Lizzie Bennet is furious. Fitz has just finished helping her make a care package for Jane, and in the process he's revealed that Darcy intentionally broke up Bing and Jane. Lizzie has asked Charlotte to make her excuses to Ms. de Burgh because she's almost certain that she'll throttle anyone who makes a sudden movement in her vicinity just now.

She's also completely certain that she will neither rest nor calm down until she has confronted Darcy. She managed to extract Darcy's cell phone number from Fitz before he left. It took effort to sound natural, but she's honed her acting skills through months of costume theater. It's outrageous that she doesn't have Darcy's number by now, anyway. They lived under the same roof for a month, for goodness' sake.

Lizzie dials the number Fitz gave her and waits.

Darcy picks up on just the second ring. "You have reached William Darcy," he intones, his bass voice rumbling gruffly out of the speakers of Lizzie's ancient cell phone.

"Come. Here. Now."

"Who is this? Is this a joke?"

"It's Lizzie."

"Lizzie!" Is that . . . happiness in his tone? Of course not. "Are you all right?"

"All right? No, I am not all right! Now come here."

"Where is 'here'?"

"My office—Charlotte's office at Collins and Collins. Third floor, second door—"

"I know which office is hers. Should I fetch Charlotte? She might be better able to help—"

"No. Just come here. Now."

"On my way." The line is dead before Lizzie can lower the phone from her ear.

Lizzie is pacing when Darcy bursts in less than two minutes later. He is breathing hard and his tie is askew. Despite gasping for air, he speaks immediately. "Lizzie! Thank goodness you're unscathed! What—"

"How could you do that to my sister?" Lizzie screams. She does not know how recently Darcy has shouted the same words himself.

"I—what?"

"You broke up Bing and Jane! You took my caring, sensitive, wonderful sister's heart and tore it to shreds when the decision wasn't even yours to make! And why? Because you thought she was in it for the money? The money. Jane. You looked at sweet, amazing, perfect Jane and you decided she was in it for the money, and so you turned Bing against her without even giving Jane a chance to explain herself."

"She gave me no reason to think her true feelings extended beyond her general kindness."

"No reason? No reason? Are you kidding me? I mean, sure, she's nice to everybody, it's who she is, she's Jane—but would it have killed you to give her the benefit of the doubt and let things run their course?"

"Perhaps not this time, but last time, yes, it would have."

"What?"

"Giving someone the benefit of the doubt . . . suffice it to say it wouldn't have been the first time someone close to me had been taken advantage of for the sake of monetary gain."

"I think it's a wonder that anyone's ever gotten close to you without such an incentive, given how unpleasant you are."

Darcy flinches but presses on. "Lizzie. This isn't a joke, and it's not paranoia."

Lizzie snorts. "Sure."

Darcy takes a deep breath and stops looking at Lizzie for the first time since arriving in Charlotte's office. He fixes his gaze on the side wall instead. "Recently, an . . . old friend . . . took—advantage . . . of my little sister. As . . . revenge for a . . . perceived—grievance. It . . . very nearly . . . shattered her. I cannot . . . risk letting . . . anything like that . . . ever happen again. I . . . apologize if . . . I have been . . . overly—careful."

Lizzie's head is spinning. She wordlessly gestures to Darcy to sit down and then begins rummaging in Charlotte's desk for some tissues.

It takes Darcy several minutes to stop crying. Lizzie cannot recall a time when she felt more embarrassed, but whether the emotion is more for herself or for Darcy, she cannot decide. Her feet tap, her knees bounce, her hands clench and unclench. She looks at the floor, the ceiling, the walls, her lap. There is no escape from the discomfort.

Finally, Darcy blows his nose, takes a shaky breath, and says, "I suppose I understand the feeling that your sister's heart has been broken with insidious intent."

"Oh, no. God, no. No. Jane's fine. I mean, she locked herself in her room for two days and crafted and then she had a brief meltdown but she's been functional ever since. I think she still misses Bing, and she's been sending me care packages, which means she's sad, but basically she's fine. It's nothing like what you and your sister experienced. Are you all right? Would you like some tea?"

Darcy looks at Lizzie for the first time since he mentioned his sister. "I am all right. I . . . have never shown this much emotion about . . . what happened . . . before. Georgiana's needs have always taken precedence. Thank you, Lizzie." Darcy rises.

"Wait." Lizzie catches Darcy's sleeve. "You're in no state to rejoin the outside world."

"Then I am certainly in no state to provide you with satisfactory company."

"Darcy . . . please. Let me get you that tea, all right?"

Darcy sits as Lizzie rises. A few minutes later, they are both seated once again, now each clutching a mug of tea.

"I was not aware until this evening of how deeply you disliked me," Darcy says after his first sip of tea.

Lizzie grimaces. "I'm sorry."

"Why? I can hardly pretend I do not understand the impulse to protect one's sister and harm those who have hurt her."

