As Ryder responded with equal fondness and the exchange veered deeper into family concerns, Mary saw her chance and promptly moved to seize it; intending to quietly step back and with a polite curtsy to her ladyship slip away into the crowd—leaving Ryder stuck while she escaped to find Randolph—she started to ease back, only to discover that Ryder was, yet again, ahead of her.
Not that he paused in his exchange with Lady Maude, or gave the slightest sign that he knew what she was about.
But the long fingers he’d had the nerve to crook into her silk skirts curled and tightened, effectively anchoring her to his side.
He kept the hand trapping her skirts at the back of his thigh, out of Lady Maude’s sight, and with the crowd so tight-packed, it was unlikely anyone behind them would notice. . . .
Mary had to swallow the growl of sheer frustration that bubbled in her throat and continue to smile sweetly.
But she was now more determined than ever to pursue Randolph; one way or another, she would win through.
Her chance came immediately they’d taken leave of Lady Maude. As they turned back into the crowd, Lady Heskett and Lady Argyle, elegantly fashionable matrons of similar age to Ryder, pounced simultaneously—one from either side.
“Darling, I haven’t seen you in an age!” Lady Heskett swooped in, all but physically dislodging Mary from Ryder’s side.
Entirely willing to be dislodged, Mary slipped her hand from Ryder’s sleeve and gave way.
“Raventhorne.” Lady Argyle’s voice was a touch shriller and held a distinctly possessive note as she brazenly claimed Ryder’s other arm. “Where have you been hiding, my lord?”
For an instant, Ryder was fully occupied.
With a grin, Mary stepped back, whirled, and fled.
Plunging into the crowd, she tacked this way and that like a fox dodging hounds, then doubled back and took refuge near the archway leading to the withdrawing room.
She scanned the heads but saw no evidence of Ryder’s golden mane. She exhaled in relief. “Good. Now to find Randolph.”
Keeping a wary eye out for prowling lions, she edged around the ballroom. Predictably, Randolph’s circle was more or less where it had been before. She was about to step clear of the surrounding crowd and approach Randolph and his cronies once more when she saw Ryder lounging against the wall nearby, free of encumbering ladies and apparently idly chatting with another gentleman, but in reality watching and waiting.
She drew back, but the movement caught Ryder’s eye.
What followed was a sophisticated game of cat and mouse. Somewhat to her surprise, Ryder wasn’t merely intent on keeping her from Randolph; he pursued her as she twisted and turned, trying to lose him in the crowd. . . .
He was tall enough to easily keep track of her.
All too soon he was closing in, and a peculiar frisson of panic—delicious and expectant—flashed through her.
She gave herself no time to dwell on the strangeness of the feeling. There was only one way she could see of escaping. She hurried back to the archway into the corridor; pausing beneath the arch, she glanced back—and saw Ryder only yards away. Three people away.
His gaze locked with hers.
What she saw in his eyes made her lungs seize.
One part of her mind thought that was ridiculous, but the rest was wholly focused on one thing: Escaping.
Exactly what she was escaping, much less why, she didn’t know. She just had to do it.
On a breathless gasp, she swung away and plunged down the corridor, but instead of going into the withdrawing room, she rushed past and on. The long corridor ran the length of the ballroom and at the end turned a corner; whisking around it, she came to the door she’d known from previous visits was there. Dragging in a breath, calming her thudding heart, she raised her head; straightening, drawing her usual mantle of self-control firmly about her, she opened the door and stepped onto the terrace.