A/N: More time with Mr. Wickham.

Pride, Prejudice, and Pretense

Chapter Nine: Salon

Lizzy cursed inwardly, silently.

She had hoped for a moment to recoup, to gather herself, before she had to deal with Wickham.

Not answering was a possibility — she tried quickly to reckon with it. On the one hand, it would keep Wickham on the hook and give her a chance to breathe, to gather herself. On the other hand, it might suggest to Wickham that she was better able to withstand his charms than he hoped, might suggest that she would not yield before his timetable demanded he leave Chicago. She did not take him to be easily dissuaded, but could she risk it, risk that she might have to make it up to him, if he did seem dissuaded, in the flesh — so to speak?

She inhaled deeply and answered the call.

"George?" She was careful to speak his name with enthusiasm.

"Fanny!" he responded with equal or greater enthusiasm, "I know you told me to text but — um, I confess I wanted to talk with you. I enjoyed yesterday. Enjoyed it immensely."

Lizzy considered his action, his calling, his explanation for it. Wickham probably was eager to talk to Fanny. He wanted her; she was sure of that. And last night, he had taken the issue between them all but settled, the deed all but done. The question was only how long Fanny would make him wait, how long her already rubbery loyalty to Ned would restrain her. Wickham called her, she realized, not only to hear her voice but deliberately to do something other than she had (twice) asked him to do: text her. This was Wickham not being Gentle Ned (too gentle); it was Wickham's assertion of himself.

He takes Ned to be a…simp.

Lizzy had not understood Ned that way, but she realized that perhaps Darcy had, and had intended for Wickham to form that impression of Ned. Certainly, such an impression would make Wickham more confident that he could steal Fanny from Wickham. Wives and Daughters. It had been a brilliant stroke of backstory, a backstory that conveyed a lurking weakness in their relationship, a weakness someone like Wickham, an alpha in his own estimation, would be confident he could take advantage of.

Lizzy had blushed at Salonica when Wickham rated Ned too gentle — and she realized it was because she had been embarrassed for Darcy, irritated with Wickham. Whatever Darcy was, and Lizzy wasn't sure she knew exactly what to call the MI-6 agent (vexing man!), he was no simp. She did not dwell on that self-realization though; Wickham was waiting for her to respond. Darcy needed to be separated from Ned in her mind so that she would not respond on behalf of one to what was intended for the other.

"It's okay, — good actually." She breathed out the word. "I'm glad you called. I enjoyed last night too." She started to use his word, 'immensely', but then dialed it back. "A lot."

"I'm delighted and delighted you aren't offended by my call. I want to mention a dinner idea to you, to see if you like it."

"Okay."

"There's a fancy place in Chicago, on lots of foodie bucket lists, a place called Alinea. Have you heard of it? Some magazines have rated it the best restaurant in the world."

The big guns, Lizzy thought, Wickham's breaking out the big guns. She blushed a bit at her own term. "No, I haven't heard of it. But I do love food. How could you get a reservation at a place like that on the spur of the moment?"

He chuckled, the sound low and intended to seduce, the first time he had treated her to that particular sound. Big guns."Let that be my secret. But I do have reservations in the Salon — they have various dining rooms, and tasting menus in each. The Salon is probably the most…intimate, although, since the presentation of the food is decidedly theatrical, it's not private."

He really is good at this. "That sounds interesting. Sure. When will you be by?"

"Rook and I will be there at 7:30 p.m. Our reservation should give us ample time. You needn't dress formally, but I will wear a suit."

Lizzy thought of the Fuschia dress. "I have something, I think."

"Very good. I will look forward to seeing you in it. That black mini dress at Lady Catherine's party has…lingered in my mind." The way to capture a man is through his imagination.

Lizzy stalled for a moment again, trying to decide how Fanny should respond. "That's too much praise, too much flattery, George. But — I'm glad you liked it. Ned did too." Can't let Ned disappear too fast.

"No doubt, no doubt," he brushed Ned aside. "I will see you this evening."

"Thanks, and thanks for such…generous plans."

"Think nothing of it. I have wanted to go for a long time, and they do not take reservations for one, so you're doing me a favor." He's good at this. He collects women, Father Robyn told her.

"Okay, see you this evening. 7:30 p.m."

"Bye, Fanny."

"Bye, George."

Lizzy put down the phone, swallowing hard.

Alinea proved it. Wickham was prepared to push Fanny for her favors — despite his graceful remark about Fanny doing him a favor. She already dreaded the Salon.

