Page 2 of Courting Elizabeth

“I am prepared for many things.”

“I do not believe you are.”

“Then tell me what I do not know.”

She lowered her eyes to her hand resting on the chair. Her fingers tightened on the wood.

“I know that you separated Mr Bingley from Jane.”

The joy that had risen in me hit a wall.

“I acted for my friend's good.”

“Without caring what he might want.”

“I did not know your sister was attached to him.”

“Because she does not display herself when she loves!”

The reproach was just, but I was not ready to acknowledge it when the future I desired seemed to hang on my every answer.

“I may have been mistaken about her feelings,” I conceded. “I was not mistaken about the improprieties to which Bingley would have been tied.”

She straightened.

“The same ones to which you wish to tie yourself.”

Heat rose to my face.

“Bingley is not in my situation.”

“No. He is merely more amiable.”

I should have taken offense. I would have with anyone else. With her, irritation mingled with the absurd admiration her courage inspired. She had neither fortune nor rank to set against mine, yet she spoke to me in the tone of a woman who sees no one in the room above her.

That was also why I loved her.

“What do you want from me?” I asked.

“That you stop making decisions for your friend. That Jane may be welcomed in my home without feeling you judge her unworthy to enter it. And that you accept my judgment will not bend to yours simply because you offer me your name.”

The firmness of her demand shook what remained of my confidence.

“Do you think me capable of demanding your obedience before I have even obtained your consent?”

“I believe you quite capable of confusing conviction with right.”

I held her gaze. She knew me well enough to see my pride, but not yet well enough to know what it sometimes protected. I could not ask her to bind her future to mine while claiming my intentions alone could justify every decision I made.

“I will give you my reasons when my decisions concern you.”

“And when you judge them wrong?”

“You will tell me. I shall endeavor to hear you before contradicting you.”

She studied me long enough that I felt my pride stripped of its last defenses.

“There is one more condition,” she said at last.