“Come now! I have met many pleasant young women tonight and have had the pleasure of dancing with several of them.”
“Indeed, you have been dancing with the only beautiful woman in the room.”
Lizzy looked around frantically, but there was no other means of escape. She would either have to go past them, and announce her presence, or back through the doors she had just come through. She was contemplating exiting back out to the terrace when the sound of her own name made her forget about her exit strategy.
“Jane Bennet is the most beautiful creature I have ever beheld. But her sister, Elizabeth, is very pretty as well, and I daresay very agreeable. Let me ask Jane to introduce you.”
Lizzy smiled to herself. She knew there was a reason she had liked Charles Bingley on sight, and he had just proven it to her.
“She is tolerable, I suppose, but not handsome enough to tempt me. You had better return to your partner and enjoy her smiles, for you are wasting your time with me.”
“Are you sure I cannot change your mind?”
“I am positive.”
“Then at least do not spend all night sulking in the hall. Find some way to occupy yourself.” With that, Charles took Darcy’s advice and left to find Jane.
The phone in Lizzy’s hand went off again, and surprised by the sudden movement, she dropped it. It fell to the tile floor with a clatter and brought Darcy about abruptly on his heel.
His eyes met hers, and Lizzy flushed scarlet at being caught eavesdropping. “Uh…excuse me.” She made a mad grab for the phone that was skittering away from her with every vibration. She scooped it up off the tile, but by that time the call had already gone to voicemail.
She sighed in frustration and looked up to find that the tips of Darcy’s ears had gone pink. Briefly, she debated what to do. She couldn’t very well pretend she hadn’t heard what he’d said, for it was very obvious to both of them that she had.
In the end, she decided to treat the incident with her trademark good cheer, and not let on to the hurt that had taken up residence at his words.
“Well, Mr. Darcy,” she said, holding out her hand to a silent Darcy. “It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I’m Elizabeth Bennet. The tolerable one.”
Red started creeping up his neck as he took the hand she offered him and shook it by rote. He cleared his throat, as if to get his voice working again, and said, “The pleasure’s all mine.”
She sent him a sly grin. “I rather doubt that.”
He ran one finger around his collar and made a slight choking sound. “About that…I don’t suppose there’s any way you would believe I didn’t mean it like it sounded?”
She flashed him a sassy smile. “Not at all. But I will allow you to make it up to me.” The phone in her hand started ringing again.
Darcy looked shocked and taken aback by her words. He sputtered, “You’ll let me make it up to you?”
“Yes. I assume you have a car?”
“Of course.” He looked so confused, Lizzy would have found the moment humorous, if he hadn’t just called her “tolerable” and insinuated she wasn’t worth the time spent in a dance. Well, he was about to get a whole lot more than that.
“Great! Then you can be my driver.” She strode passed him, tugging on his arm when he threatened to remain frozen in shock. Reluctantly, he allowed himself to be dragged along behind her. She answered her phone brusquely, “Yes, Jack. I’m on my way.”
She gave Darcy a shove when he hesitated at the front door, and then followed him as he reluctantly led the way through the parking lot. Somewhere between the hall and the front door he must have decided to go along with her hare-brained scheme. Which, frankly, shocked her. She had expected him to refuse. High-powered executives weren’t exactly known for letting themselves be steam-rolled.
She frowned, still listening as her sub-contractor chattered in her ear. “Really. Okay. I’ll come directly there, then.”
She hung up as Darcy paused beside a sleek black sedan and pressed the unlock button on his keychain. “Nice car,” she told him as she opened the door and slid inside.
“Thanks.”
They were silent as he started the car and drove fluidly up to the exit of the parking lot. “Where to?”
She gave him directions to Lucas Lodge and then sat back to enjoy the ride. She started second-guessing her decision to recruit Darcy as her driver when the silence became oppressive. She got out her phone to shoot a message off to Jane, informing her that she had been called away to the jobsite.
