Hiring Mr. Darcy

by Bowman, Valerie

  I was temporarily worried about Migel pulling ahead of us as they recited the scene from Emma where Knightley dresses Emma down for meddling, but at the last minute, Nigel backtracked and repeated himself for a few lines, which caused Lady Waverly-Jones to shake her head. It caused me to squelch a smile.

  Lacey and Harrison were about to perform when Jeremy leaned over to me and said, “Are you sure you want to watch this?”

  I swallowed and nodded. “We need to know what we’re up against.”

  I actually didn’t want to see it, but it would be cowardly to hide. I’d watched all the other couples perform, hadn’t I? Plus, there was a small sadistic part of me that truly thought if I saw them act out this scene together—this beautiful love scene that I’d memorized and performed with Harrison myself—that I would be able to tell if they were truly in love. I couldn’t look away.

  When they took the stage, I sucked in my breath. It was more difficult to see them together than I’d thought. Jeremy must have noticed me tense because without saying a word, he moved his hand over to squeeze mine where it rested on my knee. I squeezed back, then lifted my chin and sat in tense silence while Harrison, wearing a Regency costume I’d helped design, declared his undying love for Lacey.

  Lacey, it turned out, was a better actress than I’d given her credit for, or she truly was in love with Harrison, but either way she did such a good job that the entire audience stood and gave her an ovation when it was over, as the papparazzi cameras flashed. I sat there feeling like the wind had been knocked out of me again. Still holding my hand, Jeremy leaned over and whispered, “They’re only being nice to her because they know she’s a professional actress. It’s a pity ovation.”

  It wasn’t true, but it was nice of him to say. We scurried out the back while everyone was still clapping. Jeremy had just been trying to make me feel better. Lacey was good...really good, and Harrison hadn’t been a slouch either. The crowd cheered again when they received a ten. We heard it over the loudspeaker.

  My heart hammered in my chest, and I was doing my best to control my panicked breathing. We had to get a ten. We had to get a ten to maintain our tie with Harrison and Lacey. No pressure or anything.

  “Don’t worry, Meg.” Jeremy gave me a reassuring smile. “We got this.”

  Two more recitations were ahead of us and I hovered backstage, waiting for them to end.

  I gulped and put my hand on Jeremy’s arm. “I think I’m going to cast up my accounts.”

  He frowned. “What does that mean?”

  I pressed my hand to my belly. “It’s a Regency way of saying ‘puke.’”

  He searched my face. “Do you want me to go get you some seltzer?”

  “No.” I shook my head. “There’s no time. I can do this.” I took a deep breath. I was going to have to do this. There was no choice.

  I glanced up just as Harrison walked past. He stopped in front of me. “We’ll talk after, Meg.”

  Jeremy moved in front of me, blocking Harrison’s access to me, but not before I got a glimpse of a smiling Lacey, who somehow had a dozen roses clutched in her arms like it was opening night on Broadway.

  The next several minutes passed in a blur and then the speaker announced our names. “Performing the reunion scene from Pride and Prejudice, Dr. Meg Knightley and Mr. Jeremy Remington.”

  I felt like I’d swallowed a rabbit and its foot was hammering against my heart while its ears were lodged in my throat. I followed Jeremy onto the stage, my movements wooden. We took our places in the center of the space. I sucked in a deep breath.

  The silence was deafening before Jeremy began to speak. The words were familiar. I’d recited them so many times before, but like some public speaking nightmare, when it was my turn to recite my lines, my mouth opened and no words came out. All I could remember were Lacey’s passionate words to Harrison earlier, and his equally impassioned speech back.

  That was supposed to be me. Those were supposed to be my words. Jeremy and I exchanged panicked glances before he whispered my first line to me. I grabbed it desperately and repeated it while the vision of Lacey and Harrison kissing pummeled my traitorous brain. I somehow stumbled through the entire set of lines until it was Jeremy’s turn again.

