by Penny Jordan
‘We’ll leave our jackets in my office,’ Jennifer told her. ‘The cloakroom’s only small and it will be crowded.’ Jennifer’s office was a bare room at the end of a long corridor, and Heather was familiar with it from previous visits. She took off her jacket, hanging it in the small cupboard, waiting patiently while Jennifer checked her make-up without even looking at her own.
‘Okay, that’s it,’ Jennifer announced when she had finished applying her lipstick. ‘I warned Terry to save us a table and I told him what time we were arriving, so with a bit of luck he should have got us drinks.’
Heather knew Terry Brady quite well. Jennifer had flitted from man to man like a bee in search of honey until she met Terry, with whom she swore she had fallen in love at first sight. At the moment she wasn’t sure whether he returned her feelings, but she was determined to give him every opportunity to find out.
The moment they entered the crowded studio which was being used for the party Heather spotted Terry. He was sitting at a table with another man, his fair head turned towards him. As though he knew they were there his companion lifted his head and looked towards them, his eyes riveted on Heather’s face. For some reason she was consumed by a wave of heat, burning slowly up her body, leaving her feeling as though she had been completely robbed of energy. Although he was too far away for her to study properly, Heather had a vivid impression of darkly male features; a face stamped with arrogance and masculinity, dark hair growing low over a white shirt collar, lean brown hands and the shocking and inescapable feeling that he had just slowly and thoroughly removed her clothes arid then caressed every inch of the skin he had revealed.
‘Can you see Terry?’ Jennifer asked her, standing on tiptoe.
‘No, but I have seen someone I want to talk to, an old friend,’ she fibbed. ‘Look, why don’t you go and look for Terry, and then I’ll come and find you later.’
Jennifer squirmed uncomfortably. ‘I wish you’d come with me,’ she protested, adding hurriedly, ‘Well, Race asked Terry if you were coming, and he suggested we make up a foursome. They’ll be waiting for us, and….’
‘I thought you’d just warned me against him?’ Heather reminded her cousin wryly.
‘Against trying to make a fool of him,’ Jennifer shot back. ‘Look, he only wants to meet you….’
‘To meet me, presumably as a prelude to bedding me,’ Heather agreed bluntly. ‘Look, I’m sorry if it embarrasses you, but I’m not going to be manipulated. I’ll join you later when I’ve spoken to Donna.’
So Race Williams wanted to meet her, did he? Her heart contracted on a fierce wave of anger as she remembered the look Terry’s companion had given her. He had to be Race Williams, she was sure of it, and equally sure that there was no way she was going to be manoeuvred into spending the evening with him. If he wanted her, then let him find out the hard way, as others had done before him, that he was going to have to work hard at trying to get her. And he did want her—she had seen it in the look he gave her. It had been ferrociously sexual, and not simply sexual, there had been a hint of possession which sent fear coiling along her spine, even while she shrugged it aside. Heavens, there was nothing to be afraid of, he represented nothing she couldn’t handle, just as she had handled men like him before.
Eventually Jennifer left, plainly none too happy about doing so, and Heather was free to walk in the direction of the bar. She was stopped half a dozen times by people who recognised her, all of them male, and she parried their questions and compliments with her cool, languorous smile, never realising that the languor beneath the ice was what fired their blood, and excited their masculinity.
From the vantage point of her height she was able to see Terry’s table relatively clearly, although she took good care to study it discreetly. Race Williams had his back to her. She watched him stand up as Jennifer approached, Terry frowning slightly and then glancing around the room.
Poor Terry—she hoped her non-appearance wouldn’t count as a black mark against him. She had already decided that she was going to leave just as soon as she could order a taxi, unwilling as yet to analyse the instinct for flight rather than fight.
As she watched Heather saw Race Williams get up and disappear, presumably going to the bar, and she let out the breath she hadn’t realised she was holding. Now was her opportunity to make her escape. Escape? She was being rather dramatic, wasn’t she?
