FANTASY LOVER
Sally Heywood
No other man could compare!
In her brief stint as a foreign correspondent, Merril met the only man she thought she could ever love. Azur, he called himself, and he was as wild and electrifying as his war-torn country.
Even back home in London, Merril couldn't escape the memories of Azur. When she was pursued by the new star of the London stage, Torrin Anthony, a stunning man most women would die for, his attentions left her unmoved.
Yet Torrin was a force she hadn't reckoned on. It wasn't long before he made Merril see the folly of her fantasy love...but when she did, it was too late...
CHAPTER ONE
A strong brown hand shot out, dragging Merril into the safety of a doorway. From further up the street came the rattle of machine-gun fire and she found herself jerked back hard into her rescuer's arms as she tried to peer out to see what was going on. She could feel the stranger's tall, muscular body pressing against her own, and for a moment she was vibrantly conscious of the long length of it, his arms gripping her tightly in a sort of embrace before she managed to struggle free.
'Stay inside. You'll get your head blown off!' he rasped.
Her eyes swivelled back at him in astonishment. 'You speak English!'
With a white cloth wrapped native-style over his head, obscuring most of his face, she could only see his eyes and a slash of sunburned skin above the dazzling cloth but a change in the honey brown of their expression hinted at a smile, despite the danger of the situation. The man gave a throaty chuckle full of mischievous amusement. 'Don't look so surprised!' He didn't go on to explain but gestured to keep quiet. Some soldiers, rebels, Merril guessed, clattered past the narrow doorway. As if he feared she might make some giveaway movement, putting them both in danger again, he dragged her roughly into his arms, placing one warning hand over her mouth.
For a moment all danger was forgotten and Merril became aware only of being locked intimately in his arms. Her limbs softened against him despite her fear, and they clung together for what seemed like an age as the sounds outside advanced and receded. She could hear the in and out of his breathing, smell the scent of a kind of sun-oil he wore and feel the roughness of his Army shirt against her burning cheek. The moment might have gone on for ever if he hadn't bent his head and whispered in his hoarse voice, 'You're one of the foreign correspondents?'
She nodded, too scared to speak now that the noise of fighting outside was increasing again.
'You're the first one to show a race outside the hotel bar,' he grinned, then shushed her reply as voices were heard just outside their hiding place.
Merril and Rory, her photographer, and somebody from a French daily had left the hotel at ten o'clock that morning, as soon as they heard a rumour that there was going to be some action. They had been inside the hotel ever since they arrived twenty-four hours ago, and the news desk was already on to Merril, demanding a story to justify her air fare. It had been bad luck to get caught in the crossfire like this, but as soon as everything was quiet again she would make her way back to the hotel. With any luck Rory would have some decent pictures to show for their adventure. She whispered all this as they clung together in the shadow of the doorway.
A strong smell of carbide was drifting in from the street, but the sounds of fighting were more distant now. More disturbing was the effect of being locked in the arms of this exotic stranger.
Merril felt her senses swoon, then she shook herself. This was no time for thoughts like that! She was a professional journalist, just as her father had been, and she was here to do a job, not to wilt over some dashing stranger!
Mercifully his grip had slackened as soon as he was sure the soldiers had gone on down the street, and he was looking at her now with a quizzical expression in his eyes, one arm still round her shoulders. Despite the danger of imminent discovery he seemed totally unafraid, and a devilish expression came into those compelling brown eyes as he let his glance run appreciatively over her figure in its jeans and clingy T-shirt.
She wriggled from his touch, blazingly aware of the war-honed muscles beneath the white scarf draped over what looked like combat trousers and regulation Army shirt.
'Don't go outside!' He let her step away from the protection of his arms without trying to stop her, but his gravelly voice held a warning note that brought an involuntary shiver. Merril turned back.
'They won't shoot me. They'll see I'm a foreign journalist,' she protested, annoyed at being told what to do.
'Do you think they'll be impressed by that?' he demanded drily in the same hoarse whisper. 'These people are trained to shoot first and question afterwards.'
Despite his words his gaze lingered over the bright mop of blonde hair and he looked as if he was going to say something else, but just then another burst of firing broke out, there were yells and a stampeding of heavy feet, and the man grasped her by the shoulder and hurried her further back into the building.
It had once been somebody's home, but now it was gutted by war, its walls pocked by bullets, a hole gaping in one corner where something large had driven into it.
'We can't stay here. Follow me.' He strode over to a door in the wall at the back of the house, peering round it with trained caution, beckoning to her to hurry after him. Merril found herself in a small alley, and before she could call out he had started to run alongside it, half crouching, looking back now and then to make sure she was following. When he reached an intersection in the honeycomb of little passages, he waited for her to catch up.
'See that building over there?' he rasped, pointing to a gutted office block further up the hill. She followed the direction of his glance and saw a four-storey building, its windows smashed, debris strewn across the piazza in front of it. 'When I tell you to go, I want you to run like hell and don't stop till you get inside. OK? Once there you should be safe for the time being. Ready?'
'Wait! Why should I --?'
'Ready?' he repeated, one hand gripping her shoulder.
'No—listen! Where are you going --?'
