Chapter 33: Cascade

He crept up the stairs towards Lizzy's second floor hotel room, trying not to alert the other guests to his presence. He had planned a coup, and any interference from his family would impede with his mission. Her first day in the DR had clued him into her interests, and he finally had an opportunity to catch her alone and work his magic. Nothing was going to get in his way.

Reaching her door, he tapped very lightly and loudly whispered, "Lizzy!"

No answer. He tried again.

Finally, he heard feet shuffling inside the room, and the door cracked open to reveal a crusty-eyed Elizabeth. "Richard? What are you doing here?" She dug the palm of her hand into one eye and released a huge yawn. "What time is it?"

"What time is it? Time to go! I'm stealing you. We're skipping the beach and exploring Santo Domingo."

Her eyes brightened immediately. "Really?"

"Yes. Now hurry. Get dressed. Robert will never let us ditch the excursion if he catches us."

Elizabeth re-shut her door and he heard an excited flurry of drawers opening and closing. He smiled to himself as he thought, good…she's excited. I still can't believe Will said she didn't kiss him. Hopefully, I can do him a favor and give her just a little push in the right direction. And encouraging her while completing one of her goals for this trip definitely can't hurt…

The door swung open again and this time a completely different Elizabeth greeted him. Dressed and ready, she bounced on the tips of her toes as she stuffed her camera into her back pocket. "Alright, let's go!" She began to sneak down the hallway like a child who had just stolen a candy bar.

"Wow. You're more excited than I thought you would be! Wait up LB." Taking on a similarly mischievous stance, he followed stealthily behind her until they reached the brilliant sunshine of the outdoors.

Three hours later, Elizabeth and Richard sat on the steps of the Catedral Primada de America sipping Frío Frío* under the hot Dominican sun. They had made the rounds to a few historical monuments, and Lizzy felt that she could not be more in her element than she was at that moment. Glancing over at Richard, she laughed at the sheer pleasure of it all and congenially bounced her arm into his. Unfortunately, the gesture sent a small bit of his drink over the rim of his cup and onto the gravel below.

"Hey! Watch it," he cried playfully. "This stuff's precious."

"Oh, so you like it, do you? What happened to the, 'I don't drink things with corn syrup in them because I'm a health nut' speech?"

"Ummm…I think the health nut went on his own vacation. Seriously, this is the perfect drink for this heat."

She nodded. "It really is, isn't it?"

"So…did you have a good time at the club last night?"

"Yes! It was incredible. Best night club I've been to in my life, I think. I had a fun dancing partner to start me off too."

"Thanks. I think you wound up in better hands though."

"Oh, really…you do?"

"Yeah. Will is…he's a good guy Lizzy. He takes care of his own, you know?"

"No. I mean…I've gotten to know him a little on this trip, but what I told you on Saturday is true. We aren't that close. How does he 'take care of his own'?"

"Do you know his sister, Gianna?"

"I would love to meet her but have not had the opportunity yet."

"Well, she's a perfect example. He does everything for her. Spoke to the people at Dartmouth to get her in, found her a beautiful off campus apartment, got her set up, everything. Even when she was little. She dreamed of a gray pony with white spots one day and the next that horse was being groomed in the stables of Pemberley."

"That's his house, right?"

"Yeah."

"It sounds like he spoils his own."

"No, no. He just, likes to take care of the people that he's close to. Really. It defines him in some way, I think. I mean, he even does it with his friends. He just recently helped his friend Charles out of a really tough situation."

Elizabeth's ears perked up. "Really? What happened?"

"Well, I don't know much, but it seems that Charlie's girlfriend was cheating on him, and Darcy was the one who broke the news to him…gently, of course…so that Bingley wouldn't get hurt. It sounded like Bingley was pretty serious about the girl."

The ice from the Frío Frío seemed to burn a large hole in her stomach. She could barely get the word out, "Cheating?"

"Yeah, I know. Terrible job, but someone had to do it."

Elizabeth felt an enormous rage flood through her. Surging to her feet from the rush of adrenaline, she walked away from Richard in an attempt to calm herself down. That lying, son-of-a-bitch.

