Elizabeth longed to tell him that this wasn’t true, that she and the doctor were actually conspiring to lessen his dependency. But she feared that it would throw him into a rage. That it would backfire, and he would simply eat more of the opium than he ever had.
The doctor said they must wait a little longer before telling him. He said that once they had reached an appreciable threshold, then Darcy might feel that he had made an accomplishment. Going backwards would be less appealing to him at that point, or so the doctor theorized.
Darcy began drinking liquor again, in the stead of drinking more laudanum. That, coupled with the fact that he was getting more alcohol in the laudanum itself, led to his being drunk and maudlin on most evenings.
But occasionally, his drinking seemed to lift his spirits, at least for a short period of time, anyway. One such afternoon, he had been hitting the brandy bottle rather liberally, and he found her in her own bedchamber, discussing the laundering of the bedsheets with one of the servants.
He leaned against the doorway and gave her an insouciant grin, and he almost looked like his old self. “Mrs. Shockey, is it?”
The servant turned to face him. “Oh,” she said, putting a fluttering hand to her chest. “Mr. Darcy up and about. How wonderful.”
Darcy winked at her. “Mrs. Shockey, I need to speak to my wife alone.”
“Of course,” said Mrs. Shockey, already leaving the room. “Begging your pardon, sir.”
Once she was gone, Darcy shut the door and leaned against it, folding his arms over his chest. “How long have we been married, Mrs. Darcy?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Elizabeth, coming over to him. “What has gotten into you?” She was smiling. “Not that I don’t like it, but—”
“Has it been weeks?”
“Months, sir,” she said, shaking her head at him.
“Months?” He raised his eyebrows. “Certainly not.”
“Indeed,” said Elizabeth, stopping in front of him. She smiled wider.
“I have quite a bit to make up for then, I suppose,” he said.
“Don’t worry about that now.” She patted his shoulder. “You are rarely well enough to get up and about. You must take it slow—” But she broke off in a yelp, because he had pushed away from the door and gathered her up into his arms. Her feet dangled off the floor. “Mr. Darcy, what are you doing?” she cried.
He propelled her back across the room and deposited her on her bed. “It’s only,” he said, his voice husky now, “that I was suddenly taken by the very strong desire for my wife, which it occurs to me I have been neglecting.”
“It is daylight!” She propped herself up on her elbows.
He gently shoved her back. “All the better to see your beauty.”
“Mr. Darcy!” And now she was laughing, and she had not felt quite so happy in a very long time.
He had her out of her dress in minutes flat, had her back on the bed in her chemise and stockings, and he was yanking his shirt over his head, climbing up there with her.
His lips found hers.
She clung to him. They had not so much as kissed in a very long time. This was… she had not dared to hope for something like this.
“I owe you pleasure,” he murmured, pushing her chemise up to her thighs, baring the secret parts of her. “I have shown you too much pain. I want you to have one good thought of me.”
“Mr. Darcy, of course I have good thoughts of you.” She was breathless. The air was touching her bare thighs, her bare sex.
He pushed her chemise higher, and he ran his fingers over her nipples, teasing them stiff.
She gasped.
He kissed her. “God, you are beautiful. How have I not been worshiping this beauty every second? I must be mad not to have touched you yet.”
She sighed. She pulled his face down, kissed him hard.
One of his hands traveled down her body, skimming over the slight curve of her belly, down between her thighs, to the very center of her. He fumbled for a moment. “Pardon me, madam, but if you’ll only give me a moment—”
She seized his hand and guided him to the proper spot. She had not spent all those nights thinking of him with her own hands on her body not to have discovered a bit about how to bring herself pleasure. “There.”
He grinned at her. “My deepest thanks, Mrs. Darcy.”
She shuddered. “Oh, say it again. Call me that again.”
His lips on her ear lobe. “Mrs. Darcy.” On her cheekbone. “Mrs. Darcy.” On her jaw. “Mrs. Darcy.” And all the while his fingers stroked and nudged and teased her, working her into a frenzy.
