Longbourn to London (39 page)

Darcy smiled in agreement. “Then pile it on, Mrs. Chawton, and we shall do our best.”

In her dressing room, Elizabeth found Sarah dozing on a stool by the fire. Elizabeth’s arms were full of the clothes she had not put on again after waking. “Oh, dear, Sarah, you need not wait here for me. I can ring for you when I am ready.”

Sarah took the clothes and Elizabeth slipped behind the screen. When she emerged, Sarah held the velvet dressing gown, steamed smooth after its trials. Elizabeth selected a sheer nightgown to wear under it, with an alluring low neckline. It made her breathless to think what Darcy might attempt when he saw her in it.

There was a tap at the open door from the mistress’s bedroom, and Darcy stepped inside. Elizabeth was charmed that even with the door open, and wearing only a robe, he was gentleman enough to knock upon approaching where he had every right to enter.

“Mrs. Darcy, I was just coming to enquire whether you would like to bathe in my dressing room after we eat. I shall alert Murray if your answer is yes.”

Elizabeth blushed. “My answer
is
yes.” Taking a deep breath, she smiled sheepishly at Sarah. “That will be all, Sarah. Thank you for working your miracles with this dressing gown.”

Darcy took Elizabeth’s hand and gave her a half turn, reviewing the restored garment. “Yes, Sarah, thank you.” Darcy smiled at his wife.

Sarah bobbed a curtsey. “Goodnight, ma’am, sir.” Her eyes barely flickered to Darcy as she hurried from the room.

Darcy and Elizabeth heard the rapping of the servants with food at the master’s door, and re-entered that bedchamber. After eating nearly everything brought to them, Darcy carried the champagne in its ice bucket into his dressing room. Once she was certain Murray had left the room, Elizabeth joined her husband with the flutes.

Standing several feet from the tub while Darcy kneeled in it, she slowly took off the velvet dressing gown, laid it over a chair, and turned to face him.

He drew in his breath. The sheer fabric did not adequately cover her bosom, and only where multiple layers folded over her body was any detail hidden.

Feeling her power over him, she stretched her arms up as if tired. She pretended to yawn, and shook herself. “Fitzwilliam,” she said lazily, “perhaps I shall precede you to our bed.” She shrugged a shoulder, dislodging a strap and completely revealing one breast. From beneath her brow she looked at him, and finally smiled.

“Elizabeth,” he murmured. He stood, revealing his reaction to her little charade, which brightened her eyes. “You have had ample sleep, so do not trifle with me. Let me comfort you.”

“Again? You are not bored with me?” She held his gaze, and slowly slid the gossamer gown down the length of her body.

“Lizzy…step into the tub. I shall show you how bored I am.”

***

The next day and the day after, several more rooms were
explored
, including the study and the music room. The next attempt at an evening meal in the small dining parlour was interrupted by Darcy pulling his wife onto his lap, disordering her hair, and lifting her skirts. Elizabeth and Darcy were rarely out of each other’s company, even for the writing of letters, and a second desk was indeed moved into his study.

Elizabeth could not convince Darcy to walk in Hyde Park—“I most fervently do not wish to see anyone to whom I am not married, Mrs. Darcy”—and when the weather turned foul, she stopped asking. She did not really mind. Elizabeth wondered how they would find a normal rhythm to life at Pemberley when such ample joys were so readily available and tempting.

On the fourth night in Darcy House, as they sat before the fire in the master’s chamber, Elizabeth asked why Darcy had not shown her the rooms where he had resided prior to their wedding.

“I have a special curiosity about the room in which you slept as a bachelor. I want to see where you struggled against loving me and where you dreamt of me. May we go there?”

Darcy paused, his mouth half open in awe.

Elizabeth misunderstood his silence. “We need not of course, but I have imagined you there…”

“Miss Elizabeth! You continue to astonish me. That a maiden would imagine a bachelor’s bedchamber never occurred to me. Let us make haste.” He was well on his way to becoming fully aroused.