Darcy glanced over at her curiously. “What are you doing?”
Lizzy answered, “Texting Jane. She will worry if I’m gone too long.”
“Why did you need to leave?”
She perked up as they neared the drive to Lucas Lodge. “You’ll see when we get there. Turn here.” At the gate, she instructed him to punch in the code. She smiled as the outline of the grand old building came into sight around a curve in the drive. “Ah. Welcome to Lucas Lodge, home of Sir William Lucas and his family.”
“It is beautiful,” admitted Darcy grudgingly. “But I fail to see why we had to make the mad dash here.”
“You are a businessman, Mr. Darcy. Surely, you appreciate that sometimes business cannot wait until the morning.”
He didn’t deny it. She waited until he had put the car into park and then struggled to get out of the low-lying car gracefully in her long gown. Darcy came around to her side of the car and offered her a hand up with a wry smile.
Hating to accept his help, she nonetheless took his hand and let him pull her up. “Thanks,” she said breathlessly, her heart rate accelerating at his gentle touch.
“No problem,” he murmured. He followed her up to the main entrance, more than a little curious as to their purpose in being there.
The subcontractor met them at the front door.
*****
The moment they stepped through the front door, Darcy saw Elizabeth Bennet switch into work mode.
She had been fun and light-hearted in the car, despite his discomfort and what he knew had to be an awkward lack of conversation. He had tried to think of something to break the silence, but had been entirely unsuccessful. Whenever he was trapped in a social situation that demanded he be polite and friendly, his mind just seemed to shut down.
His gaze lingered on the back of the young woman who strode confidently in front of him down the front hall of Lucas Lodge. She had caught him off guard with her impromptu request for a ride, and he had been swept along by her enthusiasm before he had even realized what was happening.
He wondered at that now, because he was not the sort of man that let anyone coerce him into doing something he didn’t want to do. He blamed it on the guilt.
He really should not have been so harsh on her. He had been fine, pacing the hallway alone and playing games on his phone, until Charlie had shown up and insisted he dance. His disgust had been born more out of irritation at his friend than from a true dislike for Elizabeth. Charlie knew how much he disliked dancing. He knew how Darcy struggled with social interactions and how difficult he found it to make polite conversation with new people. Now he expected him to make friends with a whole roomful of strangers? The very idea was ludicrous.
When Charlie had mentioned Elizabeth as a potential partner, all Darcy could recall was an impression of the petite brunette. She had been happy, radiating joy, and that was the last type of person he had any interest in interacting with at that moment. He had no desire to be drawn from his taciturn musing. He was perfectly happy as he was. That was why he had called her tolerable and sent Charlie on his way. He was comfortable in the hall with his own thoughts.
But then a clatter on the tile behind him had drawn his attention. He had turned around, and there she was. The look on her face as their eyes met had been priceless. An inexplicable mix of annoyance, shock, and guilt had crossed her features. She obviously hadn’t expected to be caught eavesdropping any more than he had expe
cted someone to overhear his unkind remarks.
It had taken him far longer than it should have to overcome his embarrassment. By the time he had started to come out of it, they were already in the parking lot and he was roped into serving as her chauffeur.
Now, here he was, in the music room of Lucas Lodge, standing off to one side and shifting about uncomfortably as Elizabeth Bennet discussed paint colors and trim with the contractor.
She was tiny, not more than five foot two or three, but he could see she was truly in her element here. If not for the confidence and poise that radiated from her, she would have looked ridiculous in her formal attire surrounded by construction materials and drop cloths.
It was obvious she was in charge here by the way the contractor deferred to her opinion, and he wondered for the first time what her role was in Longbourn Design and Construction. If Jane Bennet was the interior designer, what did that make her?
She was eyeing the scaffolding set up along the back wall as she spoke with the contractor, and Darcy had the sudden, horrific realization that she was going to try to scale the thing in her quest to enlighten the contractor.