She moaned. “That’s nice,” she whispered.
“Just nice?” He arched an eyebrow. “I’m not doing it right, then.”
“Oh, no, it’s very lovely. Please don’t stop.”
“Not for the world.” He put his mouth to her breasts, suckling one nipple after another, making them round and hard pebbles against her soft skin.
She arched her back, her eyes closed. She whimpered.
“Ah,” he breathed. “I could watch you like this all day. You are beautiful, bared to me like this, surrendering to me like this.”
She grasped fistfuls of the covers. She began to writhe. “Darcy…” She could hardly get the words out. “Fitzwilliam.”
“Let it go, my love,” he whispered to her, continuing his slow, smooth strokes.
She had brought herself thus before, of course, but it had never been like this. She could not believe how good this was, how intense. She was overcome. She was destroyed. She twisted in pleasure, unbridled noises ripping through her lips, writhing and bucking against his fingers.
And then she hit the brink of it, the height of her pleasure, and she went to pieces.
The shocks and tremors built to an apex and then began to ebb out, and he was looking down at himself in something like wonder.
“What?” she whispered.
He undid his trousers, freeing himself.
“You are…?”
“Yes,” he said. “Somehow…”
She thrust her tongue into his mouth. “I want you now,” she said in a thick voice. “Now, Fitzwilliam.”
“Oh, God, yes,” he muttered. He shed his trousers and settled against her hips. Her body cradled him, and he slipped into her, easily gliding deeply inside, burying himself to the hilt. He groaned softly.
She looked into his eyes, and they began to move together.
And for one glorious moment, everything was perfect.
* * *
But after, he fell asleep and stayed asleep for hours. She got up and read for a bit. When he woke, he was disoriented.
He clutched his head. “Why am I in your bedchamber?”
“You don’t remember?” she said.
“No, I remember drinking brandy,” he said. “A lot of brandy. God, I want some laudanum.” He sat up, rubbing his forehead. “What happened to my clothes?”
“Darcy, you and I, we, um… that is… you really don’t remember?”
He gazed at her. “I remember nothing. Did I undress myself? What did I say to you? Dear Lord, I didn’t harm you, did I?”
“No,” she laughed. “Quite the opposite. We were… together. You must understand my meaning?”
He laughed bitterly. “That’s not funny.”
“It’s not a joke.”
He staggered to his feet. “Where is the laudanum? If you care for me at all, you’ll find some.”
And so, more months passed.
Elizabeth continued, with the aid of the doctor, to step down the laudanum, but Darcy was increasing his intake, drinking more and more, and hating himself for his weakness. She was afraid her attempt was a failure.
But she did not feel that she could stop, because she now had a very important reason to get Darcy off the dreaded stuff.
She was with child.
She did not reveal this to the doctor, but she asked if they might not reveal to Darcy that they had been ste
pping down his intake of the opium. The doctor said that it was too soon, that Darcy was still too dependent. They must wait to tell him, the doctor said. He would tell her when it was a good time to apprise Darcy of the situation.
One afternoon, Colonel Fitzwilliam appeared at Pemberley without warning.
Darcy was sleeping off whatever laudanum he had ingested after luncheon, and so Elizabeth had to greet the colonel alone.
She had one of the servants bring him down some bread and butter and tea. She tried to think of how she should speak to him. She didn’t know much about him, but she knew that he and Darcy were cousins, so she knew that she must be polite and welcome him. But it was a sorry household they kept here. Darcy was not in any shape to entertain.
“Colonel Fitzwilliam,” she said. “What a surprise to see you here.”
“A surprise? But I wrote to Darcy and told him I would be coming,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam. “Didn’t he tell you?”
She shook her head, smiling. “It must have slipped his mind.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam ate some bread and butter. “Where is Darcy?”
