Page 64 of The Difference of a Darcy
Finally, he spoke. Quietly. “I enjoyed dinner tonight.”
There was a pause.
“Really?” Her voice was soft, surprised.
He turned his head slightly on the pillow to look at her silhouette in the dark. “I did.”
She said nothing.
“Your family was… animated,” he added, a smile tugging at one corner of his mouth. “But genuine. Warm. I had thought them only noisy before, but I see now… they care for one another. Deeply.”
Elizabeth was still quiet, and he did not expect a reply.
“I used to think,” he continued, “that good breeding and polished manners were the marks of superiority. That a composed drawing room reflected a superior household. But I have dined with earls whose tables were silent as tombs. I have been welcomed by ladies of status whose kindness would not extend past the parlor doors.”
He swallowed.
“Tonight was different. And it has made me… consider how easily I dismissed things I did not understand.”
Still, she did not speak.
His hands curled into the sheets beneath the blanket.
“If you wish to remain,” he said carefully, “to assist your sister—I would understand. We could find work…” he trailed off helplessly.
Her breath caught.
He stared up at the ceiling, every muscle tense, his heart pounding as if he had just run from Longbourn again in the rain.
She said nothing.
Not yet.
And so he waited—his entire world poised on the hinge of her silence.
∞∞∞
Elizabeth was touched by Darcy’s offer. It was thoughtful. Kind. So very like him to consider her feelings—her obligations—even when he must be anxious to return to Derbyshire and to whatever remnants of his life remained there. That he would offer her the chance to stay with Jane... it spoke of selflessness. Understanding.
And yet—
It surprised her.
The truth was, the idea of remaining behind had not even occurred to her. This Jane, tender and dear as she might be, was notherJane. This was notherworld. It was another Elizabeth who had grown up in this house, who had made choices and forged bonds and accepted a man she had once rejected. It was not Elizabeth’s responsibility to untangle those decisions, nor her place to remain in someone else’s life.
But Darcy...
Darcy did not exist in this world. And yet, Georgiana was still his sister.
Alone.
Abandoned.
Then, unbidden, a small voice crept into her mind:
He is being polite.
The thought struck like ice.