"But I assumed your acts were malicious. I refused to contemplate other potential motives."

"I suppose you were unfair, but then I know as well as anyone how difficult it is to be fair when one feels that one's sister has been ill-used."

"But it wasn't just then." Lizzie takes a deep breath. "I wasn't just unfair to you after I found out about what you did to Jane. I hated you this whole time."

Darcy's face goes blotchily pale. "H—hated?" His voice is no steadier than it was when he spoke of his sister.

"I mean, our first dance was just about the most awkward experience of my life—well, prior to tonight—and then you said rude things about me afterward and then you seemed to be mocking me the whole time we were at Netherfield—you have a checklist for what constitutes an accomplished woman, which is not anywhere in the neighborhood of okay—and then I suspected you of meddling with Bing and Jane." Lizzie tilts her head to one side and peers at Darcy through narrowed eyes. "Oh yeah, and then I talked to George Wickham."

Darcy sets his mug on Charlotte's desk so hastily that tea sloshes onto her papers, and then he flees the room mutely. Lizzie stares at the open office door for a moment and then sets down her tea, picks up the tissue box, and runs after Darcy.

"Darcy! I didn't mean to make you cry! Or to make you leave! I don't feel like this conversation is over."

The heavy footsteps slow and Lizzie tracks them through the labyrinthine corridors of Collins and Collins. All at once she rounds a corner and finds Darcy staring at her from the opposite end of the hall.

"I doubt continued companionship would be in either of our best interests. However, there is one thing I must tell you before I cease to inflict my presence upon you." Darcy draws a deep, shuddering breath and stares at the ceiling. "It was George Wickham."

"What was George Wickham?"

"He was the one who . . . that is, ah . . . with my sister."

"Oh, my God."

"I will stop bothering you." Darcy turns to leave.

"Bothering me? Who just chased whom down a corridor?"

Darcy turns back to Lizzie and gives her a small, sad smile. "You have my gratitude for your generosity. I assure you that I will be fine."

Lizzie laughs past the lump in her throat. "I have not been generous."

"You have attempted to comfort someone you hate. How else should I characterize your actions?"

"Maybe they're stemming from the belated realization that my reasons for hating you weren't as solid as I thought they were."

Darcy bites his lip. Lizzie strides forward, hands him the box of tissues, and sits down on the floor with her back against the wall. When Darcy doesn't join her, she says, "Come on. Your shirt is already tearstained. You may as well wrinkle your pants and get it over with. I mean, if you—well, I mean, I just think—that is, just—"

Darcy settles on the floor next to Lizzie. "For someone who hates me, you seem pretty eager to continue spending time with me."

"As I've been trying to tell you, I'm not sure I can hate you anymore." There is a pause. "Um, if you can tell me—and it's okay if you can't—what exactly happened with George Wickham? I, uh, I got his side of the story—something about being denied a college fund . . . I believed him—it fit with what I thought of you—but after tonight I can't continue thinking that your nature is one hundred percent cruel." She gestures at him. "If you were going to fake cry, it wouldn't look like this."

Darcy draws a shaky breath, sighs unsteadily, and tries again. This time he speaks. "George Wickham and I were friends growing up. His family didn't have as much money as mine, so my parents paid for him to do things with us when he wouldn't have been able to afford to come along otherwise. Funding his higher education was an obvious next step. My parents started his college savings account just a couple of years after they started Georgiana's."

"My, um, my parents—ahem—died when I was sixteen. Georgiana was twelve. We moved in with our aunt, Catherine de Burgh—I hear you two have met—but when I turned eighteen I got control of the finances. I was accepted at Harvard and George had committed to Stanford and the plan was for me to manage both sets of tuition. But George came to me and said he wanted to control his account himself. Said it would make him feel more like an adult, his own man, not a charity case. I consented. We did the paperwork and the account was his.

"He ran out of money in less than a year. I still don't understand how he managed that. Two hundred thousand dollars . . . He came and asked me for more. Told me he'd made a mistake and he'd learned his lesson and he deserved a second chance. I said no. It would have been different if it had been an indiscretion of a few thousand dollars, but two hundred thousand—! Besides, the future was uncertain for Georgiana and myself, and I needed to make sure that the resources our parents had left us would be available to fall back on if necessary.

"For a while, I thought I would never hear from George again. Years passed. And then, I made a surprise visit to the condominium Georgiana was living in while at UCLA. I found the two of them—"

"I can guess," says Lizzie quickly.

Darcy clears his throat and blushes. His face isn't as blotchy as before. "Right. In any event, he had turned her against me. She hated me. It was my fault, of course—I'd pushed her so hard that she hadn't felt good enough for me, and it had been easy for George to prey on her insecurity. I told George to get the hell away from my sister, and Georgiana screamed that George loved her as I never had, and . . ." Darcy squeezes his eyes shut tight. "I had to show Georgiana what was really happening. I wrote a ten thousand dollar check and told George it was his if he never had any contact with my sister again. He took it and ran. The fallout was . . . rough."

