Imperative: Volume 2, A Tale of Pride and Prejudice

by Wells, Linda

  “No, just enjoy the way that you feel now.” She batted his busy hands away and pressing her fingers to his protesting mouth, laughed when he suckled them. “Surprise me sometime.”

  “Dearest, I am … I am so very ready for a lifetime of surprises with you.” Darcy settled back down, wrapping his body around hers. “I love you so very much.”

  “I love you, dear Will.” She whispered, smiling when he nibbled then kissed her throat, and cheering inside as she felt the familiar heavy warmth of his body relaxing against hers. Warm, delicious hours of sleep passed peacefully until cries like the mewing of a cat escalated to a full-throated wail. Darcy woke with a start. “She is fine.”

  “She is crying!”

  “Good for her, telling everyone that she will not be ignored, even though you have slept through this display several times already. My, but I did relax you …” Darcy rested his head upon her shoulder and laughed softly. “There, you see? She is quiet now. Someone came to her rescue.”

  He nipped her ear lobe. “I imagine that you were quite vocal as a child.”

  “I will choose to see that as a compliment, Mr. Darcy.”

  “Of course.” He let a long sigh go and hugged her tightly. “I feel as if I should be doing something.”

  “Will you feed her? I am afraid that you are not built for it. Besides, this is not to be our responsibility.” Elizabeth laced her fingers with his. “Our responsibility is to set Georgiana back on her path.”

  “I will never give up responsibility …”

  She turned in his arms and scolded him, “Fitzwilliam Darcy, would you presume to walk into another man’s home and begin caring for his children?”

  “Of course not. But how many months did we spend expecting to be taking on this role?”

  “Nearly every one since we married.” She kissed his ear and whispered, “What man even thinks of rousing himself when a baby cries? I cannot describe the happiness that is flooding me at this moment. Our children will be so blessed to have you as their father.”

  Darcy felt his face warming with a blush. “How can you say that? I have not even held Hope yet. How can you know?”

  “I think that I have always known. From nearly the first moment I met you, I saw that you were caring for someone, even if I did not particularly appreciate your methods.” His head lifted and he tried to read her eyes in the faint light from the fire. “Charles.”

  “Charles!” He laughed softly and dropped his head back down upon the pillow. “That seems so long ago. I remember meeting him and thinking what a hopeless fool he was.”

  “And why did you adopt him? Was he your ward?”

  “It was more along the lines of him latching on. I found that I grew used to him and rather missed him when he was gone. But I also learned that he is not really a fool, just young, inexperienced, and in need of guidance. And he did me a great deal of good, too.” He smiled sheepishly when she laughed. “All right, Mrs. Darcy, yes, I liked having a friend who wanted nothing more than friendship. I am afraid that I have been so preoccupied with our troubles that I have been rather careless with it. He must think I have abandoned him.”

  “Do you miss him?”

  “Do you miss Jane?” He countered with a smile when she sighed. “I miss … Do you know what I miss?”

  “Tell me?”

  Darcy stroked his finger over her cheek. “I miss all of the time we have lost together. I miss … do you remember the day that we walked from the museum home? And the day that we were kissing as we walked down the street and scandalized Aunt?” Elizabeth smiled and nodded. “I miss all of that. All of those moments we had all too briefly when it was just the two of us, being ourselves. I miss that I have yet to dance with you in our ballroom, dressed in one of your beautiful, untried gowns, in a room full of candlelight and music, and forgetting that there is anyone else there.” His eyes were shining. “We have been robbed of time.”

  “Then let us take it back.” Elizabeth caressed her hand through his hair. “I miss the same things.”

  “I am so tired.”

  “So am I.” She rested her head on his chest and his arms snaked around her. “But soon we will be home.”

  “I have always been home, wherever you are is home.”

  “That sounds like something I would say.”

  “Shh.” Darcy closed his eyes. “Sleep some more, we have earned it.”

  “OH MY.” Mrs. Bennet pulled out her handkerchief and dabbed at her eyes. “I did not think that I would lose my place here, as well!” She stood at the dining room door for the first time since her husband’s death and saw Mary at the head of the table.

