Dear lovely friends and readers, I hope you enjoyed Happiness in Marriage. Thank you for those who left a review for the final chapter. I love them all!

Now, are you ready for a change of pace? I haven't written a modern P&P-inspired story for quite some time. Being a modern story, I've made the family size smaller. Elizabeth is a single child. Jane is her cousin, etc. Some of the surnames are different as well. Again, it has about 20 chapters. Thank you to N.H. for her enormous contribution to this story.

It was set in Magnetic Island, an island 8 kilometres (5.0 miles) offshore from the city of Townsville, Queensland, Australia. The island is about 52 sq. km. (20 sq. miles). There are regular ferries from Townsville to Magnetic Island every day. The ferry takes about 20 minutes. (You can search "Magnetic Island" at Google or Wikipedia to view its map)

I will go back to posting every Sunday (Sydney time), except for the first four chapters, in order to catch up more or less with my posting at Austen Underground. I hope you will continue to encourage me through comments.

Happy reading! Stay safe and healthy! Big hugs from Sydney, Enid.

Below is the blurb:

William Darcy sails into Australia's Magnetic Island waters and wreaks havoc on Elizabeth's quiet life. She is entangled with a hunky professor, international intrigue, and gruesome murders. Can she retreat to hugging her favourite animal, rather than dealing with the stiff Mr. Darcy? Be warned – this P&P-inspired modern eco-mystery may contain racial stereotypes, medical procedures and a villainous Mr. Darcy.

Many P&P characters appear, but they are not necessarily the same as the original novel. If you don't like re-imagined P&P stories, please stay away!

All rights are reserved. Please do not post it anywhere else or share it without my permission. Thank you.

Chapter One

Life can resemble a storm. It brews. It rages. And it calms.

How very true! Cyclone Ran stormed in one day and changed my life.

I hated working for Mom, especially on a school free day, much thanks to Ran. Mom's shop at Horseshoe Bay symbolised the epitome of capitalism and consumerism. The packed shelves of goods with no meaning represented the Chinese hunger for wealth. I hated the sight, the smell and the noise of it. I hated the restriction and label it imposed on me and my freedom.

Why couldn't I go kayaking on such a gorgeous day? To touch the sky and to dip in the waves? Instead, I had to restock for Mom. Who would come to the island just a week after a category five cyclone had ravaged it? The palm trees along the beach bent to the anger of Ran, and sand from the beach still piled right up near the doorstep of Mom's shop. I wished the cyclone had destroyed Mom's ugly baby and carried away its meaningless merchandise. I would have danced and thanked Ran then.

"Life sucks!" I swore, as I carried a box of frivolous, ugly and loud bikinis from Mom's car. A woman blocked my way into the shop.

"Darling, are you local?" An American tourist.

I scrunched my nose and glanced at the pretty woman. Flawless! She reminded me of Canberra, our man-made capital. From her salon-crafted hair, large symmetrical sunglasses, wrinkle-free sunflower bikini, perfectly shaped breasts, toned belly to her lean, long legs; she looked as artistically clinical as Canberra. Both were designed with the help of money and ambition. Miss Perfection just looked a tad whiter.

Shrugging my shoulders, I replied, "Yeah."

She picked up a postcard on the rack outside the shop with her rose-patterned finger tips. "Do you know how to get to this quaint Balding Bay?"

My eyes brightened. Perhaps I was too quick to judge her. Any tourist interested enough to go to Balding Bay was worth the encouragement. I turned up my enthusiasm. "You take this track here." I nodded my head to the left. "Past the wonderful beach, round that red house and up the gentle mountain. Balding Bay is on the other side. It's a really peaceful place."

"Peaceful?" A frown appeared on her face. "How long does it take to get there?"

