Page 59 of Inventing Mr Darcy

That’s the moment when he spots Geoff. Sitting on my bed.

“Elle?” He’s impossibly still, the only movement his eyes flitting between us. But his grip must have slackened; if I hadn’t already reached for the champagne, it would have gone crashing to the floor. “What the hell is going on here?”

“Nothing,” Geoff and I blurt out at the same time, which only makes us sound guilty.

“Not that either of us owes you an explanation,” Geoff adds, “but if you must know, you’ve interrupted two colleagues discussing a scholarly matter. Nothing more.”

“I was showing him a historical document I found,” I explain. “An early nineteenth-century novel. It’s”—everything—“nothing.”

Geoff twists the laptop as if to show him. “A career-altering discovery, that’s what it is.”

Somehow, that only makes Fisher angrier. “Christ.” When he turns to face me, I can’t escape the hurt in his eyes. “You promised.”

I did. And now guilt makes me defensive. “Nothing happened between me and Geoff,” I reiterate. “Do you—do you think I’m cheating on you?”

Fisher flinches like I’ve just slipped a knife between his ribs. “No, Elle.” His voice is soft. Dangerously soft, maybe—like that night on the phone. “That’s not what this is about.”

But I don’t believe him. After all, he can’t really be this angry about me showing Geoff a random file on my laptop, can he?

“Then what is it about?” I demand.

Fisher jerks his hard gaze from me to Geoff, as if he expects Geoff to explain.

Geoff looks bewildered and shrugs.

“I can’t—” Fisher begins, and then drags a hand through his hair and bites off the rest. It’s clear there’s something he’s itching to say but can’t, or more accurately, won’t.

“Maybe I should go,” Geoff says as he starts to set my laptop aside.

“Yes,” Fisher hisses.

At the same time, I say, “No.” The real problem here isn’t that Fisher doesn’t trust Geoff.

It’s that he doesn’t trust me.

A muscle ticks along Fisher’s jaw. “I was sitting there tonight, in my father’s hospital room, and all I could think about was you—how much I missed you. How much I—”

I’m pretty sure I know what his next words were going to be, before he stopped himself. What I don’t know is whether he won’t say he loves me in front of Geoff, or whether he’s no longer sure he loves me, period.

“I didn’t tell my mom where I was going when I left, just promised her I’d only be gone an hour. Even then, she was terrified I was making a mistake by leaving.” He looks me up and down again “Maybe she was right.” He strides toward the door, then tosses over his shoulder, “I’ll let you know when I’m back in Grantham.”

My pulse hammers in my temples, driven by a chaotic mixture of panic and fury. “Why bother?” I snap back.

And then he’s gone.

Silence reigns for several minutes. All I can think of is that conversation Geoff and I had at the Grind.

You don’t know Fisher as well as you think you do.

I wonder … do you?

I could cry. But instead, I march toward Geoff, thrusting the bottle of champagne at his chest, trading it for my laptop. “Open that,” I order him. With a nod, he gets up to fetch a couple of plastic cups from the top of the dresser as I sit down. I hear the cork pop as I click on the Grantham College remote log-in app.

“What are you doing?” he asks, peering down at the screen as he hands me a fizzing cup.

“Uploading this to the database.”

“Oh, wow. That’s a big step, taking it public already.” He sits down beside me. “Are you sure?”