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Chapter Forty-Nine

The home of Thomas and Mary Williamson was a large, two-story house painted a warm cream with a porch that seemed to run completely around the house. The huge front yard was currently obscured by all the cars that had been parked in it. Darcy feared that he would have to park in the street until he saw what looked like someone deliberately clearing a space for his car. How else to explain the car-free path from the garage to the street? He pulled in and got as close to the garage as he could, which left enough room for someone else to park although he imagined that everyone was already present, and turned the car off.

The moment Darcy had put the car in park, Elisabeth had opened her car door and struggled to get out. Her legs were killing her, and once free of the car, she made a small sound of relief. Darcy got out after popping the trunk, where their suitcases were. Well, his travel bag and Elisabeth's suitcases----he'd had no idea that an overnight trip required two suitcases heavy enough that Arnold Schwartzenegger would have trouble carrying them. He set them on the ground and shut the trunk before picking them up, almost groaning from the weight.

"You put rocks in here, I know it," he grumbled as he saw the front door of the house open.

"I did not, you wimp," Elisabeth teased. "I think we've been spotted."

Darcy, struggling with the suitcases, didn't notice what she was referring to until the bags were ripped out of his hands and he found himself being crushed by someone hugging him...the faint scent of jasmine assaulted his senses.

"Darcy," he heard a voice murmur near his ear. "You're here. You're really here."

"Uh..." Darcy wasn't sure what to say as he put his arms around the person who was holding onto him as though he were a life preserver. He turned his head slightly, but all he could see was a head of white hair. After a few more seconds, the woman stepped out of his arms and took hold of his hands. It was then that Darcy got a better look at her.

She was perhaps three inches shorter than he was, with short, curly white hair. Her light brown eyes were brimming with tears, but the look on her face made it clear that her tears were of happiness, not pain. She looked him up and down several times before saying, "You look just like your father. I thought you'd look more like Ginger, but while you both have your mother's hair and your father's eyes, she looks like your mother and you...you look like Ron. Oh, Dare, we're so glad you've finally come back!" She threw her arms around him again. This time, Darcy put his arms around her as well.

"Grandma," he said softly, something clicking in his mind, more from the perfume than from anything else.

Darcy didn't know how long they'd stood there hugging each other before a man said, "Grandma, you've had him long enough. Everyone else would like to say hello."

His grandmother pulled away and turned to whomever had spoken. "I'll hug him as long as I like, young man."

That was when Darcy realized that every single person who'd been in the house had come outside to greet him. He thought he spied Ginger in amongst the crowd, hanging back to allow others to see him, but he couldn't be sure.

"Dear..." A tall, distinguished-looking man with silver hair had made his way through the throng of people to stand beside his wife. "We'd all like to meet Darcy, and we won't be able to do that if you won't let him go."

"I understand that, Thomas, but he's my grandson and...oh, very well. Darcy, this is your grandfather."

Darcy looked at his grandfather for a moment before hugging him. As he did so, Darcy wondered if his father would've looked like him once he'd gotten older. He held back the tears that threatened to rise when he thought of what might've been.

Don't think on that. Think about what you have now, and be happy.

"Don't believe your grandmother has the right of it, Darcy, because when I see you, I'm reminded of your mother. Got your father's eyes, though," Thomas Williamson said.

"Don't be ridiculous, Thomas. Of course he looks like Ron. Now we'll reintroduce you to everyone else...we'll start with your uncles. David, Michael, could you get those suitcases?"

Darcy almost gasped when two similar-looking men in their forties stepped forward. They both looked a great deal like his father would've if he'd lived. David extended his hand, only to pull Darcy into an embrace when he took it. "It's good to see you, son," David said in a low voice. Darcy teared up when he heard it----the man even sounded like his father!

After receiving a hug from Michael as well, the men picked up the bags and made their way through the crowd and into the house. Mary took the opportunity to link Darcy's arm through hers and lead him around, introducing him to the rest of the family.

"This is Evelyn...and Sarah...and this is Angelina." Mary had to let go of Darcy long enough for Angelina to give him a hug.

"I'm so happy to see you here," the tall, ethereal-looking woman told him. Darcy could easily believe she'd been an innocent twenty-one-year-old, since she still looked a bit like a grown-up Alice in Wonderland. "You must hate me very much...if your parents hadn't been coming to my birthday party..."

"No!" Darcy protested. "I don't blame anyone for that. It was an accident, nothing more. You didn't cause it just by having a birthday. Don't think that I blame anyone for what happened," he added in a louder voice, hoping he wouldn't have to repeat himself. "I know, better than anyone, just how ruthless Catherine can be when she's determined to have her own way."

It was too much for the youngest of his father's siblings. Angelina burst into tears. Mary sighed and dragged Darcy over to a young man about his own age. A very familiar young man.

"D.J.," Darcy said hoarsely. The man nodded and smiled widely.

"You look a hell of a lot like I thought you would," D.J. answered, giving his cousin a hug before turning to the dark-haired woman next to him. "I want you to meet my wife, Jolie."

"It's nice to meet you," Darcy said, extending his free hand to D.J.'s pretty wife.

"D.J.'s talked about nothing but you since we found out you were coming," Jolie told him. Darcy was introduced to their four-year-old son and found himself marveling at how much the boy looked like his father.

As Darcy was introduced to everyone in his family, he was surprised at how clear his head was. He'd thought he would be swimming in memories, or at the very least that he would have trouble remembering people because they would've changed so much from the younger versions of themselves he knew. This wasn't the case. As he looked at the faces of his childhood, Darcy knew he would've recognized them anywhere.

Mallory was the tall, willowy redhead who still, after all this time, had that I-know-more-than-you-do look. She was married to an even taller man with balding brown hair named Ben and had a son named Devon. "Should've named him Devil," Mary muttered under her breath as they moved on. Their youngest sister was Jessica, who had been two when Darcy had last seen her.

Evelyn's children were next----her sons Terry, who Darcy remembered as a pudgy but pleasant little boy. Adulthood had changed little about him. He was the last person Darcy recognized. Terry had a younger brother, Toby, who had been a baby when Darcy had left, and a sister, Tabitha, who was fourteen. After them was Aunt Sarah's five children, Michael's second wife Stephanie with their two girls, and Angelina's husband, who was trying to keep their two-year-old daughter, Hallie, from crying.

When Mary reached Ginger, she absently said, "And this is Ginger. She's Ron's..." Everyone burst into laughter. "Good grief. Someone should've shut me up a long time ago," she said ruefully.

"It's nice to meet you, Dare," Ginger said with a grin. She gave him a big hug and asked, "Where's Elisabeth?"

Darcy looked around, but there were so many people in the driveway that he couldn't see where she was. Fear struck at him for just a second before Ginger somehow caught a glimpse of her and called, "Elisabeth!" She darted through the crowd and over to the car, where Elisabeth had been standing all this time, watching the scene unfolding before her. Ginger's call had the effect of making everyone look in that direction.

Within moments, Elisabeth found herself being welcomed just as warmly to the family as Darcy had been, for there wasn't one among them who didn't know how this day had come about...and who they had to thank for it.

"We were idiots. Complete idiots," Evelyn said when they were introduced. "Why didn't it occur to any of us to get in touch with Darcy and Ginger? Especially Ginger after what happened to her at De Bourgh Enterprises."

"These things sometimes happen," Elisabeth said.

"It's not like we didn't know what had happened to them," D.J. commented. "We could've called or sent an e-mail..."

"You didn't know how Darcy would feel about that," Elisabeth told him. "For that matter, I wasn't sure how Darcy would feel when I did it. He'd told me that his parents were estranged from their families and..."

"Nonsense! Even if Ron had married the town tramp, we would've done our best to overlook it and welcome her into the family," Mary said adamantly. "Fortunately, he didn't marry the town tramp but rather Amelia Darcy, but just because her family disliked Ron doesn't mean we felt the same way about her."

"I know that now. I didn't then." Elisabeth smiled. "I'm just glad you're all here together."

"We're all here together freezing," one of Darcy's cousins muttered.

"Oh, for heaven's sake! Let's get inside before everyone catches pneumonia!" David called, and everyone went into the house.

