Launch, Giveaway Winners, New Book Preview, lots of goodies!

Today is launch day for Mr. Darcy and the Girl Next Door!

I’m excited to hear what you think. This was my first time writing Elizabeth as Not A Bennet, and it was so much fun! Bonus because she and Darcy were close as children. Our poor girl is wrestling with a lot of big feelings, not the least of which revolve around which Darcy brother is the handsomest, now that they’re all grown up!

Now, of course, I’ve moved on to another book. Naturally! I’m several chapters in, and I can’t wait to tell you about it.

But first, a little housekeeping.  I hosted a giveaway for Mr. Darcy and the Girl Next Door, and we had eight winners! If I had your email address, or if you reached out to me after the announcement, you should have already received your download code. If you haven’t got your download yet, please contact me! Author@AlixJames.com, and I’ll send you your book.

Here are the lucky winners!

Cath E

Colleen D

Rebecca Mc Brayer

Jeannette

Taswmom

Catherine SD

Michelle

Christine Waring

Congratulations!

And now, I get the giddy pleasure of telling you about my next project. Squee!

If you subscribe to my newsletter, you got a sneak peek of this one over the weekend and you’ve already ruined your hankie and probably thrown your IPhone. Sorry-Not-Sorry!

First of all, let me preface this preview with a disclaimer. Do NOT look at the date. Repeat: DO NOT LOOK AT THE DATE.

Amazon shows that this book won’t be out until January of 2025, but that’s a big, fat, hairy lie. It’s me. I lied. Sort of. In my efforts to build some margin into my life, I didn’t give myself a tight deadline for this one. However, my expectations are that this book will be launching in early to mid March, 2024. That’s less than two months. I promise, you can survive that long! How am I writing another book so fast? I’m obsessed with this story, that’s how. I write it in bed, in the shower, in the car, and that’s not a joke.

The next cool part is that I have a whole collection of these nail-biters planned for this year. So far, it’s three stand-alones, all slightly (or more than slightly) angsty. I might have white hair and ulcers by the time I’m done with them! And yes, all the launch dates are set ridiculously far in the future because YES, the book is planned, and I needed that out there for my own personal motivation, but I also need to make sure I’m giving the stories all the proper time to develop and not trying to rush to meet some ridiculous deadline.

Without further ado, here’s a preview of Chapter One of The Measure of Love!

ONE

DARCY POUNDED HIS FIST furiously on the weathered door, rattling the nearby shutters. This ramshackle “rooming house” in London’s East End was no better than a brothel—exactly the vile sort of place Wickham would frequent. Desperation had chased Darcy to the city’s filthy underbelly once before, but the viper had slipped his grasp. Not this time, though. The street lad who had taken Darcy’s coin said that George Wickham was back, and he was not alone.

The door creaked open, and a pinch-faced woman in garish rouge peered out. “You, sir! State your business or be off!”

“I am here to see George Wickham.” Darcy shouldered past her into the dim, smoky foyer, hand drifting toward the pistol holstered under his coat “Where is he?”

The Madame crossed her arms indignantly “Don’t know any George. Now, see here, I run a reputable—”

“Silence.” Darcy grasped her arm, pressing several coins into her palm and curling her trembling fingers over them. “Wickham is upstairs, is he not?”

The Madame licked her thin lips, eyeing the money. After a moment, she jerked her head at the stair. Darcy took them three at a time, his boots pounding up the rickety steps, his breath coming in heated puffs. The Madame’s shrill cries echoed after him, demanding he behave “civil-like”, but he heeded her not. His fury would not be contained a moment longer.

Wickham was here. After weeks of relentless searching, justice would be served. No more innocent lives ruined by that blackguard’s selfish whims. Darcy ground his teeth, an image of his dear sister Georgiana’s anguished face flashing before his eyes. Never again.

He took the last few steps in a single leap, the old wood groaning under his weight. This was the room—he could hear a feminine voice whimpering softly from within. Gathering himself, he kicked the door with an echoing crack. The lock splintered apart, opening on a dingy room wreathed in opium smoke and illuminated by one rusted oil lamp.

Wickham lounged on the bed like a sultan, shock melting into his trademark wolfish grin. But it was the girl who drew Darcy’s blazing eyes—for all her buxom déshabillé, hers was the face of a child—a child with tumbling golden curls who couldn’t be more than fifteen years old. She tugged the thin chemise up around her shoulders, her mouth opened in protest… but it was Darcy’s voice that thundered first.

“Wickham!” he roared.

With nostrils flared like an enraged bull, Darcy seized the front of Wickham’s shirt and slammed him against the wall hard enough to make the mirror rattle dangerously. Out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed the girl fleeing from the room but paid her no further mind. His full fury was reserved for the wretch before him, now twisting and writhing in his tight grasp.

“Well, well, if it isn’t Mr. High and Mighty,” Wickham choked out. “Wasn’t expecting to see you in a den of iniquity. Don’t tell me you’ve finally come to your senses and sampled the wares for—”

Darcy cut him off with a swift right hook to Wickham’s sharp jaw, sending him sprawling to the warped floor boards. “That was for Georgiana, you bastard,” he spat. As quick as a jungle cat, he pounced, hauling Wickham up once more by the shirtfront. “Now, you dog, you are going to pay for what you’ve done!”

