by Iris Lim
I gritted my teeth. “We owe you nothing.”
The knife he brandished in his hand reflected the candlelight upon his greedy eyes. “Yer lives matter, sir.”
I moved forward only to feel Miss Elizabeth’s restraining hand upon my arm. I turned towards her. She nodded softly even as she frowned. I attempted, with little avail, to decipher her thoughts.
“We have money – but not much,” she insisted, eyes still on mine. “My husband can inform you as to the location.”
The cruel laughter our attackers sported was drowned out entirely by the way my heart raged at being called her husband, however falsely.
“Mr. Bingley has –” she began.
“The front drawer of the desk by the window,” I ordered, removing my eyes from her bewitching ones and moving them towards the ground. “You will find all.”
The man marched over immediately, and his evil laughter followed his discovery of the bank notes I had seen Bingley shove inside the drawer this morning. The papers filled his hands and wrought a smile – though neither act lasted as long as I wished it to.
“Where is the rest?” Our captor growled once more, the limited notes discarded upon the desk’s surface. He marched towards us, angry. “You could not purchase a house with so little. Reveal to us the rest!”
“It is a lease, not a purchase.” I refused to humor him.
“You brought more, I am certain.”
“I did not.”
“You most certainly have!” The mischievous tones had fallen away to reveal true ire. His face glowed darkly, harshly. “I demand your cooperation this very instant.”
“There is little to –”
“Bo!” The leader cried.
I did not know what he shouted for – until I heard Elizabeth’s shriek beside me.
“Let me go!”
I turned quickly to witness her fight against the strongman’s arm across her neck. Her limbs flailed. Her face began to lose its color.
“Miss Elizabeth!” I struggled against the last of my bondage.
“Miss Elizabeth?” The leader frowned.
I stopped still, realization too late.
I nearly choked on my unruly tongue.
• • •
“Miss Elizabeth, eh?”
I flinched when his grip tightened around my neck. Any warmth of hope I had felt before entering this room was replaced entirely by harsh, cold dread. I could not blame Mr. Darcy, though I still felt the urge to do so.
“Not a missus ‘ere?” Arnold leaned so close I smelled his breath. Three baths would prove insufficient to cleanse me from this ordeal. I held my breath as his smirk grew. “I knew there was no Mrs. Bingley.”
“But I am!” I protested quickly. Bo’s locked grip made breathing, much more talking, a challenging task. Miss Bingley’s ruse had to be maintained at all costs – lest harm come to an already suffering Jane. “I – we – just –”
I turned desperately to my fellow captive. Mr. Darcy’s frown spoke more of fear than anger.
My heart cursed him, cursed me, cursed our captors and the universe.
“No ‘scuses.” Arnold smirked again. I felt Bo’s bones crushing my skin.
The panic in my blood coursed fearfully in my veins. My heartbeat raced, flew.
“I – we have been married – very shortly.” I cried.
Arnold raised a brow. Bo relented slightly.
Despite most of my good sense having fled me completely, I churned on. I compelled my voice to remain even – succeeding only partially in my endeavor. “I – we – we had to marry – very quickly – recently.”
Arnold’s unhinged laughter gave no comfort.
“Race to the altar, was it?” He leered at me, eyes wandering until they rested upon my flat abdomen. “Unlucky timing, perhaps? Dressed almost like a gentlewoman too. Ain’t it quaint now? Give ol’ Arnold a taste of them charms tonight and I just might –”
“No!” Mr. Darcy cried before I managed to elicit a response. My eyes, and the leader’s, turned quickly to watch him. His piercing eyes seemed to flame in the candlelight. His voice, when it emerged, resounded low and firm. “I shall not have you – proposition my wife in this way, you miscreant.”
Arnold grinned. I inhaled sharply. Mr. Darcy stared. Bo held me still.