The front door opened into the den, a large, spacious room with a tree in one corner, laden down with ornaments, lights, and garland. There was a staircase leading to the second floor that had also been decorated with gold garland and the occasional bit of mistletoe. The stockings were strung about the entire room, as there were too many to fit over the fireplace mantle. The living room opened directly into the dining room, and beyond that he could see a door that undoubtedly led to the kitchen. There was a hallway just to the right of the dining room that led to the bedrooms and bathrooms...and if Darcy recalled correctly, to the children's play room.

"Darcy, Ginger, we need you over here for a moment," Mary called to him, stopping him from walking down the hall to see if the play room was as he remembered it. Mary was standing in front of the tree holding what looked to be two ornaments. Ginger stood on her right side, so Darcy took her left. The moment they were in place, someone took a picture. "Not yet, Sarah," Mary mumbled. "You probably don't remember this, Dare, but every member of the family has an ornament on this tree with his or her name on it. I'm usually the one to put them on the tree, but I thought, this year, you'd like to put your ornaments on yourselves. I left a little space under your parents' ornaments."

Darcy took his ornament----an elf holding out a gift-wrapped package with his name on it----and hung it on the tree just below his father's, which pictured Santa Claus in a net and a mischievous little boy grinning up at him. Ginger, however, had never seen her ornament before and stared at the little angel sitting on a cloud. Her name had been engraved on the cloud.

"It's beautiful," she said softly. "How did you..."

"Your grandfather had them specially made one year as a gift," Mary answered her unspoken question. "But I don't think he realized when he gave me that first box full of ornaments that he would have to keep buying them for the rest of his life as our family grew."

"The original gift that keeps on giving, dear," Thomas said from the back of the room to everyone's amusement.

Ginger placed her ornament beneath her mother's, which was of a cat tangled up in garland and lights. She smiled. "Why does Daddy's ornament have Santa Claus hanging from the ceiling in a net?" she asked.

"Because your father, when he was young, threatened to trap Santa Claus until the man promised to bring him everything on his list," Mary said. "Your grandfather told him if he did that, Santa would never stop at this house again and would ignore his children when he had them. That convinced him of what a bad idea it was."

"Thank God for that," Ginger said.

Darcy looked over at Elisabeth, who was standing between D.J.'s wife and Mallory. She looked at him and smiled. Thank God, indeed, he thought, knowing that Elisabeth was thinking the same thing.

While family gatherings were nice, and being a member of the Bennet family, she'd been to more than her share of them, Elisabeth quickly remembered that there was problem with having more than thirty people under one roof. Even when there seemed to be plenty of space, there wasn't. The den had become man country, with Darcy's uncles and cousins huddled around a big-screen television watching a football game. Darcy himself was absent. Elisabeth wasn't a big football fan and besides, there weren't any available seats for her to take, so she wandered out to see if there was someplace else she could go. Her legs, which had been cramped from sitting so long, were now beginning to bother her because she'd been standing so much.

Make up your damn mind, she thought to herself.

She found both bathrooms, which was handy information she tucked away for later. She hoped there were a couple more somewhere in the house, however, because two bathrooms for a group this size was not a good situation. After another minute in which she'd found two bedrooms and a hall closet, Elisabeth found a door which led to a large room occupying the southwest corner of the house.

The noise had reached her before she'd reached the door, which she opened to find just about every child under twelve...and Darcy. The younger children were shrieking in delighted terror as Darcy, wearing a baby blanket over his head, growled loudly.

"Monster!" one of the children shouted.

"I'm coming to get you, Katie Williamson!" Darcy growled, causing the singled out child to start running. Darcy, in deliberately menacing steps, stomped after her. He caught up to her after a moment or two and lifted her off the ground. After a minute or two of tickling, he set her back down and looked at the other children. "Who's next?"

"Darcy, you're going to give these poor kids nightmares if you don't cut that out," Elisabeth called before any of the children could deny that they were the monster's next victim.

He straightened up suddenly, the blanket falling to the ground and causing all of the kids to groan. "The game's over?" little Katie asked.

Elisabeth got worried when Darcy just stood there staring. "Darcy? Are you all right?" she asked as he put a hand to his forehead, covering his face. She waddled over to him, carefully sidestepping toys left in the middle of the floor to impede the "monster's" progress.

"I'm...fine. Really, I'm fine. I...uh...kids, we'll play again a little later. I'm getting a headache." When the kids groaned again, Darcy gave them a winning smile and said, "I promise, right after lunch, we'll play again."

"You'd better," one of the older children said. "Not that I believe you're a monster. You're just Darcy."

Darcy just nodded to this before telling Elisabeth, "I need to be alone for a few minutes, okay?"

"Sure," she said. "I'll...just find someplace to sit, if there is such a thing around here."

"I know where you'll find a place to sit," Darcy said, leading her back the way she'd come. They paused briefly in the dining room, where most of the women, Ginger among them, were sitting and chatting, but there were no empty seats to be found there, either. Passing them by with a jaunty wave, Darcy kept going until they reached the kitchen. Darcy headed for the back door leading to the porch and stepped outside----without his coat, Elisabeth noted with a sigh. He'd catch a cold if stayed out there too long.

To her surprise, she found Thomas Williamson cooking alongside his wife. Mary was checking on a heavenly-smelling German chocolate cake while Thomas was chopping up stalks of celery into sticks. More importantly, Thomas was sitting at a heavily-scarred kitchen table which had matching chairs. Elisabeth, with relief, sat in one of them.

"Hello," Thomas said with a smile. "Lost?"

"No, just looking for someplace where I could sit. All the chairs in the den and dining room are taken and..."

Mary shut the oven door and frowned. "Just a minute," she said, walking out of the kitchen. A minute later, Elisabeth heard her snap from the living room, "I didn't raise you to be impolite bums who wouldn't offer a pregnant woman a seat!"

There was some grumbling, and apparently someone moved, because Mary continued, "Well, it's too late now. She's in the kitchen with us. But if she comes back in here, I want there to be a contest to see who can offer her a chair the fastest. And Trey better not win it, either!"

"Trey?" Elisabeth asked.

"D.J.'s son. David Williamson III. We call him Trey to avoid confusion. He's four." Thomas finished with the celery and opened a bag of carrots. He reached for the vegetable peeler and got to work.

Elisabeth grinned and offered to help with something. The offer was quickly rebuffed.

"Mary and I are not so old that we can't do things for ourselves. Besides, if we left it to the others, we'd have such a crowd in here that nothing would get done," Thomas said. "You just sit there and rest. Would you like a drink?"

Elisabeth shook her head. "I'm fine."

"Oh...well, if you change your mind, let me know." Thomas continued peeling carrots. "I don't know if Mary's told you this or not, but we're grateful to you for what you did."

"I didn't do much of anything," Elisabeth said. "I just looked up a few things on the Internet, that's all. And I wouldn't have found out as much as I did without Mary's website on the Williamson family."

Thomas chuckled. "When Mary told me she wanted to take that computer class, I thought she was crazy. We had one, of course, but all we ever did on it was play games and keep up with our checkbooks. Then she got to talking about the Internet and creating her own web page, and the next thing I knew, she was doing all sorts of things. Tried to teach me, but e-mailing the kids is all I cared to learn about."

"I'm not all that great on computers, either," Elisabeth admitted. "Charlie, my cousin, is the one who knows a lot about them. And everything she knows, she learned from her boyfriend, who's a genius with computers."

Mary returned to the kitchen. "I'm sorry about that, Elisabeth. They really do have better manners, but sit a bunch of guys in a living room with a football game on and they turn into cavemen."

"I think I should be offended," Thomas said in a tone of voice which indicated he wasn't the least bit offended.

Mary opened the refrigerator door and frowned. "Oh, dear. I thought I had more butter than this. I'll have to run out and get more. Is there anything else you can think of that we need, Thomas?"

"I don't believe there is." He continued peeling carrots as Mary bustled out of the kitchen, heading to the grocery store. Elisabeth said nothing but she did glance out the window and saw Darcy staring at the yard, lost in thought.

"So, you live in Effingham, I believe?" Thomas brought her attention back into the house.

"Yes," Elisabeth replied. She'd been wondering if Thomas would remember her family at all. "I've lived there all my life."

"I knew some Bennets from around Effingham," Thomas said. "That's where Mary and I are from originally. Then I got a job offer here and we moved a month after we got married. It was a hectic time, let me tell you. I don't suppose you happen to be related to Amanda or Frank Bennet, would you?"

