What Would Lizzy Bennet Do? (33 page)

‘Holly, if this has anything to do with last night…’ he began.

‘It doesn’t.’ Her words were polite but firm. ‘You’re right, Hugh. This is your parents’ home. It’s better for all concerned if we wait until we’re married to – to take things to the next level. And I’m fine with that.’

‘You are?’ He regarded her with a doubtful expression. ‘You seemed a bit upset last night. I know I probably didn’t handle things very well…’

‘No,’ she agreed, ‘you didn’t.’ Her lower lip betrayed her and began to tremble. ‘You rejected me, Hugh. You
humiliated
me.’

‘I’m sorry.’ He frowned. ‘That was never my intention. I love you, Holly. You must know that. I want to be with you, more than anything.’

‘Do you? I’m sorry, but sometimes you don’t show it.’ She met his gaze. ‘Do you trust me, Hugh? Do you still want to marry me? Because if you don’t, it’s all right, we can always call it off…’

He stared at her, dumbstruck. ‘Of course I want to marry you! What’s going on, Holly? Why are you acting like this?’

‘Let me ask
you
a question, first. If you trust me, as you say you do,’ she went on, her eyes never leaving his, ‘why didn’t you tell me about your engagement to Jacinta?’

Hugh’s face darkened. ‘How do you even know about that?’

‘Not from you, obviously,’ she retorted. ‘Harry told me.’

‘He had no right. My engagement to Jacinta has no bearing on my relationship with you. It’s in the past,’ he said, his face rigid with anger, ‘where it belongs.’ He scowled. ‘How did my engagement to Miss Harlowe even come to your attention? It’s not something I’d expect to come up in conversation.’

‘I was upset when you went off to Derbyshire with your father last week,’ Holly said, and added, ‘
without
bothering to tell me.’

‘It was early. I didn’t want to wake you.’

‘Added to which,’ she went on, ignoring him, ‘you never once mentioned that you liked to sail, or told me the real reason you came between Ciaran and your sister… or that you were engaged to
someone else
before me!’ Her eyes searched his. ‘Didn’t you think I deserved to know, Hugh? Don’t you think I should know at least a few bits beforehand about the man I’m planning to
marry
?’

For a moment he stood and glared at her, his stance rigid and his eyes dark with anger. He turned away and strode to the window and stared out, his back to her.

‘I suffered a public humiliation.’ He did not look at her. ‘My fiancée didn’t have the decency to leave me a note, or to tell me privately that she couldn’t marry me, or why – instead, she told me the news at our rehearsal dinner, the night before our wedding, in front of all of my closest friends and family.’ He turned to face her. ‘You know me well enough to know that pride is something I have in abundance. You’ve pointed it out, more than once.’

‘Hugh,’ she began, flustered, ‘I’m sorry, truly. You don’t have to do this. I shouldn’t have brought it up…’

‘My pride took a blow that night; and it’s a blow from which I’ve only recently begun to recover.’

Holly bit her lip. ‘I’m so sorry. I can’t even imagine the pain she must’ve caused you. What Jacinta did was unforgivable. Harry told me about the engagement ring, how she chose the pink diamond, and kept it, and sold it afterwards…’

‘It’s in the past.’ His words were clipped. ‘That’s where I’d like to keep it, if you don’t mind. Do you still wish to go to the regatta ball tonight?’

She nodded slowly. ‘Yes. If you still want to go…’

‘We’ll leave directly after dinner. I’ll see you then.’

And with a curt nod, he turned away, and left.

Chapter 39

The regatta ball, held that night in the little seaside town’s largest hotel, the Longbourne Regency, was underway.

Lizzy paused in the ballroom doorway, one hand resting on Harry’s tuxedoed arm, her eyes alight with excitement as she took in the glittering spectacle before her.

Chandeliers blazed down the length of the room; the polished wooden dance floor gleamed, awaiting the couples – ladies clad in elegant ball gowns and men in white tie and tails – couples who’d soon waltz and twirl over its surface. An orchestra played on a raised dais at the far end of the ballroom, filling the air with music.

‘It’s perfect,’ Lizzy told Harry, her eyes shining as he led her inside. ‘Like something out of – of
Pride and Prejudice
!’ She laughed. ‘I can just about
see
Mr Darcy snubbing poor Elizabeth now…’

She broke off as Hugh and Holly appeared and paused in the ballroom doorway. Her smile froze.

