A/N: First chapter! The next few may take a while to post, as I have an obsessively busy life schedule.

I know it's typical so far, but I'm doing my best to revise the plot.

Please R & R!

Tara is Caroline's 'friend', as seen in the Prologue

Charlie's Spanish basically translates to 'My sister is very nice.' Where have you been, Charlie, hiding under a rock?

Disclaimer: As my first name is not Jane and my last name is not Austen and I do not live in England in the 1800s, it is safe to assume I am not Jane Austen and do not own her books, characters, etc.

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Chapter 1

"Are you ready, Tara?" Caroline breathed. "And you, Will?"

The beautiful sunset, glowing golds and pinks and purples, stood before them, but they did not see it.

"As ready as I'll ever be," Tara said, trying to put some cheerfulness into her voice and failing.

"Please, call me Fitzwilliam," Will said irritably.

"Good evening," Caroline greeted the arriving stream of guests. "How are you? So nice to see you. And how is your daughter? And your son Rathmill- he's still at Cambridge? Oh, I see. What a beautiful dress, Mrs. Wilcox. Designer Valentino? It is marvelous. Buongiorno, Signore i Signora Ciardi. Yes, parmesan will be served…."

Finally, she went inside, dragging Will with her. Her excuse was that she had to see to a detail, but Will knew they would be in the ballroom the whole night after dinner. He only hoped that once Caroline was caught up talking to other people and old acquaintances, he would find a welcome distraction.

The cloying smell of perfume in the rooms sickened him. Caroline really shouldn't have gone with rose sachet. He was allergic to rose sachet.

O0..0O

"Stupid damn party," Elizabeth snapped as they got out of Charlie's Rolls Royce. "I can tell it will be terrible."

"Oh, you never know," Jane said brightly. She would have agreed with Elizabeth had she not been looking into Charlie Bingley's eyes the whole time.

Elizabeth rolled her eyes and walked with them towards the front entrance. She was abruptly stopped by the butler, who demanded to know who she had come with instead of letting her in like the other faces he recognized.

The butler, a tall, thin, long-nosed gentleman, said in one breath, "Good evening, sir, Mr. Bingley. Your sister is in the ballroom. And you must be Miss Jane Taylor, and you are…?"

"Elizabeth Bennet," she said. "I'm Jane's plus-one….."

"Oh, yes, Mr. Bingley put you on the list an hour ago. You may go in." He literally looked down his nose at her.

"Shall we go in, then?" Charlie asked. Once they were inside, he said, "I must apologize for Richard, Elizabeth; he knew you were with me, just didn't recognize you and had a snobbery attack. There are some people I want you both to meet, so if you'll follow me….."

Elizabeth groaned inwardly. Jane turned around and smiled at her. "It'll be alright," she whispered.

Elizabeth sneezed. The enormous ballroom smelled heavily of rose sachet. Oh no. She was allergic to rose sachet.

Charlie practically dragged them both by the pelts to meet one solitary guy, drinking some kind of unidentifiable substance, be it wine or champagne.

"This is Mr. Darcy, a fellow executive of mine. Will, this is Jane Taylor. And this is her best friend, Elizabeth Bennet."

Jane shook hands with Will warmly. He nodded in a perfunctory kind of way. Elizabeth held out her hand. Will ignored her.

Or at least, she thought Will was ignoring her. In reality Will was preoccupied with some kind of way he could get out of the destructive grasp of Caroline Bingley, who was making a beeline for them.

"Charlie, there you are," she said irritably. "I've been looking all over for you. I seem to have offended the Ambassador to Peru by saying something inappropriate. I tried to explain to the idiot that he had it all wrong but-"

She stopped short, having finally noticed Jane and Elizabeth.

"Caroline, meet my new girlfriend, Jane Taylor. Jane, Caroline. Caroline, Jane."

Caroline smiled sickeningly, sugar oozing from her every word. "Jane, dear. Charlie has told me so much about you! I feel as if we are going to be such great friends. But he did mention you hated his hair- I'm so sorry, Charlie refuses to cut it shorter, I have tried everything, but alas, all in vain."

Charlie, who was enormously proud of his hair and thought Jane liked it, was confused. "Caroline, my dear, perhaps the heat is getting to your head, I never said any such thing-"

"Neither did I," said Jane, who was such a genuinely kind person she could not find fault in Caroline or see her ridiculously transparent manipulative scheming.

Caroline smiled again. "Jane, perhaps you could come with me, I know the Duke of Albermarle would be absolutely captivated by your lovely face….."

Throwing a hard-gripping arm around Jane's shoulder, she steered Jane away from Charlie and turned her head around to see Elizabeth better. There was a split second of a look that wasn't understandable- that defied comprehension- then an arrogant head-to-toe glance that took in Elizabeth's long, unruly black hair and short dress that was quite obviously not expensive.

Elizabeth was fuming. What an absolutely disgusting- The rest of her thoughts just then would not be received well by the general public.

She shook her head, tapping her feet to the beat and looking slowly around the room, waiting for her radar to pick up on something to do.

Then she caught sight of Mr. Darcy. He was handsome enough, and it would be amusing to make him feel awkward by dancing with him. She was never one to think her actions through.

She strode over to him self-importantly. "Excuse me, Mr. Darcy," she said, speaking to his back. "Would you like to dance with me?"

Without even doing her the courtesy of turning around (something that would have much changed the situation, had Elizabeth only known), he said, "No."