On an impulse, Lizzie takes Darcy's hand. Darcy looks down at their hands and then up at her face.

"It's what Jane would do," she says. "She'd be more help to you than I am in this kind of situation."

Darcy squeezes Lizzie's hand. "I think you're doing just fine."

"Yeah? Let's see. I dragged you away from your work, yelled at you for something I didn't understand, made you cry, made you run away, refused to leave you alone, and forced you to confess your deepest secrets to me. Are you sure that's 'just fine'?"

"My work can wait, your anger was understandable, you weren't trying to make me cry, you had no idea of the effect that George Wickham's name would have on me, I'm glad you followed me, and you didn't force me to do anything."

"You are disturbingly good at responding to points in sequence."

"I am a CEO, Lizzie. It comes with the territory." He looks at her. "You said you used to hate me, but you're not sure you can anymore?"

Lizzie squeezes Darcy's hand. "I know I can't."

"I had no idea how you felt about me."

"Thank goodness I'm so good at acting, right?"

"Well—had I known your objections to me, I may have attempted to improve my behavior, and I certainly would not have considered doing the thing I've been trying to work up the courage to do since I got to Collins and Collins."

"Oh? And what is that?"

Darcy looks away, takes a deep breath, and then looks back at Lizzie. "Confessing my love for you."

Lizzie's head hits the wall, hard, as she stiffens in shock. "You—your—what?"

Darcy draws his hand away from Lizzie's. Her fingers have splayed open anyway. "I apologize. I should not have said that. I had overstepped boundaries already by telling you too much about my sister and George Wickham, and I thought perhaps I was better off just telling you everything, now that I was so far in, but clearly I miscalculated. I'm sorry. Are you all right? That was a nasty crack when your head hit the wall."

Lizzie leans forward and rubs the back of her head gingerly. "I think I'm okay. I don't have double vision, at least. That's supposed to be one of the signs that you've got a concussion, right?"

"Oh no, do you think you have a concussion? I can call nine-one-one—"

"I said I don't have double vision. Relax. There's no need to overreact."

"I am not overreacting."

Lizzie gives an incredulous snort, which seems to convince Darcy that she is unharmed. He fiddles with his tie and says, "Um, I should—"

Lizzie catches his sleeve for the second time that night. "Wait. As long as we're confessing things, there's something I should tell you."

Darcy raises one eyebrow. "Oh?"

"I—I have a video blog. I've been doing it since the spring. I, um, I've talked about you on there a lot. And, um, I haven't been kind. Actually, uh, I'm pretty sure you could sue me for libel. Several times over. I mean, obviously I'd rather you didn't, but . . . yeah. I can delete the videos if you want me to, but I have hundreds of thousands of viewers and I think they'd be mad and the videos are already, like, out there, you know? I'm really sorry."

"How can I find these videos?"

"Oh, God. Please don't."

"If you wish me to respect your privacy—"

"No, that's not what I meant. I posted them on the Internet. I've already signed away my privacy. I just—I'm ashamed of how hard I was on you, and I don't want to hurt you more than I already have tonight."

"I assure you that I will be grateful for any and all insight into your mind that the videos can provide."

Lizzie stares at him. "You—wow. You really weren't kidding about loving me, were you?"

Darcy straightens up as much as he can while seated on the floor. "I do not joke about such things."

Lizzie half-smiles. "I am coming to realize as much. I'm really sorry about tonight. I—I thought I was so clever and rational and unbiased and perceptive, but apparently I've been wrong about a lot of things for a long time."

Darcy returns the half-smile. "I have likewise taken pride in my intelligence and fairness, and I have made at least as many mistakes."

"I'm sorry about your sister."

"As am I about yours."

"Do you think Bing still likes Jane?"

"I'm not sure. He certainly has not leapt into new flirtations as I had expected him to. I should have realized that my inability to accurately predict his actions was a sign of larger flaws in my perception."

"Will you talk to him?"

"About Jane?"

"Please."

"I am unsure as to whether—"

"Just try. Please."

Darcy smiles at the interruption. "Very well, Lizzie."

Lizzie stares at him. "That's the first time I've ever convinced you to do something! And you're smiling!"

Darcy blushes and does not meet her gaze.

Lizzie suddenly finds herself giggling. "Oh, God, you've got it bad, don't you?"

Darcy reddens further. "I will neither confirm nor deny that."

Lizzie continues giggling. "Spoken like a true CEO."

Darcy finally eyes her. "In the interest of clarification and balanced disclosure, what is your current stance toward me?"

Lizzie eyes him back. "Respect."

Darcy smiles and stands. "Thank you for an enlightening evening, Lizzie Bennet."

Lizzie stands as well. Her head barely reaches his shoulder. "Likewise," she says, and smiles.