Hugh Darcy, resplendent in white tie and tails, was quite the handsomest man she’d ever seen. With his dark hair and broad shoulders – and in spite of his face, which was set now in a stony expression – he was magnificent. Holly wore a simple but elegant gown of cream silk and had one gloved hand resting lightly on his arm.

Why
, Lizzy thought with a twist of despair,
can’t
I
be the one on Hugh’s arm tonight?

‘There’s Hugh and Holly now,’ Harry said, and drew her forward. ‘Let’s go and say hello. Perhaps we can all sit together.’

Lizzy pressed her lips together. There was nothing she wanted less than to share a table all evening with the man she loved, desperately and with her whole heart, but couldn’t have.

They were just making their way through the crowd to greet Hugh and his fiancée when a ripple of excitement swooped through the room.

‘What’s going on?’ she asked Harry now, and frowned. ‘I can’t see anything in this crowd.’

He came to a stop. ‘It’s Ciaran Duncan,’ he said, his face hard. ‘He’s just come in with Cara Winslow.’

‘Oh! I didn’t know they were invited.’

‘Nor did I.’

Lizzy stood on tiptoes to gaze anxiously past Harry’s shoulder at the entrance to the ballroom, and as the crowd ebbed and parted, she glimpsed the film star and his date, Cara. His dark good looks paired well with his white tie and Cara’s pale beauty; and unlike Darcy, he was smiling and nodding, stopping now and again to speak, or to grip an outstretched hand as he made his way into the ballroom.

Suddenly, he and Cara stood before Lizzy and Harry. ‘Well, if it isn’t Harry Darcy,’ Ciaran drawled, and held out his hand. ‘My erstwhile competitor in Saturday’s regatta race. So sorry for your loss.’

Harry ignored his hand and his comment. ‘Mr Duncan.’ He inclined his head curtly and held his hand out to the actor’s companion. ‘Good evening, Miss Winslow,’ he said. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you.’ He turned to Lizzy and introduced the two women.

‘Such a chilly reception,’ Ciaran said, and lifted his brow. ‘But I can’t say I blame you. It must’ve been quite the comeuppance, not to win the race. You Darcys aren’t accustomed to losing, are you?’

‘Don’t count me out just yet, Duncan.’ Harry drew Lizzy’s hand through his arm once again and turned to go.

‘What do you mean by that? The race is over,’ Ciaran scoffed. ‘It’s finished. And – more’s the pity – the
Pemberley
lost.’

Harry turned back. ‘We lost, yes. But the
Meryton
won only because you cheated. And I intend to prove it.’

By now, a crowd had gathered around them, murmuring and watching to see what – if anything – might happen between the two men. Lizzy edged closer to Harry and clutched his arm.

‘The
Meryton
won the race fair and square.’ Ciaran paused and added, ‘It’s time you manned up and faced the facts, Darcy. You lost.’

Harry muttered an expletive and drew back his arm to hit the actor, his face set in fury.

‘Harry, please, don’t!’ Lizzy kept a firm hold on his arm. ‘He’s not worth a scene. Let it go.’

‘She’s right.’ Hugh and Holly joined them. ‘Let the regatta committee review the evidence, and we’ll await their decision on Monday,’ Hugh told his brother. ‘Let’s go and sit down.’

Reluctantly – for he wanted nothing so much as to smash his fist into Ciaran’s handsome, smirking face – Harry followed Hugh and their respective dates to a table, and sat down beside Lizzy and resolved to do his level best to enjoy the rest of the evening.

***

‘Thank you for this dance, Miss Bennet.’ Harry mock-bowed after his waltz with Lizzy ended and straightened back up. ‘Would you like to go out on the terrace for a breath of fresh air?’

‘I would,’ she murmured, and fluttered her eyelashes, then burst out laughing. ‘If I had a fan, Harry, I swear, I’d rap your knuckles. Hard.’

‘So cruel!’ He pretended to be hurt. ‘No flirtatious glances from behind your fan for me, then?’

‘Not a one.’ She followed him out onto the terrace overlooking the bay and leaned against the stone balustrade, admiring the twinkling lights of the harbour below as a breeze cooled her face. ‘It’s funny, isn’t it – to think that once, a girl’s only means of communication on the dance floor was her fan.’

‘No mobile phones,’ he agreed. ‘A flick of her wrist or a tap of the fan to her face could make a bloke happy, or break his poor heart for ever.’

She laughed. ‘I never knew you were such a romantic. Or so knowledgeable about fans.’

‘I’m not. I’ve just been dragged to a lot of those sorts of films on dates.’

