Page 17 of What's an Earl Gotta Do?
They packed their weapons away and started toward the stables.
“You must be glad to have Morsley back,” Edward said.
“Of course,” Anne replied. “His return was a wonderful surprise.”
“And his timing is… fortuitous,” Edward added.
Anne peered up at him, brow furrowed. “Fortuitous? How so?”
“It’s just that, well, you’re looking for a husband, and he is unwed,” Edward said. “You two get on so well together. Have you never considered that you might...”
Anne laughed. “Oh, no! That is to say, certainly Michael has every quality I would seek in a husband.” She looked down. “But I know he doesn’t think of me in that way.”
She caught Edward and Harrington exchanging a look. Edward cleared his throat. “What makes you say that?”
“Oh,” Anne said, feeling heat rising to her cheeks, “it’s nothing.”
There were a few beats of silence, then Harrington said, “It doesn’t look like nothing.”
Anne waved him off. “Just something he once said.”
“And that would be?” Edward pressed.
Anne cringed. How could she describe that horrifically awkward encounter? She had never told anyone about it. But it appeared her brothers were not about to let it go. “It was the last day of summer,” she began haltingly. “I remember you were heading off to Oxford, Harrington, so Michael and I would have been fifteen. We were having a picnic over by Cranfield Castle, and… um... my bonnet started to blow away, and we both reached for it, and we somehow ended up in an... an awkward position.”
The last part was a lie, but she could hardly tell them the truth—that she and Michael had been teasing each other, and for reasons Anne still could not understand to this day, she had reached out and started tickling him. And then he had started tickling her back, and they had started rolling around on the picnic blanket and somehow Michael had wound up lying on top of her.
No, clearly she couldn’t tell her brothers that.
They reached the stables. A groom was already leading Anne’s mare out, so she headed toward the mounting block.
Edward’s brow was wrinkled. “So, you both reached for your bonnet. Did you bump heads or—”
“Yes!” Anne lied.
“And what happened next?” Edward asked.
It felt like her cheeks were on fire. “He apologized and made sure I understood that he had not meant for it to happen. That he was not interested in me in that way. And that he never would be,” she added in a small voice.
She swallowed thickly, recalling her mortification. Looking back, she could not fathom what had possessed her to touch him in such an inappropriate manner. Of course, having grown up together, Anne had felt comfortable with Michael in a way she could never have imagined being with another boy. How many times had they boosted each other over a fence, or pulled each other into a tree? Gracious, after Michael’s mother died when they were nine, he’d spent hours just lying there with his head in her lap. They had even tickled each other before, but it had been altogether different when they were both seven. At fifteen, she should’ve known better.
But it was the strangest thing—although tickling him was entirely out of character for her, at the time it had felt so... natural. Even when they started rolling around, and he wound up on top of her, she... hadn’t minded.
Be honest, Anne. You thought he was going to kiss you.
She’d even closed her eyes.
But instead of kissing her, Michael had scrambled off her. She could still picture him sitting on the blanket, knees to his chest, his back to her.
That was when he said it.
“I’m so sorry, Anne.”
She pushed herself up to sitting. “It’s all right, Michael.”
“I did not mean for that to happen,” he continued, still refusing to look at her.
“I—I see.” She started to redo her braid, which had come undone in their tussle.
