Page 49 of Mr. Darcy's Christmas Letters
Epilogue
Elizabeth Darcy shivered as her bare feet touched the cold floor. With a sharp intake of breath, she scurried to the curtains and parted them a little. Then, just as quickly, she made her way back to bed and thrust her legs under the warm covers.
Fitzwilliam slept soundly beside her. There was a peace that settled over him here at Pemberley, especially visible as he slumbered, when all the cares of the day were banished. Elizabeth rolled away from her husband and onto her side to watch the snow drifting lazily past the window, allowing the warmth from the quilt and his body to begin to lull her back to rest. She jumped when one strong arm snaked around her waist.
“Your feet are like the inside of an icehouse,” he grumbled.
“Which is why I returned to bed, dearest.”
“You returned for the blanket and not for me?” The low, gravelly sound in her ear made her shiver, and it was not from the temperature in the room.
“You are warmer than the blanket,” she informed him, turning in his arms to place a little kiss on his nose.
He took her in his arms. “When you recompense me in such a way, I do not mind your freezing feet.”
“That may be the most romantic thing you have ever said to me,” Elizabeth teased.
Suddenly she was beneath her husband and he was smiling down at her. She proudly noted the lines near his eyes that proved her Fitzwilliam smiled and laughed a great deal more than he had when they first met. He raised himself up on his forearms. “If that is the case, I must make amends.”
Elizabeth reached up to touch his face. “As wonderful as that sounds,” she told him, “I would like to take a walk out of doors before church.”
“You would rather go out in the snow than remain indoors with me?” Fitzwilliam asked, a wicked gleam in his eye. He leaned down to whisper in her ear. “I shall have to do better by you, Mrs. Darcy. Allow me to demonstrate.”
He then trailed several light kisses down her neck, and Elizabeth sighed with pleasure. Who could have guessed that the activities in the marital bed could be so very pleasing? Particularly when they had been wed ten years and already had four children. Fitzwilliam had once explained that having waited so long for her, he was determined never to take for granted a single moment they had together.
Elizabeth acquiesced. “Very well. But afterwards, I wish to go out, whether it is before church or after.”
“It would be my pleasure to escort you out into the freezing snow for your walk, Elizabeth,” he told her. “You know how much I enjoy it. Particularly when you throw snowballs at me.”
She laughed at him. “You adore walking in the snow. Before the day is out you will roust all three of our sons and lead them in pelting one another with snowballs. Do not even attempt to deny it.” She smiled mischievously up at him.
He smiled but did not reply, and Elizabeth felt her point had been made. As Fitzwilliam lowered his face to hers, she only wished she could recall what that point had been.
When at last Fitzwilliam felt he had sufficiently defended his honour, Elizabeth kissed him on top of his head, sat up, and plucked a letter from inside a book on her bed table.
“Here,” she said a bit nervously. Why, she could not say, for they wrote letters to one another with some frequency. Their Christmas letters, though, were special. “It is for you.”
Fitzwilliam took it with a shake of his head. He leaned back and stretched one long arm behind him to open the small drawer on his own bed table, from which he removed another missive, sealed in red wax. He held it out to her.
“You seal yours every year. So formal, sir.”
“My words are only for you, Elizabeth,” he told her solemnly. “Therefore, it is sealed.”
“Are you suggesting that I ought to seal mine?”
“No, for you do not have the bad habit of tucking important items into your pockets as the boys and I do.”
Her husband rarely lost anything unless it had been moved by someone else. Bennet and Fitzwilliam still lost things on occasion, and Edward, at five, lost everything. “Only because I do not have any. I intend to have Kerr sew pockets into all my dresses and Georgiana Jane’s as well, I shall have you know. You make us quite jealous over them.”
He chuckled and tapped her nose with the end of his letter. “You have pockets in your coats.”
Elizabeth had mentioned once in passing how warm his greatcoat had been, and on St. Nicholas Day that year, he had presented her one of her own. It was slimmer than Fitzwilliam’s, clearly fashioned for her smaller frame, but made of the same sort of materials and very warm. When Georgiana Jane, named after his sister and hers, had shown signs of taking after her mother rather than her namesakes, Fitzwilliam had quietly spoken to the tailor in Kympton. The result was that perhaps the tiniest greatcoat ever made in England had been shortly thereafter gifted to little Miss Darcy. To say that their daughter had been thrilled was an understatement, though her older brothers were not quite as pleased, for now the youngest Darcy could remain out in the snow with them for a good deal longer than she had before, and though her little legs carried her a long way, the distance was accomplished very slowly.
“It is important to have pockets when you are determined to collect every interesting stone at Pemberley,” Elizabeth said fondly, shaking her head.
“Do you mean our daughter or you?”
She laughed. “I will not answer that.”