'Do you always stand and argue like this? Do as you're told, damn you!' His demeanour was suddenly so savage, she felt she had no alternative but to do as he ordered. As soon as she heard his command, she ducked her head and ran as fast as she could over the open ground between their shelter and the office block. Before she had gone half-way she knew why he had told her to run. The pattering sound of bullets broke out almost at once, and she tried to zigzag just as she had seen in countless films. But instead of little spurts of dry dust being kicked up around her feet as she expected there was nothing but unbroken, hard-packed earth, and she realised that the gunmen were aiming in another direction altogether.
When she reached the sanctuary of the gutted building, she turned her head and saw that her companion was running along the top of a low wall. He must be mad! she thought. He's clearly visible, an easy target. Then she understood what he was doing. In a moment he had jumped down on to the piazza, and making full use of available cover like a professional gained the safety of the building a few seconds later.
'You fool!' she burst out. 'You deliberately drew their fire! You must be mad!'
He adjusted the protective cloth across the lower part of his face again and for a second she saw the brief dazzle of even white teeth.
'Not mad, chivalrous! After all, you are a lady!' He gave that deep-throated chuckle again. 'Are you all right?'
'Of course I am,' Merril snapped, resenting the fact that he seemed to think she needed wrapping in cotton wool. 'But what do you think you're doing, dragging me right up here? It's going to be even more difficult to work our way back to the other side now. Don't you realise we're right behind rebel lines?' Everything was quiet ou
tside and she made for the door. 'I'm going back down. I've got a story to file—I can't hang about up here. I don't know why the hell I followed you!'
He grabbed her roughly by the forearm as she moved away, and held her in a grip that hurt. 'Look here, you're not going anywhere yet. It's a complete shambles down there. Nobody knows who the hell they're taking pot shots at, and I'm not having you finishing up dead . . . Keep still!' he commanded as she started to struggle. 'They'll be busy out there for quite some time. You'll have to sit it out.'
'Don't you tell me what I have to do! Who do you think you are? And let go—you're hurting!' His grip was amazingly strong and Merril guessed that under the concealment of his battle-gear he would have muscles like bands of steel.
She glanced down at her trembling hands, and the strong brown one wrapped tightly round her wrists, then glanced up at him with an elfish smile. 'All right—I guess you win. Now take your hands off, please. I promise to behave.'
'Good girl!'
Merril greeted this sort of remark as she always did, with a scowl. 'I'm twenty-three,' she informed him coldly, 'hardly a girl, thank you.'
'You look about sixteen. What on earth have they sent you out here for?'
'Oh, yes, you would ask that,' she tossed her head, 'that's a typical male reaction!'
'Not at all. It's simply unusual to find someone like you in a place like this. You have to admit,' he grinned disarmingly, 'you're not the usual whisky-sodden, chain-smoking reporter. You must work for an unusually enlightened editor.'
'There was only a rumour of trouble before I left England. If they'd imagined it was going to turn out to be anything risky, they'd have sent one of the men for sure,' she admitted candidly. 'They always get the exciting assignments.'
'This is exciting enough for you, isn't it?'
'It would be if I could get down there to see what was going on,' she grumbled, half turning to the door again.
'Look, sweetheart, you wouldn't see much even if you did go down,' the man rasped in his strangely sexy voice. 'One gun pointing at your head looks much like another. And believe me, nobody knows who they're shooting at right now. It's total panic and confusion.'
'But I've got to get a story! If my news editor thinks I copped out, he'll never send me anywhere like this again!'
'He won't be able to send you anywhere if you're dead. Be sensible.' Then he smiled again, softening the effect of his warning. 'What are you worried about? That it'll be the Chelsea Flower Show and man bites dog for evermore?' He was still holding her by the arm, though his grip had relaxed, an a his sharp eyes sparked over her, restless and alert.
'Who are you?' Merril demanded. 'You're not a journalist yourself, are you?'
'Definitely not.'
'Then you must be part of some security force the government hasn't told us about—'
'Wrong again, and even if I were, a journalist would be the last person I'd tell!'
'Fair enough,' she agreed as if she wasn't really interested. But she looked thoughtful. 'Been out here long, then?' She opened her lustrous blue eyes in a look of calculated innocence that never failed to elicit the information she wanted. This time as a ploy, however, it was a disastrous failure.
'Don't ask questions --'
'And you'll tell me no lies,' she finished for him, turning away. She would find out who he was, because as far as she knew this was a local conflict. News of any official involvement would be a scoop to end scoops. If she was the only one on to it she would hit the headlines in a big way, and that would make the news editor sit up!
Conscious that her companion was still holding her by the arm, she made herself draw closer, passing a hand over her brow as she wilted against him. 'It's so hot! Nobody warned me it was going to be like this.'
Unmoved by the seductiveness or her body pressing against his, he disengaged the hand which had somehow found its way on to his forearm and pushed her towards a jumble of furniture beside what had once been an elevator. 'Better take the weight off your feet if you're feeling faint,' he suggested humorously. 'We're in for a long wait.'
He went over to lean against the doorpost, folding his arms across his expanse of chest and dropping his head as if instantly asleep.
