Free Darkness Falls Upon Pemberley by Susan Adriani Page A

afforded a picturesque view of the Bennets’ small park. The weather was fair—partly sunny and dry, if not a bit chilly for late spring—and he wondered whether Elizabeth would consent to walk out with him, preferably without a chaperone. He’d be foolish to think she wouldn’t have questions the moment she laid eyes on him, and figured it would be far better for both of them if they had no audience under foot.
    His injuries from his accident had been severe, so severe in fact that Colonel Fitzwilliam had immediately sent to London for a physician, but it’d made little difference in the end. Though his lacerations faded with time and his broken bones had begun to mend, Darcy never regained consciousness. After a month passed with no sign of improvement, his sister, who flatly refused to leave his sickbed, was instructed to prepare for the inevitable. Richard was grieved, but Georgiana had been inconsolable. By the time Darcy’s heartbeat had grown so faint it could barely be detected, she’d borne all she possibly could. Richard hadn’t even tried to stop her.
    Darcy’s hand went instinctively to his neck, where two small puncture wounds were once visible. They’d faded almost instantly after his change, but would have been concealed in any case, neatly hidden beneath his shirt collar and the artfully tied layers of his cravat. He hadn’t felt Georgiana’s bite—not even so much as a pinch—but the pain that followed was vivid still, burned into his memory as though with a branding iron. The sheer agony of it had consumed him, raging in his body for an entire day before gradually receding to nothing more than the minor discomfort of a sore throat.
    His thirst was always with him, but to his immense relief it by no means ruled him or defined who he was. As it turned out, the well-practiced self-control Darcy had so prided himself upon throughout his nine-and-twenty years as a human proved an asset to him still. Not only had the master of Pemberley learned to resist the mouth-watering lure of human blood, but he’d become adept at ignoring the incessant burn in his throat as well.
    Sighing heavily, he laid his forehead against the window and closed his eyes. It was nearly tea time, and the room he occupied faced the east, untouched by the late afternoon sun. The smooth panes, however, weren’t cool to his touch, but felt almost warm. He still wasn’t quite accustomed to that; to his body’s temperature being either lower than or equal to that of inanimate objects. He recalled the first time he’d grasped Georgiana’s hand in his after he’d awoken from his transformation and smiled. By then, Darcy was so used to feeling the chill of death whenever he touched her that he hadn’t expected her skin to feel warm to him. It’d come as a shock, but it didn’t follow that shock was unwelcome. It was tangible evidence they were the same once again; the same temperature and the same type of entity. Brother and sister still, yet bound by so much more than the blood of their birth.
    The slamming of a door above stairs roused him from his reverie, the unmistakable sound of footsteps on the staircase alerting him to the fact that he would soon have company. Much to Darcy’s disappointment and annoyance, it was not the light staccato cadence of a lady’s, but the heavier footfalls of a gentleman. With a sigh of resignation, he straightened his shoulders and waited patiently for Elizabeth’s father, choosing to keep his back to the room as he stared fixedly out of the window. When the drawing room door was thrown open a moment later, the master of Pemberley remained as he was, and therefore sensed rather than saw Mr. Bennet enter.
    “Mr. Darcy,” he said icily and without preamble. “I thought I made it perfectly clear to you the last time you were in Hertfordshire that your presence is neither desired, nor welcomed in my home.”
    Darcy took a fortifying breath and turned to greet Elizabeth’s father,