Undressing Mr. Darcy (25 page)

“Chase, once we get home, I’d like to take you out for drinks, get to know you a little better,” she said. “Since we’re going to be like family and all.” She winked.

“A very
close
family,” he joked. He put his arm around her until they stepped into the British Library.

Once she stood in the darkened, hushed Sir John Ritblat Gallery of the ultramodern library, in front of a glass case displaying Austen’s portable wooden desk, her mind did not even flit to Julian.

On this day alone, between the National Portrait Gallery and the British Library, she had endured more silence than she’d allowed herself in an entire year, it seemed. Her phone sat silenced, too, in her bag, as per the library instructions, and she hadn’t posted or used her earbuds all day.

On the gorgeous mahogany writing box, sloped for handwriting and hinged to store paper and ink, sat a pair of spectacles so small and fragile that Vanessa couldn’t help but think, for some reason, of Jane Austen’s heart.

Austen was, no doubt, a strong and resilient woman, able to wield barbs, irony, and satire the way a fencer wields a sword, but what of her heart? Vanessa suspected it might have been as delicate as these spectacles, made of two delicate glass lenses with the thinnest of wires to hold them together.

Austen’s was, Vanessa decided, a vulnerable but all-seeing heart.

Meanwhile, her own heart, though equally vulnerable, lacked the all-seeing quality.

Could she, just a few years away from forty-one, Austen’s age at death, acquire the vision the author had at half her age? She was in her twenties when she wrote her major novels. How could such a young girl, born more than two hundred years ago, have known so much about life and the nature of true love? How could she, without a computer, cell phone, TV, movies, or Internet, have been infinitely wiser?

Maybe it was just too late for Vanessa. Too late for her true life to take shape. Too late for love.

She thought she’d been smart, protecting her heart with barbed wire wrapped around it, just like the tattoo on her ankle, but instead, she’d ensnared herself and her ability to love and locked herself into nothing but loneliness. She’d trapped herself and stunted her own emotional growth, and she’d been doing this for years, for decades—deliberately.

It had taken the likes of Julian, a by-product of
Pride and Prejudice
, to crack her open and make her bleed.

Why she had to realize this in a library in England was beyond her, but sometimes you have to travel great distances to discover your own interior landscape.

“Well, there’s her writing box,” Sherry whispered with a sigh. “Isn’t it gorgeous? That’s where Darcy was conceived.”

Vanessa flinched at the word “conceived.”

Lexi squinted. “Yes,” she whispered. Even she seemed in awe. “It was the original laptop. I’ll dash off the description,” she said as she scribbled in a notepad die cut in the shape of a woman’s lips. “Vanessa, you look for the next clue.”

But Vanessa couldn’t tear herself away from staring at the spectacles.

Lexi nudged her. “Are you okay?”

No, she was not okay.

A warm hand touched her shoulder—Chase. “I have to pay homage to the Magna Carta. Come and get me before you leave.”

The Magna Carta, the Gutenberg Bible, Shakespeare’s first folio, they were all here, surrounding her, mocking her, it seemed, and her little missives on social media sites, her press releases, endless e-mails, and frivolous social media posts.

A step in any direction in this room led to greatness and genius, to the highest of human achievement. Austen sat in the company of the intelligentsia, where she belonged.

Within Vanessa’s immediate sight stood Oscar Wilde’s “Ballad of Reading Gaol” in his flamboyant cursive, and, further along, Handel’s
Messiah
rang out to her with its bold score and crossings out. The page of the
Messiah
on display showed the score for the Hallelujah Chorus, and it resounded in her head—maybe it wasn’t too late for her. Maybe she was just in time—for Julian.

Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

Why had she kept herself so guarded for so long?

An older couple, probably in their early seventies, and looking American in their white matching gym shoes, approached the display. They exuded happiness and coupledom and emanated a vanilla scent as they stood arm in arm in front of the glass case.

Vanessa stepped back to allow the couple, both shorter than she was, a better view. She yanked Lexi out of their way, too.

“Look, sweetheart,” the woman whispered to her companion, “it’s Jane Austen’s writing box. The one that, when she was twenty-three years old, was accidently put in a chaise with her dressing boxes, headed for the West Indies. She had all of her manuscripts, letters, and money in the box at the time. Can you believe it?”

