Page 58 of Yearning

It became a bit of a pattern. Every day, he woke up, read all the letters he’d written, and then composed a new one, which went in the drawer.

She would have to be in mourning, of course, for her husband. For a year. But if she and Richard were in a hurry, they might announce an engagement after several months. They might marry when she went into half-mourning, at six months. People might talk, but it would die down.

But then news came that his cousin had announced his marriage to Lady Marybeth Constance, and Darcy was entirely flummoxed.

He sorted through his letters to her.

All of them were awful.

He threw them all in the fire.

It had been three weeks at this point. He decided this was foolish, and that he would simply call upon her.

However, when he arrived at Hellig house in town, the butler informed him that the dowager baroness had retired to the country, ceding the house to the new baron and his wife.

Darcy had not stepped foot in that house since he had held Elizabeth’s brand new baby girl. He should simply write her a letter.

But it was impossible. He had tried to write her only twenty letters, and all of them were wrong. Instead, he made himself ready for a journey to Hellig, where he would stay in an inn. He would see her. He would speak to her.

And then, the morning he was meant to leave, he received word that there had been complications with Georgiana’s latest pregnancy. The babe had come early. She was bleeding. The babe was not strong. They feared for the worst.

He left to see to his sister, of course. He left because she might be on her deathbed. He could not say that all thoughts of Elizabeth were forgotten. He never forgot that woman. But he was distracted, and he was there for a matter of two months.

In the end, it all turned out well.

Georgiana recovered.

The babe recovered too, small but strong. A little boy, his wife’s husband’s heir. The child ate more each day, woke for longer, struck out his little limbs and grasped at the air, wiggling and dancing as if he was fighting himself back to health.

Darcy thought often of how much he would have liked to have been there to watch little Lily grow in this way. He thought of what Elizabeth had said, of her having another man’s babe, of how it could have been between them.

By now, going to her seemed ridiculous.

He had no idea what to say for himself.

He tarried with Georgiana for longer than perhaps was necessary, lingering as their guest to make sure all was well, but then he felt it was time to go, and he headed back to London.

He should not have.

He should have gone to her.

He went to Richard instead.

“SHE’S WITH CHILD,” Richard pronounced, pouring brandy for both of them. They were in a house Richard was letting in town, seemingly with his fiancée’s money, for Darcy could not see how he would have had the money else.

“What?” said Mr. Darcy, gazing at a painting on the wall of a hunting party, the dogs with their little doggy heads thrown back, barking at the autumn sky. “You mean, she was with child when her husband died.”

Richard handed him a glass of brandy. “I suppose that is what I mean, yes.”

“Or you mean, you absolute cad, it’s your child, and you are not ending this sham of a betrothal to go and rescue the woman you have gotten into this condition!”

“What?” said Richard, who was looking into his brandy glass and not at him. “Why would you say such a thing?”

Darcy took a sip of his brandy. “I saw you.”

“What do you mean, you saw me?”

“It really is why I came,” said Darcy. “I was going to confront you about it, tell you that I was angry with you for using her badly—”