"Uh...I am, actually," Elisabeth replied, not sure how much he knew of the family history. She seemed to recall Granny Bess saying that Thomas and Frank had been friends, but how deep had the friendship been? If Thomas and Mary had moved away soon after their marriage, then it wasn't likely he knew that Frank had abandoned his family. "Frank was my grandfather."

"Really?" Thomas didn't look too surprised. "I thought you had a bit of the look of him. We didn't hear from him again after we moved here, but Frank wasn't what you'd call a good correspondent. How is he?"

Elisabeth didn't answer. The uneasiness stretched until Thomas said, "He's been gone a while, has he?"

"I don't know," she murmured. "From what my father told me, my grandfather Frank abandoned his family when my father was very young. No one's heard from him since then." Elisabeth went on to tell Thomas the story of Frank and Mickey as she best knew it. She told him more than he'd asked about, talking about her father and how he'd died of the same illness that had killed his mother. She even told Thomas about Granny Bess's recent death. He didn't say a word throughout her story, and she found that the words came easily.

Thomas stopped peeling carrots and set aside the peeler. His face seemed to age as though he'd been to blame for Frank Bennet's disappearance. "It doesn't surprise me," he said quietly. "Frank never was one to take responsibility for anything. Pair that with a restless spirit like he had, and anything was possible. And I'm sorry to hear about Bess's death. She was a fine woman. Had more energy than any other human being I knew with the possible exception of my wife. She wanted me to marry your Aunt Amanda, did you know that?"

"She mentioned it when I introduced her to Darcy. Of course, we didn't know at the time that you were his grandfather." Elisabeth cleared her throat. "My cousin Charlie is Amanda's granddaughter."

"Who did Amanda marry?"

"His name is William Lucas."

"Billy? Really? I'll be. She never gave him the time of day that I saw. He was an odd one...one of the smartest men I knew, but he always wanted to be playing the trumpet. I don't guess he ever gave up the dream, did he?"

Elisabeth shook her head with a grin. "He still plays, but he didn't take it up full-time until recently when he retired. Thank God for Aunt Amanda, otherwise he would've quit his job long ago. She managed to convince him that he had to keep working to support their family."

Thomas laughed. "Now that is certainly the Amanda Bennet I knew." He picked up the peeler and a new carrot. "I don't want you thinking that I ask about Amanda because of some regret that I didn't marry her."

"Oh, of course not!" Elisabeth exclaimed. "I mean, it's obvious that you're very happy with Mary...I mean, Mrs. Williamson. I'd be curious about someone if I hadn't heard anything about them in years, too. Look at how everyone's behaving with Darcy and Ginger. I'm surprised Darcy was even allowed to escape to play with the children."

"I can explain that. Mary hates having someone trying to help her out. She can do everything herself and better than she would with help, so everyone stays out of the way. She tolerates me in the kitchen while she's cooking, but notice what I'm doing." Thomas motioned to the pile of celery he'd already chopped up and the carrots still to do. "It's the extent of what I'm allowed to do when I'm in here. She says it's her kitchen and she'll keep everyone out if she feels like it."

Elisabeth was amused. "It's a far cry from how things are at my house. My mother has the welcome mat out for anyone willing to cook. She's not fond of it, so inevitably my sister Jenna takes over."

"How many sisters do you have?" Thomas asked.

"Two. Jenna's my older sister, Lydia's the younger. No brothers. My father was always a little disappointed that there were no boys, but he was happy with the three girls he had."

"Good. I tell Michael the same thing when he bemoans the fact that he's got two girls----boys are nothing but trouble. If he doesn't believe that, he should look back at how bad he was as a child. What about your own child? Boy or girl, or don't you know?"

"It's a girl," Elisabeth said.

"Is Darcy excited about this?"

"He helped plan the baby shower. We haven't decided on a name just yet----he seems to think Agatha would be a good name, although I'm hoping he's just kidding about that----but I'm sure we'll figure something out before Tuesday."

"Is that when you're due?" Mallory had wandered into the kitchen, probably because her grandmother wasn't in it. "Tuesday? And you let Darcy drag you several hours from your obstetrician for this?"

"I wouldn't have missed this for anything," Elisabeth explained.

"Yeah, but still, he might've shown a little more consideration. You could have any number of complications. When I had Devon, I was in labor for nearly seventeen hours and had to have an emergency C-section. It's nice to have you here, but you should be home. You could've missed this and come another time."

"We're glad to have you here, Elisabeth," Thomas was quick to reassure her. "Mallory...I think I hear your grandmother coming."

"You do not, because she just left." Mallory stayed long enough to swipe a celery stick before wandering out to the back porch.

Thomas sighed. "God love her, she's my granddaughter and a good girl, but there are times when she can be such a...know-it-all? Do people still use that phrase?"

"I don't know, but there's one in every family. We call the one in mine 'Perfect Little Bethany.'"

"Let me guess. She's one of Grace's descendants."

Elisabeth laughed and nodded her head. She listened with great interest as Thomas told her about Granny Bess, and her Aunt Amanda, and most interestingly, about Frank. It was the first time anyone had spoken about the grandfather she'd never known with anything but scorn.

Confident that Elisabeth would be fine with his grandparents, Darcy took deep breaths of the biting air, so lost in the memory that had surfaced that he didn't notice how cold it was.

"Beware! Beware! I am the unstoppable scary MONSTER!"

While the other children screeched around him, Dare Williamson, nearly eight years old, was not afraid. He knew perfectly well that it was just his father underneath that silly blanket, and there was nothing to be afraid of. He'd tried to convince D.J. of that without success. D.J. was as scared as the rest of them. Dare would have to tease him about that later.

"Who shall be my next victim! Should it be the pretty little girl with the red hair?" Mallory shrieked as Dare's father pointed at her. "Or the little boy with the green sweater?" Now his father was pointing as his four-year-old cousin Terry.

There was a long pause as his father took two clomping steps toward the children huddled together at the other side of the play room. He then stopped and pointed at Dare. "No...I want you. That one, the boy with the blue shirt. He must be my next victim! Bring him to me, children, and I might spare you!"

"Dad!" Dare yelled as the other children grabbed his arms and dragged him over to his father. But before Dare's father could pick him up and "terrify" him, he heard his mother's voice.

"Ron, honestly. You're going to give our son nightmares if you don't cut that out." Dare turned to see his mother standing in the doorway of the room. Her stomach was getting big and round. Dare had asked her the other day if she was hiding the basketball he'd asked Santa Claus for in there, but she'd laughed and said no. She'd told him it was going to be his baby brother or sister in another three months or so.

Dare wasn't really happy at the idea of having a brother or sister. He'd much rather have the basketball.

"Nonsense, Amy. Dare's not afraid of anything, are you, son?"

Dare shook his head quickly. "I knew it was Dad under there the whole time," he said proudly. "Dad doesn't scare me."

His mom just shook her head and said, "Well, it's time to stop playing because dinner's almost ready. Everyone needs to wash up."

At her words, a loud groan arose from all the children. Dare couldn't blame them----who wanted to wash up when there was fun to be had? Dare walked slowly, along with the others, but before he left he paused to look back at his father.

As he watched, his father kissed his mother, placed a hand on her round stomach, and asked, "Sure this one's a girl?"

"Absolutely," Dare's mother replied. "A perfect little girl we'll call Georgiana..."

"Darcy? What are you doing out here?"

Darcy turned to see Mallory standing in the doorway. "Uh...I was getting overheated and overcrowded in there," he said. "All the people and lunch getting ready...you know how it is."

Mallory nodded. "All too well. Even though we all get together a few times a year, there's no way to fully prepare yourself for it until everyone's here. It's worse in the summer. You're not claustrophobic, are you?"

"Not really."

"Good." Mallory stepped out onto the porch, the door shutting quietly behind her. "God, it's cold out here."

"It's not so bad after a few minutes," Darcy said.

"Careful, Dare, or you'll find yourself turning into a real Illinois native. That's the joke, you know, when the weather is cold most people stay indoors but Illinois natives are outside in shorts and T-shirts." Mallory smiled.

"I'm not that crazy...yet." Darcy returned her smile.

"So, what do you think of the family homestead? Is it like you remembered?"

Darcy's smile faded. "Very much so," he said. "I didn't remember much of it, but now that I'm here, everything is familiar and I remember things."