He shook his head no and, when he smiled, his crows’ feet crinkled around his blue eyes.

“All of her novels, in their nascent form, almost vanished.”

He shook his head.

In the time before computers and backups, Vanessa could imagine a young Jane Austen, horrified at the thought of her work on a trajectory toward the West Indies, yet still rational and, no doubt, taking control of the situation.

Now Vanessa remembered half listening to this story while scrolling through her e-mails as Julian had told it to Aunt Ella over tea.

“What did she do again?” Vanessa asked the woman.

“She had a man on a horse sent to go after the chaise, and within half an hour, she had the box back. But as Austen herself said, she had lost ‘all of her worldly possessions.’”

“That’s right.” Vanessa smiled.

“It would be like you losing your phone,” Sherry whispered.

Vanessa managed a smile, realizing how pathetic it made her sound. Was that the most valuable thing she had to lose? If so, had she really lived?

“We’d all be lost without her work.” The woman saved her by changing the subject. “The entire episode is written in a letter to Cassandra.” She looked endearingly at Vanessa. “You must be an Austen fan.”

Vanessa nodded. “Yes, yes, I am.”

Her aunt would’ve been pleased. And admitting her fandom didn’t even make her feel like she should sign up for a twelve-step program:
My name is Vanessa Roberts and I’m an Austenaholic.
She felt cool about the whole thing.

Lexi moved right between her and the older couple. She flung up her arms, and in a loud whisper she said, “We need to find the next clue—
okay?
”

“I’m talking to this nice couple,” Vanessa whispered firmly while nudging Lexi aside.

Lexi tossed her head at them. “Where’s Chase?”

“Calm down, Lexi. He’s looking at the Magna Carta.”

The security guard at the door had his eye on them, and other visitors in the library turned their heads toward them.

“Calm down? How can I calm down when you’re chatting, Chase is MIA, and Sherry’s in the gift shop?”

Vanessa craned her neck to speak to the older couple. “I apologize for my friend here—”

Lexi stomped her foot on the carpeting. “I’m only trying to keep us on task for
your
sake.” She didn’t whisper that time.

The security guard started coming their way.

“Thank you for telling me the story of the writing box,” Vanessa said to the couple. “Great to meet you, but I have to go.”

Lexi stormed off, brushing against the security guard, who then followed her.

“Before you go, perhaps you would like this?”

The woman held out a familiar card—a clue!

“What?” Vanessa couldn’t believe it. “Thank you. Thank you very much,” she whispered as she squeezed the woman’s hand.

“I know your friend has the description of the desk in her notebook. You can just hand that in at the end. I hope
you
win, dear,” the woman said. “Only one person can win, not an entire team. You’ll have to break up your group. You’re very near the end of the hunt for today.”

Vanessa thanked her again, hurried off after Lexi, and left the library without seeing any of the treasures of the collection, including the Magna Carta and the Gutenberg Bible. A couple of weeks earlier, she might not have cared, but now—

Lexi paced in front of the café just outside the library with Sherry and Chase. The café was called, appropriately, the Last Word.

“What the hell, Vanessa?” Lexi stopped and put a hand on her hip. “We didn’t get the clue.”

One thing that clearly hadn’t changed with Lexi was her fiery temper. Maybe the woman with the clue had a point.

“Lexi, I’m not sure if this is going to work out with us together,” Vanessa said.

“Uh-oh.” Sherry headed for the steps of the café. “I’m going to get some beverages for everyone . . .”

Lexi glared at Vanessa.

Chase cracked open a book. It had stopped drizzling so he leaned on his umbrella and began to read. “Let me know when you ladies are ready. I have to entertain clients soon at the Ritz, so I’m only free for another hour.”

Lexi went right up to Chase, put her hand over the page he was reading, and asked, “Chase, why have you been so helpful? I only ask because Sherry and I want the recognition for winning this thing, and we all know why Vanessa wants to win this hunt. But what about you? Has her aunt put you up to this?”

“Ella may have mentioned she hoped I could check in on Vanessa, yes.”

Vanessa dropped her phone on the concrete and the screen cracked. She picked it up and stared at the fissure.

