Bits of Ribbon and Lace by Zoe Burton

Author:Zoe Burton
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: JAFF short stories
Publisher: Zoe Burton
Published: 2020-08-20T00:00:00+00:00

I’ll Never Leave You

“I’m here now, aren’t I?!” Fitzwilliam Darcy, Will to those closest to him, roared at his wife. “What more could you possibly want?”

“Yes, you’re here! And what are you doing?” Elizabeth waved her hand in the direction of his laptop, quietly humming on the coffee table in front of him. “Are you paying any attention to me at all? And what about your son, who was so looking forward to Dad doing bath time tonight? What about him? Yes, you came home earlier than usual, but you have had your nose stuck in that computer all evening!”

“I don’t have to take this crap.” With that, he closed the laptop before picking it up and striding to the door. He grabbed his jacket and car keys. “Don’t wait up for me.

“Where are you going?” Elizabeth screamed after him.

“Out,” he yelled back.

“Just going to walk away, are you? Fine, leave! I don’t want someone here that doesn’t want to be here with all his heart! I hope that machine keeps you warm tonight!”

As the door slammed shut, Elizabeth collapsed in tears on the floor. For all her bravado, she was scared to death. Her husband had begun months ago to increase the time he spent at work. He told her at first that he was working on a contract deal with a difficult client, but that was a long time ago. Over the course of their courtship and marriage, he had often dealt with similar situations, but those had been resolved in a matter of weeks, not months. She had begun to fear he was seeing someone on the side.

The couple had met at a party in the home of one of Will’s best friends, Charles Bingley. Chuck, as he was called by his friends, immediately fell head over heels in love with Elizabeth’s older sister. Will and Elizabeth, on the other hand, took a while to warm up to each other. Will was the first to recognize his feelings. Once he did, he chased the reluctant girl of his dreams until she finally gave in and went out with him. They dated for four months, and in that time Elizabeth came to realize that he was the perfect man for her. When he proposed, she eagerly agreed.

Now here they were, five years and two children later. She was no longer the svelte, sexy thing she used to be. Pregnancy had done terrible things to her body. Try as she might, she could not manage to lose that pot belly it left her with. And her hips! She shuddered to think of those. She adored her four-year-old son Ben and eighteen-month-old daughter Jane, and she couldn’t imagine life without them, but the process of getting them was brutal.

Who could blame him if he did turn to someone else, she thought. Look at me. I’m disgusting!

Unbidden, the image of her parents and their marriage came into her mind. Her greatest fear was ending up like them. Not that her father had cheated on her mother, as far as she knew.

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