The halls were dark, and although they remained on the same floor, his previously occupied rooms were down a hall that turned twice into the opposite wing of the house. Elizabeth was not sure she could find her way back.

Once they entered his former bedroom, Darcy produced matches and they began lighting every candle they could find. Soon the room was brightened, and Elizabeth could take in some details. There was only one large chair in front of the fireplace, and all of the fabric in the room was dark green, wine-red, and rich brown. Over the mantle was a portrait of Pemberley, and next to the bed was a landscape Elizabeth recognised as the view from Pemberley to a lake, which Mrs. Reynolds insisted Elizabeth see when she toured the home with her aunt and uncle.

Bookcases flanked the fireplace, but as in the master’s bedroom, furnishings were simple. Darcy turned down the counterpane and bedclothes as Elizabeth inspected the room. There were double glass doors opening onto a small balcony overlooking the courtyard garden. She looked out at the winter night. Across the courtyard, she could see a set of windows from which the glow of candles emanated. Otherwise, the house was dark and quiet.

“Is that our room?” she asked.

Darcy joined her. “Yes. It is many years since I have stood in this window and seen it illuminated.” He kissed the top of her head. “You, Miss Elizabeth Bennet, have illuminated everything.”

She glowed with his praise. “Hmm! How sweet you are! What a lovely thing to say. Perhaps we should move you back into this room?”

“I have said nice things to you in other places, I hope.”

“There was something boyish in your tone just now. Quite youthful.” She led him to the bed and pushed him to sit before stepping away. “May I assume, sir, in some of your dreams we were lovers without benefit of marriage? Were your dreams so improper?”

“Miss Bennet! Can you read my mind?”

“You have married a woman with a passionate nature, Mr. Darcy. I might not have comprehended it fully at first, but you have encouraged me, and I understand myself better. How you saw so much in me, I hardly like to think.”

He smiled and reached for her, but she maintained her distance.

“In your dreams, Mr. Darcy”—she said his name in a most enticing way—“did you undress Miss Elizabeth, or did she disrobe herself?” She began to unbutton the velvet dressing gown, which had become a great favourite.

He tried to clear his thoughts, but her tempting query brought more than one dream to mind. “I should blush to admit it to Miss Elizabeth, but Mrs. Darcy will be hard pressed to imagine anything we did not do, in various and numerous combinations.”

She parted the velvet, and slowly drew the long sleeves down her arms. “Tell me a recent dream, then.”

“We were alone in the billiard room at Netherfield.”

She meant to be seductive, but the memory of stumbling into that room and finding Darcy apparently austere and disapproving was now extremely diverting. She laughed. “Tell me more!”

“I was teaching you billiards, and you were wearing the gown from the Netherfield ball.” He had to be careful not to reveal too much. There was a surprise coming for Elizabeth later in the week that he did not wish to spoil.

“Were you?” She had removed the dressing gown, but turned partly away, and drew it in front of her, hiding what he most wanted to see. Her face was coy. “Was I an apt pupil?”

“It seemed so, as I recall, but the dream ended with us lying upon the table, and I was about to enjoy you from behind, as I did in the library on…whatever day that was. The second time in the library, I mean.” It was Darcy’s turn to blush.

“I understood your meaning perfectly well.” She gave him a long fiery look before turning away, allowing the dressing gown to trail behind her as she neared the fireplace. There were enough candles in the room that he could see her derriere through the sheer fabric of her white nightgown. “Were we married?”

“No, but before importuning you, I did propose.” Darcy’s mouth was dry.

Elizabeth’s dark hair hung down her back in wavy tresses. He was torn between the enjoyment of studying her as an
objet d’art
and wanting her to come to bed.

“I am relieved to know that you are not entirely lost to propriety in your dreams. And did I say yes?” She looked provocatively over her shoulder.