  “Here, Mama. Come and sit with me.” Lydia sent Mary a scathing look and led her mother to sit down. “You can have Jane’s place.”

  “Dear Jane.” She sank down and looked over the table unhappily from her new position. “Why did she have to leave us? Mr. Bingley taking her away to Scarborough! Now, when I need her so much?”

  “Jane is a married woman, Mama.” Mary said quietly. “I would go where Mr. Collins wants me.”

  “Are you ready, madam?” Mrs. Hill asked.

  “I suppose.” Mrs. Bennet said indifferently. “Although how I could possibly eat now, I do not know.”

  “Please wait for Mr. Collins to arrive.” Mary looked at her mother. “I believe that Mrs. Hill was speaking to me, Mama. If you had not taken to your bed when we arrived you would have become accustomed to that already.”

  “When your husband dies, you will mourn him as you wish, if I choose to take to my bed for a month, I shall.” Mrs. Bennet sniffed. “And may I remind you, until you produce a male child; you are in the same situation as I was? I wonder who the heir of Longbourn is now.”

  Mary’s cheeks coloured and she took a drink of her wine. Lydia snorted. “That was good, Mama.”

  “And another thing, if you are to please your husband’s stomach, you would choose your menu with more care. I am no expert on Mr. Collins, but I certainly noticed his preferences. Place the foods he favours within his reach. I always made certain that the choicest cuts were offered to your father first. There is an order to these things. I see that you did not pay great attention to me and I will have to teach you now.”

  “Is that not what Mr. Darcy suggested, Mama? That you will be Mary’s advisor?” Kitty said helpfully.

  “I believe that he did, Kitty.” Mrs. Bennet sat up straighter. “I was too distressed at the time to heed his words, but obviously a man so great would understand such things well.”

  “Perhaps you can go and visit Lizzy sometime, Mama.” Mary murmured.

  “When they are in London, I will. But they are in Scotland now! Who would want to endure that journey? I am not a spring chicken. But London, oh, the shopping and the sights! And you girls will surely be introduced to wonderful rich gentlemen!”

  Kitty’s brow creased, “I thought that you were angry with Lizzy, Mama.”

  “I was … but I have had time to think, and there is no denying that she has much to offer as Mrs. Darcy, and Jane has made it clear that she cannot invite us to stay with them at Mr. Hurst’s home. So that leaves Lizzy and my brother Gardiner. If it is a choice between Cheapside and Mayfair …”

  “Lizzy would never introduce us to anyone; she thinks we are too young.” Lydia pouted. “Could we go to Brighton instead?”

  “You are in mourning, Lydia. You are not to socialize publicly for four more months.” Mary scolded. “Besides, Lizzy is correct, you are too young. Mr. Collins and I have already discussed it. You are not allowed to attend dances until you are seventeen.”

  “Mama!” Lydia spun and cried.

  “Mary, the girls are out, they cannot be hidden again. And they are not your daughters. I will decide …”

  “Mr. Collins is their guardian now, Mama. And he will not be providing funds for dresses and balls until my sisters are at an acceptable marriageable age.”

  Mrs. Bennet’s eyes narrowed. “I
see that you are feeling your power, Mrs. Collins. But do not preach your sermons to me.”

  Mary’s face flushed. “I am not preaching.”

  “Yes you are.” Lydia laughed. “You would go on all day with it. Papa would roll his eyes and hide behind his paper when you started up.”

  “I can hear his voice now.” Mrs. Bennet said quietly.

  “Well then … you would probably like to have the portrait that is hanging in Mr. Collins’s dressing room moved to your chamber, Mama. I will ask Hill to do that today.”

  “Oh no, I had Hill hang the portrait there on purpose. Your father did not like the look of it, and had it stored in the attic. When he died, I had it brought down and hung up so that Mr. Collins could look upon it and remember whose house he was in.” She lifted her chin. “He should be thanking Mr. Bennet every day for being here. He should be grateful that I never gave your father a son.”

  Kitty and Lydia looked between the two mistresses and waited for the next shot to be fired, but Mary seemed to have lost her vigour. Mrs. Bennet nodded with satisfaction.