I glimpsed at her high-heeled sandals. Definitely an hour and a half or more with those. But I wanted to encourage her to explore the enchanting beach where not many tourists on day trip in Magnetic Island would visit. "About 45 minutes, an easy walk, if you care to buy a pair of more comfy shoes from our shop." I added my most hated cross-selling pitch, taught by my mom, to tease the tourist.

"Indeed! And this?" The tourist ignored the tacky thongs on display and picked up another postcard. The techno-coloured roses on her fingernails distracted me again. "…the rocks look very cute, stacked together in such a messy manner."

I shifted the weight of the box. "It's in Geoffrey Bay. You can feed wild wallabies there."

"How whimsical!" Her exclamation sounded like the howls of the sea gulls. A man walked out of Mom's shop. The American tourist turned to grab his arm and her fingers trailed up his towards the crease of his elbow. Or was that crawled? "William, my dear, this little Chinese girl said that the Balding Bay you're interested in is right over that mountain." Her voice turned husky and low and she batted her eyes, a tad too long.

I hated people calling me little girl and Chinese. I might be short but I was high on intelligence. Dad was a true blue Aussie. I mean possibly a convict descendent from England. I just inherited more of Mom's Chinese features, much to my consternation. And I had been teaching high school for a year. Not little at all! Looking Chinese only made people think I was 16.

I observed the man. He was of a similar age as the American lady – perhaps 35, rather old. I wanted to scream at him and demand he change into something casual, for God's sake! It was the height of summer in tropical Queensland. I could even feel the heat his body emitted from the long-sleeved white shirt and trousers he was wearing. With the gentleman straw hat, he looked like one of the elderly men who'd walked straight out of a '90's movie. Yes, the English Patient. The stuffed shirt whose wife cheated on him. And Miss Perfection and he created a funny picture, one in bikini, the other in winter clothes.

Dear William nodded, but didn't say anything. The woman shared her new-found knowledge without encouragement. "And these funny looking rocks you commented on are in Geoffrey Bay. We can feed animals, yes, little kangaroos there. Should we go tomorrow, after the spa and massage?"

"Wallabies?" He raised his eyes and stared at me. His accent was definitely British.

"Yeah," I mumbled.

"When?"

"Any time." I rolled my eyes. "They are wild wallabies. They are there any time."

"Which part of Geoffrey Bay?" William frowned. What was the problem with British people? They all frowned.

"About 10 minutes walk from the bus stop," I said. "Alma Bay is here. There is a track, then Geoffrey Bay." I stared at the postcard, signalling the locations using my head, since my hands were full.

He took the postcard from the woman's clutches and lifted the box I was carrying from my hands, taking the weight off me. "Where do you want to put it?"

Surprised by his gesture, I pointed to one end of the shop. He walked. I followed.

"It is time to go, William." The perfect lady pouted, still standing outside as if Mom's shop would contaminate her body.

"We've been to Alma and Geoffrey Bays." William put down the box. "And the track is…"

With my free hands, I showed him exactly where the track was on the postcard.

"Balding Bay seems untamed and charming." He wasn't in a hurry to leave the shop. I wasn't sure about his enthusiasm. I didn't trust British that much, just look at how they treated their former colonies. He could be a property developer looking to destroy our beautiful coastline. He might be as interested in wild animals as the impeccable lady. But I encouraged him anyway. "I wouldn't describe it as charming."

"How would you describe it?"

"Cosy. A little gem. It's much smaller than Radical Bay where most tourists go. But because it's less accessible, Balding is rather undisturbed. You can see many beautiful big bounders there, like Heaven opens up and throws them down randomly."

He nodded and continued to stare at me with his deep blue eyes for a moment. "I saw a tourist sign of dugongs on the road."

"You know about dugongs?" My eyes lit up again. I would have hugged him if he wasn't a tourist and a stuffed shirt, as dugongs were my favourite animal in the world. But I couldn't keep the enthusiasm out of my voice. "They are absolutely gorgeous. We've very good seagrass beds here."