“Yes, bless you, you did.” Darcy stood and removed his robe, revealing his potency.

Still Elizabeth did not approach. The candlelight outlined every detail of her profile. She noticed a little casket on the table next to the armchair. It was unlocked. She picked up a letter, recognising her own hand, posted during the week he had been in London.

“You have many endearing habits, Mr. Darcy. That you have kept my letters where you might easily revisit them deserves recompense, I think.”

Darcy sat back onto the bed as she strolled slowly to him. He found his breath growing shallow.

“Was there a dream of me in this very bed?” She leaned against the bedpost.

“Dozens of them, but none as enticing as you actually being here.” Darcy crawled along the bed towards her. He reared up onto his knees, and she did not resist when he pinned her body against the curtained post, entwining his hands in her tresses. He whispered in her ear, “I always dreamt of your hair.”

He turned her head, lifting her hair from her neck. He tickled her shoulders with his lips and tongue then met her mouth in a long rapturous kiss. As their lips parted, he asked, “You are here?”

She looked at him fondly. “Yes, my love, I am here.”

Darcy slid the nightgown from her shoulders, but its downward progress was hung up where she leaned against the bedpost. He delicately tucked the fabric below her breasts and gave each nipple a thorough kiss. He looked into her smouldering eyes. “You are truly here?”

“I am completely and utterly present, Fitzwilliam, I assure you. You have my fullest attention.”

Darcy pulled her against him and the nightgown slithered to the floor. He lifted her in his arms and turned to plunk her on the bed. She laughed. He lay next to her, stroking and petting his favourite parts as she writhed in approval. As his hand slid along her thigh, her legs parted.

“I am not dreaming this? Elizabeth Bennet is here, allowing me every liberty?” Darcy repeated.

“If you comfort me, perhaps
then
you will believe I am not an apparition.”

“I must be awake. In my dreams, the succubus never refers to what I do as comfort. Only Mrs. Elizabeth Darcy does so. My voluptuous wife.”

Chapter 24

Mrs. Darcy Hires a Maid

“If she and I be pleased, what’s that to you?”
William Shakespeare
The Taming of the Shrew

In their final three days in London, Darcy and Elizabeth succeeded in becoming less nocturnal and less random in their meals. They had upset the schedule of the servants long enough.

A wedding gift arrived, which afforded some entertainment by producing a pair of uncommonly ugly, porcelain Chinese dogs sent secretly by their cousin Anne de Bourgh.

Darcy quizzed his wife about when her last courses had been— while he was in London, most conveniently—and wondered about conception. Being a fastidious man, he wanted to know when the glad moment would occur, but Elizabeth held no womanly secrets on the subject. Thus, he was forced to accept what his own discreet enquiries confirmed—there was no way to know. He decided to continue as if each union could be the special moment. No matter how playful and teasing Elizabeth chose to be, Darcy was aware that, at every instance, they might be creating their first child. It pleased him to think of it, and increased his attentiveness to Elizabeth.

On their final night, Darcy stood from their early dinner and drew Elizabeth to her feet. “I hope you will not mind too much, Elizabeth. I have prepared a special event for tonight. You have been patient to tolerate no company except mine all week. Your attitude has been in every way compliant.” He was full of mirth, and a chuckle crept into his voice. “Tonight will be a reward for surviving an entire week of marriage to me.” He kissed her hand lovingly.

Elizabeth laughed. “What—are we to share an entire jar of strawberry jam? What will my father think if he hears of it? He will have harsh words for you, sir, if you spoil me so.”

They walked hand in hand into the hallway. “No, Elizabeth, nothing so profligate. You have not behaved
that
well.”

Elizabeth grumbled good-naturedly.

“Sometimes you have been quite…provoking,” he whispered in her ear. “Which deserves a special reward.”

She looked at him questioningly. “You may have me compliant, or you may have me provoking, Mr. Darcy, but I fear you will never have both at the same time as long as
I
am your wife.”