Kiss Me, Annabel

Page 15

A slow grin spread over his face. “But there must be a forfeit if this is to be a proper competition, Miss Essex.”
Rosseter intervened. “Of course there will be no forfeit. That would give it the coarse air of a public exhibition.”
“But you see,” Ardmore said, “we Scots are quite coarse.”
Annabel frowned at him. Rosseter clearly wasn’t entranced with her nationality, and she didn’t wish to remind him of it.
“The forfeit is a request,” Ardmore said. “A favor that can be demanded at any time and must be paid without question.”
“Miss Annabel has no need whatsoever to ask you for a favor,” Rosseter said, and now she could hear a thin disdain behind his well-bred tones.
“One never knows,” Ardmore said, selecting an arrow. “She has already made several requests of me, and of course I am always glad to help a countrywoman.”
Annabel fitted her own bow. Griselda was giggling and helping Ardmore draw on the archer’s glove handed to him. Naturally Rosseter just stood to the side as she drew on her own glove.
Suddenly there was a spray of those high, arching trumpets that Lady Mitford liked so much. “A contest!” shouted the trumpeter. “An archery contest commences at once!”
Rosseter’s thin nostrils flared as he stepped back. Annabel realized that he was really angry now. In fact, if she didn’t back out of the contest, he might simply stroll away in his elegant striped morning coat and dismiss the idea of marrying her. That was likely how he had remained single all these years.
In a moment they had an audience, a circle of women in fluttering dresses of white and pink, a sprinkling of gentlemen with admiring eyes. Ardmore drew back his bow and let it fly. Annabel suddenly realized that drawing back her bow would make her breasts push forward in an unseemly manner. She glanced at Rosseter. He was still there, waiting for her to make a decision. Didn’t it bode well for their marriage that the two of them had no need to exchange a word to know precisely what the other was thinking?
She moved forward to take her shot.
“It appears you didn’t quite hit the target,” she said to the Scot, allowing just a trace of regret to deepen her voice.
He squinted at it. “It looks good to me.”
“Hmmm.” She drew back her bow and paused for a moment, looking for that black spot in the center of her target. Then she let fly and the arrow flew like a bird to its nest. She smiled and glanced up at her opponent. He wasn’t looking at her target, but at her, and he looked a bit distracted. She glanced down. She had felt her gown strain over her chest when she drew back; after all, such light muslin wasn’t designed for sport.
Rosseter was still there, his mouth thin with distaste. Apparently he had decided to give her a second chance.
The attendant hurried over to the targets, his yellow tights flashing in the sun. He stooped next to her target and then rose. “Miss Essex wins!” he cried.
“Second,” Ardmore said, drawing back his bow again.
It was a good shot; Annabel had to give him that. But he was holding his elbow just a fraction of an inch too high in the air. Sure enough, to her eyes the arrow was slightly off target, although he turned to her with a smile that suggested he thought it was square.
“I have heard that spectacles can be quite helpful as one grows older,” she said to him sweetly. She drew back her arrow and let it fly immediately. Truly, she had chosen a target that was too easy.
There was quite a cheer when the attendant announced the winner of that round.
But when she looked at Ardmore and thought to see him showing the strain of competition, or even a flash of competitive spirit, he was just laughing. “No matter how this attempt goes, you’ve won my forfeit. I believe my mistake was in not allowing you to go before me.”
“That would have been more polite,” Rosseter put in.
Ardmore bowed and motioned to her.
She moved forward, aware of the two men watching her intently. She shook her curls back over her shoulders; they could be distracting. Then she pulled the bow back, slowly, slowly. She could feel her breasts coming forward and up, straining from the bodice of her muslin gown. Finally she let the arrow slip and it sailed home. It was slightly off its target because she’d held the arrow too long.
Ardmore took her place. He drew back the bow just as slowly as she had. Broad shoulders flexed, and he flashed a glance at her. His eyes were almost—almost—guileless, but not quite. She nearly burst out laughing but instead she gave him a delicious smile, one of her very best. For a moment he looked as if he’d been clopped in the forehead. She stepped back. Unless she’d missed her bet, he had held that arrow too long, and his elbow was jutting high again.
Sure enough, he missed the target altogether.
Lady Mitford popped up in front of them, beaming happily. “I do so love it when my guests fall into the spirit of the times!” she trilled. “Now Lord Mitford and I have a most lovely surprise for the two of you.”
She beckoned wildly with her arm and a flower covered pony cart came into view, being dragged along by two miserable-looking donkeys. Flowers had been woven into their manes and tucked behind their ears.
“You shall be the King and Queen of May!” Lady Mitford said happily. “Of course, it isn’t quite May yet, but we thought this was so appropriate to our festival. Lord Mitford and I had planned to be the king and queen ourselves, but since the two of you entered so fully into the spirit of the day, we looked at each other and with one breath, we decided to crown you instead!”
Griselda was laughing and clapping her hands, so Lady Mitford’s suggestion must be acceptable from a chaperone’s point of view. Annabel hesitated but Ardmore took the decision from her. Without pausing to ask her, he put his hands around her waist and swung her into the pony cart. She gasped but the next second he was in the seat next to her, and the trumpets were blowing again. Lady Mitford handed up a wreath of flowers.
“You must do it,” Ardmore said to her, sotto voce. “Look how happy it’s making her!”
Surely enough, Lady Mitford was cackling with pleasure.
“There’s something wrong, though,” Ardmore said. He narrowed his eyes. “You don’t look exactly right.” Suddenly his hand darted out and with an unerring touch he pulled three hairpins from her hair.
Annabel gasped. Her hair fell down around her shoulders, rolls of soft golden curls that had taken her maid a full hour to pin to her head. “How dare you!” she said, looking up at him.
But he was settling the wreath of white flowers back on her head. “Hush,” he said. “You’re a queen.”
His thigh brushed against hers as the donkeys started off with a jerk around the garden.
“This is so humiliating,” she hissed at him.
But he was grinning broadly. They began a circuit of the garden, Annabel smiling at all the guests and silently cursing her companion. Lord Rosseter looked up at the cart and then turned away. Annabel added a particularly virulent curse to her silent tirade. But actually, she wasn’t terribly worried about Rosseter. He would come back, if she wished him to. Or he wouldn’t, and she’d find someone else. His censoriousness was a bit worrying.
Then they were back at the beginning, and Lady Mitford was begging to send the cart around the back of the house. “It’s just to show the household. They all take such interest in our little Renaissance festival, bless their hearts. I know they’d want to see the king and queen.”