“What?” Vanessa asked. “You’re here because my aunt wanted you to
babysit
me?”

“No, it’s not like that. She’s been worried about you ever since they announced their engagement, and your car accident—”

“I don’t need that kind of help. I’m not a charity case!”

“I never said you were,” Chase said.

“And I don’t need you, Lexi. I thought you changed, but you haven’t.”

Lexi flipped her blunt-cut hair. “You do need us, Vanessa.” She put both hands, stacked with rings and finished off with a bloodred manicure, on Vanessa’s shoulders. “Who helped you out after you slept with Julian?”

“Lexi—stop!” She soooo did not want Chase to hear that. Lexi knew damn well she wouldn’t want Chase to hear it—for so many reasons! Did she have no boundaries? No sense of decency?

Vanessa eyed Chase, who raised an eyebrow.

“Who’s done everything possible to help you win a goddamn dinner with a guy who doesn’t even deserve to be in the same room with you?”

Vanessa pulled away from Lexi, who just moved in closer, getting all up in her face.

Chase closed his book. “So that’s what this is all about.” He raised and then hit the tip of his umbrella on the pavement. “You slept with him. And now you just want to get back into his breeches?”

“It’s not like that at all! We have a thing, a connection.”

“A connection? Where is he, then? Nowhere to be seen! I thought this was about Jane Austen!”

“It
is
about Jane Austen,” Vanessa said.

“No, it’s not,” said Lexi. “Vanessa could care less about Jane Austen,” she said to Chase.

She ignored Lexi and pleaded with Chase. “It wasn’t originally about her, no, but I’ve come to know her and now I’m in it for her, too—to learn more about her and help raise money and awareness for preservation of her cottage and her brother’s estate now functioning as Chawton House Library. And—”

“Am I really supposed to believe this?” Chase asked. “Because it sounds like PR-speak to me.”

“If she wins she gets to have dinner with Julian at his estate,” Lexi said. “That’s the deal. Ticket fees for this event go toward preservation, but we didn’t pay for the tickets—Julian did.”

“I didn’t know you slept with him,” Chase said.

“I didn’t know you cared! Or does this just fall under your babysitting duties?”

How could he be acting like her boyfriend? Or worse, a spy? She had no clue he really cared that way. He had no claim on her, either!

“I can sleep with whomever I want!” she shouted right there, in front of the British Library.

“I need to go,” Chase said, all dignity and coolness.

“You must’ve known she had feelings for Julian,” Lexi said to him.

“I did. But I didn’t know she’d slept with him. That changes things—for me anyway.”

“I’m right here, you know!” Vanessa said to them. “What right do you have to punish me for my actions that have nothing to do with you?”

“Is my leaving punishment to you?”

Yes, yes, it was. The cloud cover seemed to darken overhead and she struggled for words. Words usually came easily to her, but she couldn’t say a thing.

“I see,” Chase said. “Take care. I’ll give you this. You might need it.” He tossed her his umbrella—a gentleman to the end.

He turned and walked away, ripping something inside her, something she didn’t even know was there.

Why? Why did she always mess things up with people she actually cared about? Yes, she cared about Chase. He’d taken time out of his day to help her out, and she’d managed to piss him off somehow! She thought about sending him a text, but what should she say?

How could she be so good at public relations and so shitty at personal ones?

* * *

L
exi sighed. “There goes the guy you belong with. But you’ve really effed that up now, haven’t you?”

When had Lexi ever been right about love? Never!

Vanessa ran after him, but he was walking pretty briskly toward the zooming traffic on Euston Road. “Chase!” she shouted after him.

Ignoring her, he took long, fast strides now toward a black London cab on the far side of the street.

It was too late. He’d gotten into the cab and it drove off. She steadied herself under the shadow of the British Library portico and nearly felt the weight of the massive brick and concrete slab above her.

She would have to fix this gaffe with him, but not now. It would have to wait. She hurried under the iron gate that read
BRITISH LIBRARY BRITISH LIBRARY BRITISH LIBRARY
over and over in black iron.

Lexi stood waiting in the courtyard, tapping her foot and checking her phone. “Once again, Vanessa, you’re truly unable to see what everyone else does. I told you he’s into you.”