Elizabeth’s expression had shifted from attentive to sharp. “You are saying a man can trap a woman into marriage by simply being alone with her.”
“A man can destroy a woman’s choices by manufacturing a situation in which marriage appears the only respectable outcome. The trap requires nothing more than a closed door and a witness who arrives at the calculated moment.”
“This is monstrous.”
“It is London.”
Her mouth rounded in an oval, drawing in a breath, and she did not speak, which was more disconcerting than if she had. Darcy felt the weight of her shame and sought to alleviate it.
“I know you as honorable and above reproach,” he began. “Because I have observed you and I?—”
“And yet, you are alone with me here, in the drawing room, and you were alone with me at Hunsford.”
The words lanced the wound that never healed. He had been alone with her in the Collins’s parlor for the duration of the worst speech he had ever made, and Charlotte and Collins had been out. If anyone had seen him enter and depart, Elizabeth’s reputation would have been as much at risk as her feelings had been. Likely, Charlotte’s maid had, but did not speak of it.
“Yes,” he said. “I was.”
“And you did not consider the impropriety at the time.”
“I considered nothing at the time except my own arrogance. I am not proud of it.”
“No.” Her voice softened instead of sharpening. “I do not imagine you are.”
He could not interpret her expression, nor did he dare. Something was different. Off, as if the attempted compromise by Sir Geoffrey, a bold one executed in front of her sisters, aunt, and uncle, had humbled her.
“Lady Sophia told me once that a reformed rake makes the best husband,” Elizabeth said with an attempt at her usual lightness. “What precisely is a rake, Mr. Darcy?”
“A man who—” He stopped. The definition required vocabulary he could not deploy with a young woman across a tea table. “A man of dissolute habits who pursues women without honorable intention.”
“Dissolute habits.” Elizabeth tilted her head. “That is wonderfully vague. Could you be more specific?”
“No.”
“Because you do not know, or because you find the subject improper?”
“The subject is impossible to discuss with you.”
“But why? When you are, for all practical purposes, my guardian for the season? If you cannot spare me the details of defining a rake, how am I to avoid one?”
He wanted to say that she could avoid one by simply marrying him. Or that he would stick to her side like a guard dog—a mastiff, perhaps, silent and deadly, but when heat burned his face to his ears, Elizabeth let out a gale of laughter—bright, sudden, and genuine.
“You are very easily discomposed, Mr. Darcy. I find you supremely entertaining.”
“Only by you, Miss Elizabeth—only for you, I mean.”
The words escaped before he could moderate them, but he did not feel his usual discomfort at facing Elizabeth’s wit. Instead, she sat across from him as if they were old friends, not judging each other.
“The dance card, Mr. Darcy,” Elizabeth reminded. “I imagine Lady Sophia and Miss Allegra would require a complete report when they return, and we have so far managed to remove only a single suitor.”
“Yes, I believe you are correct.” He seized the cards like a rope thrown to a drowning man.
“Lady Harewood’s ball will be my debut London ball, and I intend to dance every dance.” She threw down the gauntlet.
“Surely, your feet may require you to sit out?—”
“Mr. Darcy, I have not danced since Netherfield, and I had to endure my cousin trampling on my feet, and you barely conversing. I enjoy dancing. I walk to Oakham Mount most mornings without breaking a sweat. Dancing will not defeatme, and I intend to make memories—the kind I can regale my granddaughters.”
Granddaughters. Darcy could picture her sparkling like Lady Sophia as she recounted her triumphs. But he would not wish to hasten the time. She was a radiant twenty year old, given a London ball with silks and gentlemen flocking at her feet. A girl who loved to dance, and Darcy watched her anticipation with the compound awareness of a man who found her joy devastating and her vulnerability terrifying in equal proportion.
