“What a delightful coincidence,” she said, laughter dancing in her voice like sunbeams on water.
He came to a halt, his usual reserve slipping away. The air between them felt electric. “So, you are content to be married at St. George’s?”
“I am.”
“Have you chosen the gentleman who will stand beside you on that occasion?”
“Indeed, I have.”
“Someone I know, perhaps?”
“I should hope so,” she teased, the corner of her mouth betraying her. “After all, you see him each morning when you look in the mirror.”
He turned her gently by the arm to face him fully. The teasing light faded from their eyes, and the world narrowed to a hush around them.
“You are too kind to toy with me,” he said, voice soft as velvet. “If your feelings have grown since last April, speak now. My affections remain unchanged, but one word from you will end my pursuit forever.”
“My feelings have indeed undergone a profound change. If I could return to the past, I would go back to Hunsford and allow you to propose unimpeded.” Darcy’s eyes darkened with an emotion she could not name, and a warm flush rose in her chest. “Are you shocked by this?”
“Not at all. However, if I could go back in time, I would travel back to the fifteenth of October, 1811, and ask for an introduction to the most beautiful woman I know when Bingley badgered me to dance.”
“You would dance with Jane?” she teased.
He gave her a look of tender exasperation. “To me,youare the most beautiful woman in all of England.”
“I am glad you did not say the world, for then I wouldsuggest that you require very thick spectacles.”
“You tease because I am making you uncomfortable.”
“Partially. I am not used to trumping Jane in the card game of looks and grace.”
“If it helps, you are my Queen of Hearts.”
“Mr. Darcy! When did you become a poet?”
“The fifteenth of October, 1811,” came his earnest reply, “where at a horrid little assembly, that I did not want to attend, my world tilted on its axis, and I have yet to regain my balance.”
What could she say to that? She held his gaze and realised — nothing. There was nothing she could say to that, for her heart had melted and she had no words… except…
“I love you, Fitzwilliam.”
It seemed that was all she needed to say, for his hands lovingly cupped her face, and his lips were upon hers. After that, no words were required for a very long time.
Later that afternoon, Elizabethfound her father in his library, settled deep into his favourite armchair with a book open across his knee. She closed the door behind her and did not sit. She had no intention of leaving without his blessing on her engagement to William and proceeded to tell her father that very thing.
“William, is it?” her father said, a smile playing at the corner of his mouth when she had finished pleading her case. “I had always understood his Christian name to be Fitzwilliam.”
Elizabeth resisted the urge to roll her eyes.
“Very well,Fitzwilliamand I wish to marry on the fifteenth of October at St. George’s Hanover Square.”
He closed his book. “Not Longbourn?”
“We could hardly impose upon the Turners while we made our preparations. Besides, we keep a house in Town, and St. George’s is Fitzwilliam’s parish.”
“And the date itself? Is there some particular reason for it?”
“There is, though it is a private matter.”