“Wife now, is it?” Arnold pulled me out of Bo’s grasp, fingernails digging into my skin. His sneer – nearly charming earlier – was solely vicious now. There was little room for relief. “Bit o’ volatile love now, I see. Miss Elizabeth – or Mrs. Bingley?”
Mr. Darcy did not hesitate. “Harm my wife, and you shall never see your family before your neighbors bury them.”
I had no time to be impressed before Arnold shoved me forward – straight into Mr. Darcy’s lap. He propped his legs instantly, deftly catching me between his knees and torso. I blushed.
“Where’s the money?” Arnold did not wait.
“Allow me time to recall which key leads to the right drawer.” Above me, Mr. Darcy carried on. I struggled to right myself. “I shall tell you in the morning.”
“A whole night with your wife? I ‘ave no such charity, sir.”
“You show none, I assure you.”
“If ye find ‘er so frigid, I might help myself to –”
“Miss Elizabeth is –”
I stopped his words with my lips against his. My hands, freed from the floor, rested firmly on his shoulders. Mr. Darcy reciprocated slightly, fortunately not turning away.
I pulled back slowly, eyes level with his. Receiving such attentions from me could not have been welcome.
“Leave me be with my husband,” I spoke without turning. “Perhaps a night’s rest with my attentions would restore his muddled mind.”
I heard Arnold’s scoff without seeing it.
I heard also the relieving sounds of retreating, angry footsteps and a well-slammed door.
• • •
My heartbeat, blazing its trail through years and lifetimes of hollowness, refused to still. It was a kiss and nothing more. It was a brush – a singular moment of necessary touch, inconsequential yet true. She acted quickly, wisely. It was my bumbling actions that she sought to reverse.
It was almost criminal that I enjoyed her solution so thoroughly.
“Miss Elizabeth.” My voice quaked with her face still so near. The sole candle still aflame lent the room unusually strong light. Was there sorcery in the air, in this room? Was there cause for –
“I apologize,” she said softly, before repositioning herself to the floor beside me. I mourned the loss of her presence on my lap. My desires were ungentlemanly, I had to admit, but I held every intent to make right our – “I should not have acted so.”
Her spoken words interfered with my unspoken ones.
“You made no mistake. It was necessary,” I replied. Unladylike though her stratagem might have been, it had succeeded – and we had been left alone at last for the remainder of the evening.
I chose not to dwell upon the promise such an isolated evening brought.
“Mr. Darcy –”
“I shall marry you, of course.” The words flowed freely from my tongue. My heart, so recently calmed, began to soar once more. The freedom duty brought was unlike any other. Duty and honor had dictated my former feelings inopportune. Duty and honor now claimed otherwise. Relief, nay, happiness coursed itself through my veins. My lips curled themselves into a –
“No, sir, I do not ask it.” Her reply did not leave an impression until I lent it thought.
My eyes widened. Did she truly –
“None can hold you to make amends for faults not of your own making.”
“But, Miss Elizabeth, your reputation –”
“Shall survive. Neither of us need tell. No polite society would merit the words of robbers and thieves.”
“It was a kiss, madam – and a night we are posed to share disguised as man and wife.”
“Surely, sir, you know there is vas
t difference between man and wife in name and man and wife in deed.”
“I had not meant, of course –” Her frankness crippled me, confused me. I blinked, mind tumultuous. Did she mean to decline what was wholly her right to claim?
Her humility enchanted me.
I sighed.
“Miss Elizabeth,” I spoke slowly, lowly. The dancing candle flame seemed to have lost much of its former brilliance. I tilted my head until its back pressed against the wall. “Your modesty is everything admirable, but it need not hinder your happiness.”
The sound beside me seemed to teeter between a laugh and a scoff.
I felt her palm tap my arm.
“Sleep, Mr. Darcy. Your brain is addled with excitement.”
“It is not –”
“Hush. We shall talk in the morning. Let us thwart these aggressors before we determine the course of lives that we may yet be able to preserve.”
The serenity in her tone, despite its contents, spoke of tenderness and grace. An image of her as a young mother, smiling and flitting all about in Pemberley, soothed my mind.