Lizzy took a minute to slip off her jacket and kick off her shoes. Darcy or Bingley or both would soon follow up on the phone call from Wickham but she was not ready to face that follow-up.

In the bathroom, she filled the sink with hot water and sank a washcloth in it, wrung it out, and wiped her face and hands.

Her face in the mirror showed that she was tired. A nap before Alinea was the prudent course. For a spy, especially one undercover, sleep was perhaps the most effective of all weapons, a break from the pressure of pretense, a chance to recharge. The problem with being undercover awake was that nothing so done could ever be truly relaxing, except sleep. While undercover, lounging was pretending to lounge, relaxing pretending to relax. Nothing was what it was; everything was itself and another thing, and, thus doubled, exhausting.

But before sleep, she would do the follow-up. It would be expected.

She dried her face and hands on a clean towel then returned to the kitchen, climbed on a stool, and opened the laptop. A moment later, Darcy was on the screen.

Although he was trying to hide it. Lizzy could tell that he was upset. His neck was flushed.

"You heard?" Lizzy asked, forgoing any introduction.

Darcy nodded, his brows contracted. "I did. Bingley's already at work on Alinea and its environs. He'll trail you again tonight. I will be here, keeping up with the video and audio. Wickham's not wasting time."

That was Lizzy's view too, but something about Darcy's delivery of it irritated her. "That's what we want, right? We don't want this to stretch out more than necessary."

"No, but hurrying Fanny, or trying to, could also be a test by Wickham, deciding whether he finds you already corrupt or will himself corrupt you."

"By finding out how long I will cling to Ned?"

"It's second nature to Wickham," Darcy said, "and he'll balk if Fanny's too hard — or too easy. You need to manage to achieve…" Darcy paused and smiled without humor, "...the proper, improper seductive medium of easiness and resistance."

Lizzy smirked darkly at his complex phrasing. "How do I do that, Agent Darcy?"

"You seem to be managing it well. Dropping poor Ned in just enough to make Wickham know there are hurdles to clear, but not enough to make him despair of…crossing the finish line first."

She knew Darcy was talking about Fanny, not her, but it still upset Lizzy to hear that description, although she acknowledged the justice of it. She'd been saying much the same to herself. Strange, the way the same words, spoken by yourself, could seem so different when spoken by another — the strangeness measuring the distance between 'I' and 'you'. Darcy seemed to always manage a delivery of lines about her that provoked Lizzy. But she ignored the provocation; she had her job to do.

"So, what should I expect tonight?"

"Wickham's taking you to Alinea to contrast with Ned," Darcy said, his eyes focused elsewhere, thinking. "He doubts that poor editor Ned could afford anything like that, and Fanny's already given him reason to believe that she can be swayed by affluence — you did that well at the Rosing's party, your reactions to it, to Lady Catherine. He's also taking you to obligate you. My guess is that a table for two in the Alinea Salon costs more than a thousand dollars. He'll find a way to mention that, offhandedly, no doubt, but to make sure you understand how much he's invested in you." Darcy paused to let Lizzy hear the pun on 'invested', exposing his earlier pun on 'poor'. "He'll almost certainly start pushing physical contact tonight. You need to let him…travel a certain distance, but not let it go too far."

Distaste showed on Darcy's face and Lizzy felt a blush rise to hers. She pressed her lips together and nodded, willing the blush away unsuccessfully.

"And you say Bingley will be tailing me?"

"Yes, and nearby while you are in the restaurant, though he won't be inside. After all, it's a public place."

"Like the Chicago River?" Lizzy asked, scoring a point against Darcy and last night's debrief. He nodded, owning it. "Yes, like the Chicago River."

Lizzy leaned back, surprised but pleased by his response. He was a hard man to read. "What if he wants to go somewhere afterward?"

"That's fine, although not ideal. Try to make sure that plans, if there are any, are settled well before you leave Alinea, so we can plan, Bingley can anticipate where you'll be. But don't take Wickham to your apartment, not yet. Too much could go wrong, and it might seem like too early a capitulation on Fanny's part. Soon, but not yet. We have more planning to do before he's in your apartment."

"Okay. I'll do my best to refuse any plans afterward if I can. I'll mention Ned. But I'll be sure to encourage Wickham before we part company."

"How so?"

"He forgettably kissed my cheek last night. Fanny will kiss him tonight, while she says goodnight, not seductively but unforgettably."

