"What are you looking for?"
I jumped when Madison appeared at my side but then took her hand and led her off through the crowd toward the back of the Harrington Estate ballroom.
"You," I hissed to my friend when we had emerged on the other side. "Where have you been? We separated to get ready hours ago."
"Ah yes, well, Benthem and I sort of... lost track of time," Madison answered, clearing her throat as a blush bloomed upon her round cheeks. I merely shook my head and ducked down out of the eye line of the man I had been avoiding all evening; Sir Thomas Abney.
The man seemed to have made it his personal mission to locate me at every event and I could see him now, neck craned above the crowd like a periscope as he searched the room for me.
"Ella, what are you doing?" Madison asked again.
"It's Sir Thomas," I answered. "He's been trying to get my attention all night. I've been doing my best to avoid him but he has a frightening amount of determination."
"Ah," Madison nodded in understanding, her keen green eyes searching the room for an escape. "Oh, I know! Your family is by the door. Well your mother and your brother, that is. They are greeting everyone with the Duke, making the necessary introductions."
"Yes, so?"
"So that's the highest concentration of people. The foot traffic over there is a nightmare. But you're part of the host family. If you were greeting everyone as well, then even if Sir Thomas saw you, he could not reasonably approach. It would be inappropriate."
I paused, eying the front of the room where my mother and brother stood arrayed in front of the Duke to make the necessary introductions, like a receiving line at a wedding.
"Genius!" I exclaimed, grabbing my friend's face and planting a kiss upon her forehead in my excitement for the plan. "I've missed you, Madison."
With that, I pushed through the crowd, giving Sir Thomas a wide berth on the other side of the room, and came upon the last in the line. The Duke himself. I settled myself in next to him and called out to the woman whose hand the Duke was releasing from his greeting.
"Lady Gwendolyn, your earrings are absolutely lovely. You must tell me where you found them," I burst eagerly. The Lady beamed at me and offered a greeting of her own and a promise to find me later to discuss my taste in jewels before she walked off into the ballroom and I was left with the feeling of eyes upon me to my left. I turned to see the Duke looking over at me, eyebrow raised and lips poised in a delicate smirk. I sighed. "What?"
"Are you to be part of my welcoming committee now?" He asked in a drawl.
"Is there a reason I shouldn't?" I snapped, regretting the state of my frayed nerves the moment I said it. But his smile merely broadened as he turned back to greet the next guest.
"Not at all," he answered under his breath and I exhaled in relief. Perhaps I would get away with this after all. One glance in Thomas' direction told me that the boy did not intend to follow me any further. Before I could turn back to the line, I heard the smooth, deep voice in my ear. "Who are you avoiding?"
I jumped and turned back to him, hand on my chest to still my beating heart.
"If you do that again, it'll be you I'm avoiding," I answered with a curse.
"Such language for a lady," he replied, that ever present smirk still plain upon his face. What was it about that which vexed me so? He fell serious as he glanced to the conversation with the next guest that my mother and brother seemed to be locked in, holding up the line for entrance. "Who is it?"
YOU ARE READING
Eventually Yours
Historical FictionA younger sister cannot wed before an older sister. It's a law of their society, a rule vehemently obeyed by prominent families in the nobility, and it's always been Ella Harrington's buffer. Ella has never been interested in marrying for anything...