  “Please forgive my tardiness, ladies.” Mr. Collins hurried in and took his seat. “I was lost in the bookroom, trying to make some sense of the arrangements. I do believe that it is entirely at random. I observed in the library of Rosings a most extraordinary system of cataloguing. I am quite keen to apply it to my own library. My own library. Imagine that, Mrs. Collins! I have made my father proud, if only he were alive to see it.”

  “If he were alive, would he not be the master of Longbourn?” Kitty asked as she nibbled on a roll.

  “Well … yes, of course.” Collins stuttered. “I meant … if he could look down upon me from heaven.”

  “That is not what you said.” Lydia smirked

  “But it is what I meant.” He said positively.

  “Will you say grace, Mr. Collins?” Mary spoke up. “You always know just what to say.”

  Lydia rolled her eyes and bowed her head. “La, the food will be cold by the time he finishes.”

  “YOU LOOK HOW I FEEL.”

  “Spent?” Darcy smiled to himself as he watched Richard come into the study and settle into a chair with his feet propped on a hassock. “I feel like a cloth that has been wrung out.”

  “No small wonder, your thoughts have been focussed on yesterday for months. I bet that you never put any serious consideration into today.” Richard clasped his hands behind his head and stared up at the ceiling. “What happens after the battle is won?”

  Darcy looked up at the moulding and followed the endless circles worked into the plaster. “I cannot see it as over yet.”

  Richard raised his brows. “The baby is born.”

  “The recovery has just commenced, and I do not mean just physically. We have to start Georgiana back on the path to … whatever her future holds.”

  “Naturally, but this work is no different from what you expected to be doing now, anyway. Is it?”

  “I suppose not.” Darcy picked up a pen and watched the feather twirl as he rubbed the quill between his palms. “I forget what I thought I would be doing right now.”

  “Do you?” Richard smiled. “Think back to last spring, when you had the Bingley clan at Pemberley and Miss Bingley was determined to have you.”

  “Is it too dramatic to think of myself as almost virginal then?”

  “Well …”

  “Quiet.”

  “You broached the subject.” Richard studied the soft smile playing across his cousin’s lips curiously. “In any case, I believe that you might have been in the thick of a courtship or engagement right now, to the right girl, from the right family …” Darcy nodded, watching the feather. “Who would it have been?”

  The smile grew and he looked up. “Elizabeth.”

  “I admire your confidence, particularly when I do remember who you were then.”

  “But I still would have gone to Netherfield. And Elizabeth still would have set me straight.”

  Richard allowed his delusion and set his feet back on the floor. “What do you think Sophie will do to me? Will she turn me into a sentimental being like you?”

  “If you are fortunate, she will.” Darcy set down the pen and sat back, looking out of the window. “Although, I think that you are in full possession of sentimentality already. You and Samuel both. What were you two doing escaping the house when Uncle and I were upstairs waiting for the baby? You ran out of the door as soon as you were alone, I spied you out on the lawn and then you disappeared. Where did you go?” Turning to smile at him he laughed to see his face reddening. “Richard, if it had not been my sister, I assure you, I would have joined you out there.”

  “Well, I was glad to go out, even if it was for a wild goose chase.” Samuel entered and took a seat. “I could not bear to hear Georgiana suffering any longer, I felt so helpless. I hated it.”

  “As did I.” Darcy looked at him curiously and then to Richard, who was staring at Samuel menacingly. “What was this folly?”

  “Richard thought that he saw …” Samuel noticed the glare and caught himself. “Ferguson. Outside of the window.”

  “Ferguson? What of it?” Darcy looked between them. “I know that you bear some unreasonable distrust about his attention to Georgiana, something that you and I need to discuss, by the way, but why would the sight of him prompt you out of doors? He belongs here.”

  Richard cleared his throat, drawing Darcy’s gaze back to him. “Naturally. I did not recognize the man and thought that it was an interloper. After all, the last thing that we needed at that moment was to have a stranger lingering nearby and hearing Georgiana. We could hear her cries outside, could we not, Samuel?”