Darcy looked at her and then his eyes dropped. She remembered his kiss at her apartment door, Ned saying goodnight. She hadn't intended the parallel, hadn't intended to recall that. She rushed on. "What do you think?"

"You know what you're doing. You have to make the final call at the moment, in the moment, and no one but you can do that."

"Alright. Look, I'm tired. I'm going to nap for a while, then I'll get dressed. I'll talk to you again before Wickham is due to show up."

"Good. Sleep well, Elizabeth."

She stalled as she shut the computer.

Has Darcy used my first name before?

She shut the computer, trying to remember.

If he had, he had not said it quite as he did a moment before, almost with regard, audible concern.

Lizzy made herself a quick lunch, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, halved it, ate it, and then went to bed. She went to sleep quickly, too tired to play hide-and-seek with her own emotions or tag with her thoughts.

She let the pitchy hurdy-gurdy inside her play on its own as she sank into a blank unconsciousness.

She woke to the afternoon, later than she intended, the groggy after-leavings of a too-long nap eluding her large yawns and her repeated eye-rubbings.

She stood and went to her closet, retrieved the garment bag with the Fuschia dress, and found a pair of bright pink heels in the closet — again, she had been well-provided in terms of costuming for Fanny.

After as long a shower as she thought safe for staying on schedule (she had needed to shave her legs), she moisturized then put on underwear and slipped the dress over her head, zipped the back. She put her blonde hair up in a messy bun and applied light pink lipstick and the barest hint of blush, hoping to obscure the real thing if it happened.

Stepping back, she was surprised by the effect. The blonde hair matched the fuschia dress differently than it matched the black one. And with her hair up, her neck and shoulders were further accented, and her eyes seemed larger. Although it had no transparent back, as the black one did, it hugged her figure much more tightly, revealing her in another way. For a moment, she regretted the dress, all the moisturized, glowing skin it left uncovered, top and bottom. The dress was going to pressure Wickham, its pink exposure of her.

The video necklace and the audio earrings went on next to last.

Lizzy sat down on the bed to put on the heels and jumped, dropping one, when she heard a soft knock on the door. She picked it up and slipped it on.

She tiptoed in the heels into the kitchen and picked up the knife she had used to slice her PB&J earlier. It still had remnants of strawberry jelly on it. The red jelly made her stomach clench.

Knife out, she crept to the door.

There was probably no reason for her elaborate caution except habit, and the fact the visit had not been preceded by notification, either from Darcy or Bingley — or from the security desk.

She peeped out to see Bingley standing in the hallway, nervously glancing around.

She ran to the kitchen and put the knife in the sink, then ran back to the door and opened it. "Charlie? What are you doing here?"

"I came through the tunnel and up the stairs," he whispered. "Let me in. No one's seen me."

Lizzy stepped aside and closed the door after Bingley hustled inside. He turned to her immediately. "Have you heard anything from Jane?"

"No, nothing, although I haven't checked since I napped. Let me look." She went into the bedroom and got her phone from her bag. There were no calls, no texts. Lizzy shook her head. "Nothing."

"Damn," Bingley said, his hands clenching at his sides. "She hasn't contacted me, either." He stopped and seemed to be weighing something in his mind, his weight shifting from foot to foot like the balancing of a scale. His face slowly showed resolve. "I told you not to tell Darcy, that he'd be pissed. The truth is that he's already pissed. He dressed me down last night for being distracted, unprofessional. And all day, he's acted extra stiff…"

"Is that possible?" Lizzy would have guessed that the stick that was up Darcy's ass was at the maximum northern height.

Bingley laughed but not with much conviction. "He's always been sort of terrifying, awful when he wanted to be. Even as a boy he used to make me nervous. Especially on Sundays, when there wasn't enough classwork to keep us busy. He's never known how to relax. Always driven by some kind of internalized self-demand. He handled free time about as well as Sherlock Holmes."

"A seven-percent solution?" Lizzy asked, puzzled.

"No, nothing like that. But he would be at sixes and sevens with himself, and he'd take it out on me. Criticize me for being changeable, too quick. He repeated all that to me last night. I ended up telling him who I was calling, telling him about Jane."

"Why, Charlie?"

He shook his head. "Because he's Darcy and I'm Bingley. Because the pattern was established so long ago and now I can't seem to break it, even though I'm a grown man, and not just his… sidekick."

"God, what an ass!"

