The same dressmaker that made Elizabeth’s wedding gown was commissioned to make Jane’s, and Mary was to stand up with her. The friends they made in Margate were all invited and the Gardiners would come for the week of the wedding. The new couple would leave immediately after for Brighton. Bingley had let a house there for the remainder of the summer. All was put together rather quickly and before anyone really knew what had happened, Jane Bennet was Jane Bingley, waving to her family from the coach as they pulled away from their small but elegant breakfast.

~

“Fitzwilliam!” Elizabeth called as she rushed into his dressing room.

“Yes?” he replied, amused at her entrance and at his valet’s quick exit.

“You will never believe what Jane is doing!”

“I thought she was marrying my friend Bingley. Is that not the case?” he asked sardonically.

“Ha ha. You may think you are funny now, Mr. Darcy, but I know something you don’t know,” she said in a sing-song voice.

“How do you know I don’t know it? It’s likely I have a letter from Bingley waiting for me as we speak.”

“Fine. If you’re so sure you have no need of my information, I shall leave so you may finish preparing.”

He smiled at her as she flounced out of the room. Once he was finished dressing, he looked in his room for a letter but saw nothing on the table where a letter would usually be found. He then checked the salver near the door and nothing was there but a packet on its way to Georgiana. He asked a footman if there had been a letter for him that day and the man said there had not been, but that Mrs. Darcy had received three.

Gritting his teeth, Darcy turned and found his wife in the sitting room, seated by the window and reading a letter with a look of pure happiness on her face. He sat down and watched her, saying nothing for several minutes. She bit her lip and laughed out loud and gasped more than once at what she was reading. Finally, he could take it no longer.

“Any news?”

“Hmm? Oh! Just something with my family. I’m sure it wouldn’t interest you,” she said simply.

He caught her lip twitching but was impressed by her ability to keep up her little game this long. Usually she could hold nothing in when she was excited.

“That’s all right. I should come to know your family better. What says your father?”

“They are planning to return to Longbourn in early September. Mother wants him to stop in London for a week and he is trying to find a way to avoid it.”

Darcy smiled. “Has he been successful?”

“Not yet.” She gave him a look he’d seen often before. Half sympathy, half mischief. Lord, she is delightful!