"I wasn't aware that they could be found here." He took a step back and put his hands behind his back. I wasn't sure what made him move. It was like he was afraid of my enthusiasm for dugongs.

"We're not that well known."

"We?"

"Magnetic Island and dugongs, we're not as famous as Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef."

"I see."

"What is a dugong?" The impeccable woman finally came inside the shop and grabbed William's arm again. She looked me up and down, with a superior glint that reminded me of our politicians.

"The Lady of the Sea." I hated people who didn't know about my favourite animal and interrupted my conversation. And of course Miss Perfection only pretended to be interested in dugongs because of Mr. Stuffed Shirt. I might have passed my teenage years but I still hated most people, with the exception of a few of my students, my cousin Jane, her ex-boyfriend Wickham and my father.

I caught a glimpse of the corner of William's lips turning up. When I arched my eyebrow at him, his expression turned back to serious. He added, "The Queen of the Sea, according to the Kenyan."

"Not a monarchist here." I shrugged yet again.

"Little girl," Miss Perfection's mouth tightened. "You are very opinionated for someone so young. You never know who you might offend, with that kind of attitude."

"Australian schools teach useful stuff, like wallabies are not little kangaroos," I added in a low voice to myself, as I bent down to open the box. "And your school teaches extreme makeover."

William cleared his throat and said, "An egalitarian, Miss…"

I pulled out some skimpy bikinis and shook them in front of the tourists. I didn't have to tell them my name or be friendly with them. Mother's shop sold stuff, not sociability.

"We are the Bennets," Jane said.

I turned to look at Jane, who'd walked into the shop, with a cheerful, handsome man by her side.

"My mother is the Detective Sergeant on the island. I'm Jane Bennet and she's my cousin Elizabeth. This is her family store. Her dad is the only doctor here. Elizabeth, this is Professor Charles Bingen. He's a visiting lecturer at University of Queensland."

I rolled my eyes. Did Jane have to tell these people our life history? She was too nice for her own good. You would think with a police officer as her mom, she would be more cautious. I turned to the other man. Wow, a professor with such a charming face and friendly demeanour! The girls in UoQ would swoon, unless Professor Hunk fell for my absolutely stunning cousin first. I put out my hand to the grinning Professor. He looked much kinder than the other pair here, although he was giving me a rather intense stare.

"Elizabeth Bennet." I greeted him.

"Pleasure to meet you, Elizabeth. Jane has a lot of good things to talk about you, especially about your synchronise swimming competition days. Ah, I see you've met my friend, William Darcy; and Caroline Bingley is a very very distant relation of the Bingen. They arrived just yesterday."

I shrugged.

The Professor continued, "You're very lovely. Are all Aussie girls so lovely? No wonder all the Poms love to park their bums here for the entire summer."

"How would you know? Are you from Britain too?"

"Nah, Norway. No need to call me Professor. Just Charles will do. Jane told me about the frog competition at Alma Bay motel tonight. It sounds fun. We're going."

"Charles." Miss Perfection pursed her lips. "William doesn't like this sort of entertainment."

"William can stuff himself and go back to the hotel to watch BBC. I'm going with Jane," Charles grinned and wrapped his arms around my cousin's shoulders.

Well, another conquest for Jane. I glanced at my cousin who had blushed pink. She might be five years older than I and picked up heaps of admirers wherever she went, but she was shier than a koala. And this dear Professor surprised me. Why would someone as charming as him want to watch the frog race? "It's not fun," I stated.

"Why not?" Stuffed Shirt William asked.

"It's all for tourists. Not very humane to the frogs."

Professor Long Blond Hair laughed out loud. "Don't tell me you're an animal rights activist."

I folded my arms on my chest and glared at Professor Bingen. "The Murrays keep the frogs in a cage in their motel. They only feed them after the competition. They poke and hit them with sticks, all in the name of training. If you were the frogs, would you like such a life?"