Bingley shrank back and put up his hands. "No, not really, Lizzy. He also did so much for me in school. Lent me money and never asked for it back. Protected me from older boys who tried to bully me, and not just on slow Sundays, but every day. He helped me with my school work and tended to me when I was sick enough to need a little help but not sick enough for the school to call my parents. I admire him; I just wish he had more tolerance for human weakness, human needs."

Lizzy worked to understand that. Typical male friendships had always puzzled her, been opaque to her, the curious, deep ties, real ties, that grew out of what seemed antagonisms. Lizzy's only close friend was Jane. Their friendship had no such dynamic and never had, although she knew women could have friendships like that. Her friendship with Charlotte had some of that character. But she didn't think female friendships were typically like that. But maybe that was her inexperience.

"I'm sure we'll find out that Jane's phone is broken, or that she's been tied up with a recruiting assignment. She's the last person to leave someone she cares about waiting and wondering. Let's get through tonight and then tomorrow I will do everything I can to help if we still haven't heard from her. But right now, with Wickham looming, let's not do something that will convince Darcy we're unprofessional. Dial it in for a few hours, Agent Bingley," Lizzy said with a God-and-Country intonation, "and then tomorrow we'll figure this out." Darcy's comment about Bingley's changeability was true, Lizzy granted to herself, and she wondered if Bingley was projecting his own mercurial states of mind onto Jane, who was not mercurial in the least. Jane was steadfast. But that made her radio silence nag at Lizzy more.

After a moment, Bingley nodded his agreement. "Okay, I'd better get back before Darcy knows I've been here." He reached out and took Lizzy's hand, a friendly gesture. "Good luck tonight. I know these missions suck."

She said nothing but showed him out after squeezing his hand.

As she walked to the car, Wickham waiting and watching, Lizzy wished she had a longer jacket, one that kept her legs more out of view.

But she had decided to go with the leather jacket and decided that Fanny would leave her legs exposed.

Fanny was playing a dangerous game and Lizzy knew it because Lizzy was playing Fanny's game.

Wickham almost licked his lips. As she neared, walking in the last sunlight of the day, she could feel his appreciation of the Fuschia dress, feel the heat radiating from him as she stepped to him and he took her hand. His hand was as heated as was his gaze, his immediate atmosphere, and he allowed her to glimpse the heat before he hid it in a practiced shift of features, desire slipped behind a mask of elegant charm.

Elegant. That was the word. His bespoke gray flannel suit and Italian leather shoes were classic Gregory Peck. She realized then how much Wickham reminded her of Peck, although she hadn't realized it. A modern version. She wished she hadn't realized it now.

Peck had been the object of a crush back in her college days when she often left campus at Haverford to spend her afternoons in a small, independent theater that showed old movies. A Gregory Peck Festival had done her in. Wickham's gray suit had turned the trick of memory, revealing his resemblance to the actor. She had always thought of Peck as elegant, refined, a true gentleman. His flawless clothes were a part of him. Wickham was not a true gentleman, Darcy was right, but Wickham certainly could look as if he were, and could approach the visual standard of Peck. Wickham's face was narrower, not as strongly masculine, but the general look — the gestalt, Lizzy recalled Ned's word, Darcy's word — was similar.

She made herself stop thinking of comparisons. Work.

"Hi, George," Lizzy said, smiling brightly.

"That dress, Fanny, even with the jacket, stunning. A feast for the eyes," he added, leaning close to her as he helped her into the car, much closer than when he helped her in or out the day before.

The dress is already applying pressure.

She slid into the back seat, nodding a greeting at Rook, who nodded in his falling rock way. But she did not slide all the way to the opposite window as she had the day before. She slid halfway and then stopped. When Wickham got in and seated himself, he was not in contact with her but there was not much distance between them. Wickham noticed but Lizzy pretended that Fanny didn't, that the change was unnoticed.

"Alinea, Rook," Wickham said. He glanced at Lizzy's bare legs, exposed so far that she had crossed them to make sure that she did not show Wickham anything beneath the dress. But crossing her legs had the regrettable effect of exhibiting them, especially the leg across the other leg, her top calf made yet more curvaceous by resting on the other leg.

She saw Wickham swallow, his Adam's apple move.

He put his arm on the back of the seat. She was close enough to him that it was all but around her, except that it did not touch her. He was careful to keep it resting on the seat, not on Lizzy's shoulders. Darcy was right: Wickham was wasting no time. His smile at her as he put his arm on the seat was possessive, even if the arm did not touch her.

She pretended not to object to the movement, and Rook pulled the car into traffic with an amused glance in the rearview mirror that was not about oncoming cars.

