Page 32 of What's an Earl Gotta Do?
Oh, but what was she thinking? There was no point in deceiving herself. That was merely the reaction any young, healthy man would have, finding himself in such a position with any woman. It didn’t mean anything.
Yes, this should feel awkward. It should feel mortifying.
But Anne found that she felt none of those things. Instead, she was overwhelmed by a feeling of rightness, a feeling not dissimilar to the way she had felt when Michael rolled on top of her at that picnic all those years ago. It was as if this was an inevitable conclusion. As if the universe itself had conspired to throw them on top of each other, right here in this boat.
Almost as if they were meant to be together.
Gracious, she needed to stop thinking these ridiculous thoughts and get off him! She struggled to sit up, but only managed to lift her head, and to her horror, Michael immediately caught her eye.
Oh, sometimes it was a curse that she could read his every expression. She steeled herself to see his discomfiture, his disgust, his eagerness to disentangle himself.
Instead, she saw… adoration?
That couldn’t possibly be right.
Could it?
“Anne,” he whispered, and there was a rawness to his voice that made her tremble all the harder. And then his hand came up and framed her face, and he was tipping his head toward hers. Her arms were sliding up around his neck, her own lips were craning toward his, her eyes were squeezing shut, and—
“I say, is anybody in there?”
“Check the water, Robert.” A pair of voices, one male and one female, penetrated Anne’s brain as if through a dense fog. It was the woman who was now speaking. “This is where the scream came from, I’m sure of it. They must’ve fallen in.”
Suddenly Michael was looking at her with a regret so pure, it bordered on pain.
The woman continued, “Oh, how I hope they haven’t drowned! I don’t want to see a dead body.”
“No, look, Margaret! Someone’s there, in the boat. They’re, er, they’re lying down, and—oh my.”
That jolted Anne into action. She tried to scramble off Michael, but her foot slipped and she ended up collapsing back onto his chest.
“I’m sorry,” she called to the couple regarding them with their mouths set in identical grim lines. “It’s not what it seems. Our boat started to capsize, and we lost our balance!”
“Come away, Robert,” the woman said crisply. “I, for one, don’t want to witness this licentiousness.”
“Quite right, dear.” The man squinted as he began rowing away. “I say, isn’t that Lady Wynters?”
“Lady Wynters?” The woman raised a lorgnette to peer down her nose at Anne. “It can’t possibly be. Lady Wynters is the most respectable woman in all of London.”
“Well, she looks just like the woman in that cartoon…”
“Anne.” Michael punctuated her name with a gentle squeeze. She dragged her gaze back to his, and found his eyes were intense. “There’s something I need to ask you. Will you—”
“Yoo-hoo, anybody in there?”
This time, Anne’s attempt to scramble off Michael was more successful, and she managed to regain her seat. The person who had called out proved to be a milkmaid standing on the near bank, accompanied by her cow.
“Oh, good,” the milkmaid said brightly. “I heard somebody scream.”
“Yes,” Anne babbled, “we lost our balance for a moment, but everything’s fine, everything is just fine!”
At this point, Michael emerged from the bottom of the skiff looking rumpled, frustrated, and utterly delicious.
The milkmaid appeared to agree because she gave a low whistle. “Good for you,” she stage-whispered to Anne as she turned to lead her cow back to the meadow.
Michael was staring off into space, by all appearances unaware of his surroundings. Gracious, but this was awkward. Anne looked down and began adjusting her skirts.
That was when she noticed something in the bottom of the boat. Now that the skiff was still, she recognized it for what it was—a large black feather.