He noticed her agitation. "Something wrong Lizzy?"

Ok, cover story. Quick. Go. "No, I just realized…we should probably start on our way back. We're gonna miss the shuttle to the falls.

"Oh, good call." He took her empty cup and threw it into the nearby trash can. "Thanks for coming out with me this morning. It was much better than another beach."

Lizzy didn't quite have it in her to agree.

Elizabeth sat as far as possible from Will Darcy on the way to the falls, sandwiched between Charlotte and Robert in the back of the van.

Upon arriving, she wished she could have peacefully stopped and taken in the majesty of the Waterfalls of Damajagua; twenty seven tumbling falls that spilled into languid swimming areas surround by high, rocky outcroppings. A large amount of physical exertion was required to reach the top, but once there, the day would be spent jumping, swimming, sliding and diving the way back down to the bottom. Donning her helmet, she gave the tour guide her last bit of patience as she listened to his safety speech before charging up the path of ladders. It didn't matter how, she just had to get away from him; he was the last person in the world she wanted to see.

Finally reaching the precipice after forty-five minutes of fury-induced, adrenaline driven climbing, she discovered that waterfall number twenty-seven was truly glorious, leaping out from the rocky ledge in an energetic and aggressive way. Lizzy followed the path around, finding number twenty-six around the bend: a short, four foot falls flooding an area of the path with ankle deep water to wade through. Exploring a bit further, numbers twenty-five and twenty-four appeared almost side by side, and Lizzy spotted the slide that had been naturally created from centuries of erosion that she was intended to slide down.

A dark shadow behind waterfall twenty-four stopped her, however. Following the path around, she hopped over a small gap in the ledge to reach the point where the waterfall began above her head.

Looking down, she noticed that she was roughly fifteen feet above the inlet below. From her vantage point, the source of the dark shadow was now obvious: she was surprised to find the entrance to a small cave behind the cascading water, the perfect hideaway from the rest of her group, and especially, him. The rocky walls glistened as though someone had taken the time to paint them with silver glitter, and the creamy white sand served as the perfect contrast to the varied hues of copper and tan surrounding her. The cool, moist air filled her lungs and temporarily cooled her burning thoughts, although a steady anger remained at her core. Sliding her back down the moist rock as she hunched over, she un-snapped her helmet and tossed it aside, entangling her fingers in her hair and holding her head in her hands.

You knew it all along Lizzy. You chose to ignore the signs and almost let yourself get in too deep. Will Darcy is a vile, self-centered, worthless liar. No matter how wonderful he may seem, he will never…

Elizabeth startled as the very villain of her thoughts parted the water that flowed over the cave entrance and entered the alcove with her.

"Will," she gasped as she stood, almost as if he had been able to hear the musings that were just then flooding her mind.

"Elizabeth," he breathed. In two strides he was just before her, fingertips pressing lightly into her shoulders, ice grey eyes boring into hers, pleading with her to understand him. Frozen under his gaze, her eyes flashed at him with equal parts curiosity and anger.

However, before she could verbally respond, his lips captured hers with urgent impulsivity. Suddenly, everything grounding her to reality slipped away, and the only things in existence were herself and Will Darcy. There was no sound of water, no gravel between her toes, no rough rock wall steadying her from falling backward. Just him: the incredibly muscular back that her hands pressed into, the water that dripped down his face from his wet hair and mingled with their kiss, his hands that had slipped from her shoulders to her waist and encircled her tightly to him.

It seemed that he was also unable to harness the wildly electric connection they shared; their kiss ignited from deeply intense to furiously passionate as his fingers wound unrelentingly into her hair. Neither could catch their breath, and neither wanted to. Lizzy marveled at how right it felt, how natural it was to kiss him; in that moment she wanted all of him, a desire that came from so deep within her it seemed to have been knitted to the very fiber of her being. She felt lost in him, in the sensations he created inside her body, in the butterflies that beat furiously around her stomach and whose frantic pace now matched the beating of her heart.