He was estimating the come-on. Lizzy made herself focus.

Alinea was indeed fancy.

They were shown into the Salon, most of the walls, the fixtures, the tables, and the seats were white. The non-white walls were pale blue, and some of the white walls were covered with abstract paintings. Other guests, pairs, were seated at some of the tables. A lovely brunette waitress pulled out the table so that Lizzy and Wickham could be seated.

"The first course will be served soon. Relax and enjoy yourselves. Savor and luxuriate in the meal. Everything is designed to enhance your sensory experience, not only gustatory but visual, olfactory, tactile, even auditory." The woman's voice was syrupy, pleasing. "I will return momentarily."

Wickham gave Lizzy a commanding smile. "I've been told the best experience here is to be had by yielding yourself completely to the meal, giving yourself over to the presentation, and sinking yourself into the details."

Lizzy nodded and looked around. She could not meet Wickham's gaze after that thinly veiled, salacious advice. She glanced at the other couples. It may have been the honeypot mission, or Wickham's aroused vocabulary, or the room itself and the other pairs of customers, but the air seemed charged with an eerie erotic electricity as if they were all about to commence an orgy of sorts.

Lizzy did her best to concentrate on Wickham and ignore everyone else. But Wickham seemed to find her attention to him permission to attend to her in turn, and his eyes kept slipping from her eyes, down to her dress, its tell-tale Fuschia record of her body, and from there to her legs, her ankles, her pink heels.

After an uncomfortable few minutes for Lizzy, during which she studied the abstract paintings to no effect, the waitress returned, followed by two waiters. "Nacre," the waitress announced, "first course." The two waiters began carefully serving small bowls of caviar, the bowls themselves resembling caviar.

Lizzy recalled that 'nacre' meant mother of pearl. "The caviar is atop lychee gelee, its consistency like tapioca. We're serving it with champagne."

As the waitress said this, the two waiters, like synchronized dancers, finished serving the bowls and began pouring champagne. Lizzy took a small bite — it tasted tropical first, with an aftertaste of caviar. She took a sip of the champagne. The pairing of the food and drink was perfect. Wickham looked at her, smiled, and gestured for her to finish the small bowl. She did.

The waitress and waiters deftly cleared the tables and disappeared after everyone finished the first course. The couples talked among themselves quietly. Wickham sighed. "Never imagined that I would one day be able to eat at a place like this, with company like this. Eleven hundred dollars a table." He added the last in an even softer voice. Darcy was right, Wickham made sure to mention the cost.

"You haven't always been…comfortable?" Lizzy asked. Wickham glanced at her with a hint of suspicion but then it passed.

He sighed again. "No, when I was young, I often woke up with no idea if I would eat that day. My mother raised us alone, trying to feed seven children and herself on a meager factory wage that would hardly have fed her and kept her warm. Damn northern towns. She often didn't eat so that we could. Wrapped us in her clothes when we had no heat, her teeth chattering."

Lizzy listened without shifting her posture or reacting. She felt like he was telling the truth, and a truth he did not often, if ever, tell. She did not want to upset the moment, and she wanted to be sure Darcy heard. But before Wickham could continue, the waitress and waiters were back. "The next course: Hot Potato, Cold Potato." They were served a hot, baked potato with truffle, parmesan, and vichyssoise.

When it finished, as the waitress and waiters cleared the table again, Lizzy leaned toward Wickham and put her hand on his arm softly. "I'm sorry about that, about how hard things were when you were a boy. Your mother must have been wonderful."

"She was," Wickham nodded, "she kept her head up even as the world beat her down. If this were a remotely just world, she would have had servants, and been celebrated. Instead, she had a long series of worthless men, including my father, who only made her plight worse, each getting her pregnant a time or two and then disappearing. But she kept hoping one of them would turn out to be a good man. When I was small and we had meals," he said, redirecting the subject, looking at the remains of the second course, "they were often just boiled potatoes."

"Is your mother still alive," Lizzy asked, keeping the question pertinent, innocent, the kind of thing Fanny would ask.

"No, long dead. Worked to death. Dead before I was old enough to help her."

Lizzy had left Fanny's hand on Wickham's arm. She squeezed it and stared into his eyes, expressing her sympathy. He put his free hand on top of hers, and then the next course arrived and he moved his hand and she moved hers.