She found the corridor leading to Jennifer’s office without too much difficulty, not bothering to switch on the light as she walked inside. She was just reaching for her jacket when the hairs on the back of her neck prickled warningly and she swung round, her heart thudding as she found herself confronted by the very man she wanted to avoid.
He was taller than she had imagined, six four at least, arms folded across his chest, his lean body completely at ease as he rested against the door, blocking her exit.
‘Leaving already?’ he drawled.
‘I have a headache,’ she smiled, keeping her voice even and pleasant. ‘I’m sorry,’ she added, deliberately casual, ‘I don’t believe we’ve met….’
He snapped on the light, almost blinding her with its brilliance, his mouth creasing into a humourless smile as he drawled mockingly, ‘Nice try, Heather, but it won’t work. You know who I am, just as I know who you are. Terry’s told me a good deal about you.’
‘Terry?’
‘Umm, I asked him. You see, I’ve been wanting to meet you for quite a long time. You’re a very beautiful woman,’ he added softly, ‘and extremely desirable…. I’d very much like to go to bed with you.’
Heather hid the anger she could feel boiling up inside her.
‘But then you already know that, don’t you?’ Race Williams continued in a smokily seductive voice. ‘You knew that the moment you saw me tonight. What I don’t understand is why that knowledge made you run away from me. Because you are running, aren’t you?’ He laughed softly when she didn’t answer. ‘You’re giving me a psychological advantage, Heather. Why are you frightened of me?’
‘I’m not,’ Heather retorted coolly, gathering her scattered wits, ‘and neither am I running.’
‘Then come back to the studio and dance with me. Something tells me we’d move very well together, you and I.’
She forced herself not to acknowledge the sexual undertones of his comment.
‘I hear you’re in the running for the Rio contract,’ he commented, suddenly changing the subject, relaxing the sexual pressure, she recognised suspiciously, wondering at the change in tactics. ‘Do you want the contract?’
She raised her eyebrows. ‘Of course. If I didn’t I wouldn’t be in the running, as you put it, would I?’
‘And you’re hot favourite to get it. I can see why, but the competition is pretty tough. I hear you’re also a writer.’
Heather’s eyes hardened. Damn Jennifer and her careless tongue! She hated anyone knowing about her writing. The family knew, of course, but that was all. She had been a dreamy adolescent when she first knew she wanted to write, and the urge had never left her.
‘I’m interested in lots of things,’ was her careful answer, but she wished she hadn’t given it, when he agreed laconically.
‘My sex being one of them, so I hear. You go through men like other women go through pairs of tights.’
‘Perhaps I’m choosy.’
‘Then choose me.’ Suddenly he had closed the distance between them, and she was intimately aware of the heat coming off his body, the desire glittering in the dark grey eyes as they roamed restlessly over her. Fear knifed through her, a sharp throat-gagging fear she had never experienced before and which held her motionless as his hands slid down her shoulders, exploring the shape and texture of her back, forcing her against the unwanted intimacy of his body, making her burningly aware of the power and maleness of him, her mind fastidiously outraged by the pulsating hardness of his body when his hands gripped her hips. She shouldn’t have come here, she should have made sure he hadn’t seen
her leave the studio. Here they were alone and there was no way she could fight him.
‘I want you, Heather.’ Race Williams kept on saying it as though saying the words reinforced his belief that he had every right to take what he wanted. Heather could feel her body tensing, recoiling from his, fear coiling through her stomach, acrid on her tongue. He bent his head and she knew he was going to kiss her.
She forced her body to relax, wrenching herself out of his arms as he relaxed his grip, and snatching up her coat, turned for the door.
‘Well, I don’t want you!’ she told him furiously, cool disparagement forgotten as rage flicked through her veins. How dared he assume that she was his simply for the taking, that he could state his desire and blandly assume she would assauge it! ‘Men like you make me sick,’ she told him in a low voice, the pent-up loathing of years thickening it until it was only a husky whisper, her eyes emerald in her pale face. ‘If you want a toy to play with, go buy yourself a Barbie doll! I’m fussy about the men who share my life.’