Wickham coughed wetly as Darcy threw him against the stained mattress. Yet as he swiped blood from his mouth, his cracked lips twisted in a jeering grin.

“Come now, what’s all this about? Can’t blame a fellow for enjoying a willing girl’s company. Why, your delightful sister was the one who threw herself into my arms. Begged me to run away with her, she did! How is dear Georgiana?”

With a roar of outrage, Darcy seized Wickham by the shirtfront once more, hauling him up and slamming him into the headboard so hard his teeth clacked together.

“You will not speak her name!” he thundered, cocking his fist back again with murder in his eyes.

Wickham held up his hands, still grinning his infuriating, insolent grin even as twin trails of blood leaked from his flared nostrils. “Very well, very well. But tell me, Darcy, how ever do you propose I ‘pay’ for my indiscretion, as you call it? Will you take a cheque? For I dare say the entertainment was well worth more than you’d get from flogging a dead horse.” His grin turned positively vulpine. “Why, I imagine your dear sister still misses my affections!”

Darcy trembled with rage as he gripped Wickham by the shirtfront, his fist raised and ready to explode against that foul, sneering face once more. How easy it would be to beat this blackguard within an inch of his life, to feel the satisfying crunch of bone and flesh yielding to his revenge. Blood for blood.

With Herculean effort, Darcy regained a shred of control. He was no street ruffian, and Wickham hardly worth dirtying his hands over further. Breathing hard through flared nostrils, Darcy released his foe and stepped back. Wickham collapsed against the mattress, face swelling grotesquely from Darcy’s fury. “I have better plans for you.”

Wickham spit crimson through his ruined grin. “What’s this? The high and mighty Darcy gone squeamish at the sight of blood? You ought to have sent your attack dog cousin if you didn’t have the stomach to see this through. Fitzwilliam would have happily finished the job.”

Curling his lip in disgust, Darcy replied in a deadly soft tone, “Be grateful Colonel Fitzwilliam is not here. For your brutality against innocents, he would tear you limb from limb without hesitation.” He flexed his aching, blood-stained knuckles. “Fortunately for you, some semblance of reason still governs my actions. But test that fraying thread further at your own peril.”

Wickham leered up at Darcy through swollen lips. “Come now, old boy, no need for this unpleasantness. Why not relax and sample the wares? I’ve a tasty little tart just downstairs, ripe for the picking. Pretty as a picture, with fire in her blood—just how you nobles like them. Still innocent in all the ways that matter, too.”

He licked the blood from his teeth, eyes fever-bright. “How about it, Darcy? Care to take her off my hands and school her in the ways of men?”

Revulsion churned Darcy’s stomach. He hauled Wickham up by the throat, shoving him brutally against the stained wall. “Have you no shred of decency or conscience left? She is but a child! Ruining innocents for sport—you disgust me.”

Wickham just chuckled. “Innocent? That one was born wild. Why, Miss Lydia is a gentlewoman in name only. She makes most London whores look saintly.”

At this casual besmirching of yet another young lady’s reputation, Darcy slammed Wickham back again, arm pressing viciously across his windpipe. “I’ll see you rot.”

Wickham just leered, undaunted. “Oh, I hardly spoiled anything. But sweet Georgiana, now there was a tender lamb ripe for the plucking. So softly yielding, so deliciously willing to be taught and shown and taken…”

With a savage roar, Darcy seized Wickham about the neck and began raining blow after brutal blow upon his fiendish, grinning face. In the distance, he was dimly aware of violent shouts and pounding footsteps on the stairs over the roaring in his ears, but all his world had narrowed to crushing the life out of the blackguard who had hurt Georgiana.

They grappled violently, crashing into the furniture and shattering some sort of bottle. Darcy deftly avoided a knife-handed strike at his throat but missed the knee rocketing upwards into his groin. He staggered, and Wickham slammed into him full force. They tumbled out of the shattered doorway, teetering together on the landing’s edge with flailing arms.

Wickham managed to grab the splintered railing, steadying himself. But Darcy was already overbalanced—he felt nothing but sick terror as the stairs rushed up to meet him. His head cracked against the wooden floorboards, and pain exploded through his back like a gunshot. Still he tumbled limply down, every edge and nail of the crude staircase gashed his flesh until all went black.

Far off, a familiar voice cried out. “Good God… Darcy!” Strong hands rolled him onto his back. Darcy struggled toward consciousness, and pain—blinding pain—returned in nauseating darkness. Colonel Fitzwilliam’s familiar face hovered above him, creased in horror. “Darcy! Can you hear me?”

He tried to stand, but there was… nothing. No response or sensation where his legs should have been. Fighting panic, he gasped, “My legs… oh God, I cannot feel my legs!”  

