Page 32 of Dancing On Air

“I-I’m sorry,” he said softly, feeling as if he had no right to kiss a noblewoman. Not anymore. “I just got caught up in the moment.”

“Don’t be sorry. I liked it and wanted it just as much as you did.” A wide smile spread across her face.

“I have wanted to kiss you for what seems like forever, Eleanor. But now that I did, I know it’s not right. We shouldn’t have kissed at all.”

“Don’t say that,” she told him. “It’s not right that we are no longer betrothed.”

“Nothing can happen because of this.”

“All we’re doing is picking apples. Now stop all the worrying and help me get that red one right up there. It’s too high for me to reach it.” She looked over at him playfully. “Will you pick me up?”

“I know what you’re doing, Eleanor. It’ll only prolong the agony for both of us.”

“Just shut up and pick up me so I can reach the apple.”

That actually made him laugh aloud. “I guess you really have changed. The Eleanor I remember never would tell a man to shut up.”

“The Eleanor you remember is gone and the new one is more determined than ever to get back the man she’s always loved, and lost.”

“Loved? Do you mean that?”

“I do,” she told him. “I think these years apart have only made me realize how much I really care for you. I wish we could be married, like we were once supposed to be.”

“I know what you mean,” said Connor. “I think about it every damned day.” The wind blew a stray strand of her hair across her face, and he boldly reached out and tucked it behind her ear. Then he kissed her once more, wrapping his hands around her waist and picking her up high over his head.

She squealed and laughed, holding on to his broad shoulders.

“Pick the apple. It’s right over your head,” he told her. “I promise I won’t drop you.”

She did pick the apple, and when he put her down their eyes interlocked. Connor felt like that young boy again, for a moment in his life all his troubles dissolving when Eleanor smiled at him. He half expected her to start singing, taking his hand and running through the field. But of course, that was naught but a memory of the past, and it didn’t happen. It would never happen again.

“You realize today has been our first kiss,” she told him.

“I know,” he answered, staring at her mouth. “You don’t know how many times in the past I had thought about it and planned it. I think waiting all this time has only made the kiss even better than I had ever imagined it would be.”

“Me too.” She boldly kissed him again, then took a bite of the apple. Holding it up to his mouth, she offered it to him, and he took a bite as well.

“Eleanor, if things had worked out, we’d be married by now,” he told her. “I’d be a knight and you’d be my wife. We might live in a manor house and even have our own orchard.”

“And lots of babies.”

“Yes,” he said, swallowing hard, feeling his emotions welling up within him.

“I’d like that,” she said. “And I will never give up hope that it will someday still happen.”

“What the hell are we doing?” He shook his head and ran a hand through his hair.

“We’re entitled to dream,” she told him.

“Are we?” he asked. “Because somehow, I feel like it’s wrong to dream. So very wrong.”

“Let’s not ruin the mood, Connor. Now, help me pick the apples so you can get them home to feed your family.” She reached up and started picking apples from the tree.

“Why are you so good to me, Eleanor? Everyone else is repulsed by me and my family.”

“I intend to treat you no differently than if you were a knight.”

“Then you’re in for a lot of disappointment, because I can no longer be your knight in shining armor, even if it’s the only thing I really want in life right now. God’s eyes, all I want to do is to protect you and care for you. Yet here you are, taking care of me instead.”