Dating Mr. Darcy: A romantic comedy (Love Manor Romantic Comedy Book 1)

by Kate O'Keeffe

  “Well, in this case you’re wrong. Never means never.”

  “Okay, okay. Gorgeous fictional characters aside, all you’ve got to do is make sure you’re not sent home in the first three rounds. That way you can promote Timothy and show the American people that you’re worth watching.”

  I let out a sigh. “No pressure, then.”

  “I know everyone will love you just as much as I do.”

  “How am I going to achieve that?”

  “Just be yourself.”

  Huh. The most useful advice given ever.

  “Look, Penn. I’ll try to stay for two rounds, then I’ll break some rule or something so I get sent home.”

  “Three.”

  “Two.”

  “Come on, Em. It’s one more week in TV time. It’s probably a couple of days at most for you in real time.”

  “Are you Emma Brady?” a voice says behind me.

  I look up to see a woman about my age, dressed in jeans and a hoodie, her oversized, dark-rimmed glasses balanced on her small nose. “Hold on a sec, Penn,” I say into the phone. “Yup, I’m Emma Brady.”

  The girl smiles. “Cool. I’m Suzie. Mrs. Watson sent me. You’ll, ah, need to pass me your phone.” She holds her hand out, palm up.

  I feel like a prisoner who’s wasted their one final call on discussing how I’m not going to fall for a Mr. Darcy imposter and keep my clothes on during parties. “Can I at least say goodbye?”

  “Make it quick.”

  “Penn? I gotta go,” I say into the phone.

  “Remember everything,” she replies sternly. “Ev-er-y-thing.”

  Pressure much?

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “What you’re doing could lead to big things for us. I love you, Em.” I can hear the crack in her voice.

  “I love you, too, Penn. It’ll all be okay.”

  “This show is going to change things for us. I just know it,” she says with a sniff. “Your dad would have been so proud of you, Em.”

  Something twists painfully inside at the thought of my dad. Although I’m not exactly sure he’d be proud of me going on a reality show to promote our new label, I know he’d support me in whatever decisions I made. Running his own business was a dream he never managed during his lifetime. Now, through hard work and sacrifice, I’ve got a real shot at it.

  “Look after Frank, okay?” I say, suddenly fiercely missing my cat.

  I glance back at Suzie. Her hand is outstretched, and she’s got a mildly panicked look on her face. I say goodbye to Penny, turn my phone off, and reluctantly hand it over.

  “Frank?” she questions.

  “My cat.” I collect my clutch from the counter and ready myself to leave. I glance at the handkerchief. There’s no way I’m giving a grown man that thing, I don’t care how scary Mrs. Watson is. This is twenty-first century America. People don’t give each other handkerchiefs anymore. It’s just weird.

  I pick it up and discreetly drop it to the floor, where I kick it under the table.

  Suzie doesn’t seem to notice as she connects a pack inside the back of my dress and a mic discreetly tucked inside the lapel of my top.

  This has all begins to feel very real.

  Suzie presses her finger to her ear and then says, “It’s time.”

  On sky-high heels, I follow her unsteadily out of the room. As I slip into the back of the long, black, glossy limo parked up at the curb, I know this could be the making of Timothy.

  Or the undoing of Emma Brady.

  Chapter 2

  How on this sweet Earth did I get myself into this position?

  I’m not talking metaphorically or spiritually or anything like that here, you understand.

  Oh, no. I’m being much more literal.

  Right now, I’m all alone in the back of the limo, whizzing through the outskirts of Houston on my way to some ranch out in banjo territory. I’ve managed to remove my mic, which was a feat all its own, and now I’m wrangling with my Timothy leggings. With an almighty effort, I pull them up to my thighs, my dress bunched up under my chin. Ever bunched up a sequin dress under your chin? Not comfortable.

  As the car turns corners, my task becomes increasingly complex. Just when I scoop my butt up off the seat to pull the leggings up, the car turns, and I go crashing into the door. Luckily it’s firmly shut or I’d be splattered across the road somewhere.

