A Mismatched Compromise

Elizabeth Bennet would never stray from the public rooms of a dance…not unless she had a very good reason.

Elizabeth has high hopes for the Netherfield Ball…hopes that fall flat when Mr Wickham is absent, Mr Darcy unaccountably asks her to dance, and Mr Collins dogs her every step. But matters go from bad to worse when Elizabeth is mistakenly given a note intended for her youngest sister. Upon reading it, Elizabeth is horrified to learn that Lydia had intended to meet a gentleman signed only as X in the empty library during the ball. There is nothing to be done but find Lydia, give her the scolding of a lifetime, and hurry her back to the safety of the ballroom……but when everything goes terribly awry, Elizabeth ends the night both compromised and engaged — to Mr Bingley, the man already in love with Jane!

Darcy thought he knew what Jane Bennet felt for Charles Bingley: mild friendliness, but certainly nothing like love. It takes an unwilling proposal from Bingley and a still less willing acceptance from Elizabeth to make him realise he is quite wrong. The devastation on Jane Bennet’s face is a mirror to his own heart screaming that Elizabeth Bennet must not be forced into a marriage of convenience, let alone with a man who is in love with her sister. Even as he is unwilling to admit it to himself, there is only one man Darcy would wish her to marry. But when he and Elizabeth become wary allies in the struggle to avoid a marriage that would make everyone concerned miserable, more than one truth will be revealed…not least the truth of their own hearts.

A Mismatched Compromise asks what might happen if Elizabeth and Darcy began as uneasy allies in preventing a disastrously mismatched marriage, only to discover a deep and unwavering love. Readers will enjoy a delightful balance of pining and lightheartedness, a decisive role for the sardonic but kindly Earl of Matlock, and of course a very happy ending!