Once she'd got over her pique at being so abruptly dismissed, Merril had to admit he looked sort of picturesque standing there in the doorway in his battle-gear. He was tall, about six foot two or so, marvellously broad-shouldered and, with his face hidden, had an aura of toe-tingling mystery.
I must find out what he's doing here, she told herself. His current indifference suggested he didn't much like blondes, but she'd get friendly enough to get his story. She'd have to. Her perennial bugbear, Ray Doyle, the news editor, would expect it. And, even without Ray breathing down her neck, she was desperate to prove herself. Apart from that, to be honest, she wanted to discover every last thing she could—who this man was, what he was doing here, where he belonged . . . and with whom.
Minutes passed. She should have been bored, champing at the bit, but, despite the rumble of distant gunfire and the knowledge that she was probably missing the best story of her life, it was strangely pleasant sitting here. The sun spilled in strong bright bars across the coloured tiles of the floor, and her companion, desperately romantic-looking in his white burnous thing, was making her imagination run riot. She imagined herself writing a few hundred words about a sexy encounter with a Lawrence of Arabia type for one of the women's magazines. Except this wasn't Arabia. And the sexiness was all in the way he looked.
A good hour passed. The sound of explosions coming from below was louder now, if anything. Spasmodic yells and the sound of breaking glass made her shiver. What would Dad have done? Merril asked herself. Would he have skulked up here away from the shooting? The rest of the journalists were holed up in the hotel bar, swapping yarns, all boys together. 'Honestly, Rory,' she had grumbled after breakfast that morning as they'd set off to see what was brewing, 'they seem to expect the stories to come to them! Our papers send us out here in good faith to go out and report on what's happening, not to sit in the bar getting drunk.'
'Perhaps they're scared of getting shot at,' he had suggested expressionlessly.
'Of course they are! They're a bunch of yellow-livered cowards. My father would have been ashamed to call himself a journalist, working with a bunch like that!'
Soon after that they had run into trouble and got separated. She hoped Rory was all right and coming up with some brilliant photos. Impatient to be off, she got up and walked quietly over to the door.
'Don't try it.'
She gave a start, the hoarse voice, full of command, pulling her up like a whiplash. 'I thought you were asleep.' Giving a shrug, she poked her head out. After what had already happened she should have been prepared for the hand that emerged rapidly from within the folds of the scarf, dragging her roughly back inside the portico. 'I'm a free agent,' she protested. 'I do what I like!'
'Not when I'm around you don't. I know this place better than you and I know when it's safe and when it's not, so you'll do exactly as you're told. Understand?'
Merril was about to flare up when she thought better of it. 'Do you know this place better than me?' she asked.'
'Yes.'
There was a pause, but he didn't take the bait. 'You don't give much away, do you?' she laughed, not feeling amused at all.
He gave a glance outside, looking up at the sky before turning back to her. 'They'll be finished in an hour.' She managed to discern a small frown and he shrugged. 'Then you'll have to wait till dark and we'll try to get you back through the lines to your friends.' There was an odd inflection in his voice, but Merril was too preoccupied to take much notice.
'In England,' she told him, 'I would probably slap your face if you tried to boss me around and interfere with my work like this.'
He gave her an amused look that sent a spiral of fear up her spine. 'But this isn't England . . .'he said softly, letting his words trail away signifi
cantly. He noticed the look of uncertainty cross her face at once and, reaching out, he put a friendly hand on her shoulder. 'I'd hate anything to happen to you. Heroics aren't necessary. You can learn far more by treading softly.'
She felt his touch through the thin cotton of her T-shirt like a brand of flame on her flesh, and it was followed by a sudden flooding warmth in her cheeks.
'Heavens!' A hand flew to her face. 'I can't remember ever doing that before --'
'Hard-bitten journalist blushes at man's touch. Headlines, indeed,' he mocked. There was a brief stillness, then slowly he let the offending hand slide away. 'Are you frightened of me?'
She bore the scrutiny of his golden eyes for a moment before answering as honestly as she could, 'No, I don't think so. You probably saved my life down there—and again crossing the piazza.' Even now it hadn't properly sunk in. 'I feel a little bit confused,' she confessed. Her eyes opened wide in amusement and this time there was no guile in her expression. 'None of the home rules seem to apply out here. It's a shock to meet somebody like you.' Her eyes shone. 'I always knew men like you existed somewhere. You're like my dad—'
'Who?'
'He was a war correspondent, one of the best, always where the action was thickest—a real swashbuckling hero type, just like you --' Merril broke off. He was looking somehow angry, and his eyes had narrowed. When he spoke, his already hoarse voice had roughened even more.
'The real men around here, and the real women, come to that, are the ones who stay put. They live out every day of their lives faced by terrible grinding poverty, struggling to wrest a living from the soil for their children's sake. They're the real heroes. We come and we go. It's easy for us. If things get tough we simply jet out, back to so-called civilisation. No problem.' He gave her a sharp glance. 'You want to meet some real heroes and heroines?'
He sounded genuinely angry and she said, 'I'm sorry. Have I said something wrong?'
'You're suffering from culture shock. Just don't go around making snap judgements about people.'
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