He spent the remainder of the evening drinking; following through on his promise of getting completely trashed. That incident before...he wanted to forget it. The swirl of humiliation, of being rejected, was unfamiliar as it was opportunistic. He certainly hadn't planned on kissing Elizabeth Bennet today. But look how he tried, the second he got a chance. She hadn't exactly responded like she appreciated the sentiment, but maybe that was a good thing. She was keeping him in his place. He wouldn't step out of line, if she didn't want it.

Eyes bloodshot, Darcy turned to the person sitting next to him.

"Why aren't you going home?" He croaked. Elizabeth hadn't left his side the entire night.

Even Charles and Caroline had retired, the latter being forced to leave, as Charles needed a ride home. Elizabeth hadn't gone with them. Instead she just sat there, silently judging him, the bloody insolent little...

No, no. His brain whispered. You like her, remember? She's your mate. A female mate. It's totally possible to have a platonic relationship between opposite genders. There doesn't need to be any unrequited feelings involved, no siree...

He downed another shot, licked the salt sprinkled on the back of his hand, and sucked on a lime wedge. The shudder that ran through him was so horrendous, it made his face contort into something a hyena might make, if it was sicking up it's dinner. He jumped when a cool hand, placed itself on the bridge of his back and he turned to see it was Elizabeth.

"Are you okay?" She asked, concern marring her features.

"I-I need to go home..."

"Okay then."

Disregarding his personal boundaries, Elizabeth started patting the area near his groin. Darcy jumped again. No, she was just trying to locate his wallet, but it was still too close. She didn't find it on his right side, so she jumped to the other, and frisked through his other pocket where she had more luck. Why was she touching him, when hours before, he'd regretted making advances on her? She was teasing him. She was playing a game, just like the rest of them...

He shook his head again, trying not to go down the bitter road.

Whoa. She was just a mate, trying to help out.

Elizabeth paid the bartender with the cash in his wallet, then also nosily sifted through, until she found his driving license. She appeared to be staring at his photo, which was roughly taken eight years ago when he was a teenager, very intently, but he couldn't be sure. She'd been so upset earlier, and now she looked anything but.

Instead, she looked irritatingly clear-headed.

"Come on..." She placed a hand on his arm, trying to tug him away from the bar. Darcy stumbled over his feet, and crashed into the empty bar stool next to him. This earned a few grumbles from the patrons of the bar.

"Sorry, sorry," Elizabeth apologised to them, and back-peddled, ducking under one of Darcy's arms and securing it over her opposite shoulder. She gripped around his waist, and used a great deal of energy to maneuver him out of the door, and the waiting minicab she'd called fifteen minutes earlier. He sprawled out onto the backseat, unconscious, and she pushed one of his legs aside, to sit at the opposite corner.

"Had a bit much too much to drink, has he?" The minicab driver asked her, watching the both of them through his rearview mirror. Elizabeth nodded grimly, and told him the address she'd memorised from Darcy's driving license. The driver was clearly in a chatty mood tonight, so he kept talking, hitting a home run in a few of his observations.

"That's nice you're looking after him." He executed a left-hand turn. "You don't know how many pals I see, both as drunk as each other, stumbling at all hours after dark. Society is going to hell in a hand-basket. More people should buddy up when drinking, and when they do, to do it responsibly. Do you know how much money is wasted by the NHS for alcohol related emergencies alone? Millions. Personally, I believe the taxpayer shouldn't foot the bill..."

After a while, Elizabeth just started to tune him out.

Why was she looking after him? By all rights, their night should've ended when he attempted to kiss her and she'd turned her cheek. But as he turned to go back inside, she remembered how soft his lips had been. So feather-light, it could've been a butterfly landing on it's perch. Why had he been so gentle? It would've been easier to condemn him, if he'd forcefully snapped her chin back, and attacked her, like someone else had done in the past.

But he hadn't.

And the hatred in her, just turned to disquiet.

Maybe there was some lines he just didn't dare to cross.

Elizabeth snorted, and noticed they were driving slower down a residential street, almost like the driver was looking for the correct house. In the dark, it was hard to understand the impressive detached houses sitting at the end of their drives, but she caught glints. Pruned hedges. White-washed exteriors. Gleaming windows, that sparkled under the synthetic streetlight. They all looked like five, six or even seven bedroom properties. And Darcy lived in one of them?

