Ch 1

Disclaimer: I don't own Pride and Prejudice. Just having a little fun.

5 years later

Fitzwilliam Darcy sat at his desk at Pemberley rubbing his temples with his forefingers.

He had acquired a pounding headache for the last two weeks straight.

Ever since Ramsgate.

All he could think was thank God he had gotten there in time. If he had been one day later...

Just the thought sent new waves of pain coursing through his head making him sick to his stomach.

Darcy had always thought of himself as a good, rational man, even if he was somewhat standoffish and proud. But anything dealing with George Wickham sent his blood boiling beyond reason.

George Wickham. A man he once thought of as a friend. How could a man raised with so many advantages turn into something so despicable and try to ruin an innocent girls life?

Poor Georgiana. His sister deserved better then some rake in disguise going after her fortune. Darcy could hear her playing a slow, mournful funernal march from a couple rooms away.

This only served to increased his headache. He had always tried to do what was best for her but he knew he wasn't there for her as much as he would have liked to be.

Becoming master of Pemberley and his sisters guardian at such a young age forced him to become an even more serious young man then he already was. Not to mention it commandeered much of his free time.

His sister deserved someone to help her grow into the great woman he knew she would be. She deserved a sister.

Darcy had often thought about marriage, especially at the insistence of his aunts. But every time he went into society he cringed. All those false women with their simpering and eye batting. He couldn't stand it. It simply made his skin crawl.

He just did not understand how his good friend Charles Bingley could do it. Every couple weeks he had a new angel. He truly worried about which fortune hunting shrew would finally capture his friend.

But in all his time keeping watch over his friend he could not help but be a little jealous. To be able to express ones heart so openly... No wonder everyone adored him.

Maybe Charles would help him find a wife or at the very least, introduce him to some more women(he certainly knew enough of them). After Ramsgate he felt he needed someone in his life more then ever. Someone for him to confide in and for Georgiana to lean on.

But who would he marry? He could always do right by his family, and by family he meant his aunt, and marry his cousin Anne.

Just the thought of his Aunt Catherine as his mother-in-law sent a shiver down his back. Plus, even though Anne was fine as cousins go, she was too sickly and quiet to be the kind of sister he wished for Georgiana. Or the kind of wife he wished for himself.

But who else was there currently in his life? There was always Caroline Bingley. This thought brought a smirk to Darcy's face. Won't she just love that. Darcy could put the names of all the women in England into a hat, pull one out at random and find someone less ridiculous and better suited for him then Carolina Bingley. Of course he wouldn't doubt Miss Bingley would somehow rig the hat to still choose her.

It was his own fault there weren't more women in his life. He was too busy emerging himself as master of Pemberley and raising his sister.

It's times like these he truly missed his father. He wished he could talk to him about how he had found mother and how he knew she was the right one.

How had his father been able to sift through all the ridiculous preening women of the ton and find someone so perfect for him.

George Darcy would have known exactly what to tell his son. How he wished his father were here to advise him.

At this thought Darcy sighed again and lowered his head to rest on the edge of the large ornate desk. If only he could know what his father wished him to do.

As Darcy sat staring at his immaculately polished boots, contemplating what he should do next, an odd niche under the desk drew his attention.

Drawing his brow together and kneeling down under the desk to examine it further he noticed the niche was infact hinged. His curiosity was now great. Grabbing a letter opener from above him he pried open the compartment.

As the door gave way a folded document fell out onto the floor. In all this time Darcy couldn't believe he never knew his father's desk held a secret panel. How many times had he hid under there as a boy and never noticed it?

Crawling back out from under the desk, document in hand, Darcy repositioned himself in his chair.

Unfolding the papers in his hands he read across the top:

Marriage Contract
Between one Fitzwilliam Darcy of Pemberley & Derbyshire and one Elizabeth Bennet of Longbourn & Hertfordshire.

AN: Hi everyone! I'm so excited you like it so far. Thank you so much for all your reviews. They really mean a lot to me. I plan to keep with a regular updating schedule (weekly or bi-weekly) I've recently become a new mom and I basically am writing this on my phone while breast feeding (My only free time). So all errors are mine. If someone would like to be my beta please pm me. Sorry this chapters is a little short but I wrote it and the prologue together but thought they were best broken up.

Also in this world the rest of the Darcy/Bennet families have not met yet since Mr. Bennet rarely went to town and George Darcy lived far away, then was sick and trying to prepare his son as master. I also think Mr. Bennet is a wise enough man not to tell his wife he was friends with a very rich man with a very single son.