  By the time I’m halfway done, I’m hot and sweaty and panting like I’ve gone three rounds in the ring with Muhammad Ali. Or some other boxer from this century. (Fighting’s so not my thing).

  My leggings finally in place, I heave a sigh of relief. Time for my Timothy top. I pull my sequined dress over my head, only for it to get snagged on my hair.

  I tug at the dress. It pulls at my hair but it holds tight. I tug again. This thing is not budging.

  The car begins to slow. I peer out the smoky glass window and see a large house at the end of the long drive. It looks like a ranch in the middle of nowhere.

  Uh-oh.

  Panic begins to set in. I need to get this darn dress off and pull on my T-shirt over my strapless bra, and I need to do it now.

  As the car slows to a stop, I yank on the dress, hard, only to cry out in pain as my hair refuses to untangle itself from the many sequins.

  I hear a car door thud closed and know the driver is about to walk around to open my door.

  No! We can’t be here already!

  Think, Emma, think!

  In just my leggings and strapless bra, my dress acting as some sort of weird hair extension, I’m not only going to be the laughing stock of the nation, but I’m sure the Mr. Darcy wannabe will send me home before he can say “that one was totally cray cray.” Penny’s and my dream will amount to nothing.

  With probably less than about three seconds to go before the driver reaches my door, I ditch the near-impossible hair issue and focus on getting my top on. I grab it out of my clutch and loop one leg through, then the next. With a strength that would impress Wonder Woman herself, I yank the top up over my thighs, and begin to loop an arm through one side. So far, so good. All I’ve got to do now is loop the other arm through and ...

  The next thing I know, the wall I’m leaning up against gives way and I fall backwards out of the privacy of the limo and land with a thud on my butt.

  Ooof.

  As my butt meets the hard, unforgiving ground, the wind is instantly sucked out of me and the pain sears. Trying to regain my balance, my legs flail in the air like I’m some kind of insect that can’t get itself back up. At least twelve different cuss words erupt from my mouth. Cuss words my mother would blush to hear me say.

  Everything goes quiet around me.

  Smooth, Emma. Real smooth.

  “Well, that was quite an entrance,” a voice says.

  I blink. Everything around me is bright white. I raise my hand to shelter my eyes from the blinding lights and see a silhouetted figure leaning over me. I lift my head from the ground and do a quick tally. Legs still look like, well, legs, both nestled snugly in my Timothy leggings. Thank goodness. My body is mostly covered, but for the straps of my top, which I quickly rectify by snapping them into place. Other than a throbbing pain in my butt, I’m all in one piece. Physically, at least.

  “You are very original,” the voice continues. “Do you need help getting up or is this all part of the show?” Is that an English accent I hear, or has that Mrs. Battle-axe Watson somehow got into my brain?

  I peer up at the figure. “That’d be great. Thanks.” I reach out and take his outstretched hands. “Are they filming right now?”

  “I believe they are, yes.”

  Dammit! So not the entrance I was going for.

  “Do you think the Mr. Darcy guy saw?” I ask him in a low voice. I’m still blinded by those darn lights. “I mean, this is hardly much of a good first impression. Am I right?”

  “I’m certain you have made an impression,” he replies stiffly. “Whether or not i
t’s a good one remains to be seen. May I help you with your, erm, dress?”

  My hand flies to the back of my head. The dress! It’s still hanging from my hair in a deeply unflattering way. Not that a dress can ever hang from your hair in a flattering way, but you get the picture.

  “You can give it a shot, dude, but it’s really wedged in there.” I turn and the man unhooks the dress from my hair with ease. “How did you do that?” I ask.

  “It was very easy, actually.”

  Is there judgment in that tone?

  I shift from the blinding lights to get a proper look at him for the first time. He’s a good-looking guy, there’s no denying it. He’s tall with dark brown hair. His eyes are brown and flecked with tiny chunks of gold that make them appear to sparkle in an unworldly way. Dressed in a perfectly-fitted tux, he positively radiates masculinity in a way I’m sure has made many a woman weak at the knees. The similarities between him and James Bond are not lost on me, particularly with that pompous English accent of his.

  He holds the dress out to me. “Yours, I believe.”

