A Continued Affection

Part 32

"Thank you, Miss Elizabeth!"

Colonel Fitzwilliam made an extravagant bow, designed to extract a laugh from Elizabeth and she had barely had time to smile and curtsey in return before a movement to her right brought her up sharply and she straightened, surprised to see Darcy stride forward and offer his own hand in place of his cousin's.

"I hope you do not mind, Richard?" He asked, gruffly, never taking his eyes off Elizabeth.

"Not at all! Now, I shall go and drag Georgiana to dance, if she will let me!"

Elizabeth slid her hand into Darcy's, accepting his invitation almost before he had formally made it.

"You look..." He paused, frowning as if he was struggling to summon the words. At last, he relaxed and an expression that might have been a smile rested on his features. "You look very well this evening, Elizabeth."

There! The use of her Christian name, without any other qualifying title, was all that she needed to hear. It was an indication that she had not imagined the closeness growing once more between them. She was not foolish to hope for a future where they might be more than strangers, more than friends, more, even, than they once had been to one another.

"Are you sure you do not object to dancing, Mr Darcy?" she asked, biting her lip and fearing, for a moment, what his answer would be. He frowned as if he, too, queried her reason for asking. "I only ask, because I recall you were not always the greatest proponent of dancing at assemblies."

Darcy grimaced, ducking his head with admirable self-deprecation.

"Must I remind you, Lizzy, that I say a great many things and I do not always care to be held to account for my words many years after the fact. I trust you and I are alike in this?"

Elizabeth coloured, unsure whether it was because she sensed the truth in his words or because she had not missed the tender Lizzy that had escaped him, even if he seemed unconscious of the slip.

They danced in silence for a moment but it was not the awkward, nervous silence she had expected. There was something natural in the way they moved, mirroring one another almost unconsciously, so when he spoke again it seemed almost as if she had been expecting him to, and her answer was on her lips before she was conscious of thinking one up.

"I have missed this. I have missed you."

"So have I." She paused, angling her head to look at him so that she might try to judge his mood from the expression on his face before speaking further. His perpetual scowl remained in place, but it had softened. It might be nothing more than concentration on their steps. Catching her gaze, his brow smoothed further, and the hint of a smile tugged at his lips.

"I ought to have said as much when first we met, and not stubbornly clung to a wound that was years old, and unfounded."

His voice rose a little at the end of unfounded as if he was posing it as a question, seeking her confirmation that this was so. She nodded, holding his gaze in hopes that he would see the truth in her eyes and know, even before she said as much, that she, too, had blamed him for that which was not his fault.

"You never received my letter," he said, after what seemed like a long moment of silence. His smile grew said. "You thought I had abandoned you."

"I am sorry for the loss of your father," she murmured, a painful lump swelling in her throat at the thought of a world without her own beloved Papa. "I did not know -"

"How would you?" Darcy drew a breath, and the dance caused them to part, turning with other partners for a bar or two before being permitted to come together again.

"The fault is mine, still. I might have written again." He smiled, wryly, self-deprecatingly. "I entrusted delivery to Wickham, and I knew his character even then." A pin-prick of a frown creased his forehead. "Georgiana has...told you?"

"Some things." Lizzy nodded. "Some from Wickham's own lips."

Darcy's lips tightened.

"I give him only partial credence," Lizzy assured him. "I confess I was never quite fond of him, even when first we met. He seemed too...charming, somehow."

Darcy's eyes rose, and he seemed not to believe her.

"Too charming. That, I confess, is not an accusation I have ever heard levied against that man, or any other."

"You go out of your way to avoid it, certainly."

It was a risk to tease him, but Lizzy felt as if she could, and was rewarded by a flash of amusement in his dark eyes.

"It is not easy for me to charm strangers. Those who know me often give me more leeway than they ought," he confessed. "My sister and cousin, for instance, are kinder to me than I deserve."

"Indeed, Colonel Fitzwilliam seemed intent on singing your praises every chance he got," Elizabeth put in, smiling at the memory of the colonel, who, once the matter of Wickham was put to rest, had turned to list every quality worth admiring in Mr Darcy as if he were an item for sale and Elizabeth an interested buyer.

"Strange. My sister spoke similarly of you." Darcy's wry expression grew to a full smile. "Almost as if they had some scheme afoot."

"Scheme?" Lizzy swallowed a laugh at the thought of brash Colonel Fitzwilliam and gentle Georgiana lurking in dark corners to hatch some plan together, with the end goal being reuniting two people who had allowed themselves to be parted all too easily.

"I wager they do not work alone," Darcy remarked, glancing pointedly over to one corner. Elizabeth followed his gaze and saw Mary staring intently in their direction, speaking quickly to Mr Egerton, who leaned close enough to hear every word. Mary looked away as soon as she realised she had been discovered, colouring so brightly that Elizabeth could see the change even at a distance. She sighed, but could not help smiling at her sister's attempts to help her.

"I am afraid, then, that our plan to ignore one another has quite fallen apart."

"It was a foolish plan," Darcy said, taking her hand as the dance instructed and holding it longer than was necessary, bidding her meet his gaze. "I could no more ignore you than I could forget you. I certainly do not mean to let you go again."