. His presence, which had once so unnerved her, now settled into her like a balm— steady, anchoring.
She had never felt more herself.
Darcy studied her face for a long moment, then gave a faint, sheepish smile. “I ought to confess something.”
“Oh?” she said lightly, her thumb brushing against his.
“I spoke to your father this morning. Before we came into the drawing room.”
Her brows rose. “You did?”
“I asked his permission to address you. He did not grant permission for marriage—not yet.” A flicker of self-deprecating humor crossed his expression. “He said he would allow me to ask for your hand, but only if you accepted. If you had not, I imagine I should have been ejected from the house by now.”