"Wake-up." She shook Darcy's shoulder. "We're here."

"Urgfgh-" He made no sense.

"Where are your keys?"

"Mmpfph-"

Sighing, she asked the driver to wait, and went to knock on the correct door. She felt reassured by a light shining in the hallway, that not everyone was asleep. A couple of minutes later, a sleepy young girl in her dressing robe, and pajama bottoms opened the door, keeping it on the latch.

"Who are you?" She asked, trying to sound territorial.

"And you're...?" Elizabeth stalled.

"None of your beeswax," she snapped, as Elizabeth shoved her foot through the door, lest she slammed it close. That would be a travesty!

"I've got Will with me," Elizabeth pleaded. "He's a bit worse for wear, but I think I know who you are... You're the girl who answered the phone, when I called this morning, right? Georgiana?"

At the mention of her brother's name, and Elizabeth placing herself as that anxious caller from earlier, Georgiana reverted back to her bashful self. Colour flooded into her cheeks, as she fumbled with the locks and wrenched the door wide open. "Come in! Come in!" She said, wrapping her arms around her body. "I was wondering when my brother would come back. He said he'd catch-up with me, if I was still awake when he got back, so I waited up."

"That's sweet." Elizabeth knew how it felt like to be a sister. Once.

Turning back to the cab, she saw Darcy had half-fallen out, trying to follow her. She thought nothing of retreating to his side, and grabbing him under the arms. At this rate, she was going to know every ridge, every curve, and every square detail of his back, through his shirt, just by handling him alone. Did he have to shiver, every time she touched his spine?

"Come on," she cajoled.

It took thirty minutes for her to help him up to his bed, and by the time she came down exhausted, Georgiana was merrily waving the driver off from the comfort of her doorway. Elizabeth nearly tripped in her haste to get down the last few steps.

"What are you doing?" She cried.

"Oh," Georgiana turned. "I paid him, you don't have to worry-"

"No, I needed him to get back to my flat!"

Georgiana put a hand over her mouth. "Oops?"

"Call him back! No, I'll call him back -" Elizabeth patted herself down as the other girl looked on in alarm. "God, I've lost the card! Do you have the number of another taxi rank around here -" She looked around, like she hoped to see a copy of the Yellow Pages. Georgiana hesistated, before making another suitable offer.

"Why don't you spend the night...here? On the sofa?"

"That's mental-"

"You will be quite safe here. And it would save you money. Will can take you home in the morning, after he's sobered up."

"It'll be afternoon, before that happens!" Elizabeth stated.

"Well, you can take his car."

"Really?" Elizabeth made a disbelieving noise.

"Yes. He won't need it till the afternoon like you said."

"Oh, I don't know.."

"Go on. It'll just be for a couple of hours. And I'm grateful you're such a nice PA. The previous one, would be stretched out on the bed beside him, just as drunk or stoned. At times I couldn't figure out if she was a PA, or a cheap tart for hire."

"Georgiana..."

"My brother is a good guy underneath. Even our housekeeper will tell you. It's just that he hasn't been the same since dad died five years ago."

The topic of conversation was too close to home. Elizabeth wordlessly looked at the potted plant in the front hall, and tried not to dredge up memories from her past. At least, Will still had Georgiana, so no sympathy there. What did she have? Charlotte. And if Charlotte decided to get married, and leave her, then she'd not even have that. Georgiana yet again indicated towards a room, that was further down the hallway.

It turned out to be a living room, warm and soft. Everything was mismatched, like an older couple had lived here once, and they liked their particulars. The armchair and sofa, were striped, and were clearly over two decades old. The fireplace, had a byzantine feel to it, with solid slate and marble and a roaring fire that was now reduced to embers.

The thing that clogged her throat most, were two pairs of slippers, a his and hers set, propped against the legs of a carved wood, coffee table. They were close to falling apart, one touch, and it'd split apart at the seams.

Without a word, she instinctively knew who they belonged too.

"Okay," she found herself saying. "Okay, I'll stay the night."

.

.

Sleep came naturally and easily, which was surprising, considering she didn't like nodding off in strange places. But the living room had been sold to her exactly right. The moment she clapped eyes on it, a warmth had spread across her chest and it made her heart ache. It was a privilege to spend a night in a room, that was full of character and whispers of a hidden past.

