Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe by Melissa de la Cruz

Author:Melissa de la Cruz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

15

Back in her New York loft-style apartment, Darcy hid in bed, deep under luxurious, Egyptian-cotton linens and a three-thousand-dollar European goose down comforter. The phone by her side kept lighting up with texts from Bingley and Carl and her brothers, and even one from Jim, but she ignored them all. Especially the ones from Carl. Of course, Carl didn’t know that she had gone to Luke’s house to make a total fool of herself, but she was so ashamed of herself that she worried that talking to him now would push her over the edge into officially hating herself.

This feeling was a completely new one for Darcy. It’s not that Darcy had always been an upbeat kind of girl, but she had always, always thought highly of herself. Even in her darkest hours she never blamed herself or worried that she was the problem. Sure, people at work or people she didn’t know at all had called her a snob and other horrible things, but nobody whose opinion she cared about, and definitely nobody she loved. Until now, names she’d been called had always been water off a duck’s back, but Luke’s words were sticking. He was right, she was self-centered and egotistical, and it was true, aside from a select few, she really did only care about herself.

As for thinking she was better than everybody else, was that really so wrong? She played this one over and over again in her mind. Didn’t everybody think they were better than everybody else? If life is a competition, then you are your own team, and if you want to win—i.e., survive—you have to believe that your team—i.e., you—is the best. Right?

She burrowed deeper beneath the blankets, wondering what she was missing. Was she actually supposed to believe that everybody was created equally? To Darcy, there was evidence running rampant that this was simply not the case.

It doesn’t matter, she told herself. It doesn’t matter what Luke thinks of you. You’re getting married to Carl, and he thinks you’re perfect just the way you are. She picked up the phone she’d been shamefully avoiding and read the text from Carl.

When is your appointment to look at the Plaza? it read.

Today at 5, she replied.

Amazing, he wrote. I’m flying in today at noon, I’ll get to see it with you!

Hooray! she typed, then searched for the right emoji. Her thumb hovered over the skull for a second, but she ended up going with an unrealistic amount of heart-eyed faces, then let her phone drop listlessly onto the mattress.

The good thing about her anxiety about marrying Carl was that it distracted her from the epic devastation of Luke not only rejecting her but also tearing apart her character and entire sense of self-worth. There was one other thing that could distract her: work. She picked her phone back up and called Millie.

“Darcy!” she answered cheerily. “We haven’t heard from you in so long!”

“I know,” said Darcy. “Sorry about that.” There was a moment of silence from Millie’s end.

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