“Asleep, as he usually is at this hour, unfortunately,” she said, deciding the truth was the best policy in this situation. Colonel Fitzwilliam was family, after all.
“At this hour?” Colonel Fitzwilliam raised his eyebrows. “It is not yet three o’clock.”
“Yes,” she said.
“Well, have someone wake him up. I’m sure he’d like to see me.”
She spread her hands helplessly. “Even if I wanted to, I doubt that I could. He sleeps very soundly after his lunchtime laudanum.”
“He sleeps every afternoon?”
“He sleeps most of the time. When he is awake, he is not quite himself. Very much in a daze.”
“Dash it all,” muttered Colonel Fitzwilliam.
“He will probably be up in time for dinner. You must stay, of course.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam’s nostrils flared. “He has gotten very bad, has he?”
Elizabeth studied her fingernails. “He is actually a bit better than he was.” But maybe she was lying to herself about that. Maybe he wasn’t better at all. Maybe she only wanted him to be better so that he could be a proper father to their child. But maybe Darcy wasn’t capable of such things. Maybe the opium had swallowed him whole.
Colonel Fitzwilliam regarded her with a concerned expression. “Oh, dash it all,” he said again. “I had hoped that marrying you might help him turn things around.” He drew in a long breath. “I will stay. Perhaps I can do something about this mess.”
“Oh, I do hope so,” said Elizabeth. But she wasn’t sure that her hope wasn’t simply a liability these days.
* * *
Darcy blinked hard. “Richard?”
“Ah, good, you’re awake,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam, who was standing over Darcy’s bed. “If I’d had to shake you any longer, I was going to call for a bucket of icy water to dump over your head.”
Darcy struggled to sit up. “Honestly, Richard, you might have waited for me in the drawing room.”
“I’ve been waiting for you for hours now. I finally got your wife to consent to have a servant rouse you. When he wasn’t successful, I said that I’d do it myself.”
“Oh,” said Darcy dully. He looked out the window. What time was it?
Well, he’d eaten luncheon already. It must be late afternoon then, nearly evening. Yes, now that he looked again, he realized that the light was fading.
He got confused sometimes. The days bled into each other. He was on edge all the time. He longed for opium, but whenever he took some, it was only enough to barely blunt his desire for it. He was in agony most of the time. He didn’t dare up his dosage, because at the rate he was going, he would be taking a ridiculous amount of the stuff if he did. But there was nothing pleasurable about his life now. It was only need and hunger and pain.
Colonel Fitzwilliam wandered over to Darcy’s bedside table, where several laudanum bottles were sitting out. Colonel Fitzwilliam picked them up, walked over to the window, undid the catch and dropped them out of sight.
Darcy made a noise in the back of his throat. “What have you done?”
Colonel Fitzwilliam gave him a lopsided smile. “I don’t suppose you’ll be helpful enough to tell me where the rest of them are.”
Darcy lunged out of the bed, suddenly surging with energy. He tackled Colonel Fitzwilliam and knocked him to the ground. “You don’t understand. I need it.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam seized his wrists and held them at bay. He chuckled. “It’s going to be a long couple of days, Darcy. Saddle up.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Elizabeth paced. “The doctor said it could kill him. I don’t think this is a good idea.”
In the next room, Darcy was pounding on the door, screaming at the two of them. It had been ten hours since his last dose of laudanum. The first few hours had been bearable. Darcy had merely sulked in his room, and Colonel Fitzwilliam had assured her that there was no danger.
The next few hours had been a bit worse but still hadn’t overly worried Elizabeth. She had even begun to think that perhaps she should have done this ages ago, that it was not so bad after all, and that Darcy would be feeling better soon.
But now, things had started to get much worse. Darcy had stopped sounding sulkish and started sounding desperate. After the screaming started, Elizabeth started to think they should stop the whole thing.
“Oh, nonsense,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam. “I’ve seen it before, at least two or three times. It’s hellish, but they get through it. No one dies. Your body doesn’t need opium to live, it only tricks your mind into thinking it does. Everyone knows that you’re better off without it in your system.”