She was the first person in the household to wake up, and stretched, noticing there were a few frames on the mantelpiece. Wandering closer, she saw pictures of Georgiana and Will as children, their parents on their wedding day and many, many happy memories together. She picked up a picture of the four of them, lined up in front of a pyramid. They had traveled a lot. Going to places like Egypt, and India and Singapore. Maybe that's why Darcy now worked in the travel industry, trying to recreate those memories for other families.

"I really like that picture," a voice said softly behind her, and Elizabeth nearly had a heart attack.

With a clunk, she put it down and turned to face the person who'd caught her out.

It was Darcy. Wearing a white nightshirt and dark bottoms. He looked devilishly handsome and good enough to eat. Elizabeth tried to forget, how many times she'd touched him the night before. But she couldn't help replaying it over and over again, as he prowled closer...

"My mum, my dad..." he said, staring at the picture with a longing smile. "The whole family."

"D-Do you sometimes wish you could build a time machine? So you can go back..." Elizabeth had spoken without thinking, and now blushed heavily for it. "Stupid question..."

"No. I think it's perfectly fine. Yeah, it's nice in theory...but I'll probably just mess up the timeline at the end of the day." He grinned.

"You must miss them very much."

"Yeah, all the time. But what about you?" He gestured at the wall. "Don't you ever wish you could go back?"

"No."

"Why?"

"It would be, because I would murder. Without fail."

Darcy looked at her with a slight frown. There was a darkness to her, he hadn't really taken notice of before. She wasn't infallible. That perfectly crafted veneer had so many chinks in it, at once, he could see she was damaged. Something in her past, had terribly affected her. Whilst his childhood has always been idyllic, hers hadn't been. Did he dare to keep tapping at it? To see if she'd shatter and let all the darkness pour out?

The idea enthralled him, as much as it made him wary.

Not yet. He wasn't dressed for it.

Ha, a joke! Darcy thought. I actually made a joke in my head. What next? A whole stand-up routine?

After a beat, she asked, "Aren't you going to ask who I want to kill so bad?"

Darcy began to shake his head, when a horrible idea took precedent. What if, when she'd been younger...

"D-Did someone," he stuttered, "When you were y-young, make you do things you didn't w-want to do? L-Like were you m-mol -"

"God, no." Elizabeth stared at him very hard. "You think I was molested? I admit, I had a shady boyfriend in the past, who wouldn't take no for an answer, but I punched him in the face, before he did anything worth talking to a therapist about. I can hold my ground, you know."

Darcy blinked, enjoying this fiery side to her. Somewhere underneath, lay a steel core. It was just a shame she didn't show it more often, because it made him like her even more. A little bit of scratching, and she was opening up to him...which was a glorious thing to see.

"So yesterday..." he ventured. "You don't want to kill me over what happened?"

"No. Jeez, get over yourself."

"Scouts honour, I won't try anything like that again," he said earnestly. "I mean, unless you ask me to -"

"I won't."

His mouth twisted into an amused smile. "Are we...bantering?"

"No. It's all in your head."

"We totally are. Now you've shown this side to me, I don't think I would want you to go back. To how you were before. This side is too...heartwarming. And it makes my heart happy." He grabbed his chest, and did a little hop forward. Ignoring his playfulness, which was amazing considering he must've woken with the mother of all hangovers, Elizabeth set her shoulders back and walked to the door.

Just as she reached the front of the house, she called back, "Well? Do you want to grab breakfast or not?"

"Can we walk, like that day I came to your coffee place?"

"Unless you want to fly," Elizabeth deadpanned.

And walk they did. All the way to the end of the road, before Darcy ran back, because he'd forgotten he was still wearing the nightclothes he'd pulled on, sometime during the night.

Men.

.

.

.

A/N: I am dealing with mature themes, that some people might be too young to understand. But if you're over 15 (or are a very mature 12 year old), I think you should be okay! There's a reason why I made Elizabeth so introverted, and Darcy extroverted from the very beginning. It's so I can strip multiple layers, and reveal light and shade, and all the good stuff between.

Lastly thank you to all those who reviewed the last chapter. You were ace :) Especially you, StoryPirate! :D And JRB, what do you think?