***

Elizabeth paced the worn carpet of Longbourn’s sitting room, twisting a handkerchief between anxious fingers. The family had gathered here each evening for the past fortnight—waiting, praying, as her father searched London’s seedy underbelly for their lost Lydia. Thus far, his letters have been told of naught but failure. Yet when the creak of carriage wheels echoed outside in the twilight, Elizabeth’s heart seized in her chest. Father had returned, and his journey ended. She steeled herself against a surge of hope as Jane gripped her wrist, eyes round with shared trepidation.

They hurried to the entrance hall as Mr. Bennet entered, travel-stained hat in hand. One look at his haggard face, the grim set of his jaw, and Elizabeth’s fragile hope guttered out. The news would not be good. They had not found Lydia.

At this confirmation of her deepest fears, Mrs. Bennet collapsed into the same hysterics that had fueled her since that express came from Colonel Forster. “Ruined… my poor girls are ruined!” she wailed, dampening her handkerchief with tears. “And my sweet Lydia gone who knows where with what sort of man?”

Mary crossed her arms, rage smoldering beneath her sullen expression. “What does it matter whether she comes home at this point? Papa not finding her changes nothing. The loss of reputation in a sister is a stain upon us all.”

“Oh, how could you, Mary?” Kitty wailed.

“Yes, yes, how could you, Mary?” Papa asked tiredly. “You ought to rejoice, at least, that I did not find her with the constable or bring her home in a box. Jane, have some tea sent to my study.” He braced his hand on the door leading out of the drawing room, hesitating slightly as his eyes found Elizabeth and Jane. Then he quit the room.

Kitty clung to Mama, weeping and hiccuping. “It’s all so h—horrid! I cannot endure it. I wish I had gone to Brighton too! I could have stopped her… or at least gone so that we might be together—”

“Oh, such a state I am in. Oh, where is Hill?” Mama demanded. “My salts, I need my salts!”

Jane rolled her eyes to Elizabeth as Mama’s lamentations rose to near ear-splitting volumes. “We should speak with Papa,” Jane urged softly.

Elizabeth nodded. Their father’s drooping shoulders and faded eyes terrified her like nothing ever had. With a fortifying breath, she followed Jane to the study. Pausing at the door, Elizabeth steeled herself, then knocked.

There was no answer for a moment, but at Elizabeth’s second knock, they heard, “You may as well come in and hear the worst of it.” Elizabeth spared Jane a glance. Then, biting her lip, she pushed the door open.

Mr. Bennet raised his head from weary hands, his eyes bloodshot and posture stooped. “Lizzy… Jane.” He attempted and failed at an encouraging smile for his eldest daughters. “I am relieved to see your compassionate faces, at least amidst the turmoil out there. Please sit, though I fear I have little to offer besides empty hands.”

Elizabeth took the chair opposite her father as Jane perched beside her. The silver scattering his temples seemed so much more pronounced after even a fortnight away. Guilt and regret lined his face as deeply as grief.

He ran a trembling hand down his jaw. “Forgive me, girls—I’ve failed you all…”

“No, Papa.” Elizabeth reached across the desk to grasp her father’s other hand. “We must hope. Tell us, what did you learn in London?”

With a shuddering sigh, Mr. Bennet related the scant crumbs of intelligence gathered. Tracking the carriage bearing Lydia and this Mr. Wickham she had met in Brighton through several coaching inns… Hiring Gardiner’s private investigator to navigate London’s less savory districts without success… Long days pounding grimy streets and haunted nights plagued by visions of his youngest daughter’s peril and ruin…

Jane’s eyes shone with tears as he haltingly relayed it all. Even Elizabeth harbored little hope left untainted by dread after learning how thoroughly this man had disappeared into the urban labyrinth with her sister.

“…I confess my imagination torments me, supplying endless possibilities for why a scoundrel like Forster claims Wickham to be would run off with a gentleman’s fifteen-year-old daughter,” Mr. Bennet eventually finished in a bleak voice. “Would that I had been a better father…”

Elizabeth squeezed his hand. “The fault lies with the man’s wicked intentions… and Lydia’s own recklessness. We must not abandon hope.”

“Had I but put something by for you all! Then my most deserving daughters need not be without all hope of a respectable future!” He dropped his head into his hands, his fists tugging at the tufts of hair above his ears.

“Papa!” Elizabeth cried. “There must be something to be done. You said Uncle hired a private investigator. Surely, there is hope! Why…” she tugged her lower lip to the side of her teeth. “No one could hide Lydia for long. She is too loud.”

Her papa snorted, shaking his head. “Aye, and what I would give to hear her carrying on about her bonnet just now. Leave me, girls. Let me soak in my shame alone—I surely deserve it.”

Elizabeth sighed as she nodded. “Hill ought to have your tea ready soon, and then you must rest, Papa. Surely, we will have some word tomorrow.”

Yet despite her steadfast words, sick fear slithered in Elizabeth’s heart. What horrors could Lydia be facing now at this strange man’s mercy?

Are you ready to throw your Kindle at me yet? Hang on to your bonnets, because this is going to be a rocky ride! And I’m mean enough to make you wait until next time for more. If you want updates a little more on the fast-ish side, be sure to subscribe to my newsletter! They’ve already seen Chapter 2. 😉

Until next time! I hope you enjoy Mr. Darcy and the Girl Next Door!