Um so yeah. This is chapter 23. That is all! Review!

Chapter 23

It didn't take long for Darcy to react. Infuriating woman. How could she not trust him, and worse, how could she take a strangers word over his. Of course he had not slept with Caroline Bingley, she should have known him better than that by now.

Darcy ordered his carriage to be prepared, to leave for Devonshire House at once.

He was tired of her running, he was tired of the chase. Could not she see that she was all he wanted? Caroline was just a mere thing, not even in Uni. He kissed her, once, after a dinner party. That was all. Mr. Wickham knew exactly what he was doing, and exactly who Elizabeth was, he had been employed by Devonshire, he knew exactly not what happened. But it was Wickham's loose lip about Devonshire's father, that got him in trouble. Darcy had paid Devonshire not to punish him, and he paid Wickham's debts and paid his commission up north. He had not seen him for three years.

Soon Darcy was at her home, demanding to be heard.

"I have nothing to say to you."

"But I have every damn thing to say to you."

"You should not be here."

Darcy was an honorable man, and had never wanted to hit a woman, at all. Until now. He restrained himself. Stubborn, insufferable woman.

"You will listen to me," she turned away, "LISTEN. How is it that at my first test of honor, you listen to a cad, a man you barely know, instead of the man who is soon to be your husband?"

She was about to protest, when he cut her off.

"I have had enough. You do not get to be The Duchess right now, you are my partner, my equal, and I will have my say. I did not bed Caroline Bingley, for G-d's sake Elizabeth, have you so little faith in me? Do you think me that sneaky, and dishonorable that at a first accusation, you believe the worse of me? Do you think that I would be able to do that to Bingley, my best friend. Elizabeth look at me. Wickham is the worst of men, and I rather wonder how you have never heard of him before.* He looked around to be sure nobody was listening. "He was the son of my father's steward. My father treated him as a son, loved him as a son. When he died, my father bequeathed the parish in Derbyshire, outside Pemberley, to Mr. Wickham, at which point he announced he was no longer taking orders, and took the whole living instead. A year later," Darcy started to choke up. "Georgiana. He convinced Georgiana, she was in love with him, and convinced her to elope with him. Georgiana is to inherit thirty-thousand pounds. When I made it clear he would not receive nothing of her inheritance, he ran. He told her that since she could not trust him, that he no longer could be with her. As you are me now. How can you believe something as false as that he laid against me?"

"You said nothing to convince me otherwise." She was looking nervously around at anywhere but him, feeling completely foolish.

"Because you do not trust me!"

"Then why did you not deny it?"

"And do Wickham the pleasure, of seeing me fight against him? He is a sneaky man Elizabeth. Well able to twist one's words, very easily."

She sighed and sat down and looked down at her hands. "What did happen, then? Surely something must have."

"I kissed her," he was blunt, and quick to respond. "I should not have done it. I felt terrible afterwards, not only for me, but for her as well. I knew what her feelings to me were, and I should not have led her on, it was just as if I bedded her Elizabeth. Perhaps, had I not done that, perhaps then, she would not be the way she is today." Elizabeth recognized her words as he used them against himself.

He looked at her, on his face was a smile, but it did not meet his eyes. "You are not a whore, my heart. You are far from it." He knelt in front of her. Elizabeth was nearly in tears. "I have a special license. We can wed anytime. Invite the rest of your family up here to reside for a week. We shall be married, then we will return to Hertfordshire, and I shall make sure that your sister, has all she dreams of for her wedding, if Charles has not done so already. But no matter, I shall outdo even him, for I always take care of my sisters." He kissed her softly. "Elizabeth, say you will. Say we will be together, as equals, at my home, at your homes. We will live and raise those wonderful children, so dear to me as if they are my own. We will travel, and have many children, and live out the rest of our lives in bliss not disturbed. Say you will."

"For heaven's sakes child, answer him, for I am in all anticipation," Mr. Bennet said from behind the door, he had been listening the whole time, and she couldn't help but chuckle at the role reversal, her father, as flighty as all of his daughters, eavesdropping on important conversation.

"Mr. Darcy it seems as if I have no choice, for if I do not, not only will my father be unhappy, but I as well," her laughter was infectious as her father burst through the door. "Praise the Lord!" Darcy unable to stop laughing, picked her up in his arms, and spun her around. Mr. Bennet was good-natured about the show of impropriety, he simply chose to ignore it.

"I will write to the family at once my child, tell them to prepare and be up here in two days time. Lord to be in that house when Fanny receives this letter," muttering he shook his head as he exited the room to go to his letter.

"I am sorry, I did not trust you. Caroline Bingley seems to bring out the worse in me."

"Or the best, for you are always alert, and very headstrong when it comes to her. I like you that way."

"Only like that, Mr. Darcy?"

"Oh no, Your Grace, but the other ways are way too improper to speak of publicly." Darcy's eye held a wicked gleam, and she knew she was doomed.

Shame on you, naughty readers for doubting our Mr. Darcy! How could you do it? And to think, I was beginning to understand you all! JKJK Hope you enjoy!