However, just before giving herself over completely, she mused, this is just how Jane described her first kiss with Charlie…wait, Jane…JANE! Dear, heartbroken Jane. Water, sand and rock came rushing back, and with every bit of passionate strength within her, Elizabeth pushed both hands onto Will Darcy's shoulders and sent him stumbling backward toward the opposite wall of the alcove.

"Wait, what?" Will panted, extending his arms and stepping forward again to recapture the previous moment.

"Don't touch me!" Elizabeth swiped her hand through the air at him as angry tears immediately stung her eyes. "How dare you kiss me? What are you doing here?"

Will looked as though a fire breathing dragon now stood where Elizabeth had been, and he was partially right.

"Elizabeth," he furrowed his brows together. "Elizabeth," he repeated, "I…I thought you knew. I've fallen in love you. I want you as my own. I'm ..," he ran his fingers through his hair in an agitated swipe, "I can't believe I'm saying this - I'm desperate for you. I shouldn't be. I did whatever I could to fight my attraction for you. In fact, I had come up with so many reasons why we shouldn't be together that it soon became obvious to me that you are the only thing I truly want."

She heard his words, but couldn't yet make sense of them. In her silence, he continued, "I know that you're attracted to me as well. I've never felt a more powerful sensation in my life than whatever this is between us. When fate brought you on this trip I knew that my opportunity had come. Tell me that you'll be mine; that I can have you as my own."

Confidence exuded from his words and look as he gestured for her to draw close to him once again; a fact that sharpened her anger and immediately determined her response. "I am not some object that you can take possession of, Mr. Darcy," she seethed. "How dare you assume that I've been longing for you? That I would be ready to jump in your arms at a moment's notice? From the moment I met you I knew that you had a big ego, but even I had not imagined this. I'm not even sorry to disappoint you." She dripped her voice in sarcasm as she continued, "At least you will finally be able to talk yourself out of me, seeing as how you seem to find your attraction to me unreasonable."

The change in his countenance from her reply was striking. He went from lover, to surprise, to anger in the matter of a moment. It was the first time that she could even describe his eyes as stormy. His tone took on disbelief as he responded, "Wow, Lizzy. That's not what I meant. And that can't be all you have to say. I know you better than that. I could ask… "

She had stopped herself from telling him off many times before, and it wasn't going to happen again now. She settled into her anger and let the words roll off her tongue as she interrupted him, "Oh, don't worry. I have plenty to say to you. What makes you think that I could knowingly enter into a relationship with the man who has single-handedly ruined the happiness of my own sister?"

Instead of shrinking back, he rose taller and glowered at her. "How can you even be surprised that I did that? I'm glad that I separated my friend from your sister. I would do it again in a moment."

"Of course you would, you lying, hypocritical asshole. How could you do that to your best friend? Jane's heart was ripped from her chest and it is still bleeding. And it's all your fault!"

"You're serious? You would have preferred me to stay silent simply to save Jane's feelings? Am I then to assume that you knew about Jane's actions and were complicit in her deceit? I've always thought better of you."

"Deceit? Oh, you must mean the boyfriend you made up to separate them! My sister is the most honest person who has ever breathed – she can't even steal a pen! You would know that if you had ever bothered to really get to know her…to get to know anybody. She loved him more than I thought it was possible for someone to love someone else; much more than I ever expect to find for myself. She would never cheat on him."

"Then you must not know your sister as well as you think. I saw the email; Andy," he sneered the name, "thought that maybe Jane and he even kept you awake with their nighttime…activities." He relaxed a bit before continuing. "You know, it's actually a relief to find that you didn't know about their behavior. Unfortunately, Jane had already told Bingley about Andrew previously and it was all too easy to fill in the gaps."

Lizzy's mind was reeling at his revelation. In the moment, she reached a hand out to the wall to steady herself before squarely looking Will in the face. "Wait a minute. Who did you say wrote the email you saw? Andy, or Andrew?"

"Andy. Andrew. Same difference. Your sister was caught."

