neighbors, and we should be friends.”
“But will I continue to be your neighbor? What does Mr. Darcy say about Monsieur Reynard? I fear he has a pointy nose. All Frenchmen have pointy noses. I cannot abide a pointy nose.”
Lizzy could not help but laugh. An entire nation with the same physical characteristic? “You will have to ask Mr. Darcy for Monsieur Reynard’s physical description, but to say that all Frenchmen have pointy noses is like saying that all Englishmen are short with big bellies. They are both caricatures used in the press to ridicule.”
“Will you please ask Mr. Darcy for a detailed description about monsieur and write to me as soon as you do?”
“Of course. But I do know one thing about the Reynard family. They are all gourmands, and when they fled France, their chef came with them.”
“Really? Gourmands, you say? With their own chef? The Devonshires have a French chef, and we frequently dine with them. I am very fond of beef in
When Nell finally brought her litany of French dishes to a conclusion, Lizzy could see that Lady Helen was in a much better humor, and she hinted to Lizzy that she might have had a culinary close call. If she had become Mrs. Darcy, she would have been subjected to Mrs. Bradshaw’s cooking, and although she was a perfectly good cook, capable of producing roasts and stews, she was not, by any stretch of the imagination, a chef.
“William, how would you describe my eyes,” Lizzy asked as her husband brushed her hair, a task he performed each night with great pleasure.
“Dark brown.”
“How would you describe my hair?”
“Dark brown and curly.”
Lizzy grabbed the brush out of his hand. “So Lady Helen has golden hair and eyes as blue as a summer sky while I have dark brown eyes, the color of bark, and curly dark hair?”
“I would not use the word ‘bark.’” Darcy successfully ducked a flying brush. “Are you in need of compliments, my dear?”
“This morning, Nell happened to mention how your favorite thing to do in the whole world is to run your claws through her luxurious coat and to compliment her on her seasonal eye color.”
“My favorite thing to do is to run my hands over your luxurious body and to gaze into your dark eyes, which are pieces of onyx carved out of the night sky.”
“Ahhh,” she said. “That was a good answer.”
“As I told you before, Nell is a beautiful woman on the outside, but because she is also selfish and conceited, little beauty shines from within. Since you are beautiful inside and out, there is no comparison to be made. As for running my claws through her coat, when Teddy is not there, I do it so that I might have some peace but also because it makes her drowsy. It is the same as telling children a story so that they will finally fall off to sleep. On the other hand, I hope to keep you awake for most of the night.”
“Ahhh, that is another good answer.”
After they had made love, Darcy asked Lizzy what she thought would happen in their first year together.
“You and I shall have so much fun getting to know each other better, and I shall learn how to be the mistress of this great estate. Georgiana will come out and will have a brilliant debut, but she will not marry, as she is too young, and I do so want her to marry for love. You and I shall become an uncle and aunt, twice over, with Lydia and Jane, and Anne and Lady Catherine will be frequent visitors to Pemberley. We shall have puppies, all black, running all over the estate, all named Wolfie. I shall succeed in getting Mr. Jackson to smile at least once a month with you present to witness it, and Mrs. Bradshaw will be open to suggestions from me regarding the menus. And by the end of the year, we shall discuss starting our own family.”
“All right, my turn,” Darcy said. “In the coming year, Nell will marry Monsieur Reynard, and the couple will eat their way to wedded bliss. David and Goliath will finally accept you, or at least stop grumbling when you walk by. As you said, Georgiana will make a brilliant debut, and I agree that she should marry only if she is in love. I shall not deny her what I have. I shall see you grow into your role as mistress of Pemberley, and I shall endeavor to be the best husband I can be. I could tell you that I will be more in love with you next year than I am at this moment, but that is an impossibility as I am filled to overflowing.”
As they lay in each other’s arms, they continued to talk well into the night about their future together, but neither thought to say anything about the other incarnation of Mr. Darcy.
Chapter 39
William and Lizzy’s first year of marriage could only be described as blissful. The sole rough spot was Lizzy’s cool reception by the ton, but after six weeks spent in the company of women who were immoral and unkind and delighted in ridiculing those whom they considered to be beneath them, she decided it was a compliment to her character that she did not fit in.
It was during their second year that the couple had their first disagreement. Darcy steadfastly refused to come to his wife when she was fertile, and Lizzy knew his reasons. In addition to his fear of losing her in childbirth, he believed that his children would reject him once they learned of his other nature. She decided to take the matter into her own hands. With potpourri sachets scattered about her bedchamber, a nightgown covered with scented powder, and a body bathed in perfumed water, her husband’s ability to determine where she was in her cycle faltered, and Lizzy became pregnant.
Although Lizzy’s labor was hard and long, there were no complications. Darcy was so delighted by the birth of his son, David, that he agreed to father a second child, and Fitzwilliam Jr. arrived two years later. Darcy was relieved that both of his children were boys. It would be easier for lads to understand that their father was a werewolf. His sons would see their Papa’s transformation as something to be marveled at and not repelled by. But what would a daughter think? He was soon to find out that a little girl would think that her father had hung the moon.
Over Lizzy and Darcy’s objections, Georgiana, in her twentieth year, married the widowed Viscount Wilston, the heir to Granyard Hall, and became a mother to his three children. Although Georgiana liked her husband very much, she did not love him, and Lizzy was convinced that she had married into the Granyard family for the protection it afforded her brother and because she loved another. After ten years of marriage, her husband, now the Earl of Granyard, died of a fever, and the Dowager Countess and Mrs. Brotherton returned to Pemberley. It was shortly after Granyard’s death that a handsome, dark-haired stranger, Thomas Benson, bought a farmhouse near Lambton. Although an Englishman, the gentleman had gone to America when he was a young man and had made his fortune in steamships, plying the waters of the St. Lawrence River in Canada. After selling his business, he decided to return to his home country to live the life of a gentleman farmer.
Mr. Benson chose New Year’s Eve to introduce himself to his neighbors at Pemberley. He had learned that the Darcys celebrated a new year’s tradition of welcoming a dark-haired stranger into their home, and so the gentleman came bearing a gift of a pine wreath to ensure long life and good luck and was invited to stay for supper. Despite the lapse of more than a dozen years, Georgiana knew Teddy Brotherton as soon as she saw him. As she had told Lizzy long ago, everything about a werewolf changes, except the eyes, and Georgiana knew those eyes.
Their marriage raised eyebrows among the elite of London society, but Georgiana had tired of their company and was perfectly content to remain in the country with her husband and their two children. Mr. Benson proved to be a stellar citizen and eventually served as the mayor of Lambton. Many people remarked on how well Mr. Darcy and Mr. Benson got on and how much they had in common, especially their need to always be on the move and their love of large black dogs.
From their earliest years, the Darcy children heard stories about wolves who became men during a full moon
