Page 35 of Her Duke Next Door
Then he was too close, his face looming toward her, his mouth parting.
Bile rose in Mary’s throat as she pushed against him. He laughed threateningly. “You cannot evade me, Mary. I am everywhere you go. Think of your daughter. Surely you want to ensure her safety? I am sure she will stop ignoring you eventually and come to think of me as her new father.”
He dropped his face closer to hers but Mary gave into her fear and kicked out with her heeled foot, landing her blow right into his calf. Hugh yelped and she did not waste a second in seizing her chance to flee even as he moved to grab her. Mary ran out of the room, slamming the door closed behind her, pushing a chair underneath the handle.
It looked too out of place, so somebody was bound to move it any moment, but it would buy her a few more moments to put distance between her and Hugh.
Her chest heaving with breathlessness and fear, she tore off toward the ballroom again, only to slam into a body coming toward her. Strong arms held her, hands gripping her upper arms to still her struggling.
“Lady Yore?”
The voice belonged to the Duke of Livingston.
ChapterEleven
“Lady Yore?”
Dominique had promised himself that he would ignore Mary but at the sight of her being pulled out of the ballroom, something had been amiss and he had not been able to shake it off. He had followed her, only to find her jamming a chair beneath the handle of a door.
“Your Grace,” she gasped. “I—I, ah, I just found myself flushing in the ballroom. It is rather hot in there!”
“Lady Yore,” he said again, fixing her with a gaze that he hoped would convey much more than he could muster.Don’t lie to me, he wanted to say. “I can see that you are frazzled.”
“It is only the champagne,” she insisted but her eyes darted around them and her body startled with every small noise around them. Dominique had not let go of her arms. Instead, he slid his hands lower down her arms to hold her wrists.
But he saw right through her.
“Come with me,” he said, not offering an option for her to decline. “I can get you out of here.”
“No, I cannot?—”
“I insist,” he said sharply. “Come with me, my lady.”
His fingers danced over hers before he pulled away. Behind his back, he closed his fingers into a fist, recollecting the feel of her fingertips against his every time he had been fortunate to touch her hand.
Her brow pinched and she parted her lips as if to decline.
“I could do with some fresh air myself,” he said and strode past her, turning to her, offering his arm. “Shall we?”
After a moment’s hesitation, she slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow. Leading her away from the ballroom, he found a side entrance to the spacious gardens.
Mary cast him a curious glance. In the dim lanterns outside, and the candlelight coming from the house, she looked softer, younger, as though the years that tried to wither her down when she stood next to Hugh finally disappeared.
She did not smile at him. Instead, she averted her gaze, and her shoulders pulled inwards.
“How do you know where we could escape?” she asked as they strolled through the shadows. It felt like their own secret, avoiding lingering in the windows, dancing from one puddle of shadow to the next, almost a dance of their own.
“I was good friends with the host of this house in Eton,” Dominique told her. “We have remained connected ever since.”
“So you were invited to this ball tonight?”
He smirked. “Did you think me a party crasher, my lady?”
She laughed, a small sound that was weaker than he would have liked. “No. I merely thought you were a recluse in the countryside, like… Well—I did enjoy my own peace out there.”
“You must miss it.”
For a moment, it appeared as though she might admit it but then a steel strength came over her face as she shook her head.
