But he’d claim the bastard child, and a child of his, properly educated, could have a life that would rival whatever it was Hurst was going to give the babe. As for her family, well, yes, that might be a blow. They might have to officially cut her, but that did not mean that, with time, they could not visit her and their children, just discreetly. It would not be an easy life for her, perhaps, but it would be a better life for her than the one she had currently planned for herself.
However, he supposed he shouldn’t decide for her.
He would present all the options to her, lay them out, and she could think about it, she could choose.
That was what he must do.
And it would not do to go over there and announce that he knew she was up there, not when she had begged him to pretend he did not know she was in the house.
However, he owned the dower house. He certainly knew ways to sneak in and out of it. When his grandmother had lived there, many years ago now, though she had been alive a few years after his own mother had passed on, he used to go over almost every afternoon for tea time. His grandmother had special sweetbreads made up just for him, and she doted on him in the way that only grandmothers can, and he had then made it his mission to explore the entire dower house, and to know all its nooks and crannies.
He did not know where they were keeping her, of course, but it must be somewhere out of sight, so he supposed it would be the second floor. As the dower house was meant to house an elderly lady, the largest bedchamber was on the main floor. He suspected that Caroline had claimed that. There was another bedchamber on the main floor as well, and it would be where Louisa was staying.
So, somewhere on the top floor, and not in the servants’ portion, that was where he would find Elizabeth.
It was only hours later that he went to seek her.
CHAPTER TEN
ELIZABETH OPENED THEdoor in surprise. “Mr. Darcy, what are you doing here?” She could not help but stifle a yawn.
“I woke you,” he said, looking chagrined. “My apologies. I paced over there, thinking this through, and then I barged in here looking for you—”
“Does anyone else know you’re here?”
“No, no, heavens, Miss Bennet, give me some credit.”
“Well, you did say ‘barged,’” she said, letting him into her bedchamber and shutting the door behind him.
He looked around the room. “They have really shut you up in one of the smallest rooms, haven’t they?”
“I’m to be out of the way of the servants, for no one is to know I’m here.”
“Ah,” he said. “Yes. And you could have been in a lovely small cottage nearby, but Caroline forced me into hosting you here.”
Elizabeth shrugged.
He sighed, shaking his head. “I cannot understand that woman. Why does she do the things she does?”
“Well, she has some designs on you, I suppose,” said Elizabeth and then wondered if she should reveal that.
“Oh, obviously, but what can she be thinking? That I would be drawn to a woman who is accompanying her sister who isincreasing? How does she think to entice me now when she has not done so before? Why will she not give up?”
Elizabeth smirked, looking down at her bare feet. This was when she thought about the fact that she was only wearing her nightdress, that she had not even thrown a bed jacket over it to answer the door. Lord, she was improper, and she was becoming more so with every passing moment.
“I did not come here to speak about Caroline Bingley,” he said in a very deep voice.
She looked up at him, something about his countenance had changed. There were questions in his eyes. He breathed, one very ragged breath, and he slowly dragged his teeth over his bottom lip.
Something leaped inside her. She felt an odd yearning go through her. No one had looked at her in that way since…
Perhaps never, truly. But no one had looked at her with anything approaching approval in some time. She had been nothing but a burden for so long, and he was not looking at her as if she were an inconvenience or a trial. He was looking at her as if he yearned, too. As if he yearned forher.
Her lips parted, and some kind of noise came out of her chest, something relieved, something broken.
He was coming closer.
He was right next to her before he stopped moving, less than a foot between their bodies. He peered down into her eyes. His voice was husky. “I want…”