‘That wasn’t the way I heard it.’ They faced one another like two antagonists. Heather could see the rage simmering in the molten heat of his eyes sharpened by sexual frustration, the intensity of his emotions half frightening her as she watched him, wary as any animal scenting the hunter.
‘I want you,’ he repeated thickly, ‘and I damn well mean to have you….’
‘Never!’ The denial was out before she could silence it, lying between them like a gage, anger and frustration mingling in his expression, his chest rising and falling as though he had been running. Without pausing to think Heather turned, running down the corridor and out into the foyer, pressing the button for the lift. Jennifer would wonder what had happened to her, but she would just have to wonder. She glanced over her shoulder half expecting to find that Race had followed her, but there was no sign of him. He was probably still trying to come to terms with the blow she had just dealt his mammoth self-esteem.
She could hardly believe he was real, she thought, mentally re-living their conversation. Had he actually thought all he had to do was say he wanted her for her to fall into his arms? Was that what normally happened? There was a raw maleness about him that some women might find appealing, an overt sexuality that she found totally repelling, frightening almost, but that other women might enjoy. His arrogant assumption that she was his simply for the asking still had the power to stun her. She had met some self-assured men in her time, but they had nothing on him. No wonder Jennifer had warned her against him!
Well, she needn’t worry, Heather thought grimly as she got out of the lift and asked the commissionaire to get her a taxi. There was simply no way she was ever going to get within a mile of Race Williams knowingly again.
He had frightened her—she could admit that from the sanctuary of her taxi. His determination had overwhelmed her, threatening all her carefully erected barriers. He wasn’t a man she could lead on and then drop, he wouldn’t stand by and let her dismiss him.
She was in bed but awake when Jennifer came in, and called out to her. Jennifer looked defensive and slightly guilty when she walked in.
‘I’m sorry,’ she apologised without Heather having to speak, ‘but he made Terry promise to introduce you to him. He was furious when I turned up without you. He went looking for you.’
‘And found me,’ Heather told her grimly. ‘It’s high time someone taught Mr Race Williams that he can’t get everything he wants simply by demanding it. Relax,’ she added when she saw Jennifer’s face, ‘I value my skin far too much to try it.’
‘He wants you, Heather,’ Jennifer told her uneasily, ‘and he won’t let go. He kept on asking me about you. It was frightening… he’s almost obsessive about you. Perhaps you ought to go out with him, let him see what you’re really like—behind the model-girl mask. He likes sophisticated worldly women, when he realises what you’re really like….’
‘I don’t want to hear another word about him,’ Heather told her, pulling the bedclothes over her head. ‘Not another word.’
CHAPTER TWO
THE phone rang and Heather jumped, eyeing it dubiously. She had been tense all day, and all because of Race Williams. The desire she had seen flaming in his eyes had unnerved her. She wasn’t a stranger to men’s desire, she reminded herself, and he wasn’t the first man to make it plain to her in a first meeting that he wanted her, it happened all the time, but there was something different about him; an intensity and determination that alarmed her.
She picked up the receiver at the fourth ring, relieved to hear her agent’s voice on the other end. ‘Good news, I think,’ he told her, ‘You’ve been summoned for another interview for the Rio contract. One of the directors this time. I’ll give you the address. They want you there at three o’clock sharp. I haven’t heard of any of the others being sent for, so I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you.’
Heather replaced the receiver and glanced into the hall mirror. Her reflection looked unfamiliar, her eyes dark and clouded, her mouth tremulously full, intensifying the sensual attraction of her features. She knew she ought to be feeling glad about the interview, but instead she merely felt restless, impatient with the constant round of interviews; of move and counter-move, and she yearned to be free to be herself, not a marketable commodity.