"I can just imagine what your aunt would think of all this." Mallory's smile was now gone, too. "I met her once."

"You did?" Darcy was surprised. He hadn't been aware of the fact that anyone outside of Mallory's father had met Catherine or any of her associates.

"Yeah. I worked in a Planet Earth Pizza for a few months while I was finishing up my degree. Actually, I was there right around the time Catherine bought the company. I didn't know it had happened until one day, in the middle of the worst rush I'd ever experienced, in walks the queen and a little entourage. Someone told me who she was and that she'd just bought us. I was praying one of the people with her was you."

Darcy shook his head. "Before she sent me to Effingham to work, I'd only had a rudimentary knowledge of the place. Did you tell her who you were?"

Mallory nodded. "I was only introduced to her by my first name, but when she deigned to shake my hand, I asked how you were. She was stunned and demanded to know how I knew you. I can remember exactly what I told her. 'I'm Mallory Williamson. Dare's my cousin, and we'd kind of like to know if he's even alive.' She turned to my boss, who by this time was horrified that I'd just insulted the owner of the company, and said, 'Fire her.' I told her she couldn't fire me because I'd just quit."

Darcy chuckled. "I seem to be having the same debate with her about my departure from her company."

"You quit your job?"

"Yes, just this week. Well, I guess I still technically work for her, since I work at the store, but I no longer work for the main company. I told her I quit, which seemed to shock her. Once she recovered, she made it sound like she'd fired me." Darcy sighed. "I know in the long run, being fired by her isn't going to matter to most companies I would apply to for work, but it's still a blemish and it's bothering me more than it should."

"I'd be mad, too. I'd be mad about a lot of things if I were you. I can't believe..." Mallory's eyes got teary. "You don't know what it did to D.J. when we didn't hear from you. He didn't understand it. I know you guys treated me like hell back then, but I hated seeing my brother so hurt. At first, he thought you didn't like him anymore."

"I never..." Darcy started to protest.

"Of course you didn't, but D.J. didn't understand that back then. In time, he overheard enough conversations to learn what Catherine de Bourgh had done and knew it wasn't your fault at all. It's funny, though. You read about things like this happening in books and you think, 'that can't happen in real life.' Then something like this does, and...you're really not sure what to do."

"It's taken me nearly twenty years to figure it out," Darcy said. "And even then, I wasn't the one who got everything going. That was Elisabeth."

"Yeah." Mallory smiled. "She seems pretty special."

"She is."

"So how come you haven't married her yet? Is she one of those women who hates the idea of marriage?"

Darcy's gaze flickered to the back yard as he wondered how to answer the question. He should've seen the question coming, but in all the scenarios he'd had about finally coming here to see his family, he hadn't thought of how to answer questions about Elisabeth. He knew the rest of them were dying to ask the same question Mallory had. Without all the facts, Darcy realized, it looked bad that she was about to have the baby and they weren't married.

But at the same time, he wasn't sure he was ready to tell them everything about Elisabeth without her approval. She hadn't said anything to them so far about his not being the biological father, and he didn't think it was his place to reveal that piece of information. Darcy wished she were there, because he'd know with one look whether or not it would be all right to say something.

"Well...I haven't..." Darcy sighed. "It's complicated."

"Oh...I see. Complicated. Say no more."

Was that sarcasm? Darcy wondered. Well, what could he have said?

"You see, Mallory, Elisabeth had just ended this thing she'd had with a guy named George Wickham, who happens to be the baby's real father, when I met her. We hated each other at first until we started liking each other but we didn't realize we were in love until about four months ago. I only proposed two weeks ago, so we really haven't thought much about the wedding."

Darcy bet that wouldn't have gone over well, so he was better off leaving it at "complicated."

"Your father used to do the monster thing with us when we were kids. Do you remember?"

Darcy had been in such turmoil over the other matter that hearing Mallory's voice temporarily startled him. Her question surprised him almost as much.

"Yes," he said. "I remember that. My mother used to scold him because she thought he was terrifying everyone...just like Elisabeth did to me." Darcy thought of the memory her words had recalled for him. "Mallory, do you remember a lot of what happened to you when you were younger? Like the time D.J. and I poured syrup in your hair because you'd told Grandma we were trying to buy cherry bombs from the boy down the block?"

"Vividly," Mallory said wryly. "Why are you bringing that up?"

"Because times like those are the ones I don't remember well. I don't know if the accident did something to me or if Catherine did, but there are time when I have to struggle to remember things about life before my parents died. Sometimes I remember things without warning, like I did when I played monster for the kids. Other times, something triggers a memory and...it's like getting a puzzle piece to fit somewhere. Only I don't think I'll ever have the complete picture."

Mallory grew thoughtful. "I'll probably get in trouble for doing this, but the hell with it. Follow me."

"Why?"

"Don't ask questions. I'll tell you everything when we get there. Come on." Mallory walked back into the house without looking back to see if he'd followed her order. Darcy hesitated for a moment before joining her inside. The moment the warm air from the kitchen hit him, Darcy realized how cold it had been outside and was grateful for the warmth.

Mallory glanced in the kitchen, presumably to see if anyone was watching them. But the kitchen was oddly empty, so she opened the door that Darcy had presumed led to a pantry when he'd seen it earlier. He'd been wrong, because it led to a staircase leading to the second level.

"This is the only way to get to the attic," Mallory said in a low voice as she started walking up. "The other set of stairs only leads you to the second floor. I don't know who designed this house, but that was a major mess-up on their part."

"Why are we going up there?" he asked.

"Keep your voice down." She was now whispering. "You'll see."

At the top of the stairs, Mallory flipped a switch to turn on the light. She then entered the room with Darcy close behind.

Darcy had expected the attic to be musty and cold, filled with spiders and mice and all sorts of gruesome creatures. Instead, the attic was almost as immaculate as the rest of the house and smelled faintly of lemon polish. While it was definitely cooler than the rest of the house, the four floor-to-ceiling windows allowed enough light to get in and warm the room somewhat. Darcy was also surprised at how organized everything seemed to be. Except for one corner, where a number of boxes stood unopened, the attic seemed almost like the children's play room. There was a bookshelf full of books with scantily-clad women and larger-than-life men on the covers, a toy box opened to reveal worn-out Barbie dolls and stuffed animals from days gone by. An exercise bike stood next to a treadmill, and across the room from that was a large stereo system.

"When we graduated from children's things to teenager things, Grandma set this place up for us," Mallory said. "Of course, she might less than thrilled to know that I sat up here reading the romances my mother wouldn't let me read while the boys talked about whatever secret things they were up to, but she never asked us what we did. The only thing she told us we couldn't do was to open those boxes." Mallory pointed to the stack of boxes Darcy had noticed when he'd walked in.

"What's in them?"

"I don't know. But I always had a feeling it had something to do with your family from the way Grandma guarded those boxes. She doesn't have a bad temper, but she really lost it one day when D.J. and Terry tried to open one of them."

"And how did she find out they were going to open one?" Darcy gave his cousin a knowing look.

Mallory had the good grace to blush. "So I used to be a tattle-tale. Big deal. I've become incurably curious about what's in those boxes, so if you'd like to do the honors..."

"I don't think I should," Darcy said. "You don't know for certain that what's in here. It could be anything."

"D.J. thinks they could be mementos Grandma kept after Uncle Ron died...you know, yearbooks and baby booties and things like that. Terry thinks they're full of money your parents hid from Catherine. Jessie has no opinion."

"And you?"

"I think they're your parents' belongings."

Darcy shook his head and turned back to the entrance to the attic. "Catherine had everything she didn't think valuable thrown away or given to Goodwill. There's nothing left."

"Do you know that for certain?"

"I was there the day she..." Darcy's throat constricted, thinking of the fight over his father's bowling ball. "Yes, I know for certain."

Mallory nodded slowly. "Okay, then. We won't open what's in the boxes. I just hoped...well, you know what? Go ahead and open one, just to be sure. D.J. could still be right, and it's only fair that you'd get a look at them if he is. Wouldn't you like to see if your father looked like a dweeb or a hunk in his yearbook photos?"

"What makes you think he looked like a dweeb?" Darcy demanded.

"If he looks anything like my father did in his yearbook photos, then he looks like a dweeb. Mom says Dad grew into his looks, which he did, but you sure wouldn't have said he would from those pictures."