  “Yes.” He licked his lips and looked at his clasped hands. “I have only heard such pain in a woman’s voice once before, but that was anguish of an emotional nature, although I am sure that the pain felt was very real.”

  Darcy’s fingers found his ring and he rubbed as he continued to watch the two men. “While that is an excellent subject to distract me, I will not give in just now. What are you not telling me?”

  “Secrets? Is it not early in the day for such things, particularly a day such as this?” Harding walked in and sank onto a sofa. “Your aunt resembles a woman half her age. So why do I feel like a man twice mine?”

  “Your new ward has a strong set of lungs.” Richard laughed when Harding rubbed his face wearily.

  “Elizabeth chastised me for wishing to rise.” Darcy smiled fondly.

  Richard’s eyes lit up as he at last cottoned on. “I am sure that you did not mind. I can imagine the methods she used made you express your feelings quite vehemently. I can see you rising to the occasion nicely.”

  Darcy’s eyes narrowed. “What, or who, did you suspect was outside yesterday?”

  “You will not be distracted. Or maybe you see this as your distraction.” Richard threw up his hands. “Fine, it was Wickham.”

  “Wickham!” Darcy and Harding said at once, both sitting up and staring.

  “What do you mean? You saw him?”

  “I thought that I spied his figure on the lawn. Maybe I was just imagining him, I do not know. I was caught up in listening to Georgiana suffering and cursing him for what he had done …” Richard glanced at Harding whose shoulders had slumped. “But why would he be here? I made myself perfectly clear when we last met. I am telling you all now; he has run out of chances with me.”

  Samuel interjected as Richard’s face set into a menacing scowl, “We did not see any sign of him, William. And believe me; we were beating the bushes.”

  “He is slippery though.” Richard muttered.

  “Like a shadow.” Harding said softly. “I thought that I saw him yesterday, as well. Just as we arrived and Georgiana’s labouring began. I … I thought that it was a spectre, not a man. A shadow of guilt.”

  “Guilt? Uncle if you are guilty than so am I.” Darcy focussed back on Richard. “Was it him?”

  “I do not kno
w. I truly do not. If I had found him, I would have told you, hell, I would have shown you his lifeless body. As it was, I was not going to mention it at such a moment. I did not want you to start …” Richard watched his hand flexing. “Damn it! There you go!”

  “Pardon?” Darcy followed his eyes and held up his hand. “It hurts from clenching the chair so tightly!”

  “A likely story. If you fall dead because of something I said, Elizabeth will have me rotating on a spit in the garden in a thrice, and don’t you laugh at the thought because it is true. Put this out of your mind, I saw nothing, the judge saw nothing, it was stupid. Just something stupid brought on by the tension of the day. That man would be an absolute fool to approach here.”

  “Shhhh!” Samuel glanced at the doorway. “Elizabeth is coming!”

  The room fell silent as the men straightened and tried to appear relaxed. In the hall they could hear Elizabeth asking Amy to cut some flowers and bring them up to Georgiana’s room, and then heard her addressing Mrs. Shaw. Darcy smiled to hear the clipped, businesslike tone that she used on the woman, and the respect in the housekeeper’s voice. Elizabeth’s light footsteps could be heard coming down the hallway and then she was at the door. In unison, the men stood.

  “Good morning.” She smiled and tilted her head.

  Darcy walked forward and taking her hands, kissed her cheek. “Good morning, love. Mrs. Shaw seems to have changed her tune.”

  “Oh.” Elizabeth shook her head and taking his hand, followed him back to the desk chair where he sat and she perched beside him on the arm. “She is seeing all of her preconceived notions dashed, I think.”

  “And what were those?” Harding asked, watching with interest as Darcy’s hand slid around Elizabeth’s waist and drew her to lean back comfortably on his shoulder.

  “I hardly know, but she is overwhelmed seeing the family coming together for what she deems an unforgivable offence.”

  “I wonder if she had a natural child. Those who have sinned and recovered are often hardest on others who do the same.” Darcy said thoughtfully. “Have you seen such things in court, Uncle?”

  “I did not make a habit of stealing or assaulting people, Fitzwilliam.” He smiled.