He did have a good idea who would be likely to give him what he deserved, though, and so it was not without a certain amount of trepidation that he asked Mrs. Reynolds to join him in his study later that evening.
“Mrs. Reynolds, there is an upcoming event for which I will need your assistance in planning.”
“Certainly, sir. What would you like me to do?”
“First there is something I must tell you, which is that two weeks ago Miss Bennet did me the honor of agreeing to become my wife. We agreed not to announce the engagement immediately, since she wished to have an opportunity to experience Pemberley without all the expectations that would be put upon her as the future mistress.”
Her face lit up, although this intelligence was not completely unexpected; she had never before seen such warm behavior on his part toward a woman. She was very pleased with the tidings, as she had long been hoping to see him settle himself at Pemberley and produce some young Darcys to fill the hallways. “That is joyful news, sir. She is a delightful young lady.”
He cleared his throat, recalling her siding with Elizabeth against him in the matter of treating his burns, and suspecting that it would not be the only time he would face such an alliance. “We have decided that we prefer to have an immediate wedding, and it is with this that I will need your assistance in making arrangements. I believe that the day after tomorrow will suit admirably.”
She looked at him in some confusion, uncertain how to interpret this information. Finally, she decided that he must not be serious, and smiled. “Is that a jest, sir?”
“Not at all, Mrs. Reynolds. Now, I realize that there are certain arrangements that must be made. I will be away most of tomorrow, and I would like you to consult with Miss Bennet as to…”
“Mr. Darcy,” she interrupted, an obvious measure of her distress. “We cannot possibly manage your wedding on such short notice! What of the guests who must be notified, what of Miss Bennet’s family? And she must have an appropriate gown, and Lord knows what else!”
“We do not plan to invite any guests other than Georgiana, Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner, and possibly my aunt and uncle, if they are available. No trimmings are necessary, and if Miss Bennet is not satisfied with her own apparel, perhaps one of my mother’s gowns could be altered to fit her; her height is much the same, I believe.”
She made one more attempt. “Sir, surely she deserves to have a fine wedding, with her family at her side, rather than a patched-together affair!”
She certainly does, he thought, and it is my fault that she will not have it. He leaned back in his chair, his face unreadable. “Nonetheless, that is the plan.”
Her eyes narrowed as they waged a brief silent battle. There was an obvious shift in her voice from the respectful family servant to the strict disciplinarian of his youth as she asked sharply, “Mr. Darcy, is there some reason why this must occur so quickly that would compensate for all the difficulties involved?”
“The matter is decided. That will be all, Mrs. Reynolds.”
Her voice was filled with suspicion. “Did you compromise the young lady?”
His only response was to look at her with the gaze that had withered the arguments of many a difficult opponent.
“Fitzwilliam Darcy, if you were not too big, I swear I would put you across my knee and give you what you so richly deserve! How could you? What would your mother have said? I can tell you what your father would have said, and you would have had worse than a beating there! You were raised better than that. This is behavior I would have expected from George Wickham, not you! And you call yourself a gentleman—I am most thoroughly ashamed of you!”
He made no response, nor did his face change, apart from a brief wince at the mention of Wickham. She continued to glare at him furiously until he finally closed his eyes in a well understood signal of defeat. She allowed him to suffer for a few more moments before she spoke again, her voice somewhat softened. “Well, there is nothing to be done for it now, I suppose. It will have to wait another day at least, though; the services for the Wheeler children will be the day after tomorrow, and it would be disrespectful to have your wedding the same day. And we must have a reason…” She paused for a moment before continuing, “We will put it about that the Bishop is set upon officiating at your wedding himself, so it has to be done while you can both be at Matlock; that also means that the ceremony will be held at the cathedral, which will draw away any attention from the lack of attendance by Miss Bennet’s family. We can arrange a celebration here as well—yes, I believe that is the best idea. Does that suit, sir?”
“Admirably,” he said quietly.
“I shall consult with Miss Bennet in the morning, then, sir.” She rose to her feet somewhat stiffly.
“Thank you, Mrs. Reynolds. I leave it in your capable hands.” Once she had left, he leaned back in his chair, running his fingers through his hair. Oddly enough, he felt more relief than anything else at their discussion, and was thankful to have handed off the responsibility for planning the event. He had been racking his brain all day in an attempt to invent a reasonable excuse for marrying so soon, and Mrs. Reynolds had solved that dilemma inside a minute.
Feeling more relaxed than he had all day, he returned to the drawing room, in hopes of finding Elizabeth still there. He wished to speak with her privately, to inform her of what had been decided, and that she need not worry about a similar loss of control on his part again. However, when he arrived, he discovered that she had already retired for the night. Disappointed, he joined the Gardiners briefly for conversation, before making his own excuses.