  And then the penny drops. I don’t even have the excuse of being slow on the uptake because I bumped my head.

  He’s Mr. Darcy! This guy. The one with the smooth as silk, aristocratic voice, dressed to kill.

  The guy who scooped me off the ground in a state of relative undress is the star of the show.

  Humiliation seeps through me and my cheeks flame.

  “What I would like to know is why you chose to make your entrance tonight wearing a dress in that most unorthodox fashion? Most women wear them on their bodies, I’ve found. Not attached to their hair.” His lips quirk into a smile, his eyes trained on me.

  I narrow my own eyes. He’s mocking me, and by the look on his face, he’s having a good old time doing it, too.

  I lift my chin and grasp at what dignity I have left. Which is not a lot, let’s face it. “It was a mistake. A wardrobe malfunction, if you will.” I attempt to smooth out what I know must be a bird’s nest of a hairstyle and try to salvage the situation. Which is a pretty tall order, I know. I lift my lips into a brave smile as my humiliation reaches all the way down to the tips of my toes.

  He cocks an eyebrow. “That was less of a malfunction and more of a complete disaster, as far as I can see.”

  Mockery does not look good on you, Fake Mr. Darcy.

  “Thank you for the dress, even if my ego is a little dented right now.”

  “As long as nothing else is dented?” he asks, a concerned look on his face.

  Faking concern for the cameras after mocking the crap out of me? Oooh, this guy is good. He’s reveling in my humiliation, I can tell. As if an aristocratic, publicity-hungry snob like him would be interested in my well-being.

  “Nope. Nothing dented. All good.” I lean in a little closer to him and do my level best to ignore his scent, a heady mixture of vanilla and musk with woody undertones. He might be a jerk, but he’s a jerk I need right now. “Look, dude. I know you’ve got some sway here.” I nod my head in the direction of the production crew, who are standing around us with cameras and notebooks. “Do you think I could get a do-over?”

  “A what?”

  “You know, a do-over.”

  “Simply repeating the expression won’t help,” he replies condescendingly.

  Oh, he is so enjoying this.

  I decide to spell it out in no uncertain terms. “What I’d like is to get another chance at exiting the limo. You’re the big guy around here, right? I’m sure you can pull that off for me if you want to.”

  “You would like the opportunity to step out of the limousine and meet me at the end of the red carpet, the way the other ladies have this evening? The ones who managed to actually wear their dresses?”

  I ignore the jibe. “That’s right.”

  “Uh, we don’t do that,” one of the people standing by the camera operators says.

  “Why not?” I ask.

  “I dunno,” the guy replies with a shrug.

  “Because we want to see Mr. Darcy’s natural reaction as he meets each of the contestants,” a familiar voice says.

  Awesome. It’s Mrs. Freaking Watson.

  “I understand perfectly,” Fake Mr. Darcy replies.

  I’m sure he does.

  “Look, I don’t want to be seen falling out of a limo on national television,” I say to both of them. “I mean, there’s natural and then there’s natural, you know what I’m saying?”

  I look to the Mr. Darcy imposter at my side for back-up, hoping he has at least an ounce of decency in that body of his. I give him the quick once over and try not to notice what a body it is.

  “Viewers will love it, Emma. It’ll bring a wonderful touch of humor to the episode. Although it would have been much more effective had you worn your microphone,” Mrs. Watson replies.

  “I don’t want to be the ‘touch of humor!’” I protest. Not when I’m trying to promote Timothy. Becoming the laughingstock of the nation wasn’t exactly the goal when Penny signed me up for this sham of a show.

  I look back at Mr. Darcy, my eyes appealing for his help. “Can you help me out here, dude? Please?”

  He presses his lips together in a vain attempt to suppress a smile. “What would you do for me in return?”

  Is he kidding me right now? I don’t know, not smother him in his sleep?

  “I’ll be super nice to you and tell all the other contestants you’re a great guy because you helped me out of a tricky situation.”

  He raises his eyebrows at me. “Will you, now?”

  “I will,” I reply resolutely.

  He studies me for a moment before he says, “It would only be fair.”

