Page 65 of Elizabeth Bennet Says Yes to Mr. Darcy

I placed her letter on the table beside my bed.

I hardly slept at all.

At dawn, no rain fell. The road to the church remained passable. No message arrived calling off the wedding. Bingley entered my room with a triumphant expression and informed me that the world had survived the night.

When I finally stood beside the altar, I stopped looking at the door.

Then it opened.

Elizabeth appeared on her father’s arm.

She raised her eyes to mine and smiled.

I understood then that I had been waiting for her long before Hunsford, without knowing that a woman could see me with such clarity and still choose to come to me.

She walked toward me freely.

And every step she took was a gift.

Chapter 20

Elizabeth

Jane married Mr. Bingley one June morning beneath a sky so luminous that my mother took it as heaven's approval of all her decisions.

She wept during the ceremony, even more at the luncheon, then recovered enough strength to inform every guest that Jane had always been the most beautiful young woman in Hertfordshire. Bingley gazed at his wife as if discovering this truth for the first time.

Darcy stood beside me in the church.

When Jane spoke her vows, his fingers discreetly brushed mine between the folds of my dress. No one could see the touch. It was enough to send a warmth racing beneath my skin—one that had nothing to do with religion.

Two weeks later, it was our turn.

I slept little the night before. Jane had left Netherfield to spend the night at Longbourn with me. We shared our old room one last time, though neither of us was still the girl who had once spoken of love there with such ignorance.

“Are you happy?” she asked me in the darkness.

“Yes.”

“You didn't hesitate.”

“Not anymore.”

She was quiet for a moment.

“You love him.”

I stared at the ceiling I could not see.

I had told Darcy that I respected him, desired him, and chose him. I had not yet spoken the word love. Not because it wasn't true, but because I feared a declaration made so late would seem manufactured—a mere echo of his own.

“Yes,” I murmured. “I love him.”

“Have you told him?”

“Not in those words.”

“Why not?”