Page 70 of A Treacherous Bet to Win a Duchess

She batted his arm, “Stop laughing! I had never ridden a horse before! So I was naturally very nervous.”

He cackled, “I know, but it was standing perfectly still when you made such a fuss about being scared and wanting to get off! Not even Cecilia was so bad.”

She crossed her arms, probably intending to appear infuriated, but ended up laughing along as well.

“So, Meredith, I suppose the next thing you are going to say is, ‘Where do we go from here?’”

“You have read my mind, Tony. To be honest, I have been wondering about it for several days now.”

He gave his chin several thoughtful taps.

“Perhaps it would be easier if we first ruled out everything that we are not. For example, we are not simply friends anymore, agreed?”

“Agreed. And we certainly are not engaged, for I most definitely would have remembered if you had asked me to marry you.”

“Quite. Then would it be fair to say that I am courting you?”

Meredith’s cheeks turned a sweet tint of pink. “I suppose so.”

He gently reached for her hand and laced their fingers together. As expected, his stomach was at once invaded by invisible butterflies—which had been visiting him several times a day over the course of the last few weeks.

He watched the gentle breeze blow strands of Meredith’s red hair out of place. And he knew for certain that no matter how long they were together, the butterflies would never cease to return.

“Out of curiosity, if I asked you to marry me, would you say yes?”

“I think I shall let you work out the answer.”

“All right.”

* * *

“So you don’t want to go out? Not even to a concert or to the theatre?”

Anthony shook his head.

“Thank you, old chaps, but I don’t feel up to it. You know I would much rather stay in.”

Day Fifty-four, the 11thof July, Anthony’s birthday. Colin and Kenneth were presently attempting to coax him into an intimate celebratory dinner between friends, to be followed by a night on the town. Kenneth had even brought his flute.

“You do this every year, you know,” Colin said from the couch.

“Do what?”

“Become the same age as Kenneth and me on July 11th. I think you’re just copying us,” he grinned. But his expression quickly changed to one of irritation.

“Kenny! Will you knock it off? I swear we are leaving that cursed flute behind if you aren’t capable of restraining yourself from playing it every two minutes.”

Kenneth narrowed his eyes from across the room.

“I’m playing a medley of songs which I have dedicated to Tony. But I suppose you wouldn’t know anything about sentimentality, Cole. Neither of you even bothered to play me a song whenIturned six-and-twenty,” he pouted.

Colin snatched the paperweight off of Anthony’s desk and hurled it at him.

“We planned an entire dinner party for you, you ungrateful dunce!”

Kenneth jumped out of the way just in time and the paperweight knocked over the fireplace poker and tongs.

“Oh, come on, you two! Now someone will have to clean that up.”