* * *
Elizabeth was preparing for bed when a not completely unexpected knock came at the door. She opened it to find Darcy on the other side, and quickly moved to allow him to enter before he could be seen by anyone. She had wondered if he planned to come to her, and had been unable to decide whether she feared or wished for his appearance more, and how she would behave if he did come. Now that it came to the moment, though, a smile came naturally to her face, and she felt breathless, but to her surprise he did no more than touch her face lightly in greeting.
“I have been making arrangements this evening, and I wanted to inform you of them tonight since I plan to ride to Matlock at first light,” he said. This was his opportunity to prove he had mended his ways, that he could be trusted in the most challenging situation possible, and challenges certainly did not come any greater than being alone with her in her room while she was in her nightclothes. He forced his thoughts away from her lovely form, and determinedly focused upon the conversation.
“And what do your arrangements entail?”
“I have spoken to Mrs. Reynolds regarding plans for our wedding, and she has decreed that it is to be in three days’ time, assuming that I have no difficulty arranging matters with the Bishop and obtaining the license. I believe she plans to consult with you regarding it in the morning. I also wanted to mention, in case you were planning to write to anyone in your family, that your uncle agreed that it might be wisest not to inform your family of our plans until we can do so personally, though…” he paused to smile endearingly, “if you are of a different opinion, we can certainly review that decision.”
“Well done, sir,” she replied with a laugh. “For a moment I feared you had forgotten our agreement regarding consulting me.”
He looked slightly uncomfortable. “I am trying to learn, though it may take me some time, but I will point out in my own defense that you did say last night that I could make the decision regarding when we married.”
“True enough, although I could argue that you were taking advantage of me in a defenseless moment,” she retorted cheerfully.
The color drained from his face at her words, and a look of deep guilt came over him. “I know that only too well, Elizabeth, and if I felt that there were anything in the world that I could do to make up for it, I would do so without hesitation, but as it is, all I can do is to say that I recognize my fault, and apolo
gize from the bottom of my heart, and hope that someday you will be able to forgive me.”
The distress in his face pained her deeply. “William, you misunderstand me completely,” she said gently. “My joke, and it was obviously a poor one, was that I offered to let you make the decision on the wedding when I was half asleep, and thus not at my best. I bear you no anger over what happened last night. As I said then, you did nothing that I did not permit, and I take responsibility for my own actions.”
“You may have permitted it, but only after I intentionally did everything within my power to make it difficult for you to refuse,” said Darcy, feeling honor-bound himself to confess the full degree of his fault.
“You may have attempted to persuade, but you did nothing to force me. It may have been poor judgment on both our parts, but I refuse to dwell on what might have been,” she said, less than comfortable with the course of this conversation.
He looked at her in unhappy bafflement, leading Elizabeth to the conclusion that he would prefer to have her rail at him than to refuse to blame him, but she could recognize that his distress would not be alleviated by any amount of reassurance. A smile touched the corners of her lips as she conceived of a suitable revenge for his stubbornness, but she debated whether she had the audacity to follow it through. She could hardly believe she was considering it, though it would certainly relieve some of his anxiety and distress. Impulsively, she stepped up to him and began to untie his cravat.
“Elizabeth, what are you doing?” he asked in a strained voice, looking down at her tempting form, clad only in the night attire that he knew so well how to remove.
She dropped the cravat on the floor, and proceeded to his coat. “I am undoing the buttons of your coat, sir.”
“I am aware of that; my question is why.”
Elizabeth hid a smile. “My proximate goal is to remove your clothing. Following that it is my intention to seduce you, sir.” She paused briefly in her endeavors to kiss his neck lightly.
“Elizabeth, it was my intention in coming here tonight to demonstrate to you I can be trusted not to take advantage of you again, and you are making it extremely difficult!”
She finished with his coat and began on his waistcoat. “I cannot see why. You have made your point admirably, and now the question is whether I can be trusted not to take advantage of you, and I fear the answer to that question is no.” Realizing that she would need at least minimal cooperation from him if she were to have any success in removing his coats, she slipped her hands inside them and tried to tempt him by caressing his chest through the fine lawn of his shirt. Moving to press her body against his, she felt the evidence of his arousal as she opened the collar of his shirt and kissed the exposed hollows of his neck.
“Elizabeth,” he groaned. She continued to spread kisses across his neck while she pressed her hips against his provocatively, until with a moan he captured her mouth with his in a kiss that spoke of undeniable hunger. She took advantage of the moment to slip his coats off his shoulders, letting them drop to the floor.
