Elizabeth moved to rest her cheek upon Darcy’s back and slipped her arms around his waist. “Are you?” she asked, “for I must say I am hardly concerned such a thing shall ever happen. We have many years ahead of us yet to teach Eleanor how to go about choosing a young man who is truly worthy of her love and admiration. I daresay when the time comes for her to surrender her heart to the keeping of another, she shall have no trouble whatsoever in discerning whether or not he is deserving of her.”
Darcy laughed ruefully. “Forgive me if I do not share your confidence. There is no way to ensure such a thing. If Georgiana so easily failed to see what a wretched mistake she was making, and then Lydia—though at the time your sister was hardly the woman she is today—I am afraid I cannot carry so much faith in my heart.”
“You fail to see the common element then, Fitzwilliam.”
He turned sharply. “You mean Wickham? Though he has been dead these four years, I had not thought you so naïve as to believe there are not others in the world very much like him, who would not hesitate to do just as much harm, perhaps even worse.”
“I was not referring to Mr. Wickham, my dear,” Elizabeth said. “I was referring to us, to our love. That is the common element or, rather, one not so common.” Darcy stared at her, and Elizabeth sighed, clearly exasperated. Rather than lose her patience, however, she decided to take pity upon him. “Though I have no doubt Georgiana has always been a very sensible young lady, she had not a mother to speak to her or to guide her and though Lydia had the benefit of such counsel at her constant disposal, one can hardly declare either my sister or my mother to ever have been sensible at the time. Neither of our sisters had anything truly tangible to base their woeful decisions upon. It was not until they were able to see what love should be—to observe it firsthand in us, and to discuss it openly and honestly—that they were finally able to begin to experience it themselves on some vicarious level and, ultimately, to apply that knowledge they had gleaned—that recognition—to their own circumstances. Because of this, they have been able to make sensible decisions for their own greater good and that of their husbands’, as well.”
Watching her husband struggle with this revelation, Elizabeth sighed and extended her hand to caress his abrasive cheek. “You are truly the very best of men, Fitzwilliam. Indeed, I have yet to meet any man who could ever begin to compete with your goodness and your sense of honor. Both Georgiana and Lydia were able to recognize that in you, as well. They chose to model their ideals after you, and as a result, they are now married to two very respectable men who love them unreservedly, in spite of their youthful indiscretions. I can almost promise you Eleanor will be no different and much quicker to pick up on it, I might add, simply because she will have me to explain it to her.”
Darcy held Elizabeth tightly. “You are correct, of course. I should have known better than to question your logic. However better I may feel, though, it still does not help knowing that someday my baby girl will leave me, even if it is for the love and admiration of the second best of men,” he said with a slight curve of his lip.
Elizabeth laughed. “I doubt Eleanor is ready to leave you just yet, especially after the way you have taken to spoiling her.”
“Then I believe I shall have to use this information to my advantage and endeavor to continue with my current course of action. Perhaps tomorrow I shall purchase a pony.”
“You may purchase twenty ponies if you like, Fitzwilliam, but I am sorry to inform you that such generosity shall not ensure your daughter’s continued residence at Pemberley any longer than it takes the man of her dreams to find her and sweep her off her feet. As you know, your time would be far better spent showing Eleanor the many remarkable things you can offer her as her father, such as your wealth of knowledge and strength of character, not the material objects your money can purchase for her. In any case, that is one lesson you have learnt well since the day you met me, so I am convinced you shall do an equally admirable job with our daughter.”
Darcy struggled to repress a smile at her teasing words. She was right; he knew she was. Though Elizabeth had been unaware of it at the time, she had made him work hard to earn her admiration and, ultimately, her love, but in the end, the reward was well worth every bit of the initial suffering he had endured. This woman was, beyond a doubt, his most cherished treasure, and she had been generous enough to give him two others as welclass="underline" their son and their daughter.
“Indeed,” he said, his voice holding a hint of a teasing inflection, “it is a lesson I found forced upon me very early in our acquaintance, Mrs. Darcy. However, it only continued to prove to me your full value as a woman worthy of being pleased. Of course, I remember well that you were often impertinent to me throughout the whole business and on far too many occasions for me to recall with any degree of accuracy.”
“You are incorrigible, Mr. Darcy,” she replied, then ran the tip of her tongue over his smiling lips. “I believe, sir, in cases such as these, a good memory is unpardonable. Tell me, husband, why must you forever make mention of my faults?”
Darcy captured her lips in a slow, teasing kiss before he turned his attention to the curve of her neck. When his lips reached her ear and upon hearing her sigh of pleasure, he murmured, “In my opinion it is hardly a fault, you minx, as you are well aware. Though it was the teasing look in your eyes that first drew my notice, it was your impertinence and liveliness of spirit that soon captivated me. The combination, madam, and only in you, I might add, is one I have always found irresistible.”
Elizabeth smiled as he took her lobe between his teeth. His hands wandered over her curves in agonizing slowness; all the while, he drew her body closer. She allowed herself to melt into his embrace, their bodies pressed together. Her voice was hardly more than a whisper when she said, “All this time I had thought it was my intelligent discourse.”
“Hardly,” Darcy growled, “but that was a most pleasant inducement, as well, as was your light and pleasing figure.”
“Incorrigible,” she whispered again as his hands slid down her back to caress her hips.
“Lizzy,” he whispered roughly. His hot breath, coupled with the name he always reserved for those moments of deepest intimacy, sent shivers of longing through her body. “Let us see if we cannot make another impertinent daughter.”
Nine months later, and over the course of the ten years that followed, Elizabeth presented Darcy with three such daughters. Though each was exclaimed over and pronounced to be a local beauty, much in the same manner that their mother and aunts had been, to the astonishment of their elder brother, none of his teasing sisters was ever proclaimed by their father to possess even half so much of their mother’s celebrated impertinence. In light of such a declaration, young Charles, who had inherited much of Darcy’s serious mien, could not help thinking his proud father must have had very little sense in his head at the time to have so easily fallen under the spell of a pretty young woman those many years ago…even if the pretty young woman was his mother. Darcy took great pleasure in enlightening him.