“Step behind me, Elizabeth.” Darcy moved her to relative safety as he kept his gaze on their interloper. She stilled against him, terror tightening her fingers on his arm.

“I thought you dead,” Withey snarled.

A sarcastic smile graced Darcy’s face.“As usual, you were in error.”

“Well, Darcy, we are at an impasse. Our battle is to end this day, with only one claiming victory.” Falsely, James took a small step backward. “It is my belief that you are too honorable to kill a man in cold blood, and you are in too much pain to come for me,” he added brashly. With that, James dived through the open doorway, gunfire chasing him into the dusky shadows.


The gunshot surprised her, but Elizabeth did not scream. Instead, she prayed that Darcy had not killed Wickham. The man was correct; it would haunt her husband terribly, so despite what he had put them through, she wished Wickham to live.The sound of the front door banging open told her that God had answered that prayer.

“Help me,” Darcy ordered as he lurched toward the noise.

She clung to her husband. “Let him go, Fitzwilliam,” she begged. “I will not have you labeled a murderer.”

Darcy pulled up. Looking down at her bruised and bloody face, he said, “He did this to you.” He reached to caress her cheek.

“And to you.” She braced his shoulder with her hands.“Let this be the worst of it.”

The sound of hoof beats said Withey had made his escape, and for a moment, they thought it finished, but suddenly Demon bore down on them; and James Withey wielded a sword, slicing the frozen air.

Darcy pulled Elizabeth behind a burial crypt at the last second, but Withey circled the horse and came at them again. Everything moved in shadows: the crazed face of George Wickham yelling a curse filled with years of hate and a proud and a principled Fitzwilliam Darcy standing tall to rebuke the attack. And then Darcy reacted by instinct: He whistled to the horse—his horse—to Demon, and the stallion reared up, pawing the air with violent strikes.


James Withey barely held the reins as he charged Darcy for the second time, concentrating purely on making contact with his enemy, so when Darcy emitted a shrill whistle, at first he did not understand the man’s intentions; but then the horse rose on its back legs to defend itself from an unknown attack, and James felt himself sliding from the saddle. And then a grim silence.


“My God, Fitzwilliam!” Elizabeth rushed around her husband as he calmed his favorite horse. George Wickham lay, arms and legs akimbo, on a nearby grave, his head split open and a grayish blood seeping into the frozen ground. “He hit the tombstone,” she whispered to the stillness, as she reached out tentatively to touch her sister’s husband. However, the man no longer moved.

Darcy stood beside her. Lifting her gently to her feet, he pulled Elizabeth against his chest, allowing his wife’s grief to begin. “It is over, Sweetheart.” He held her to him. “Mr. Wickham can hurt us no more.”

The sound of fresh horses brought his head up, but only Stafford and Worth appeared. In silence, both men dismounted and joined them in the cemetery’s middle. Surrounded by marble and wood, dismay at what they had all suffered permeated the winter’s quiet. With a nod of his head, Darcy indicated for them to check the body. Worth did the honors while Stafford entered the church to set things aright. No one spoke. They had been through so much together in the past week that none of them needed words to know what to do.

“Are we taking Wickham back to Pemberley?” Stafford said at last.

Darcy still held Elizabeth in his embrace.“It is what Mrs. Darcy would want for her sister.”

Worth brought Vulcan alongside of the grave, so he and Stafford could load the body across the saddle. “Did you notice the epitaph?” the solicitor asked as they clumsily lifted Wickham to the horse.“’Tis fate that flings the dice, and as she flings, of kings makes peasants, and of peasants kings.”

“Wickham proved the folly of keeping bad company.” Stafford shot a quick glance at the Darcys. “As Ovid said, ‘The vulgar estimate friends by the advantage to be derived from them.’”


“Can you ride, Darcy?”Worth asked as he brought Demon forward.

Darcy bent his head to speak to Elizabeth. “May I take you up with me, my Dear?”

Elizabeth raised her head to look at him carefully. “Will it not hurt you?”

“It will hurt me more to have you out of the safety of my arms.”

Stafford suggested, “We should leave before the village comes to see what is going on.We are lucky no one seems to be home at the parsonage. I think we will need to construct a new truth out of this.”

“I suspect you are correct,Your Lordship. Now, if you and Worth will give me a leg up, we will take the back roads to Pemberley.”