The process of seducing him, she was fascinated to discover, was at least as exciting to her as the known delights of his touch. In the past, he had always taken the lead in touching her, and she was finding this reversal a heady experience. She ran her hands lightly across his shoulders, and drew them tantalizingly slowly down his back before beginning the process of extricating his shirt from his breeches. She had just managed to slide her hands onto the warm skin of his waist when he raised his mouth from hers. “Well, my love, if you are bent on this process of seduction, perhaps I should mention to you that removing your own clothes would be at least as effective in that regard as removing mine,” he said.
“I appreciate the intelligence, sir,” she said teasingly as she explored the warmth of his chest. “Perhaps I should investigate the truth of that hypothesis, once I have had a chance to enjoy myself with this.” Although somewhat reluctant to give up the pleasure of touching him, she removed her hands and stepped back. With a seductive smile playing across her lips, she untied her dressing gown and slipped it off, allowing it to fall to the floor in a pile of silk. Aroused by the expression on his face as he watched, she undid the ties of her nightgown one at a time, making the discovery that he seemed even more affected by the process as she proceeded more slowly. Finally she slid first one shoulder, then the other out of her nightgown, so only her fingertips were holding it up, and then she let that drop as well.
It was beyond understanding, she decided, how he could excite her so much simply by looking at her. “Pray do not forget your hair, my love; that is a very effective tool in seduction as well,” he said, his voice hoarse. She obligingly undid the braid she had made for the night, and shook her long curls loose with a beguiling smile, looking up at him as she touched the tip of her tongue to her lips enticingly.
Darcy had reached the end of his endurance for this delightful game. He strode toward her, his hands going to tear at the buttons of his breeches until, with a muffled curse, he discovered just how extraordinarily painful the process of dealing with buttons was likely to be for him for the next few days. Elizabeth, recognizing his difficulty, pushed his hands away, and said with a flirtatious smile, “Please allow me.” She undid the buttons, though at a far slower pace than he would have chosen, and had the inspiration of interrupting that activity periodically to stroke the bulge in the front of his breeches, enjoying the sense of power she felt when he moaned her name pleadingly.
“I am simply doing everything within my power to make it difficult for you to refuse me, William,” she teased him provocatively.
“Believe me, I could not refuse you if I tried at this point.” He kissed her neck and nibbled at her ear. “And you have me at a distinct disadvantage, madam, since I am unable to use my hands as effectively as I would like to make you suffer as much as I am suffering at the moment.”
She smiled wickedly at him as she continued the process of removing his breeches. As soon as he was free of them he said with a roguish look, “There is, however, nothing wrong with the rest of my body!” He propelled her backwards to the delightful accompaniment of her laughter until she was forced onto the bed. Holding her shoulders down with the backs of his hands, he kissed her greedily, then sought her nipple with his mouth and suckled her until she writhed and moaned beneath him. Once he was certain she was ready for him, with a passionate demand quite different from the gentleness he had shown the previous night, he thrust himself deep inside her, and possessed her with hard, rapid strokes that demonstrated the strength of his desire and drove her to the peaks of arousal until she was engulfed by waves of exquisite pleasure. Triggered by her moans of ecstasy, his release followed almost immediately.
When he at length surfaced from the oblivion to which she had led him, he said with concern, “I apologize for my loss of control, my love. I hope that I was not too rough with you?”
She shook her head. “I found it very… exciting,” she said, smiling with the memory. “I believe I enjoyed seducing you, as well.”
“You, my love, are a menace!” exclaimed Darcy.
“Is that a complaint, sir?”
“Not at all! I am quite content to have been seduced so effectively. And, as Shakespeare says, ‘Therefore ’tis meet that noble minds keep ever with their likes; for who so firm that cannot be seduced?’”
“Sir, I cry foul; learning quotes on seduction is not a part of a young lady’s education. You shall have to choose another topic.”
“Perhaps it should be part of their education—there are many gentlemen who would think it a good cause.” He caressed her cheek.
“Then seduction, perhaps, is one of the skills a truly accomplished young lady must possess, along with a thorough knowledge of music, dancing, and singing?”
“I would say so,” he said with mock gravity, “though I might point out that if you wish to truly excel at seduction, you will need, as my aunt Catherine would say, to practice it quite con
stantly.”
She nipped his shoulder affectionately. “I will have to consider how to obtain my practice, then.”
“Solely in the interest of furthering your education, I will volunteer to be the subject of any further experiments you choose to undertake.”
“That is one of the many things I admire about you, William—your constant attention to the improvement of my mind.”
“‘Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediment,’ my love.”
“A much fairer subject, sir. ‘Young men’s minds are always changeable.’”