I smiled.
“Goodnight, Mrs. Bingley.”
“Goodnight, sir.”
Chapter Three
My arms felt sore when I roused – their weight pinned down by a heavy log. I wriggled and shifted at an attempt to free myself, but said log remained resolutely where it laid. The warmth of the earth radiated through my body, a ward against the chilly morning air. The grass grazing my ankles was smooth, nearly as smooth as fabric made for –
I sat up, shocked, nearly hurting my head against the log’s low beam, and extricated myself quickly from my confines. My chest heaved against my neckline, its position pulled dangerously low upon my bosom. One quick survey of my predicament indicated, at least, no ill intention from my gentleman companion. His eyes remained closed, his own chest rising and falling at an erratic pace. His sleep was not secure, nor light enough to remove quickly. His right arm, now flung upon the wooden floorboards, ended with an open palm by my knees. Stray loops around his forearm hinted at knots long untied.
It was strange, even funny, that our mindless limbs had accomplished something our lucid minds had not managed but one night before.
“Hm – Elizabeth.” My name mingled with his groans as he stirred slightly, before resettling into wary sleep.
The simple utterance was enough to cause me unrest.
His marriage proposal, so simply stated, reemerged in my memory. Had he truly asked for my hand so nonchalantly? Had the resignation in his tone not been an insult itself? Had I truly acted so brazenly – kissing a man I to whom I had no relation and whose acquaintance I barely possessed?
I sighed, chest tight, cautious not to awake the source of snores I heard drifting sparsely through the door. The whirlwind of last night’s activities – from heroic self-enlistment, to pride, to surprise, to a desperate move for our captors’ confidence – appeared vastly foolish in the light of day.
Mr. Darcy, gruff and barely conscious, shifted again.
I tried hard to maintain a quiet sigh.
A few quick words had succeeded in distracting him after his untimely proposal. His tiredness, I was certain, aided his acquiescence.
Would he insist upon similar resolutions today?
My breath shortened a pace, my eyes watering. Marriage to Mr. Darcy was not disastrous. Mama herself would insist, on the contrary.
Marriage by compromise – rooted in an act without passion, no less – refused to strike me as attractive in any way whatsoever.
There was no honor in trapping the hand of a man who disdained me, whatever his consequence.
“Elizabeth,” my fellow victim mumbled again, squinting his eyes for one brief moment before light sleep resumed control.
My heart beat in uneven spurts as I pondered what I disliked but might be unable to avoid. The touch of his lips on mine lingered despite the hours in between. Had I attempted to pay a price I could not afford?
The handsome man woke slowly beside me. I lamented that his lack of knowledge of our sleeping poses could not extend to his ignorance of our fleeting kiss the night before. He was a fine man, in many ways. I hoped, rather recklessly, that his memory could be one part of him that was not as fine as all other parts he possessed.
I scoffed, bitterly.
Had my fleeting moment of bravado resulted in little more than a delay towards the inevitable? Would our farce – however strangely concocted – be ultimately seen and destroyed through other means of punishment I had yet to imagine? The possibilities mesmerized and terrorized in equal measure.
Mr. Darcy stirred in time to the sound of movement through the door.
I knew then that I must think.
I had to think – quickly.
• • •
The gradually increasing sounds did not bode well as I opened my eyes. The raw ache of sleeping on the floor – a sensation I hadn’t experienced since my Cambridge days – permeated every muscle, harsh and unfortunate. I groaned loudly, forgetting for one moment my female company.
“Mr. Darcy,” she called gently.
I glanced at her then, noting quickly that I must have imagined the bodily warmth I had sensed in the last two hours of my restful slumber. She was perched as far as far could be, not a fraction of an inch of our figures touching.
The realization was, again, unfortunate.
“Mr. Darcy,” she repeated, most likely from my lack of response.