Nevertheless she went into her room and carefully selected the outfit she would wear for the interview. The Rio cosmetics range was essentially glamour cosmetics and that was the image she would have to project. She chose a black suit, the skirt fitted and fairly short. The jacket was tailored to follow the lines of her body, flaring out gently just below the waist, the sleeves slightly full. With it she wore a white silk blouse, and Dior stockings. She swept her hair up into a chignon and sat down to put on her hat, carefully arranging its spotted net veil. The finished effect was one of carefully contrived sophistication underlining her sensuality. Jennifer, who had the day off, came in loaded down with shopping just as she went into the living room. ‘Wow’, she exclaimed with a grin. ‘What’s the big occasion.’
Heather told her.
‘Umm, well you should get top marks for that outfit, especially if it’s a man. It simply shrieks sexy underwear,’ she added obliquely, but Heather knew what she meant, and said dryly that that was the whole idea.
The address she had been given was in Mayfair, and she managed to find a taxi to take her there without too much difficulty. A manservant opened the door to her ring, showing her into some sort of waiting room, its furnishings as uninspiring as those in any busy doctor’s surgery. In the distance Heather could hear someone typing, and she sat down, trying to empty her mind and concentrate on the interview ahead. There had been half a dozen of them already. Rio was a new concept and the directors seemed unable to agree on exactly what image they wished to project. Ten and then fifteen minutes ticked by, and her thoughts strayed back to the previous evening. She could feel the tension and anger rising inside her as she remembered the way Race Williams had looked and talked. She had met men like him before, she reminded herself, men who thought women existed solely for their pleasure; and she detested them. This man was not so different, merely more dangerously sensual; more explicit in his intentions. She quelled a briefly impulsive desire to puncture his conceit, to destroy the monstrous ego that made him think his attentions might be welcomed.
What kind of a woman did he think she was? She grimaced. She already knew the answer to that one, and curiously enough resented the reasoning behind it with an intensity that startled her. She glanced at her watch and tapped her foot impatiently. Why was she being kept waiting like this? She got up and opened the door, the hall was empty, the sound of typing louder. Frowning Heather listened to it. Perhaps they had forgotten about her?
Without giving herself time too think she marched towards the door behind which she could hear the typewriter and knocked, her eyes widening in stunned shock as she saw the man sitting behind the large desk.
‘I’m sorry Heather
,’ he apologised blandly. ‘Did you think I’d forgotten about you?’
‘You!’ It was all Heather could manage to say. What was Race Williams doing here? ‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded baldly, ‘I’ve….’
‘You’ve come to see one of the directors of Rio, he interrupted smoothly, ‘Quite right. That’s me.’ He rose from the desk and came to stand in front of it, leaning back, arms folded as he studied her. ‘Very nice,’ he added when he had finished. ‘Not quite as provocative as what you were wearing last night. You must wear that dress for me again Heather,’ he added softly. ‘What there was of it made me ache to take it off you.’ His eyes rested on her breasts and to Heather’s furious confusion she felt their involuntary response and knew without having to look down; without hearing his soft, satisfied laugh, that her nipples were tautly outlined against the thin fabric of her suit.
‘You tricked me into coming here,’ Heather ground out, turning back to the door, ‘I….’
‘Not really,’ he said smoothly. ‘I am a director of Rio with enough shares to make sure you get the contract, if….’
‘If?’ She turned to stare at him, hardly able to believe she was not imagining that delicate pause; hardly able to accept that he was actually going to say what she suspected.
‘I’ve done a little more research on you since last night, Heather,’ he told her softly. ‘And from what I’ve learned it seems plain that you and I got off on the wrong foot. Now, if I were to promise you that you would get the modelling contract for Rio, I’m sure….’
‘It would persuade me to go to bed with you?’ Heather inserted, hardly knowing how she kept from screaming the words at him.
‘Oh I wouldn’t put it as crudely as that. Let’s just say I’m sure you’re nothing like as hard as your detractors suggest, and that pure kind-heartedness would persuade you to assuage my… desire?’