He moved to intercept her as she started forward. “You cannot go up there.”
She paused with one hand on the ladder and one foot on the rung to cast him an annoyed glance over her shoulder. She was plainly wondering who he thought he was to tell her what she could and could not do. She held on to her patience with an iron will. “Why not?”
“You had trouble getting out of the car in that dress,” he pointed out. “I don’t think trying to climb scaffolding in it is a good idea.”
She gave him a beatific smile. “Ah, but that was getting out. This is going up. They are two very different things. Besides, look- I took off my shoes.” She stuck one bare foot out from under her hem and gestured to the high-heeled sandals he hadn’t noticed she had discarded at the base of the scaffolding. “Without those torture devices on my feet I’ll be fine.”
Without waiting for him to respond- indeed, he was speechless at the sight of those dainty toes with their pretty pink toenails peeking out from beneath her hem- she scrambled up. The contractor, Jack, followed her up, leaving Darcy to gawk at them awkwardly from the floor.
Darcy wasn’t used to feeling so discomfited. He also wasn’t used to being ignored and he definitely wasn’t used to being told ‘no’. He struggled between astonishment and irritation, even as a small part of him applauded Elizabeth’s bravado.
He tried to dismiss that part of him as he contemplated going up after her and dragging her back down to solid ground. His gaze swept the height of the wall and tried to judge the distance from the top of the scaffolding, where Elizabeth was now perched, and the floor. The ceilings in these historic homes were high, and she had to be a good fifteen feet up. Considering that he found the top of a ladder to be vertigo inducing, it probably wasn’t in his best interests to go up after her.
After everything she had already put him through, Darcy definitely did not want to embarrass himself further in front of Miss Elizabeth Bennet. Fainting out of fear would do that to a guy. She would never be able to look at him with respect again. Why that mattered to him, he didn’t know, but for some reason, he knew without a shadow of a doubt that earning Elizabeth Bennet’s respect was no easy feat, and once won it would be well worth the effort.
From his spot on the floor, it looked like Elizabeth and the contractor were concluding their discussion and starting their descent.
Darcy took a step to the side so he wouldn’t be in the way and waited impatiently for her to be back on solid ground. She was still chatting with Jack when she put her foot on the rung of the last ladder and swung under the bar of the scaffold. With her mind preoccupied, her concentration wasn’t on what she was doing, and her foot slipped out from under her on the slick rung.
Darcy immediately leaped into action, grabbing her around the waist and lifting her to the ground before she could slide more than a few inches.
She stumbled into his chest as her feet hit the floor. All the breath whooshed out of her lungs at the sudden contact. The muscles of his biceps were hard under her splayed fingers. She could feel his strength through the fabric of his tux. She curled her fingers around his arms to steady herself and then stepped away, trying to ignore the tingle that ran up her arms at the contact.
“Sorry,” she said breathlessly.
He didn’t say anything, just stared at her, his eyes unreadable.
She turned away, discomfited, her cheeks pink from embarrassment and her reaction to being in his arms. He probably thought she was a clumsy fool, but she couldn’t stop the awareness that swamped her senses.
She struggled to focus on the job, the reason she was here and had been climbing the scaffolding in the first place. She slipped back on her shoes and forced herself to sound businesslike and competent. “Is that all you needed me for, Jack?”
“I think so, ma’am.” At least her contractor seemed properly respectful, even if he was shooting curious glances between her and Mr. Darcy.
“Good. Then I’ll see you first thing Monday morning unless something else comes up between now and then.”
“Sounds good.”
“We’ll see ourselves out, Jack. Keep up the good work.”
“Thank ye, ma’am.” He gave her a nod and disappeared down the hall to do as she instructed.
Without a word to her companion, Lizzy started back down the hall the way they had come. Her mind was still reeling, and she didn’t quite trust herself to be civil at the moment.
