“I didn’t.”
“You did.”
“What were we? Eight?”
“You do remember.” She was surprised. “I was six.”
“Ah, a time of tender feelings.”
“It was my best dress.”
“Clarissa, boys laugh at everything. I mean you stood up and you were black with mud from head to toe and a funny sight. I also remember I wasn’t the only one who laughed.”
He was right. Now, with him bringing the memory alive, she could recall there were several other children around.
But he’d been the only one who had mattered.
Mars leaned toward her, arching his long body around Dora. “Will you forgive me?”
He was so close. If she leaned forward, she could kiss him. She felt herself blush with the thought and he immediately leaned back as if he might have upset her.
Clarissa sat up. “I don’t bear grudges,” she said, thinking perhaps he thought she was angry.
“No, you just remembered a day almost two decades ago, isn’t that right, Dora?”
The baby made a squeal as if she agreed.
“I wasn’t even thinking about the mud day,” she said in her defense. “At least, not just then.” But she had nursed the memory of her wounded pride.
His gaze strayed to her lips as if he had truly known her thoughts, but then he rose to his feet. “We should be heading back.” He picked up the baby and offered a hand to her.
Clarissa put her palm in his. He lifted her to her feet as if she weighed nothing. They packed up the remnants of their picnic. He placed a yawning Dora back into the sling and helped Clarissa mount. She noticed he didn’t touch her any more than necessary in helping her.
Adjusting her skirts and her seat, she took the reins from him and had to confess, “I mean,I did hold a grudge against you because of the past.”
He looked up at her. It wasn’t often she was taller than him. “Why? Certainly not because of a childhood incident?”
Clarissa swallowed, seeing her own culpability. “Maybe.”
He nodded, accepting that one word. He moved to his horse and mounted, giving great care to Dora... and Clarissa realized she’d perhaps always been wrong about him.
Not about his arrogance. He was arrogant.
But he wasn’t callous. He also wasn’t completely selfish. Although he could be rude.
They started riding back to the house. He began giving her a description of the land beyond what she’d seen.
She listened, but her thoughts were on what he’d said. She’d always valued the truth and now wondered what to do when the honesty made her sound petty.
At last she couldn’t take it any longer, she said, “You never danced with me at the Cotillions.” The Cotillion was Maidenshop’s most important village dance. From the time she’d been sixteen, the earl had always attended. “You danced with everyone else,” she had to add.
He halted his horse. “We never danced?”
“Not until yesterday. I always had the feeling that you avoided me and, well, you made that comment the other day about my being a matron-in-training.”
He sat a moment, his expression stoic, andthen he said, “I remember you sitting with the matrons when you first attended.”
“The Taylors were ill. They insisted I attend... but I didn’t dance with anyone. It would have been unseemly.”