“As you wish, Darcy.”

When Elizabeth had settled herself across Darcy’s lap, Stafford handed up his coat. “This may smell a bit better than the blanket your husband wears, Mrs. Darcy.”

“Thank you, Lord Stafford, but I find the odor of horse flesh quite alluring.” She turned into Darcy’s warmth as he draped the coat around her.

Stafford chuckled. “If I ever find a woman with your mettle, Mrs. Darcy, I will be on one knee in a heartbeat.”

“I shall happily celebrate that day, Your Lordship.”

Epilogue

Two days later, the Pemberley family and trusted guests sat together in the same blue drawing room they had shared for the preceding fortnight. Of the havoc George Wickham had wreaked, Lydia suffered the most serious injuries—the bullet from the colonel’s gun going completely through her left shoulder, leaving a gaping wound in her back. However, in Elizabeth’s opinion, Lydia’s most difficult injury to heal would be her sister’s emotional state. Months of dealing with Wickham’s mental decline had left Lydia vulnerable.

Georgiana needed only a few well-placed stitches. Mrs. Reynolds’s diagnosis of Colonel Fitzwilliam proved correct. Doctor Miller removed the fragments of the bullet and of one of the colonel’s many medals and casted the colonel’s broken wrist. Elizabeth suffered only a grazing wound close to her temple, while Darcy had some muscle damage across his shoulder blade and along his spine.An elaborate bandage crisscrossed his back and chest, restricting his movement, which totally frustrated a man known to take pride in the actual running of his estate.

“Sir Phillip returns today?”Worth asked as he sipped a cup of tea.

Darcy replied, “The baronet will take Mrs. Harwood to Derby first, but he and I have decided to send her to a friend in Antigua with the stipulation that the lady never returns to England.There is a facility nearby, where she will be expected to serve her sentence helping some of the island’s many orphans.”

Worth’s contempt for the idea showed. “For the heinous crime she committed, it is more than the lady deserves.”

“We have been through this several times, Worth,” Edward warded off the solicitor’s objections. “It is the only way we can reduce the scandal.”

“I understand,”Worth grumbled, “but I do not have to like it.”

Elizabeth reached out and patted Worth’s arm. “We appreciate your and Miss de Bourgh’s approval of this plan. We comprehend the depth of your disdain for this alternative, but we need to protect Mrs.Wickham.”

“Of course, Mrs. Darcy. I did not mean to criticize. Miss de Bourgh simply loved her long-time companion dearly.”

“As I love my sister,” Elizabeth said quietly.

Worth verbalized no further objections on the subject. Everyone assumed he would soon declare himself for Anne de Bourgh, and when she accepted him, he would become head of that branch of the family. His counsel had become valuable to them as they decided how to handle the outrage associated with Wickham’s intrusion.

“It still galls me that Mr. Steventon knew of the passages and never disclosed the information to me, especially as we searched for an unknown intruder,” Darcy grumbled.

Edward inquired, “What did the man say when you questioned him on it?”

“He thought me to be aware of the ruins. Said because Mr. Wickham’s father served my own for so long that he assumed me familiar with the layout. It seems my great-great grandfather saw a need for escape if the estate was attacked. In the 1600s, it would make sense. I must take the blame, I suppose, for not familiarizing myself with the house’s history. I thought I knew it, however.”

“Wickham must have known of the passageways because of his father?” Stafford thought aloud.

“One can only guess.” Darcy still showed signs of irritation. “His secrets died with him.”

“And what of your sister, Elizabeth?” Edward changed the subject. He sat beside Georgiana on a nearby settee—their fingers barely touching on the cushion between them.

Elizabeth watched with some amusement as Darcy eyed his cousin’s forwardness and his sister’s acceptance. It had taken her several hours the previous evening after Edward presented himself to Darcy to even consider a union of the two.


“Georgiana is not ready,” he insisted.

Elizabeth laughed softly.“Of course, our sister is ready. Women are born ready to marry.”

“You were not,” he accused.

Elizabeth snuggled into his right side. “I was born to marry the most honorable man to grace this earth. It was not my fault he came to me disguised as a pompous prig.” She stroked along his chin line as she spoke.

Darcy chuckled. “He was testing you, my Dear.” He lightly kissed her fingers. “Trying to see if you would recognize Love when it called upon you.”