She didn’t feel in control, not like she normally did while she was on a job site. With Darcy by her side, she felt nervous, self-conscious, and more than a little rebellious. What had possessed her to press him into service? Sure, she had needed a ride, but his silence had been heavy, disapproving.
She had heard the man call her barely tolerable only an hour earlier; how much less he must think of her now! She had all but declared her ill-breeding by climbing scaffolding like a monkey in her formalwear and falling all over him in the process.
Her breath caught in her throat as it occurred to her that he probably thought she was trying to throw herself at him! If he had heard anything out of her mother’s mouth, there could be no doubt what Mrs. Bennet’s hopes were for her daughters. Even though Lizzy knew herself to be uninterested, especially after his comment in the hallway, he couldn’t know that.
Thus occupied by her thoughts, they had made it out to Darcy’s car and were climbing inside before she realized it.
She expected him to start the car, but he turned to her instead, a quizzical lift to his brow.
“So, what exactly is it that you do?” he asked.
It was so unexpected, Lizzy could do nothing more than gape at him for a moment before she collected her wits back about her. “I am the general contractor for my family’s company, Longbourn Design and Construction. We specialize in historic renovations.”
He nodded, once, very firmly, and turned back to the steering wheel. “That’s what I thought.” He started the car and drove off.
Lizzy let the silence linger for a few minutes, but when it became evident that nothing further was forthcoming, she couldn’t stop herself from asking, “That’s it? You don’t have anything else to say?”
He looked at her askance from the corner of his eye. What had she expected him to say? “Yes. I knew your sister did good work. Now it is evident that you do as well.”
Flabbergasted by the compliment, Lizzy could think of nothing else to say the entire way home.
When they pulled into the drive and the entire house was lit up like the Las Vegas strip, Lizzy nearly groaned. Why couldn’t her family have stayed at the party just a little while longer so she could sneak in unnoticed?
She considered going in through the back door, but instead thanked Darcy very prettily for the ride and mounted the front steps as he drove off. Her mother and sisters met her at the front door with a
chorus of questions.
“Where did you go, Lizzy? You were gone for ever so long,” said Kitty.
“You missed all the dancing,” said Lydia.
“Who was that?” Mrs. Bennet came to the point.
Lizzy went for the simplest answer first, hoping to throw them off. She slipped off her shoes. “I was not gone for that long, Kitty. I simply had to stop by Lucas Lodge and speak to Jack. They had some problems with the paint.”
Jane appeared from the kitchen to join the melee. “Did you get it taken care of?”
Lizzy nodded. “Yes. Everything is back on track.”
“Good. I’m ready to start bringing the furniture and accessories in as soon as they finish up.”
Mrs. Bennet wasn’t giving up so easily. “Who brought you home, child? Mrs. Long said she saw you leaving with some young man.”
Lizzy shared a guilty look with Jane, and gave up trying to withhold the information from her mother, not when Mrs. Long had already whetted her appetite. “Mr. Darcy gave me a ride, Mamma.”
“Mr. Darcy!” Mrs. Bennet looked quite taken aback for a moment. She started fanning herself vigorously. “My stars! Both of my daughters wed, can you imagine? First my Jane with Mr. Bingley, and now my dear Lizzy with Mr. Darcy. It is beyond my wildest expectations!”
Lizzy rolled her eyes and started to protest, “Mamma-”
But then Mrs. Bennet promptly fainted, and all attempt at rational conversation was lost.
Chapter 3
The drive from Longbourn to Netherfield Park was a short one, and it didn’t quite give Darcy the amount of time he needed to collect his thoughts.
From the moment Elizabeth Bennet had informed him she was a general contractor, his mind had been roiling. It would have been hard to picture her in the role if he hadn’t seen her in action himself. He could already tell she was a force to be reckoned with on a jobsite, and he could only imagine she was unstoppable when she was attired properly for the job.
He put his car into park at the back entrance to Netherfield Park and turned it off, but didn’t get out of the car.
Pride and Precipice Page 4