Darcy became convinced that Mallory was right, and the boxes did have something in them belonging to his father. He walked to the corner where they were stacked and reached for the closest one to him, which was at eye-level. He was surprised at how heavy it was----surprised enough that he nearly dropped it. Managing to catch himself in time, he set it on the ground gently, looked at the label...and froze.

The handwriting on the label was unfamiliar, but the date...the date the package had been delivered was December 11, 1985. The box looked to have been opened once and then resealed.

But this can't be right. She said she got rid of everything. How could anything have ended up here?

Darcy didn't have a knife or box cutter, so he tore at the package, nicking his hands enough to draw blood in the process but finally unearthing what was inside. The first thing he saw was his father's hideous green bowling shirt. With trembling hands, Darcy picked up the garment, seeing his father's name written on the front. Turning it over, he saw the Meryton Maulers logo.

"Dad," he murmured, looking down at the rest of the box, going through everything within. Wrapped in cotton were his father's bowling trophies, no longer shiny and new as they'd been the last time Darcy had seen them. There was a plaque stating that Ronald Williamson had bowled a three-hundred game on July 6, 1984. Beneath the plaque lay a newspaper clipping mentioning Ron's achievement. Darcy stared at the picture accompanying the clipping...a picture of him with his father.

In the clipping, Ron was beaming into the camera, holding the plaque with one hand while his other hand was resting on Darcy's shoulder. Darcy wasn't looking at the camera, but was instead staring up at his father. The look of pride on his face was evident.

"Mr. Williamson, you must be very proud of your father," the photographer commented after he'd snapped the picture.

"Yes," Dare said. "But he's Mr. Williamson, sir. I'm just Dare."

The photographer laughed. "Kid's got good manners. Congratulations, Ron."

"For the game or for the child?" Darcy's father asked, bemused.

"Both."

Darcy smiled in remembrance of the day. "Catherine told me she'd gotten rid of everything," he said quietly. "She told me..."

"She almost did."

Darcy and Mallory turned with guilty faces to see Thomas standing there. How long he'd been there, neither of them knew.

"Mary had David drive her to Clayton to...to make the arrangements for Ron and Amelia to be brought here, for burial." Thomas still could not think on the death of his oldest son without blinking back tears. "When they got to the house, they found Catherine there, ransacking everything, looking for whatever might be valuable to sell. Mary had been hoping to get a look at you and Ginger before you left, the issue of guardianship having already been settled, but you weren't there.

"Mary was horrified by what Catherine was doing and demanded that she stop. 'You'd think a woman as rich as she is wouldn't bother with raiding for valuables,' she told me later. 'But there she was, like a looter in a riot, hunting for what could be salvaged.' Thank God Mary got there in time to stop her from throwing everything away. Catherine argued that as the children's guardian, she was only selling things to put into trust for them, but it was a damned lie and Mary knew it. She told Catherine that they would take care of Ron and Amelia's possessions. Catherine threatened them with legal action..."

"Her favorite thing to do," Mallory muttered.

Thomas smiled at her. "Your grandmother threatened her right back. She said she told Catherine that it would look bad to deprive a grieving family of the loved ones' mementos, and that's just how she'd make her look if pushed. Catherine had already packed up some of the things, but she left the house as soon as Mary made her threat. Mary said later that there wasn't much of value left, not that Ron and Amelia owned great works of art of expensive jewelry. But she was grateful that she and David arrived when they did, otherwise nothing would've survived. They packed up what they could and made arrangements for the rest of it to be sent here.

"And it's been sitting in that corner since then...although I suspect that Mary occasionally goes through it to make sure moths don't get to the clothes." Thomas walked over to them and peered into the box. He frowned. "She should've bought some Brasso for the trophies. I don't know if they're salvageable now."

"I don't care," Darcy said swiftly. "It's enough that they're here."

It's enough that everything is here, he thought as he set the newspaper clipping aside and reached for the bowling bag. The zipper was difficult to manage due to lack of use, but he finally got the bag open and took out his father's bowling ball, which seemed much lighter than it had the day he'd tried to save it from Catherine.

Thinking about that day made him think of something he'd told Ginger when she'd asked what Catherine had done with their parents' things.

"I was hoping that maybe she had given them away to friends of theirs. That maybe these friends might still have them and that they were just waiting for us to come back to claim them."

"That only happens in bad movies, Georgiana. It's a lovely thought, and I wish for your sake it were so, but it isn't."

He asked Mallory if she would get his sister. "She won't believe what's up here," Darcy said as Mallory made her way downstairs. He almost didn't believe it himself.

Chapter Fifty

Mary was not happy with Mallory when she returned to the house and found Darcy and Ginger in the attic, eagerly going through their parents' things. It had been Mary's intention to tell them about what was in the attic herself, but the first thing she was told when she walked in the door was that Ginger and Darcy had already discovered what was up there. Dissatisfied though she was about not being there when they first saw what she'd kept for them for so long, Mary was still content to watch as they started looking through things.

Lunch came too soon for Darcy, who would've been happy to spend the rest of the time going through his parents' things, but he knew the purpose of this visit hadn't been to stay up in the attic and refuse to speak to anyone. The first person he saw when he reached the bottom of the stairs was Elisabeth, which made him feel guilty because he'd neglected her.

"How are you doing?" he asked, putting an arm around her shoulders as they walked back into the main kitchen area.

"Fine," she told him. "I've been having a nice talk with your grandfather. He showed me a picture of my grandfather Frank."

"He did? Oh, that's right, they were friends, weren't they?"

Elisabeth nodded. "I'd never seen a picture of him before because Granny Bess threw out his pictures after he walked out on his family. I was surprised to see how much Frank looked like my father. It was like seeing someone you recognize but then, after a second, you realize that it's not who you thought."

Darcy glanced over at his Uncle David, who was holding his grandson and whispering to him. Trey was giggling. "I know the feeling."

The kitchen had become crowded with as many people as could fit standing around, waiting for lunch to be served. Thomas called, "Settle down now, everyone! Mary's going to lead us in prayer, so someone turn off that stupid football game!"

The television was turned off and a silence fell over the house. Elisabeth found Mary standing between the kitchen and dining room, presumably where everyone could hear her. "Everyone bow their heads," she commanded. After a second, she began to pray. "Heavenly Father, we thank You for bringing us all together safely on this beautiful afternoon. We thank You for the many blessings we've had over the years and we pray that we continue to be blessed. We especially thank You for at long last returning Darcy and Ginger to us. We've had so many Christmases where we've stood here and prayed that this day would come, and now that it has it almost seems like too much. But Lord, you knew when the right time would be and we're thankful it's now."

Everyone's head may have been bowed, but there were quite a few pairs of eyes on Ginger and Darcy.

"We thank You for keeping everyone healthy and happy, and we pray that You watch over and guide those of us who may not be so. We ask these things in Your son's name. Amen."

"Amen," everyone chorused.

Mary raised her head and had a gleam in her eye that General Patton would've admired. "Now, I want the small children in the play room, so their parents should get their plates and take them there. Mallory, it's your year to watch over the kids."

"What?! I had kid patrol last year!" Mallory objected.

"No, you didn't. I did," one of Sarah's daughters said. "You came in to make sure Devon didn't choke on anything, which I told you time and again wasn't necessary."

Darcy's lips quivered. He noticed several other people were having the same problem. He would've volunteered for the duty, especially since he'd promised the kids another round of Monster, but he wanted to sit with Elisabeth and talk with other members of his family. Mallory grabbed plates for herself and her son before disappearing to the other end of the house, where tables had been set up for the children.

Once the children were taken care of, Mary insisted that Elisabeth go next so she could get a seat in the dining room. Elisabeth demurred, insisting that she didn't need any special treatment, but everyone else insisted so Elisabeth picked up a plate. She took a slice of ham, two deviled eggs, a spoonful of mashed potatoes, homemade noodles, green bean casserole, and a roll. Darcy had already poured her a glass of milk, which she took with a small frown. She would've preferred lemonade or tea, but apparently she wasn't getting a choice because Darcy gave her a look that dared her to argue with him. He'd been grumbling that she didn't drink enough milk.

Even Darcy has turned against me. What's the world coming to?

