Page 76 of Yearning

Then he had to listen to her broken little girl sobs as he put his leg and his brace on, and he swore under his breath, and it was then that he thought he must have decided it, but he didn’t think it, because there was no time.

As luck would have it, he was only a short way down the path before Elizabeth was coming, and she was running, because Lily’s cries must have been loud, and she had heard them.

He pointed, out of breath, sweaty everywhere. “I let her get ahead of me. I should have stopped her.”

Elizabeth shot past him, skirts clutched in one fist, face like a stone mask.

He wavered, unsure if he should continue on to go for more help or to go back. He decided in favor of going for someone else, for with Elizabeth there, Lily would not be alone. He continued toward the house, but by the time he got back, Elizabeth and Lily came back as well, moving faster than him, catching him up. The little girl was clinging to her mother, face buried in her neck. Elizabeth clutched her daughter to her hip.

“You got her down,” he said.

“Well, it was very steep,” she said. “My skirts got ripped, but it was… well, the things one can do when it is one’s child.”

He grimaced. “I was going to get more help.” Did she think he had just run away like a coward?

“Yes, of course you were,” said Elizabeth. “I am going to take her inside. She has had quite a fright.”

He stopped someone on his way up to his room and asked them to pack his belongings. Then he went to the stables to see to his carriage.

Leaving, it was the only thing he could do.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

ELIZABETH STAYED WITH her frightened daughter for some time, though she found it curious that Mr. Darcy never came to offer anything. She did not know if she wanted him to apologize or not. She supposed it was not entirely his fault. However, he should say something. At the least, he should be inquiring after little Lily.

So, after her tiny daughter had quieted, she went to seek him.

He was not in his bedchamber.

The wardrobe was open. It was empty.

It all went through her like a gust of winter wind, and she felt first devastated and then angry, the anger burning through her like a bright flame.

How dare he?

Not again.

Lord, she could not with this man! She could not believe that he would leave her. But it was entirely what he did, apparently, and she should never have trusted him again.

Every time he left her, it destroyed something in her.

And he never said goodbye.

And he never gave her any choice. He was always deciding things for the both of them without even consulting her. The great Fitzwilliam Darcy knew better than she did.

She clenched both of her hands into fists and left the room.

She clambered down the back stairs and out of the back door.

She was not sure why she was going to the stables, because she knew that when she got there, she would simply find that he had already left. If he hadn’t already left, she wasn’t even going to try to stop him. She was going to tell him to go away and leave her be, forever.

Not only for her own sake, for Lily’s. For when her daughter knew that Mr. Darcy had left, she would blame herself, and Lily’s little heart would be broken. So, after that, it was done. She would not allow him to hurt her daughter in that way.

Either they could depend on him or they could not.

That was the truth of it.

But before she got to the stables, she saw that his carriage was sitting in the drive, just sitting there.