  I tried not to breathe so heavily that the audience could hear me, but—oh my God—I was having another panic attack! Perhaps my face went white, perhaps it was the way I was breathing, but by the look on his face, I could tell that Jeremy knew I was in trouble. He fed me every line as quietly as he could and took my freezing fingers in his and squeezed them, all the while never breaking eye contact with me. Then I remembered our kiss last night, the one that shouldn’t have happened, the one that should have made me feel guilty, and in that moment, he felt so much like he was my Mr. Darcy, I believed. He’d made me believe.

  I squeezed his hand one last time to tell him I’d be okay, and then I turned back to the audience and belted out the rest of my lines in a strong, confident voice. The crowd roared with approval. Thankfully, it was all over in a flash, and while the clapping from the audience did not rival the noise made when Harrison and Lacey had finished, I was confident that I’d redeemed myself, if only a little.

  When it was over, we’d gotten a seven, which meant we were three points behind Harrison and Lacey. Jeremy tugged my hand and pulled me backstage, where he ushered me through the throngs of contestants, out across the lawn and into the hotel to the door marked ‘stairs.’ He pulled me inside, shut the door, and took a breath.

  I raised my gaze slowly to his, the rabbit ears still lodged in my throat. “I ruined it. I ruined everything.”

  “You didn’t ruin anything, Meg.”

  “Yes, I did. We got a seven. We’re three points behind. You’re a terrific actor, by the way. You were wasted on the school play. The points we got were all because of you.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Jeremy insisted. “You came back. You earned that applause.”

  I patted his sleeve. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to hold my failure against you. I’ll pay you the entire amount after we lose.”

  He scrubbed his hands across his face. “Who said we’re losing? Besides we’re a team. Our fate is a joint effort.”

  I leaned my head against the wall and sighed. “Why are you so great?”

  He blinked. “I’m not that great.”

  “Yeah, you are. Why are you still single?” Where had that come from? I guess it was a question I’d been wanting to ask him for a while now, and since I had no intention of ever playing Truth or Dare with him again, I might as well ask him now.

  His hands on his hips, Jeremy turned his head to face me. “What if I told you it’s because I’ve been pining after someone who’s never really noticed me?”

  Someone super-hot like Lacey, probably. “Well, she’s an idiot then,” I said loyally. Why did the thought of Jeremy pining after someone make me jealous…and unhappy?

  “Nah. She’s pretty smart, actually. I’m just not sure I’m her type.”

  “What? What more is she looking for?” I asked, suddenly, inexplicably resentful of this unknown woman.

  “I don’t know,” Jeremy said solemnly. “I’m not sure if I’ll ever know. Look, Meg, I—”

  The door opened and Harrison stuck in his head. “There you are, Meg. You can’t hide from me, forever. We have to talk, now.”

  Chapter 25

  Still Saturday

  The last thing I wanted to do after my humiliation in the tent was go talk to Harrison about his relationship with Lacey. But I was a grown woman, and if I needed to break up with my boyfriend, then I might as well get it over with. It just seemed particularly awful to have to do it in England while wearing Regency clothing, but waiting wasn’t going to make it any better. Harrison was right. We needed to talk.

  “Okay,” I said, nodding and giving Jeremy a half-hearted smile. “Let’s go, Harrison.”

  He had my little Regency purse in his hand. “You left your reticule i
n the tent,” he said as he handed it to me.

  “Thank you,” I murmured.

  Jeremy stood aside so I could pass and leave with Harrison, but just as we were about to walk out the door together, Lacey came barreling in. “There you are, Harry. I’ve been looking all over for you. We need to go out to the lawn. There are a ton of photographers out there and I promised them some good pictures after our scene. They’re going to do a full write-up about us in the Times,” she gushed.

  Harrison’s face went pale. “Can it wait? I need to speak to Meg now.”

  Lacey’s smile faded and her nostrils flared. “No, it can’t wait. They’re waiting for us right now. Besides, I promised Dr. Holmes we’d give them their photo ops. This is what we came for.”

  She gave Jeremy and me a once-over. “I’ll give you one minute,” she said to Harrison before releasing the door and letting it shut.

