Chapter Text
The first time Gigi hears Lizzie Bennet's name is at Thanksgiving dinner. Fitz is in the middle of a story about Aunt Cathy and a recent meeting with Pemberley Digital's major investors.
"I wish I could do Catherine justice. She was at her finest, I am telling you. Lizzie B. would have had a field day."
All conversation around the table stops. William, who had been carefully chewing Caroline's stuffing, sets down his fork abruptly with a sharp clang. Caroline clears her throat loudly and glares at Fitz.
"More wine, Darcy?"
Fitz looks abashed and changes the subject immediately, asking Brandon to tell the group about the new environmentally sustainable building project his firm is working on, but Gigi's eyes are fixed on her older brother. William accepts more wine from their hostess with barely a nod. The color drained from his face at Fitz's previous comment, and now there are bright red patches high on his cheeks.
If they were alone, Gigi would pounce on the topic and push until she got an answer, but she senses that any questioning now would force William into terser and more taciturn responses. So she keeps quiet and bides her time.
She forgets about Lizzie for a week or so. The end of the semester is coming on fast and she has tests to study for and papers to revise. But when Caroline invites her out for hot chocolate and a study break one afternoon, the memory comes roaring back. And if anyone can be counted on to know everything worth gossiping about, it's Caroline Lee.
The question is, will she talk? Caroline's reaction was almost as severe as William's, and if there is a girl involved...well, Caroline's feelings for William have been an open secret for years. Catherine DeBourgh often says that the two are made for each other, so alike in stature and manner, but Gigi disagrees. Their sameness makes them indescribably ill-suited for one another. They make a handsome couple, and Gigi knows her brother uses Caroline, with her stinging wit and cool charm, like a safety blanket in uncomfortable or unfamiliar settings, but there is no spark there, no heat.
Gigi also knows that Caroline would disagree with that assessment. So she approaches the subject of Lizzie Bennet (for she has discovered, through careful Twitter stalking, that B does stand for Bennet) with the cunning and skill of a master spy.
She gets her chocolate and Caroline gets a low-fat skim mocha latte, and they find a seat in the packed coffee shop. Caroline looks around and wrinkles her nose.
"I do not miss this part of college. So many smelly, hungover college students crowded into so many tiny spaces."
Gigi smiles into her hot chocolate. "I highly doubt you ever studied with the masses. You probably had some super secret vault with test answers and fifty years of course outlines in file cabinets."
Caroline raises her eyebrows and gives her very best mysterious smile. "I'll never tell."
"I'm so ready to be done. William has our ski passes waiting for us in Tahoe. He's going to go ahead and get the house ready, and after my last final I'm taking the first flight out and not looking back."
At this, Caroline purses her lips. "You have a housekeeper, you know. He shouldn't do that himself."
Gigi shrugs. "Most of the time he doesn't. But Christmas is our time, you know? Just the two of us."
She's skirting dangerous territory now, and the expression on her companion's face is as close to wistful as it ever gets.
"Hey, Caroline, can I ask you something?"
The wistfulness evaporates. "Anything, Gigi. You know that."
And this is where she takes her big gamble: puts all her cards on the table. She's been putting the pieces together, and she's already got what she thinks is the outline of a story. Caroline knows Lizzie, and so does Fitz, but not from L.A. This information, combined with the frenetic pace that William has been working since the beginning of November, hints at a tantalizing tale.
"When you went to see Aunt Cathy in October, you know, um, right around the same time as William and Fitz were doing some consulting work for her?"
There's a flicker in Caroline's eye, but her polite smile does not waver.
"Yes?"
"Did you notice anything odd going on? Between my brother and...Lizzie Bennet?"
She tries to drop the name casually, like she says it all the time, like who doesn't know Lizzie? It doesn't quite go like she planned, however, because Caroline smile is now a smirk and she's got that look. The look that says, I know what you're playing at, little girl, and don't even try. I invented this game.
"There is absolutely nothing, odd or otherwise, going on between your brother and Lizzie Bennet."
The most fascinating thing about this statement is the force and certainty with which Caroline utters it.
Gigi is forced to abandon the Mystery of Lizzie Bennet until after her finals are complete. She tries once, half-heartedly, to get some information out of Fitz, but all he'll say is, "Oh, no. I am not going near that situation with a ten-foot pole. Sorry, Gigi D, I am in enough trouble. Leave me out of it."
She's out of options. Well, technically Bing is an option, but he's not exactly suited for subterfuge. Straight to the source it is: William must be made to tell all. And with a week's vacation over the Christmas holiday, stuck alone with his inquisitive and tenacious little sister in a cabin in the mountains, he won't be able to avoid it.
At least, not for long.