Page 165 of Pride and Prejudice Resolutions

"I am facilitating," his wife disagreed primly. She turned back to Caroline. "Miss Bingley, the Colonel has three weeks to secure a wife. Or his father sends him to the West Indies."

Caroline's stomach dropped. "Three weeks?"

"Easter Sunday," Miss Darcy confirmed. "And he has been spending every waking moment with you or trailing behind you. One wonders what could that mean, do you not think?"

"He has been helping me find a husband."

"Has he?" Mrs Darcy's smile was sharp. "Or has he been sabotaging every man who looks at you whilst pretending it is strategy?"

Caroline's mouth formed a perfect 'O'. "Oh," she said faintly.

"Oh indeed," Mrs Darcy agreed, looking entirely too pleased.

Caroline's mind assembled the evidence. The Colonel's refusal to introduce her to Lord Fawlton. His insistence she wear subdued colours. His fury at the opera. His panic at Rotten Row. His relief when he saw her sitting safely in this drawing room. Three weeks until Easter. He required a wife. A wife with a dowry. She had a dowry.

The drawing room tilted. Caroline's fingers dug into the arm of her chair, her knuckles blanched white.

"Miss Bingley?" Lady Keathley leaned forward, her brow furrowing. "Are you unwell? You have lost all colour."

"I am perfectly well," she lied. Her voice sounded distant to her ears, as though it belonged to someone else.

Mrs Darcy's sharp eyes missed nothing. "You look as though you have seen a ghost, Miss Bingley."

Caroline stood. Too abruptly. The teacup rattled against its saucer, sloshing tea over the rim.

"I must leave." The words emerged clipped, breathless. "My sister—Louisa—she is unwell. I must attend to her."

The lie was transparent. They all knew it.

Lady Keathley rose, her skirts whispering against the carpet. "Miss Bingley, please stay. Whatever troubles you—"

"There is no trouble." Caroline forced her lips into a smile. It felt like pressing shards of glass against her skin. "Thank you for the tea. It was... enlightening. Just like you promised in your invitation."

She curtsied—too quick, too shallow—and turned for the door.

"Miss Bingley, wait—" Miss Darcy's voice followed her, but Caroline was already moving.

She crossed the drawing room in five strides, her heels clicking against the parquet. The butler materialised, professional neutrality giving way to alarm as she wrenched open the door.

"Miss Bingley, shall I summon a carriage—"

"No." She did not slow. "I prefer to walk."

The late afternoon air struck her face like a slap. Cold. Sharp. She walked. Then faster. Then she was nearly running, her spencer flapping behind her, her bonnet slipping askew.

I am not crying, she told herself. A tear betrayed her, hot and traitorous, sliding down her cheek.I do not cry.

Another tear fell. Then another.

By the time she reached Portman Square, her breath came in ragged gasps, and her vision blurred. Her invincible composure lay in ruins at her feet.

What a fool I have been.

She had thought—God help her, she had actually believed—that the Colonel might care for her. That his refusal to introduce her to Lord Fawlton stemmed from protectiveness, not calculation. That his fury at the opera had been genuine concern, not an investment in a potential asset.

That when he looked at her, he saw Caroline. Not twenty thousand pounds wrapped in sarcenet.

Fool. Idiot. Desperate, naive fool.