Lizzy once again felt the tears burgeoning to her eyes but fought them down with the white hot anger that simultaneously tore through her frame. "You miserable, hateful jerk. You only saw what you wanted to see, and helped Charles do the same. Andy is Andrea, Jane's old college roommate. She's called herself Andy for as long as I've known her. In fact, now that I think about it, she actually did spend a night sometime in November: she had to get to the airport early the next day and staying with us meant that she could wake up a little later. They stayed up late singing karaoke to the Backstreet Boys." She was so devastated by the realization she let out a misplaced laugh. "I hope you're proud of yourself; you destroyed your best friend's relationship over someone who couldn't even begin to be competition to him."

Will looked too stunned to speak, but he attempted to anyway. "Lizzy, if you had seen the email…It was very incriminating…"

"I don't care what it was. Neither of you had the sense to confront Jane about it. Not that it was your business anyway, but when has that ever stopped you before? You just love judging people harshly and sticking your nose where it doesn't belong - like my staff meeting that day."

"I had every right to be at that staff meeting and you know it."

"Oh, I do? I don't think so. That was my staff and my meeting; you needed to ask me first. And let's see, what else? OH! You conveniently screwed Greg Wickham over and then flipped the story around so that Greg looked like the bad guy. Lying again. You see, I know all about you."

His entire face grew dark. "What are you talking about?"

"Your little plagiarism story. I hate to tell you Will, but Wickham told me the truth of your history with him before your entirely insufficient, I'm standing you up right now but hopefully you won't realize it because I sent you this, note. You had the audacity to practically ruin his life and still make him out to be the bad guy. Who does that?"

His eyes flashed in anger. "Are you serious? Lizzy, he plagiarized my report. I didn't plagiarize his. He's a dangerous person to be around."

She felt her voice rising. "OH MY GOD. Stop saying that. Do you know how ridiculous that sounds?"

His voice rose to match her own. "Do you really think I would make an accusation like that for my own amusement?"

"Yes, I do. You say a lot of shit for your own amusement…In fact, I've long found you to be a habitual liar. Like how you went around for almost the first month of our acquaintance pretending like you didn't know that your best friend was dating my sister."

His muscles flexed and released in an external effort towards control. "We've been over this. I really didn't know. You, in fact, have a nasty habit of intentionally twisting my words around, or just ignoring me entirely, on a regular basis."

Her eyes bulged at his remark. "Oh, really?"

"Yes, really. You have an uncanny ability to misunderstand my meaning and then jump down my throat for it. It reminds me of that dinner at your parent's house, when you accused me of insulting Charlie when really I was just suggesting that he is too easily pleased."

She was done with this conversation. "Oh, I'm so sorry. Did I misunderstand you when you called me 'sloppy seconds'? Or was it just the 'Ugly Stepsister' part that I that I didn't quite get?"

His face turned white at her words. "You…you heard that?"

"Of course I heard it. You were staring right at me when you said it. Who says that about a complete stranger? You are a brute. I don't care how unattractive a woman is; what you said was disgusting."

"Damnit. Lizzy. I…you're not going to believe me…I wasn't talking about you. I looked at a different woman."

She disbelievingly chuckled. "You're right. I don't believe you."

He stood straighter and came at her again, gripping her shoulders tightly and staring almost manically into her eyes. "Lizzy, you have to believe me. You must. When Mr. Lucas brought you out on the veranda was the first time I set eyes on you. And I will never forget it, because it was the moment I fell for you. I've never believed in love at first sight, but there is no other explanation for what I experienced. You bewitched me, body and soul, and I have never recovered. From that moment, I was yours."

She considered him skeptically and tried to shake off her heart telling her to believe him, begging her to give in. "Alright. If what you are saying is true…then who did you look at?"

He flung his arms to his sides in desperation. "Lizzy, I can't…I have no idea. Some girl who actually looked like she could be Jane's sister. There were over 300 people in that room. But it wasn't you. I promise…it wasn't you."

The lump in Lizzy's throat had grown to the size of a boulder. Looking at him through misty eyes, she could barely whisper, "I just can't believe you. You're right, you're not an outright liar, Will. You're something worse…. you're manipulative, and I…I want nothing more to do with you."

Will looked suddenly off balance. Placing one hand on the rock wall, he rounded his face to look at her. His pale grey eyes looked battle worn and weary. "And this is your opinion of me. According to you, I have the same redeeming qualities as Charlie Sheen."

