I rolled my eyes as he carefully placed them back inside their secret pocket. “I do not have disease, Graham.”
I realized my informal slip a second too late, but Graham did not miss a beat.
“Let’s hope not,Anna.”
My name in that low voice of his felt like a trap—too sweet and somehow beguiling. I slapped my hands on my thighs. “Well, as delightful as conversation with you is, I think I shall engage with your sister for a time.” I straightened, then pushed myself to my feet.
ChapterEleven
Graham
That was the strangest thing I’d ever witnessed. Anna Lane wearing my spectacles. I looked at the skies, half awaiting them to turn completely black or for stars to start falling. Perhaps even the sun would turn red.
But nothing happened.
My spectacles weighed heavily in my pocket. No matter that I’d wiped them clean, she’d touched them, worn them. And it was strange. Even though she was Anna Lane, she was still a beautiful woman, and the familiarity she’d shown me was uncharacteristic, at least according to how she usually treated me.
But what she’d said about us hating each other, about how ingenuine we were with each other ... I’d hardly believed her words. I’d known she didn’t like me, though Ihadwondered why. But to hear, to see, how much Ibotheredher was more than the exchange of fiery words. This was deeply rooted within her, and to be the cause of it was unsettling, to say the least.
Over the years, Mr. Lane had taught me how to speak to people, how to put them at ease, how to compliment them, charm them, convince them to trust me. Connecting withpeople was part of investing. I’d always felt so at home with him, I’d never had toworkto connect with him. I could always be myself. Unless Anna was around.
Of late, she darkened every room. Always shooting witty retorts to trip me up, make me feel unliked and unwanted. Who could charm their way out of that?
Cunning, calculated, cross.Thatwas Anna Lane.
But everything she’d just said, how ridiculous she’d let herself look with my spectacles on ... Was that girl—that outspoken, teasing woman—who shereallywas?
She’d stood up and was walking toward Tabs on the rocky shore as though nothing in the world bothered her. There was no rigidness to her shoulders. No heaviness to her step.
How could I keep her that way—as content as Mr. Lane had asked for? She did not want me to engage her with business matters. What could I do? By the end of this week, I needed Anna to love Brighton enough to approve of her father investing with me. But I also needed to succeed on Anna’s terms.
Mr. Lane expected details, information, numbers. But Anna did not need those things. She already knew her father had agreed with my assessment. She sought an experience. One that might rival her childhood travels to Lyme. How could I give her that?
Anna and Tabs were standing at the edge of the shoreline, water lapping up on the rocks by their feet. Tabs pointed down, and Anna looked back at a large boulder nearby. The two walked over and sat down together, and Anna started tugging off her slippers.
I bolted to my feet, gesturing for my servants to clean thepicnic, and paced to the boulder. “Anna,” I started, and Tabs gave me a mean look.
“MissLane,” she corrected. The little urchin.
Anna’s grin split her face. She looked up at me, considered for a beat, then said, “He has permission.For now.”
Tabs turned her back on me, and Anna added, “We are just dipping our toes in,Graham. Do not fret.”
I liked the sound of my name much less when she was annoyed with me. “I most certainly will fret. Your father has entrusted me with your protection. These rocks are too unstable. You might slip, and if you do—”
“You will be right behind me, I am sure. My knight in shining armor come to save me.”
She gave me a look full of sarcasm, but decidedly lacking in disdain, and I stood still, completely unsure of everything. She deposited her folded stockings on top of her shoes, which were set together on the boulder. Then she reached out her hand to Tabs, who grinned and took it.
“Can we take off our hats?” Tabs asked innocently.
I furrowed my brow. “Absolutely n—”
“Of course!” Anna said over me, reaching to unpin her own. “Just for a small time, though. We wouldn’t wish to burn.”
I spun around in place. The servants were working, but the three of us were otherwise quite alone. The last thing I needed was a rumor traveling about town for Mr. Lane to hear upon his return.
Anna stepped forward, unsteady despite Tabs holding fast to her side to balance her. Her foot was so small and smooth. So strangelyintimate. And her smile stretched from ear to ear.This was her childhood, I realized. And she was experiencing it all over again but in a new way.