  I could still feel her presence hovering outside the door.

  Harrison closed his eyes, which had dark circles under them. He truly looked tortured. Good. “I’m sorry, Meg. I really am. I have to do this.” He nodded toward the door and the awaiting paparazzi.

  “I know you do,” I said. I’d known the minute Lacey invoked Dr. Holmes’ name that Harrison would be powerless to resist. “Go.”

  In the moment, I honestly didn’t care if we ever talked about his kiss with Lacey. It was nearly comical what had happened between us since Lacey Lewis had stepped into our lives. She was like a famous tornado with painted nails.

  “Meg,” Harrison said, staring into my eyes intensely. “I want you to know that that kiss meant nothing. I’ll explain more later, but you have to believe me.”

  His eyes told me he was telling the truth, but I didn’t know what I believed anymore. And it didn’t change the fact that I felt humiliated. “We’ll talk later,” I said. There. How was that for unemotional and non-dramatic?

  Harrison took a deep breath. “I hate that I have to leave you like this, but Dr. Holmes—”

  “You don’t have to explain. Just go.”

  Harrison bit the inside of his cheek and nodded. When he turned away reluctantly and pulled open the door, Lacey was standing out there, her arms still filled with roses, talking to a crowd that had somehow formed around her. The door shut behind Harrison, and I sighed and shook my head.

  Then I turned, hiked up my skirts, and began climbing the stairs to the second floor. Jeremy followed me and we continued mostly in silence. “I didn’t know your purse was called a ‘reticule,’” Jeremy said as we trudged down the long, corridor to our room.

  “Yeah, it’s a Regency word,” I offered halfheartedly.

  He nodded.

  Once inside the room, Jeremy unbuttoned me and I went into the bathroom and changed out of my gown. My mind was numb. It was as if the thoughts of Harrison and Lacey had been swept away, replaced only by a big blank spot that felt vaguely melancholy. I thought about all the erasing I would have to do in my planner if Harrison and I broke up. Hell, I’d probably have to throw it out and get a new one. Sob.

  By the time I came back into the bedroom wearing black yoga pants and a gray T-shirt, Jeremy was already in navy boxers and a white T-shirt. He held up a bottle of red wine. “Dinner?”

  I grinned at him. He really was great. “Looks delicious.”

  He poured two glasses and handed me one while I sat on the end of his bed. I took a halfhearted sip.

  “Are you okay?” he asked quietly.

  “Yeah.” I shrugged. “I think I am. At least, I know I will be. This isn’t my first rodeo.”

  “You mean being cheated on? Like you told me last night?”

  “Yep, and I know I should be sad and mad about my boyfriend kissing an actress, but I’m only pissed that I screwed up the competition.”

  The hint of a smile played across Jeremy’s face. “We’re not out of it yet. Where’s that competitive spirit of yours?”

  I stood and made my way over to the window, where I pushed back the curtains and peered out to see Harrison and Lacey, their arms behind each other’s backs, smiling for the ring of cameras that surrounded them as if they were on a red carpet. “It’s been trampled to death by the paparazzi.” I let the curtains fall back into place and settled onto my little bed, my wine glass still clutched in my hand.

  Jeremy sat on the side of my bed near my feet. I was wearing socks but I could no longer care about whether he was horrified by my hooves. Great, apathy. How attractive.

  I laid back and stared at the ceiling, the wine glass resting on my belly. “Why is life so hard?”

  Jeremy lay back next to me and did the same thing. “A question for the ages.”

  “Seriously, why?” I said with a sigh.

  “Life is hard,” he said. “But it’s a hell of a lot easier when you’re doing what you love. I can tell you that.”

  I propped myself up on an elbow and took a sip of wine, facing Jeremy. “Is that why you quit being an engineer?”

  He continued to look at the ceiling. “That’s exactly why I quit.”

  “Why did you major in it to begin with?” I took another sip of wine. Wine usually put me to sleep, but sleep sounded good to me right now. Quiet, restful sleep where the mess my life had become would just go away for a few hours.