Her only response was a crossing of her arms over her chest and a barely hidden sniffle.

She watched him slide the mask back over his face; the one that he regularly showed to the world. "But perhaps if I had fawned over you…if I had flattered you…if I had showered you with attention and kissed your feet whenever I saw you…perhaps then this might have all turned out differently? If I had done that, you would have basked in my every word, and I doubt you would have ever accused me of lying then."

Over-confident to the last. "You are mistaken, Mr. Darcy. I had long decided that you were the last man in the world that I could ever romantically involve myself with. The way you approached me now just further demonstrated how right I already was." She bit her lip as the untruth of her next words pierced her own heart. "You never had a chance with me."

Her words had hit their mark. Straightening, he looked down at her with eyes that were frighteningly expressionless. "I completely misread you, then. I will let you get back to your enjoyment of the falls. Have a good day, Miss Bennet." He walked to the edge of the alcove, and turned to look at her one last time. Then he dove through the water and was gone.

Elizabeth could only burst into tears.

The one glaringly empty chair next to Charlotte at the dinner table that evening was a source of both relief and pain to Will. The scene behind the waterfall had been replaying in his mind from the moment he had escaped her eyes; those lovely spheres, usually so bright and alive, had been clouded with so much disdain that her hatred of him had seared itself in his memory. His temples throbbed from the enormity of their misunderstanding of each other; in fact, by the end of the conversation it had become clear that only the drastic measure of breaking the gag order, or risking her wrath by showing her the photo of Andrea's email, had the faintest possibility of convincing her of the truth. He pressed his lips together in anger as he thought about her words, the ones that had cascaded from her mouth as easily as if she were stating the sky was blue: 'you never had a chance with me'.

Really, how dare she? Any woman would be jumping at the bit to be with him, and here was the one woman he wanted calling him 'manipulative' and telling him he didn't have a chance. Who did she think she was talking to? Doesn't she know me at all?

He had become lost in thought considering their missing guest, the clinking of dishes and plates a sound far off in the distance. Charlotte noticed his gaze towards her friend's chair, cleared her throat and stood. "Lizzy asked me to apologize to you all this evening. She has a glaring migraine and told me that she needed to rest to feel better. She is very sorry that she won't be eating with us tonight, but hopes to rejoin us tomorrow morning."

Although the news that he wouldn't see Elizabeth again until the following day would be welcome considering the circumstances, Will had barely heard a word she said; he was distracted by the bright purple dress Charlotte had chosen to wear that evening. He had seen it before; in fact, he had seen her before, and the surprisingly familiar visual suddenly revealed exactly when and where.

A sudden desire to be anywhere else overtook him, and he rose from the table so quickly that his thighs jostled his silverware. "I'm sorry everyone. I just remembered - I have an urgent matter I must attend to. Please excuse me." Before anyone could object, he walked briskly out of the room.

A/N

*Frío Frío- A cold Dominican drink made of shaved ice and flavored syrup. Sold by street vendors with carts.

Thank you for all of your reviews, follows, favorites and PMs while you waited. I read each and every one and plan on writing back to you soon!

Life doesn't seem to be getting easier, but I think this chapter was probably one of the hardest I had to write for the entire story too. I've had to start a job search, so that's where a lot of my free time has gone. I haven't lost my current job; it's just time to move on to the next step in my career. Anyway, as always, I will update as soon as I have the next chapter, I promise!

(Shameless plug- if any of my readers knows of a career opportunity in Long Island, NY, that you think I might be good at, please send it my way. I know that you can't know much about me through my writing but, I do think viewing someone's work does provide a level of personal insight into their creativity and thought processes. In terms of education/expertise, I have an MBA. I really do appreciate any help that can be offered, and I am absolutely prepared to send a resume if you need it.)

Also, links for this chapter are already on my profile.

And of course, a huge Shout-out to all my readers who guessed that Will looked at Charlotte in Toshi's. I would name you individually but I think it would be a long list. Sorry it took almost 30 chapters to give you the answer, but everything in its own time. :)

Oh, and Kudos to my readers who predicted the Andy/Andrea mistake as well!