“Still, the doctor said—”
“And that was before you had been slowly stepping him down for months,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam. She had told the colonel of what she had been doing thus far. “It’ll be easier for him now. Safer. He’s already started beating it, he just doesn’t know it.”
“I really don’t think we should be doing this.”
“Oh, come now. We can’t stop now that we’ve begun. We must get him shut of the evil stuff.”
Darcy banged on the door. “Let me out, Richard. I am going to be sick.”
“Be sick in the myriad chamberpots I left in there for that precise purpose,” Colonel Fitzwilliam called back.
“You bastard. I’ll kill you as soon as I get my hands on you!” Darcy’s voice was a thin shriek.
Elizabeth stopped pacing. “We can’t do this to him. He’s in agony.”
“Elizabeth?” said Darcy. “Is that you? Are you letting him do this to me?”
She put her hands to her mouth.
“Help me,” said Darcy. “I think I hid a bottle in the study somewhere. You can find it for me, sneak it to me past Richard.”
“Shut up!” said Colonel Fitzwilliam, banging two hard knocks on the door.
“Please, Elizabeth.” Darcy was whining. He was pitiful. “If you’ve ever loved me, please. Failing that, you could go to the doctor and get me some more. I’m dying here.”
“You’re not dying,” the colonel snapped. He turned to Elizabeth. “He’s not dying. If he was dying, he wouldn’t be telling us that he was dying. He’d be silent.”
Elizabeth wrung her hands. “We have to let him out. He can’t take it.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam took her by the shoulders and walked her down the hallway. “If you can’t stand listening to him, then go somewhere else.”
She almost protested, but then she had another idea. She hurried to the stables. It was dark, after midnight, but she knew that doctors were used to being disturbed at all hours. She would ride to the doctor and tell him what Colonel Fitzwilliam was up to. If there was danger, he would help her stop the colonel from killing her husband.
She simply had to get there in time.
She rode as fast as she could. Arriving at the doct
or’s home, she didn’t even bother to tie up her horse. Instead, she ran for the door and began banging on the knocker with all her might.
The door opened and a maid glared at her. “You are in need of the doctor?”
“Yes,” Elizabeth said. “Yes, please.”
“Well, tell me where he needs to be, and I’ll fetch him. You can run on back home.”
“I need to speak to him. I must ask him—”
“Mrs. Darcy?” The doctor’s voice filtered out from behind the maid.
The woman turned.
“It’s all right,” said the doctor, pushing past the maid. “What is it, Mrs. Darcy?”
She spilled out the story as best she could, explaining everything from Colonel Fitzwilliam’s arrival to the fact that Darcy had been without any opium for over ten hours. “Is it going to kill him? Should we stop?”
The doctor rubbed his chin. “Listen, when I said that there was a chance that going off it was fatal, I only meant it was possible, not that it was likely. The future is difficult to predict, and I can’t say for sure what might happen. But I don’t think his death is imminent. However, I would say your larger problem is simply that this is probably a lot of effort for nothing.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that I’ve watched family members do this to those who are habitual opium eaters, and it’s very rarely successful at curing the eater of his problem. He will most likely go back to the bottle not long after he gets clean. This is being forced upon him, you see. No, I think that the best thing you could do would be to go to him now and tell him of what you and I have done. See if he can be convinced to try this for himself. If he wants it as much as you do, if he believes it is possible, then you’ll be much more likely to succeed.”
* * *
“You did what?” Darcy flung himself out of his chair.
Elizabeth flinched. He wasn’t taking this very well. And he didn’t look good. She supposed she hadn’t really noticed, since she saw him all the time, and the incremental changes were so minuscule so as not to be noticeable. But Darcy was skeletal. His shirt hung open, baring his chest, which was pale and had a slightly yellowish hue. She could see the outline of his ribs below his collarbone. His face was gaunt too.
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