  “You’re considering this, Sebastian?” Mrs. Watson asks with a tone of distaste.

  Sebastian? I look him up and down. He’s got money and privilege written all over him. Yup, that fits.

  “And you looked so gallant helping her up,” Mrs. Watson continues. “Quite the dashing knight in shining armor.” Her stiff upper lip quivers into what I think might be a smile, but it lasts less than a second, so who can really tell?

  But seriously. A dashing knight in shining armor, my ass. He did it for the cameras. We all know it. Let’s not pretend this is something it’s not.

  She turns her attention to me. “I don’t know what you were thinking, removing your microphone and changing out of that dress into ... whatever this is.” She raises an eyebrow at me and I cast my eyes down at the painted toes on my bare feet. Shame I couldn’t fit sneakers in that clutch.

  I look back up at her. “It’s activewear by Timothy,” I reply with pride. I might have humiliated myself in front of all these people, but I am proud of Penny’s and my label.

  “Whatever it is, you’re meant to be in the dress,” she quips.

  “Well, I—”

  “We’re getting off topic here,” the so-called knight interjects. “Emma wants you to reshoot her exiting the limousine, just like all the other contestants. It seems reasonable enough to me. I’m sure she’ll provide the viewing public with many moments of humor in the coming weeks, if that’s what you’re looking for, Margaret.”

  I raise my eyebrows at him, my hands on my hips. What the heck does he mean by that? That I’m some sort of accident-prone mess for people to laugh at? And yes, I know they’ve got the proof that I am. But I’m not. Honestly.

  Mrs. Watson pulls her already thin lips into an even thinner line, her features taut with annoyance. Without replying, she turns and walks away. I watch in hope as she mutters something to one of the crew who have been standing by, watching this whole thing unfold.

  A woman rushes over to me, a hairbrush in one hand and a lipstick in the other. As she goes to work on me, straightening out my hair and fixing my face, someone else reattaches the mic I discarded in the limo.

  I glance at Sebastian. He could very well be Mr. Darcy himself, with his self-satisfaction and obvious pride. His eyes are lit with an inne
r glow, and I know it’s at my expense. But the guy did just help me out. I should say something.

  “Thanks,” I mumble to him and he gives me a brief smile.

  And yes, I know I could be a lot more gracious about it, but this guy has gone on a reality show ostensibly to find love. What does that say about him? Either he’s a hopeless romantic with no clue about the world, or he’s here for another reason that’s got nothing to do with love and everything to do with fame.

  Either way, he’s not my kind of guy.

  “Sebastian? In position, please,” one of the crew says, and Sebastian turns his back to me and walks back up the carpet. “And Emma? Back in the limo. We’re going to take it from the top.”

  Relief washes through me. “No problem,” I reply brightly.

  I slide back into the limo and the driver closes the door behind me. A moment later, he reopens it and I step elegantly out. Well, as elegant as I can be in activewear and bare feet.

  I make my way up the red carpet, careful to hold my head high and show off my outfit. When I reach Sebastian, I smile sweetly at him and say, “Mr. Darcy. It’s wonderful to meet you. I’m Emma.”

  His lips twitch in amusement. Is he still laughing at me?

  “It’s wonderful to meet you, too, Emma.” He takes my hand in his, lifts it, and brushes a kiss across my knuckles.

  Cheesy much?

  I bet he’s done that ten times tonight already. But then, who knows? Maybe it’s a thing in England? Maybe all the rich pompous idiots run around kissing each other on the hand?

  I pull a face. It’s hardly sanitary.

  “You decided against a dress this evening, I see.”

  “I’m wearing activewear by Timothy.” I do a twirl, feeling thoroughly self-conscious, but reminding myself the reason I’m here.

  He cocks an eyebrow and I try not to notice how attractive he is up close. Fail.

  “Activewear?”

  “Yes. It’s comfortable, moves with your body, and is made of material that wicks sweat away so you can be fresh as a daisy while you work out.”

  Both brows are raised now. “It wicks away sweat? How charming.”

  I ignore his obvious sarcasm. “It is charming, Mr. Darcy. You are quite right.”