The meal went on, a procession of rich and amazing courses:

Plume: an olfactory course, cold smoked sea bass over creamed mint and spinach, served with potato crisps rendered aromatic with cedar and tobacco (the scent when Lizzy opened the small bag was remarkable). Along with the chips was an impossibly fancy onion dip, topped with onion ash and live embers.

And then more courses all with names Lizzy forgot, lost in the welter of tastes and smells and wine pairings. There were courses of Australian tiger prawns, duck, black truffle ravioli, and Wagyu short rib. And for dessert, a course called Paint (that name she remembered), a deconstructed banana split served on a rubberized table cloth, and to be spooned off it. The toppings and ice creams and bananas made the table look like a horizontal piece of abstract art from the walls. It was all delicious.

The duck course had been served with a small wildflower-honey-glazed biscuit, creme fraiche, and blueberry compote. That bite of biscuit, put in her mouth by Wickham, was perhaps the best single bite of food Lizzy could remember tasting.

Wickham had not reverted to his mother or his childhood again. He was intent on his food and on helping Lizzy to enjoy hers. She knew that by letting him feed her she was upping the intimacy between them but he wanted it, clearly, and they were in a public setting.

When the remains of dessert were cleared, Wickham sighed again but this time contentedly. "I never eat so much, but the way they serve it, the pace, the small size of the individual courses, it keeps you from knowing just how full you've become."

Lizzy agreed. Her stomach was full, her senses all hyped and buzzing "This dress will show that I've had too much."

"No," Wickham said firmly, "all that dress shows is that you're perfect. That hair and that dress and those eyes. I don't know that I've ever had a more glamorous dinner companion."

He leaned toward her to kiss her cheek again, gallant act after gallant words, but Lizzy seized the moment and turned her lips to his. She let him kiss her there, although only for a moment, then she smiled shyly at him as he leaned back. "Thank you for an extravagantly memorable evening. I've never experienced anything like this."

"Not even with Ned?" Wickham asked. Ouch.

"No, this is…beyond Ned. His means, I mean. He's been saving — " Lizzy stopped and then decided to adlib, "I think he's hoping to propose." Wickham raised one eyebrow slightly at that. Two can play this game, Lizzy thought to herself.

They left Alinea and got back in the car.

As before, Rook let Wickham handle the door. They seemed to have agreed to that ahead of time. She slid in, even less far than when Wickham picked her up. When Wickham got in, his leg was pressed against hers. She saw one corner of his mouth lift.

"Can I take you somewhere for a nightcap?"

Lizzy shook her head. "I'm sorry, George, I'm just too full. I need to go home and recover a bit before bed."

He let both corners of his mouth lift when she said 'bed'. "Can I tuck you in?"

"No," Lizzy said, chuckling, Fanny treating the request as a joke. But then Lizzy looked at him. "Not tonight."

"Miss Fanny's apartment, Rook," Wickham said and the car began to move.

Wickham put his arm around her again, more fully this time since she had chosen to sit closer. She gazed up at him as the passing streetlights created a strobe light effect in the back of the car. He lowered his head to hers, his lips to hers. The pathway had been created by Fanny in Alinea. He kissed her. He turned, reached across with his other arm, and put his hand on her bare knee. Lizzy did not open her lips, but she let Fanny melt against Wickham. He slid his hand up her knee toward her thigh, then onto it. She reached out and put her hand on his shoulder. He slid his hand to the edge of her short skirt.

It had been a long time since any man's hand had touched her like that, and, against her will, her body responded with an immediate damp warmth. This was the danger about which Darcy warned her, about which her instructors at the Farm warned her. Shifting sandbars in a strong river. She willed her legs closed. It was not that she wanted Wickham. She didn't. But the evening, the champagne, the wine, the food, the overstimulation of her senses, the length of time since a man had touched her with that intention, moved so close to his destination, the Gregory Peck — it all affected her.

"No, George," she whispered as she shut her legs, trapping his hand. "I can't. This was wonderful, you're wonderful, but I can't. Ned." She untrapped his hand with her hand on his wrist and removed it from her, but gently.

"Have you been faithful to him, Fanny?"

She nodded. "Of course. From our first date."

"I can do things to you, Fanny, things Ned has never dreamed of, you've never dreamed of." He said this close to her ear in a hot whisper.

Lizzy trembled. "Don't, George. I need time. To think."

He nodded and smiled, his smile disappointed but pleased at the same time.

"Don't take too long, Fanny. I won't be in Chicago forever. And what Ned doesn't know…" Wickham said softly.

They were silent the rest of the way to her apartment and parted with only a quick, awkward hug.