Elisabeth found herself seated at the head of the table, and a few minutes later, had Darcy and Ginger on either side of her. The table, which seated ten, soon included D.J. and Jolie, Terry, David and his wife, Cecily, and finally Mary and Thomas. Everyone else either sat at the kitchen table or headed back for the living room.

"So, what are you doing these days, Dare?" Terry asked.

Darcy paused from buttering his roll. "Not much of anything, to tell you the truth," he replied. "I quit working for Catherine, so I'm kind of between jobs at the moment."

Elisabeth grinned wickedly. "You are not," she protested. "You work at Planet Earth Pizza, and let me tell you, Mary, your grandson might not have started out as a very good waiter, but he's become one of our better ones. I bet if he wanted to, he could be a manager someday."

"Not until Catherine sells the place. I'll never work for her in that capacity ever again." Darcy took a drink of his lemonade.

"It wouldn't surprise me if she does sell the place soon," Ginger commented. "You know her habit of getting rid of anything she associates with unpleasantness. Do you remember when those five hundred Santas picketed in front of De Bourgh's main offices? A month later, they were history."

"You really think she'll sell Planet Earth Pizza just because of Darcy?" Jolie asked. "That seems like a bit ridiculous. She's a businesswoman. Planet Earth Pizza brings in a good deal of money. Surely that would outweigh the more emotional factors."

"It wouldn't be an emotional decision on her part," Darcy said.

"Yes. To be an emotional decision, one must first have something resembling emotions," Mary said. "On the few unpleasant occasions I had to deal with that woman, I saw nothing that would indicate to me that she had any."

"She'll see Planet Earth Pizza as an embarrassment and a liability," Darcy explained. "Just as the picketing Santas were an embarrassment to her. They tarnished her image. Planet Earth Pizza tarnished her image and reputation because I chose to continue working there rather than return to New York. On top of that, I didn't learn the lesson she intended for me to learn."

"What was that?" D.J. asked, his eyes dark with anger.

"That some people aren't worth helping," Darcy replied quietly, looking at Ginger. "So she's mad because she thinks Planet Earth Pizza failed in its' duty. Is it a bizarre notion for someone to have? Yes. Can I change it? No, nor do I care to."

"Enough talk of Catherine de Bourgh," Thomas said. "She'll give everyone indigestion, and that's the last thing we want today. Let's talk about something more pleasant."

The table fell silent for about ten seconds. "What do you do now, D.J.?" Darcy asked.

"I'm an architect with Bradford & Brown," D.J. said with a relieved smile. "If you can manage to get away from Grandma for a little while, I'll show you the house I designed as a wedding present for Jolie."

That D.J. had become an architect didn't surprise Darcy. Even when he was younger, D.J. had always been more interested in Legos and building blocks than the other toys.

"I should've seen what was coming because D.J. was constantly asking me what kind of house I would want to live in if I could have my choice. I thought he was asking for future reference, but then, on our wedding day, he takes me to the house and hands me the keys."

"He didn't carry you across the threshold?" Ginger asked.

"Well, he did that, but he wanted me to be the one to unlock the door." Jolie gave her husband a warm smile. "It's beautiful. It's the house I want to live in for the rest of my life."

"That's good, because it's probably going to take that long to get everything paid off," D.J. said, and everyone laughed.

"Darcy's not a prisoner here, D.J.," Mary informed her grandson. "He can go wherever he likes, and if he wants to take the tour of your house, he's free to do so."

"Maybe later," Darcy said apologetically. "I have a feeling that Ginger and I are going to be spending a lot of time looking through the things in the attic, if it's all right with you. Maybe sometime tomorrow or later tonight?"

"Sunset's the best time to look at their house," David said. "The views from their back deck are breathtaking. D.J. did a magnificent job with that place."

"Thank you. I had a client who came to my house last year who wanted me to make one for him just like it. He was willing to pay me whatever I wanted to ask."

"I hope you didn't take him up on it," Mary said sternly.

"Of course I didn't. I told him the story of how it had been a wedding gift to Jolie and that I'd sworn to her that I'd never sell the design to anyone else. Unfortunately, he was convinced that money would get him what he wanted. It didn't."

"Did that upset your bosses?" Ginger asked.

D.J. nodded. "It took me three months to come up with a design he liked better than my house. By the end of it, I was ready to kill him, but he approved and we got the house built. His house was three times the size of ours with an indoor pool, an outdoor lap pool, four stories tall with a bowling alley in the basement."

"A bowling alley?" Elisabeth laughed.

"He'd come up with the idea after seeing The Contender. There's a scene where the President is bowling, apparently somewhere in the White House. Now, I don't know if there actually is a bowling alley in the White House or not, but if the guy thought there was and wanted one of his own, who was I to say no?"

"Your bosses probably argued that you shouldn't have said no to his request to using your house design for his own house," Darcy said. "Considering what he ended up with, I'm surprised he would've wanted one like yours, if it's smaller than the other."

"He liked how warm the place felt. I guess he decided that if he couldn't have that, he'd have size." D.J. ate a bite of ham.

"Have you given any thought to what you'd like to do now, Dare?" Thomas asked.

Darcy groaned, causing Elisabeth and Ginger to laugh. "Only every day since I quit," he replied. "I don't have a clue."

"I know the feeling," Terry admitted. He took a drink of his tea and continued. "I just started college last year and I still don't know what I want to do. I didn't want to go at all, but Mom insisted that once I got there, I'd find something I liked."

"No luck so far?" Ginger asked.

Terry shook his head. "The only thing I sort of halfway like is English, and what will I do with an English degree?"

Elisabeth smiled. "Well, if you're like my cousin Charlie, you get a second degree to back up the English degree, spend half your time writing, and pray that something will come of it. If it doesn't, then you've got something to fall back on. I don't know how much Charlie actually likes her other job, but it pays the bills so she doesn't complain too much."

"What does Charlie do?" Terry asked.

"She's a...crisis counselor of sorts. She works with people who don't need to be hospitalized but require more counseling than they get in an hour-long session with a psychiatrist of whatever. They stay in the house where Charlie works for a few days, get a lot of therapy, and hopefully get enough skills to help them cope with whatever's troubling them."

"That's different," Thomas said. "I've never heard of anything like that."

"I have," Cecily, David's wife, said. "We've got a program like that. The only trouble seems to be getting people to agree to come. Most people who need the place are reluctant to do so."

"Charlie says that's a problem where she works, too," Elisabeth said. "If they're not afraid of being labeled 'mentally ill' because they sought treatment, they're afraid that something bad might happen while they're gone getting the help they need."

"It's a no-win situation," Ginger murmured, and conversation died for a minute again.

"What do you do for a living, Elisabeth?" David asked. "I don't think I've ever heard anyone say."

"I'm the assistant manager at the Planet Earth Pizza where Darcy works," Elisabeth answered. "I used to be the manager in Newton, but my boss decided that I wasn't improving business fast enough for them, so I was demoted back to assistant manager." She took a bite of potatoes, swallowed, and added, "They were more than likely right. I was having problems running the store, but I always figured I could get through the problems if they'd just given me enough time. Instead, I was yanked after about six months."

"And thank God you were," Ginger said, "otherwise you might not have met Darcy."

"And we certainly wouldn't be here today if you hadn't," Jolie said with a smile. "It probably doesn't help much to say that, but I hope..."

"Oh, it does," Elisabeth assured her. "I came to accept a long time ago that the demotion wasn't as bad as I thought, if for no other reason than that we're all here today."

"Do you intend to go back to working there after the baby's born?" David asked.

Elisabeth nodded. "It's what I do and what I know. There's really no other option for me." She sighed, wondering if she was making herself look bad by admitting to that. "I'm a lot like Terry. When I left high school, I didn't know what I wanted to do. I tried cosmetology and that didn't work, so I worked at Planet Earth Pizza and that was that."

"Do you like working there?" Cecily asked. "I remember when Mallory worked there, she hated every minute of it, and that was before..." She didn't finish the sentence, but she didn't need to.

"We rarely see her," Elisabeth said. "In fact, I think she's been to our store twice since she bought the chain. Most of the time, she's just a figurehead to us. A very powerful figurehead, but not someone we worry about on a daily basis."

"What did she think of you and Darcy?" Mary asked. "Or does she not know about the two of you?"

"Oh, she knows all right," Darcy muttered. "It's been a real surprise to me that she hasn't fired Elisabeth, because she has to know who she is."

"I'm not sure I follow you."