Just 'No'. No explanation, or even a polite lie. Even a rude answer would have been better than 'No'. 'No', for such a short word, meant so many insulting things. Like that her inferior birth and unknown status meant she would never be deemed even human by this class of people. It meant she was not even worth turning around to look at. It meant that no matter what she accomplished in her life, it wasn't worth anything because she was born into a lower class of people.

Elizabeth is furious. And when she gets furious, she gets even more rash and impulsive. She decides to make a fool of herself dancing anyway, just to shove the caste system back in their faces. So she sees a man in the corner. He is shabbily dressed, but handsome if you don't count his thick lips. And he looks pliable enough- he looks like he's been having a few drinks. So she goes over to talk to him.

His name is George Wickham. He tells Elizabeth he imports goods. He neglects to tell her he imports drugs, stolen jewelry, and illegal weapons. He also tells her he used to be part of an elite club, but got kicked out after he didn't conform to their rules. He forgets to mention it was the Mafia and that he double-crossed them, and was lucky to have escaped with his life. This and other half-truths he tells her, and Elizabeth, with her sore heart and pounding anger, believes him and asks him to dance. He heads to the dance floor with her and they strike up what the other couples are doing- a stately waltz. But Elizabeth turns her anger into energy for dancing and she is exceptionally good. George is an elegant, if negligent, dancer and together they make an excellent couple. Soon all eyes are on them. Including Will Darcy's.

She's beautiful, he thinks, even as his gaze says, 'Trash'.

I'm going to ask her out after the dance, he thinks, even as his gaze says, 'I'll date her when Hell freezes over'.

What?? She's dancing with--that can't be Wickham. How could he have the nerve to show up here? After what he's done to my family… even as his gaze says, 'Congratulations to the happy and atrocious couple'.

"Mi hermana esta muy simpatica," Charlie stammered out to a rotund man Will could only suppose was the Ambassador to Peru, using his grade-school Spanish. "Ella…did not…mean…to…erm…how you say? Offend…tu."

"Charlie," he hissed, grabbing him from his conclusion to his apology to the Ambassador to Peru, "who is that?"

"That's Elizabeth Bennet," Charlie said amusedly. "You know, the one you completely ignored in your urge to think of ways to escape Caroline?"

"Oh." Did she…was she the one who asked me to dance?

"Do you want to ask her to dance or something?"

"I- no."

"Of course not," Charlie sneered. Sometimes his best friend's stupid pretensions even annoyed him. "Just go, and hurry."

"What? Why hurry?"

As the waltz finished, a crowd of men came over, all with one question on their minds, the same one Elizabeth had asked him. Oh.

"Dinner is served!" Caroline announced in team-coach style, her voice as loud as if she had been using a megaphone. Not something very much in keeping with her gentle-lady personality she tried to communicate to people.

He caught sight of her as Caroline announced dinner, and came closer to her. "Miss Bennet? May I reserve the dance after dinner?"

"I don't know," she said sarcastically. "I believe you ignored me when I was introduced to you, so let's try the introduction again." She held out her hand, and he shook it.

"So…..would you like to?" he asked again.

She paused for a second, in mock deliberation, putting her hand to her chin in an exaggerated imitation of thinking hard about it.

"No," she said, throwing his word back at him in a cutting, if childish, manner.

He stood there, trailing in her wake, as she slipped a hand into George Wickham's and went into the enormous dining room.

O0..0O

He couldn't get her off his mind, something that was not made improved by his place card being stuck betwixt hers and Caroline Bingley's. While Caroline sticks to him like glue, Elizabeth does the exact opposite. They are such contrasts, now that Will is able to see them side by side. Caroline is very handsome indeed. But somehow, her personality wears itself out on her face and the effect is not quite pleasing. Elizabeth, in addition to looking better, wears her personality on her face too, and it enhances her looks.

"So, Fitzwilliam," Caroline laughed, "tell the Duchess that joke you made about European imports."

What? I never made a joke about European imports in my life. Oh. Wait a minute. She's lying and wants me to improvise. Okay. Here goes.

"Well, my dear duchess," he began, "there was a captain of a ship called…uh……" The only name he could think of was Elizabeth Bennet, so it slipped out. "Elizabeth Bennet. And her co-captain was…erm…." Suddenly the name George Wickham came up in his mind. "George Wickham. And….." He suddenly, terribly, realized he was addressing the whole table, which was staring at him in confusion, especially Elizabeth, whose eyes were stretching to their maximum potential and whose mouth was a round O. "They were very angry at each other, because of the effect of global warming on the economy and the subsequent stock market deflation in America. And…they…erm…bargained it out. The end."

The Duchess's thoughts were obviously written on her face. That's a perfect example of inbreeding gone awry. "That was quite amusing," she stammered. She managed a few mechanical laughs.

Caroline quickly covered the moment by announcing that she was ready to make the toasts. She stood up and clinked her spoon against the glass. "I would like to start," she smiled falsely, "by announcing Mr. Darcy's Aunt Catherine's recent marriage to Sir William Chalmers two days ago. May she live with him in good health, prosperity, and happiness."

Everyone clinked glasses with each other and somehow, after the chatter had resumed itself, his insane joke was forgotten- by all but two people: the one on his left, and the one on his right.

Elizabeth, on his right, was further enraged at him. That bastard! Getting back at her refusal by embarrassing her in front of everybody!

Caroline was not stupid, and had an especial knack for sensing when a young man was in love, and with whom. And Caroline sensed a person more suitable for Mr. Darcy than she was, could, in fact, be perfect for him.

Obviously, she would crush her as soon as possible and by any means.