‘I probably shouldn’t mention it,’ Lizzy ventured after a moment, and glanced over at him. ‘I didn’t want to say anything in front of the others, but… Em and Charli and I went for a cruise on the
Meryton
today. Ciaran invited us.’ She paused. ‘I suppose I’m feeling a bit guilty.’

‘Guilty?’ He looked at her in surprise. ‘Why?’

‘Because he won the race. But we all thought he’d won it fairly – I honestly had no idea he cheated! I feel awful, like we were… fraternising with the enemy all day.’ Although she said it jokingly, she really
did
feel badly for going. ‘We shouldn’t have accepted his invitation.’

‘Bollocks.’ Harry spoke firmly. ‘When Ciaran invited you and your sisters to go on the cruise, the race hadn’t even taken place yet. How could you possibly have known?’

‘I know I don’t trust him.’ She didn’t tell him about Charlotte, how she’d snuck out more than once to see the film star; nor did she mention Oliver Slade or the photographs he’d taken of them earlier.

‘That makes two of us.’

‘What happened out there yesterday, Harry?’ Lizzy asked. She frowned, and turned to him. ‘Did Ciaran have something to do with all those seagulls we saw flocking around the
Pemberley
?’

‘He did.’ Briefly he told her what he’d found in the crow’s nest, and of Billy’s part in the whole debacle. ‘All we can do now is wait and see what the regatta committee decides – if anything – to do about it.’

‘What a mess it all is. And what an awful man.’ Lizzy sighed. ‘You were right, Harry. The first time I saw Ciaran on the set, dressed up like Wickham, you said he was a natural for the part.’

‘He was born to play Wickham.’ He pushed himself away from the balustrade. ‘But enough about him.’ He smiled and held out his arm. ‘If you’ll allow me the next dance, Miss Bennet, then I suggest we return to the dance floor. It’s time we went back inside.’

‘You’re right – people might start to talk,’ she agreed, and laughed as she took his arm. ‘After all – we don’t want to find ourselves in the midst of a scandal, do we?’

***

Holly excused herself from the table and made her way, smiling as she went, to the powder room.

It wasn’t until she was safely locked in a stall with a wodge of bog roll in her hand and her clutch resting on her lap that she allowed herself to give in to tears.

The evening was a complete and unmitigated disaster. Hugh had scarcely spoken two words to her all night.
Why
, she wondered in despair,
why did I bring up his engagement to Jacinta, today of all days?

She blew her nose. Why hadn’t she waited – or better yet, kept her big gob shut – and never even mentioned it? That would’ve been the sensible thing to do. Instead, she’d thrown a hurtful thing from Hugh’s past in his face without warning, and now he was too angry to look at her, much less speak to her.

He was right, though. What bearing did his past engagement to some silly supermodel, an engagement that had lasted all of five minutes and brought him only pain and humiliation, have on their relationship now? None, she realised. Absolutely no bearing at all.

Except… he should’ve
told
her. Shouldn’t he?

Holly sighed and dropped the soggy bit of toilet roll into the loo, flushed, then stood up. What was done was done; it was time to repair her mascara and reapply her lip gloss, then go back out into that ballroom to try and make the best of things.

She only hoped repairing the damage to her relationship with Hugh would prove as easy.

***

As Harry returned Lizzy to her seat at the table, he saw Holly and Hugh on the dance floor. He frowned.

The two of them waltzed around the perimeter of the floor with equally grim expressions. Hugh held his fiancée at a slight distance, as if they were strangers, and not a couple in love; and Holly had a smile pasted on her lips.

It was most perplexing.

As he sat down beside Lizzy, Harry realised that his brother and Holly hadn’t exchanged above a dozen words since they’d arrived at the ball. The tension between them was palpable.

He remembered his conversation with Holly that day in Litchfield, when Hugh had first brought her home to Cleremont to meet the Darcy family.

‘
You’re clever
,’ he’d told her, ‘
and cute, and heaps of fun, but – forgive me – you’re not at all Hugh’s type
.’

‘
And what exactly is his “type”?
’

‘
Older, I suppose. Serious.
’ He’d raised his brow. ‘
Dull. Sorry, Holly, but you’re none of those things.
’

Harry frowned. He’d meant it then, and it still held true. He’d never understand what Holly – so fun loving and irrepressible, so quick with a quip and a laugh – saw in his stuffy older brother. Oh, Hugh was great, the best brother anyone could want; he was decent, fair-minded, scarily smart, and extremely focused. And he supposed Hugh was a nice enough looking bloke, at least as far as the ladies were concerned.