To Be Loved: A Pride and Prejudice Variation

By Anna Lockhart

She never imagined she would find true love...

Elizabeth Collins only married for convenience. It just so happened that the marriage lasted two days before she was made a widow. Now, she is alone and discovers she must return to Longbourn until another suitable match can be made. Before her return to Meryton, however, she visits her aunt and uncle in London, and it is there she that she meets Fitzwilliam Darcy for the second time...

Over the course of one evening, Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth will both discover that there is always a second chance for love

To Be Loved is a Pride and Prejudice variation full of love, moonlight, and a guaranteed happy ending!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Daisy Chain Publishing
• Release date: Jul 15, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393918622

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

The spring flowers were in bloom all over London, but as Elizabeth Collins looked out the window of her Uncle and Aunt’s home in Cheapside, she felt little of the joy that accompanied the season. Aunt Gardiner had done everything she was able to raise Elizabeth’s spirits, but ever since her wedding, she had little to be happy about. The subsequent death of her husband two days later left her conflicted. She knew that everyone around her expected her to be mourning, but if anything…

Elizabeth felt a sense of relief that she knew she could not express.

Her marriage to William Collins had been one of convenience, a chance to save her family home and ensure her parents and sisters kept a roof over their heads. Then, hardly forty-eight hours after Elizabeth moved her things into the parsonage in Hunsford, Collins’s home, she found her new husband dead in his garden. The doctor said it was most likely a problem with his heart, but there was no one to be sure. All Elizabeth knew was that as soon as her husband was buried, Lady Catherine de Bourgh informed her that there was no reason for Elizabeth to remain in the home now that Collins was dead. 

And with that, she was moving back to her family home of Longbourn once again, a bride who had never even been married, by the rules of the church. Lady Catherine gave Elizabeth one day to depart the parsonage in Kent and return to Meryton. She did not even need the whole day; by the early afternoon, all of Elizabeth’s personal items had been hastily packed into two trunks and she was on her way to London. 

She intended to return straight to Meryton, but her Uncle and Aunt Gardiner insisted that Elizabeth spend a few days with them in their home first. She did not take much convincing, as Elizabeth was not terribly anxious to speak to her mother. She was convinced that Mrs. Bennet already had a lecture of some sort prepared for her second eldest daughter as soon as she stepped through the doors of Longbourn. Before she realized it, Elizabeth had been at the Gardiners’ for a week and she was not terribly anxious to leave London.

Elizabeth, darling, Mrs. Gardiner said as she walked into the drawing room where her niece was staring out the window, her eyes heavy with a gloomy aspect. You look so unhappy. Is there something I can do for you? Are you mourning for your lost love?

Elizabeth thought she might laugh when her Aunt proposed the last question. Her lost love? She barely knew the man. On the day she moved into the parsonage, Collins was at Rosings, counseling Lady Catherine on something that was apparently quite private. She ate dinner alone and went to bed alone as well, for which she was grateful. The next day, when her new husband finally returned, he went straight to work in the garden and she never saw him alive again. Love? William Collins was a stranger.

She tried to force a smile and shook her head.

There is nothing I need, Aunt Gardiner, but thank you for asking. I suppose I was just thinking about my inevitable return to Meryton. My mother has not so much as written me a note while I have been in London, so I suspect she is cross with me.

Mrs. Gardiner sat in the chair next to Elizabeth and took her hand. Lizzy, do not be silly. You do not bear any responsibility for William Collins’s death. These things just happen. They may not happen routinely, but they do happen. I am quite sure that your mother and father understand that.

This time, Elizabeth did laugh.

"You may be correct about my papa, Aunt Gardiner, but my mother will find a way to place the blame on me, I assure you. Her first point of order will be finding me another husband, though I am sure my younger sisters are considered far more viable prospects now. Except for Mary… though I