To Paul, the love of my life and my own Mr. Darcy, and Deb Werksman, my editor at Sourcebooks, for her guidance and patience

Summer 1808

Fitzwilliam Darcy paced up and down the side of the road. He had been within five miles of Netherfield Park, the country estate of his friend, Charles Bingley, when the carriage had veered violently to the right. After learning from his driver that the axle was bent, he had sent his footman in search of a horse, so that he might continue his journey.

A month earlier, Bingley had signed a lease on a handsome two-hundred-acre estate in Hertfordshire with a well-stocked lake and an uninterrupted view of the surrounding countryside. The manor house was the perfect size for Bingley and his small party. The rent on the house, which was owned by the Darlingtons, was reasonable, and above all, it had stables and pastures for Charles’s horses.

Before Darcy gave his opinion on signing the lease, he had gone into the neighboring village of Meryton and had found a typical market town near enough to the London road so that it had some amenities, such as a circulating library, an assembly hall, and a variety of shops that would meet Bingley’s simple needs, if not those of his sisters, Caroline and Louisa, who were to keep house for him. He also made inquiries as to the local society. With Sir James Darlington, a baronet, gone to take the waters in search of a cure for his gout and relief for his wife’s arthritis, Sir William Lucas, who had been knighted the previous year, was the only person of rank within easy riding distance of Netherfield Park. Darcy knew that Bingley, who loved dancing almost as much as he loved horses, would sign the lease as soon as he heard that there was an assembly hall in Meryton.

By the time his footman had returned with a horse, a light rain had begun to fall, but Darcy would push on to Netherfield nonetheless and hope that the weather would improve or at least not get worse.