I minimized my grunts to the best of my abilities as I righted myself upon the floor. My free hands proved to be most helpful despite the raw gashes on my wrists.
“We cannot wait, sir.” Her voice quickened this time. I found myself unhappily reminded of the noises that had roused me in the first place. “Bo stirs, and Arnold approaches.”
I inclined my ear slightly, in thought then in agreement.
“We must have a plan,” I croaked, voice hoarse from the morning. I prayed silently – and ardently – that she neglect any other parts of my body performing their morning rounds.
“I have one,” she stated, surprising me again.
Was she going to such great lengths to impress me?
The fact that I had not woken to her naked form upon me – however disappointing the lack of that fact may be – proved her different from the many simpering ladies of London. I could not presume her forward, though I could presume her clever.
“Did you conceive it this morning?” I asked.
She nodded firmly. “Only now.”
I nodded, mind half awake. Only a woman as remarkable as she would plot her own freedom, rather than rely upon a man’s knowledge.
My heart, in danger the day before, now throbbed with gleeful hope at the prospect of the future.
“What do you have planned?” I stretched as I asked. My spine cracked gratuitously. The sitting room stuffiness that had always beleaguered my speaking skills were absent today in the clarity of our morning solitude.
“We must distract them. We cannot overcome all three men at once.”
“I agree.” I nodded. My loosened limbs began to gain their strength once more. “We must proceed to eliminate their threat whilst the others are asleep.”
“Or by separating them,” she said.
I lent the matter thought.
“How shall we separate them without separating ourselves?”
She seemed to look away slightly before meeting my eye again. She sighed before speaking, “We need not stay together to overcome them. When Arnold appears this morning, I can suggest the false premise of offering him – favors. He would gladly –”
“No!” I thundered. She looked up sharply, eyes wide. My brow and heart clenched. “I shall not allow it.”
“Sir, it is not your place to allow or disallow –”
“No harm shall come to you.”
“You cannot be certain, sir. Even in this room –”
“I cannot afford, Elizabeth, to see y
ou harmed,” I pleaded. She paused slightly, clearly unsure. I begged with my eyes what my words could not say. My breath cut itself short in my lungs. My parched lips made speaking difficult. “I cannot allow any person dear to me to risk themselves on my behalf.”
She lowered her eyes then, granting me only a view of her crown, for ten arduous seconds.
“You need not profess such feelings, sir,” she muttered, looking slightly up.
“We shall marry before autumn sets in. I see every right for me to profess feelings –”
“That is hardly necessary, Mr. Darcy. I do not believe I have agreed to –”
“Your future protector and guide –”
“My present fate is in my hands. I do not believe I –”
“You are foolish to assume –”
“Highest forms of affection. I cannot –”
“It is not duty that spurs me! I am wholly sincere in my –”
The coarse laughter crossing the room caused both our efforts at argument to cease. Slowly, we each turned towards Arnold’s piercing eyes. His right hand played with his pistol, his left hand his knife.
His smirk was two parts mischief, eight parts evil. “Lovers’ quarrel, eh?”
• • •
The air tensed around us, every breath measured. My heart, rushing mere moments ago from Mr. Darcy’s strange declarations, battled on in genuine fear. Had our disagreements circumvented our only opportunity to form a viable plan of escape? Had our pettiness stood in the way of our emancipation?
“Yer fightin’ ain’t helpin’ ye,” Arnold scoffed, leering and sneering. The knife he tossed in his left hand shimmered precariously. “George wants money, not tears.”
“George?” I reacted before Mr. Darcy could. “You still have a master?”
The comment did not sit well with our captor, and his scowl deepened.
“I’m yer master now, ma’am. It ain’t good to argue.” His eyes trained themselves firmly on me. It was a struggle to avoid flinching. “Ask yer ‘usband where the money is.”
“There is no money,” Mr. Darcy – for unfathomable reasons – continued to insist. I noticed briefly that he hid his wrists behind his back, feigning bondage. “We did not bring much for our journey.”