"They're just frogs! We humans are on the top of the chain. There's no harm getting some entertainment from some lowly animals."

"I hope you're not a biology lecturer."

"I teach finance." Charles said.

"Capitalist!"

"Tsk, tsk. No poking fun with frog and no buying and selling shares? What are you going to do when you finish school, little Princess?"

"There's no princess in Australia and I've finished school."

"Lizzy teaches biology," Jane added.

"In a high school," I continued. "but one day I'm going to invent gadgets to prevent people from poking fun at animals." I raised my chin.

"You want to dethrone queens and princes too?"

"They are totally useless."

"Luckily you're not heard in Europe. You could be trolled for disrespect," Miss Perfection Caroline sneered.

"The Royalty are not such snobs." Stuffed Shirt came to my defence. Surprise, surprise!

"William should know. He's related to them," Professor Hunk grinned.

I stared at Mr. Darcy. Miss Caroline's long fingers stroke along his arm. "His great great grandmother was one of the cousins of Queen Victoria."

I scrunched my nose. Not that it would change my opinion. He was still a stuffed shirt. Now, he was just a royal stuffed shirt. I turned away from them and continued with my chores.

"So you're not coming with us tonight? I heard the school is closed for a week due to the cyclone. You can stay out late," Charles said.

I shook my head. "I've seen the race endless times. I've much better things to do than watch boozy tourists throwing money at some poor animals."

"What better things will you be doing?"

"Something for young people, Professor. You're way too old to join."

"Ten years are nothing."

"Are you really 35?" I looked Charles up and down.

"You catch me out. William is the one who's 35."

"I guessed as much. You're at least 40."

"You hurt my ego. I'm a boy at heart, not like William here. I can join you, whatever you're doing tonight." Professor Hunk seemed quite determined to get me to come along.

"Charles, leave Miss Bennet alone," William jumped in. "She's too young."

I hissed. "I'm very mature."

Miss Perfection coughed. "Very mature indeed."

"Fine, Charles, I'll join you." I mumbled.

"Great!" Jane and Charles said.

P&P P&P P&P

"Life sucks!" I glared at the rowdy group of tourists in the motel. Judging by the number of finished beer bottles by their chairs, they had been helping Queensland's economy for quite some time. "Poor frogs." I hoped the tourists wouldn't crush them if they fell off their seats when they moved their drunken arses.

I finally found Jane chatting happily with Professor Bingen. William and Caroline were beside them. Mr. Stuffed Shirt, still wearing long sleeves and long trousers, seemed to be brooding, not saying a word as Miss Perfection whispered secrets in his ear. The lady, wearing an elegant, short red dress, looked too fashionable for the crowd here.

"Elizabeth!" Jane rose and gave me a hug. William pulled up an empty chair and squeezed it between my cousin and him. I would have demanded to sit away from him but I didn't want Miss Perfection to comment about my "maturity". I could suffer an hour of an insufferable companion, especially with Jane by my side.

"There's quite a turn out," Charles said.

"It's just half the crowd. Most tourists backed off because of the cyclone," I commented.

"Yeah, we have booked an entire resort in Mission Beach on the mainland but it's totally wrecked by Ran. So we checked online and booked the first nice hotel here. We've our yachts but sometimes it's good to be on solid ground."

Yachts? As in three? Where did Jane pick up these super rich people? "Impulsive. Surely that's not a good character trait for a professor of finance."

"Not you too, Elizabeth! William is usually the one who calls me impulsive."

"Mr. Darcy doesn't object to following your reckless action though."

"I'm not reckless! And William loves to follow me around because I chat up the prettiest girls everywhere I go."

"Now you put your foot into your mouth. Jane, you better dump Professor Bingen right now. He has no discretion. His hobby is galloping around tourist jaunts to chat up girls."

Jane bit her lips and shook her head.