"I told Catherine that Elisabeth and I were dating several months ago, but I never told her Elisabeth's last name. However, the day after she found out about us, she told Sean he had to get rid of me because Elisabeth, a manager, was dating me, an employee. That was against the rules."

"Yet you still work there," Jolie said.

Darcy nodded. "Sean promoted me. There's no rule against managers dating, apparently. I'm sure there will be very soon, unless she sells the company."

"I thought we agreed not to talk about her," Thomas said, quickly turning the conversation to something more pleasant.

It was late afternoon before Darcy felt like he could return upstairs. He'd spent a little more time with the kids, and a lot of time with D.J., talking about what was going on in his life. Darcy was surprised to discover that D.J. and Jolie had only been married for eighteen months.

"It was a strange situation," D.J. admitted. "Jolie and I broke up two weeks before she realized she was pregnant with Trey. I was begging her to take me back once I found out, but she refused. Said something about me having to prove I wanted to marry her for her own sake and not just our child's. It took me another year before she would even start dating me again, although she was never stingy about letting me spend time with my son. So we started dating again, and she fell in love with me again, and we finally got married."

Darcy wondered if this was the reason Mallory had asked him about why he hadn't married Elisabeth, and why no one else had. He spent a bit longer with D.J. before Mary insisted that he go back up to the attic. Darcy made sure Elisabeth was occupied and found her talking with Jolie and Mallory. She'd waved and smiled at him, and so he'd gone back upstairs.

He wasn't surprised to find Ginger already up there, leafing through what looked to be a stack of note cards. She was examining each one with a small smile on her face.

"What's that?" he asked, causing her to start slightly. "Sorry, didn't mean to scare you."

"Don't worry about it." She held out the cards to him. "I thought you might get a kick out of reading these."

Darcy took them, curious. They turned out to be his report cards from kindergarten through fourth grade, each one detailing his progress. He grinned at the first one. His kindergarten teacher had been Miss Morningside, and she'd written, "Darcy shows an unusual level of creativity and liveliness for a boy his age."

"I don't know about the creativity part, but the liveliness was true enough," he commented. He flipped to the next card. "Mrs. Webb. God, I remember her. She was so thin that a strong breeze actually knocked her over once. It was in the first grade that the other boys started picking on my name, and every recess, she used to have to send me to the principal's office because I'd bloodied some kid's nose. It never seemed fair to me that they started it but I always got in trouble."

"You won, didn't you?" Ginger pointed out. "It's always the winner who gets in trouble on the playground."

"Wasn't that the truth." Darcy smiled in memory. "Listen to what she wrote. 'Dare is a very bright boy but lacks the discipline to apply himself to his studies.' I was in the first grade, for God's sake! In the first grade, all you want to do is play with the other boys and throw rocks at the girls."

"You weren't throwing rocks at girls, were you?" Ginger demanded.

"Of course not. Throwing rocks at girls got you in more trouble than fighting. But you were tempted, especially when the girl was a real tattle tale, like Harriet Jones. She was the girl who thought she knew everything and had the biggest crush on me."

"So naturally you treated her the worst."

"No, if I remember correctly, she was the first girl I ever kissed, and it wasn't even a dare. She was a cute little thing, just a big pain in the butt was all." Darcy set the cards aside with every intention of reading them later. "What else have you found?"

"A lot of clothes," Ginger said, nose wrinkled. "All of them outdated if they were ever in style."

"She was our mother, not a fashion plate," Darcy said with a frown.

"I was referring to Daddy's clothes. I also found some photo albums that I thought we'd take downstairs to Grandma and go through with her." Ginger smiled wickedly. "I couldn't resist taking a look through one, however, and I found a picture that you're not going to want Elisabeth to see."

"I'm not doing something embarrassing like throwing up, am I?" Darcy asked.

"Nope, but it's about as bad. You're taking a bath."

Darcy wasn't quite sure what was so bad about that...for about three seconds. "You're not about to show her that!" he growled. "That's embarrassing!"

"Of course it is. That's what's supposed to happen when you bring your girl home to meet the family. The sister always mentions the embarrassing things you used to do while the mother, or in your case the grandmother, hauls out the photo albums and shows her what a cute little baby you were."

"You just wait until you bring a boyfriend around to meet me. I'll dig up every cliché in the book to embarrass you," Darcy warned. "Speaking of which, how are things going with what's his name, Dennis?"

"Denny's fine," Ginger said calmly. "Just fine. And yes, we're still seeing each other, if that was going to be your next question."

"It wasn't," Darcy lied.

Ginger just gave him a look. "I told him about what happened," she added quietly.

"Oh, Gin. How did he take it?" Darcy asked, concerned.

Ginger shrugged. "I don't know. I told him right before I left for here. I guess that was being cowardly----'I love you, but I did something wrong and now I have to go before I see the look that tells me you're about to dump me.'"

"Why didn't you just wait to tell him until after you'd come back from here?"

"Because he told me he was falling in love with me. I was happy, but at the same time I was sad because I knew I had to tell him the truth. If he still loved me after knowing what I had done, then I would know he was the right one."

"I was about to say that if he rejected you for a stupid mistake that he wasn't worth your time," Darcy said. "And it wasn't even all your fault. Don't even start to tell me that you think it was."

"I don't think," Ginger said bitterly. "I know it was. They trusted me with the money on that project, Dare! They had enough trust in me to think I could handle it, and almost the first thing that happened was that he stole fifty thousand dollars."

"Did you put a gun to his head to force him to steal the money?"

"Of course not."

"Then it wasn't your fault. Did you do the wrong thing in letting him near the bank book? Yes. But he ultimately made the choice to steal the money, and you can't be blamed for that. To hell with what Catherine said when she found out."

"I know that, but..." Ginger sighed. "Dare, the day before he did it, I was joking around with him about how heady it felt to have all that money. I said that if I were a less honest person, I'd take all that money and run away to the Bahamas. I said I could get away from Catherine for good if only I had that money. Don't you see? I put the thought in his head."

"No, you didn't. The thought was no doubt in his head the minute you told him you had control of the money." Darcy gave his sister a hug. "I don't know what's going to happen with Denny. For your sake, I do hope he understands the situation and doesn't hold it against you. In the meantime, try to start thinking that this whole mess wasn't all your fault. Okay?"

Ginger nodded glumly. After a few more seconds, the two broke apart and Ginger opened a new box.

"Hey, look at this!" Ginger held up a framed picture of their parents on what appeared to be their wedding day. Ron was wearing what was likely his best suit while Amelia wore a white gown with a flower in her hair. Ginger turned the frame back to where she could look at it. "Wow."

"Wow what?" Darcy asked.

"Well, Aunt Catherine always said I looked like Mommy, and Grandma said the same thing, but I never really saw it until now." Ginger studied the picture. "She never looked happy in any of the pictures Catherine had in the house. I always thought she looked kind of embarrassed to be in with the rest of the Darcy clan."

"I don't think she was happy until she met Dad," Darcy said. "But then, were either of us happy until recently?"

"I can tell you what my answer would be," Ginger mumbled as she handed him the picture and went back to looking in the box she'd opened. She snickered as she picked up another framed photo. "I have another blackmail picture, Dare."

"What?" Darcy snatched the frame out of her hands, looked at the picture, and groaned. "No! Under no circumstances are you to show this to Elisabeth."

"Why not? I think you look cute. Messy, but cute." Ginger took the picture back when Darcy's hold on it slackened. It was a picture taken of Darcy at one of his early birthday parties. He had a piece of cake in front of him, which he was gleefully trying to do anything but eat. He had it smeared all over his face, on the front of the nice shirt he was wearing, in his hair, and if the photo could be believed, all over the wall behind his high chair.

Bad as that was, the next picture was even worse. In it, Darcy had taken a handful of cake and smashed it right on his father's forehead. "How undignified," he muttered.

"Come on, Dare! You were what, two or three? I'll bet even Catherine herself wasn't so 'dignified' at the age of three."

"Oh, yeah? Let's see if there are any undignified pictures of you in here." Darcy looked into the box, which was filled with framed pictures. He found more pictures of himself as he was growing up, including one of him in a Little League uniform that made him smile. He set that aside as one he'd be happy to show Elisabeth and then came across the first couple of pictures of Ginger. "Here we go," he said with a sly grin. But to his disappointment, there were no embarrassing framed pictures of his sister. At her second birthday party, she was holding a fork in one fist and smiling impishly at the camera.