  Jeremy propped himself up on his elbow too and faced me. We were less than a foot apart. “I majored in engineering because I thought it would earn me a good living. And it did. The only problem was, it turns out a living without happiness isn’t a good living after all.”

  I nodded. “I thought I would love being a history professor.”

  “Do you?” he prompted, taking a sip of his wine.

  “There are parts of it I love,” I admitted.

  “But you’d rather be writing novels?” he prompted.

  “I don’t know. I think so. But what if I try it and hate it?”

  He pressed his lips together. “There are no guarantees in this life, Meg Knightley. There are only gut feelings. No one ever promised that following your dreams would be easy.”

  “Yeah,” I said solemnly, taking another sip of wine. “You’re right. But I don’t do well with failure.”

  His brows shot up. “Is that why you’ve never tried? You’re afraid to fail?”

  I sighed and stared at my wine glass. “Ellie would tell you that’s exactly why I’ve never tried. I’ve spent most of my life being a super-organized planner with every step mapped out. Writing a novel is messy. I can’t control what will happen there.”

  “Yeah, about that,” Jeremy said. “What made you such a control freak anyway?”

  I groaned. “Do you want my pat answer or the deep one that I paid a psychologist thousands of dollars to tell me?”

  His lips quirked into a smile. “The expensive one, please.”

  I brought my wine glass up to my nose as if I could hide behind it. “I can’t believe I’m telling you this, but here goes.” I took a deep breath. “I don’t know if you know this, but my dad had...has a gambling problem.”

  “Yeah.” Jeremy nodded. “Luke’s mentioned it.”

  That’s right. Jeremy had already met my kooky parents. Both of them.

  “Well, growing up getting letters threatening eviction because our rent wasn’t paid wasn’t exactly the easiest thing on a kid. Especially one who was already prone to anxiety.”

  “You? Anxious? No!” His tongue licked at the corner of his lips.

  I gave him a look that said ‘are you quite done?’. “Anyway, according to my therapist, I turned to trying to control everything in order to make sense of my world. The more perfect and organized everything could be, the safer and happier I felt.”

  “You do get that nothing is truly under your control, right?” Jeremy asked.

  “In the macro sense, of course,” I breathed. “In the micro sense, no way. Every single thing I do is written down and executed.”

  “I get it,” he replied. “It makes sense. I’m sorry tha
t you had to deal with such uncertainty in your childhood.”

  I took another sip of wine. “Yeah, well, we all have our little red wagons to pull behind us, don’t we?”

  “It also stands to reason that you don’t want to take a chance on writing. Anything artistic like that is iffy, eh?”

  “So iffy.” I shook my head. “I can’t tell you how much I admire Luke for following his dreams, though. I give him hell about being flaky, but I guess...I guess I really wish I had that kind of courage.”

  “Do you think that’s why you’re pissed at Lacey?” Jeremy asked.

  “Whaa?” I squinted at him. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, she’s an actress. That’s definitely not a profession for the faint of heart. And she’s managed to succeed at it, at least more than many people do. Given what you just told me, that’s gotta trigger your issues.”

  Wow. Jeremy was wise and deep and continued to surprise me with his insights. Plus, he was totally right. “Oh, my God, I’m jealous of Lacey for more than one reason?” I groaned and let my head drop to the pillow.

  Jeremy laughed. “And not because she looks like Megan Fox.”

  “She does look like Megan Fox, though, you have to admit.”

  “Maybe a little. But I’ve never really been into Megan Fox all that much. Not my type.”

  I smiled and nudged his shoulder. “Speaking of your type, you mentioned earlier that you’ve been pining after someone who’s never really noticed you.”

  “Yep,” he breathed, also letting his head drop to the pillow beside mine.

  “So, how’s that going to work out?” I didn’t necessarily want to hear the details about his would-be girlfriend, but I felt like it was selfish and boring to keep talking about me and my problems with Harrison. Jeremy had problems too. At least if I could give him some advice, one of us might be better off in the relationship department by the time this trip was over.