"Don't listen to your cousin, Jane," Charles protested. "What's the problem with a bit of R&R? I'm not talking about taking all of them to bed. I'm more discreet than that. I make friends with locals, learn about their ways and enjoy the company. I'm learning about the culture. And you never know when a friend, male or female, from anywhere can be useful. I think I fare much better than William here. He's too cautious."

"How did you become friends then? Did you find Miss Bingley and Mr. Darcy from some tourist jaunts in Oslo?"

"Charles's holiday house in Málaga is next to mine," William spoke for the first time.

"I tried taking William under my wings, but he's a smart arse. He preferred to hang out with his Cambridge crowd and now his science friends."

"I do research in Cambridge, genetic." William added.

I was impressed. "At least Mr. Darcy joins you on holiday this time."

"Only because he's in hot water back home."

"Charles!" Miss Bingley chastised Professor Bingen, who shrugged.

Hot water? As in…

Suddenly, someone ran up to me. "Did you hear, Elizabeth?"

It was Lydia Pober, a graduate teacher with attitude from the school. She was rumoured to have slept with nearly every young men on the island and many tourists. I wouldn't put it past her to come along to check out the two new male tourists in our group, especially Professor Bingen. "About what?"

"The SES found a dead dugong further down the road at Geoffrey Bay?"

"What!" I stood up. "When?"

"Just an hour ago. Unreal! It's cut into half. Gruesome!"

"A shark attack? I better go." I hopped off the chair as I murmured the words. Lydia must be exaggerating. You wouldn't find a dugong washed up on the beach here. I hadn't seen any so far. And what could have cut the body of a dugong into half? It must be the debris from the storm. Perhaps the poor animal was caught by some boats out in the ocean and killed during the cyclone.

"I'll come too," Jane rose and said.

Professor Bingen looked disappointed, so I said, "No, you stay. I'll ring you later." I raced off.

"I'll come with you," Mr. Darcy said, startling me. He was running by my side. I caught a glimpse of the thinning of Miss Bingley's lips as we pushed our way through the motel doors.

"There's no need," I told him.

"It's dark."

"Magnetic Island is very safe and I've lived here almost all my life."

"I'd like to see the dugong."

"It's dead, according to Lydia."

"It's still worth seeing it, I think."

I ignored him. It took me about 10 minutes to run past the boulders where the wild wallabies were located. At the end of the winding road, there were lights flashing and people's voices.

I stopped dead when I glimpsed the carcass of the animal on the rocks. It was a dugong, no doubt about it, very young, about a metre long. But Lydia didn't exaggerate. It was literally cut in half. The bottom of it was missing. On the rocks were the head and flippers.

Bile came up to my throat. I turned and looked out to sea, wanting to throw up.

"Are you all right?" William's voice distracted me. He touched my arm.

I drew in a few breaths and nodded before approaching the State Emergency Services volunteers. "What happened, Lucas?"

The elderly man taking photos turned to look at me. "We're not sure. The cut seems too clean. Perhaps by the propellers of a boat. Mainland SES asked us to get as much photos and evidence as we can. The dead carcass will be sent back to Townsville for testing."

I nodded. My eyes couldn't leave the face of the dugong. It looked…sad.

"And this is?" Lucas said.

"Professor William Darcy from Cambridge. I met Elizabeth today at her family store."

Was he a professor as well?

"What do you teach?" Lucas continued.

"I do research, genetics."

"Well, I guess you can't help us with the cause of death?"

William shook his head. "But I doubt it was caused by a propeller. Too clean cut, as you said, even for that."

"What are you saying?" I said. "Do you mean someone caught this dugong and cut it up?"

"I don't know but it could be possible."

"It's sick! Why would someone do something that hideous? Dugongs are the most peaceful animals in the world. They eat grass, for Christ sake. Vegetarian."

"Calm down, Elizabeth. We don't know for sure," Lucas said.

"Yes, there's never been a murder on Magnetic Island and it wouldn't start with a dugong," I murmured.

"I certainly hope not."