"See? I was a well-mannered child," Ginger said. "I knew what a fork was at the age of two, unlike you, my Neanderthal brother."

"Very funny." Darcy left her to finish going through that box and opened a new one which was filled with books. Jane Austen, Elizabeth Gaskell, Charles Dickens...Darcy smiled as he opened Wives and Daughters to find the inscription "The property of Amelia Williamson" on the front page.

"So that's where you get it," Ginger said, peering over his shoulder. "I always wondered why you liked those dull books."

Darcy nodded but said nothing. He walked over to a chair and sat down heavily, the book still in his hand. This had been his mother's book, possibly one of her favorites. He absently flipped through the pages, reading nothing but being thinking of all the times he could remember when his mother had a book in her hand.

"Do you feel a bit like you're intruding by going through all this stuff?" Ginger asked quietly.

"What do you mean?"

"I'm not sure exactly. It just feels so weird to be up here, going through our parents' things. Maybe you don't feel like I do because you actually knew them, but when I go through this stuff, I feel like I'm looking at pictures of strangers. These people were my parents but I know so little about them that I almost feel wrong going through their things."

Darcy set the book down. "That would be one way of looking at it, I suppose," he said slowly. "Or you could say that by going through their things, you're able to get a better idea of what they were like. For instance, these books belonged to our mother. She loved to read. The bowling gear belonged to Dad. In the year before they died, Dad was trying to teach Mom how to bowl with little luck. She was encouraging him to read one classic a week." Darcy smiled. "He borrowed my children's versions of the stories and pretended he'd read the actual work. She never bowled better than a sixty and managed to get a strike once that I knew of." Ginger's expression didn't change, causing Darcy's smile to fade. "I probably should've told you more about them while we were growing up, what I could remember of them. Maybe if I had, you wouldn't feel this way."

"I hate that I do," Ginger said with tears in her eyes. "I feel guilty because I know I should feel more connected to the two people whose lives fill these boxes, and yet I don't. We could sit up here for a year and everyone could tell me stories about what they were like until I know them better than I know myself, but I don't know that I'll ever feel any closer to them than I feel now."

"You would," Darcy told her soothingly. "I know you would, because that's the kind of person you are, Gin." He hugged her. "We can tell you the stories until you know them so well you'll think you were there."

"Thank you, Dare," she whispered before pulling away from him. "I hope you're right."

"I know I'm right. I'm your brother, aren't I?"

Ginger smiled in spite of the tears. "You don't want me to answer that honestly, do you? Because I had started to think that you didn't know half what you thought you did, with your blind devotion to Catherine."

"It wasn't blind devotion, it was sheer terror," Darcy quipped.

"Yeah." Ginger started to open a box, then stopped. "I hate her."

"Hate who? Catherine?"

Ginger nodded. "I never thought I would hate anyone, not even her. But standing here, I know now that I'll never get to heaven because I hate Catherine de Bourgh so much." She looked at him with fury clearly written in her eyes. "I know what you're about to say. You're going to stand there and say that I shouldn't hate anyone. But you're not the one she stole everything from. At least you remember them."

"Ginger, it's not likely that you would've remembered a lot about our parents. You were too young to remember much."

"You're missing my point. The memories aren't the point, not entirely." Ginger fell silent briefly. "Do you have any idea what it was like growing up knowing little of your parents outside of your mother being a fool who eloped with your loser of a father? Or growing up knowing that someone disliked you intensely all because of your resemblance to someone else? I do."

Darcy had never felt more ashamed in his life. On the day Catherine had threatened to send him to a boarding school and send Ginger to relatives in England, the day of the bowling ball, he'd told himself that it was important for him to watch out for Ginger. And what had he done? He'd gone along with what Catherine had wanted in his life and had forgotten to watch out for her. At the very least, he could've made sure Ginger had a fair idea of what their parents had been like. Maybe if he'd told her about them, she wouldn't feel like she was going through the belongings of strangers now.

"There was always a part of me that knew they were better than Catherine thought they were. If she didn't approve of them, they had to be great, right? But I didn't know for sure until lately."

"That's my fault," Darcy said brokenly. "If you hate Catherine for that reason, then don't overlook my part in it. I could've..."

"That's only a fraction of the hatred I have for that woman. I hate her because she did whatever it took to get guardianship of us and then treated me like I was dirt. The least she could've done was fob me off on some relative. I'm surprised she bothered with me at all, but I wish to God she hadn't. I would've been much happier if she had. Maybe that was her design all along----to punish me as she had been unable to punish my mother for whatever it was she did to offend Catherine."

"I never understood it, either," Darcy said, knowing it was a lame answer to give.

"I hate her because of what she did to you, too. Firing me was the best thing she could've done. It got me away from her even if it did create new complications in my life, and it forced you to defy her, which brought you here. I'd like to think that someday you would've broken free of her, but who knows how long that would've been? Would it happen before or after your nervous breakdown?"

"It was coming," Darcy said in his defense.

Ginger shook her head. "No, it wasn't. If she hadn't have insisted that you cut yourself off from me, you would've gone on being her lackey. You probably would've married Anne Ripley."

"I never would've done that," Darcy muttered. "That was where I would've drawn the line. I never intended to marry Anne. I know you're thinking that it's easy for me to say now, but I mean it. Catherine wouldn't have been the one spending the rest of her life with the woman, and I would. I always intended to choose my own wife."

"Then maybe that's when you would've broken free, but she still had you until recently."

Darcy couldn't argue that point.

"Maybe someday I'll be able to forgive her, but I don't think I'll ever forget what she did." Ginger glanced around at the things they'd already looked through, and at the boxes still waiting to be opened. "I don't think I realized until just now how much I hated her. And I know why you said that I must hate you, too, but I don't. If you'd grown up to be just like her, I might've, but you didn't. Catherine tried to change you, but she couldn't."

"But I still could've told you about our parents," Darcy said. "I rarely did, did I?"

"You would, sometimes," Ginger told him. "The odd comment here and there, what you remembered at the time, what fit the conversation we were having. Enough to give me hope, but not nearly enough to drown out the 'fool and loser' chorus I heard all the time from Catherine."

"I'm so sorry," he said, hanging his head. "I wish I could go back and change things."

"Hey, don't start going down that road. We'd start with wishing our parents were still alive and trying to rewrite history, and it's just as well that we try and move on. What's done is done. What's important is that we're here now, together, with our family." Ginger now hugged him. "I was feeling sorry for myself because I missed out on so much, but now that I'm over it, I'm ready to hear every story there is about our parents."

Before Darcy could start, he heard lumbering footsteps coming up the stairs. Darcy walked over to the attic entrance and saw Elisabeth huffing her way to the top. "What are you doing?" he demanded.

"I am not made of glass," she muttered. She got to the last step and tossed something at him. Darcy fumbled with it but managed to hang on. It was a cellular phone.

"I remember these," he said, giving it a quizzical look. "I had one when I worked for Catherine. It was the first thing I pitched when she insisted that I go to work at Planet Earth Pizza."

"It's not yours. It's Ginger's, and it's been ringing for the past five minutes. Actually, it's been playing 'It's Raining Men' rather than ringing. Your grandmother is in love with it and wants one of her own."

Ginger rushed over to Darcy and took the phone from his hands. She punched a couple of buttons and listened to the message that had been left for her. When she smiled, Darcy realized who the message had to be from. She held out the phone to him. "Do you want to hear it?" she asked.

"Do I want to hear it?" he asked in return. "Or will it be something that will make me want to hire a hit man?"

"It's nothing bad."

Darcy took the phone, where a deep, unfamiliar male voice was saying, "Ginger, it's me. I wish you hadn't left before we could talk about what you told me, but I think I know why. I thought about it for about ten seconds after you left and realized that I didn't give a damn. You weren't to blame and even if you'd stolen every dime Catherine de Bourgh had, I wouldn't care. I love you anyway. Please call me as soon as you get this message."

"Should we give you some privacy?" Darcy asked, giving the phone back to Ginger. "Elisabeth and I could go back downstairs."

Ginger nodded and murmured her thanks. Darcy and Elisabeth lingered at the top of the stairs just long enough to hear Ginger say, "Do you have any idea how much I love you right now?"

Continued in Next Section