by Penny Jordan
Shaking, she turned to make her way towards the door, where Jeff was standing, an impassive bouncer holding his arm—and his camera.
Jeff's face, she saw with a sinking heart, was puce with temper.
'What the hell do you think you were doing?' he demanded once Suzy reached him. 'I told you to distract the guy, not eat him!'
Red-faced, Suzy couldn't think of anything to say to defend herself. 'Did you get your picture?'
'Yes! But if you hadn't been so busy playing kissy-face with the enemy you would have noticed that one of his gorillas was taking my camera off me! Good, was he? Yeah, I'll bet he was—after all, he's had plenty of experience. Like I said, during his last campaign a certain news reporter really had the hots for him. He's got quite a reputation with the female sex, has the Colonel. A killer instinct in bed and out of it.'
Suzy was beginning to feel nauseated, disgusted by what she was hearing. And even more so by her own idiotic gullibility. She couldn't understand her reaction—never mind her behaviour. She must be going crazy—and certainly her friend Kate would think so, if Suzy was ever foolish enough to tell her what had happened.
Kate and Suzy had been at university together, and Kate had kept in touch with Suzy when she had decided to drop out of her course and go home to nurse her mother through her final illness. Kate was married now, and with her husband ran a very successful small, independent travel agency.
Kate was constantly urging Suzy to enjoy life a little more, but Suzy still had debts to pay off—her student loan, for one thing, and the rent on the small flat she had shared with her widowed mother for another!
Thinking of her mother made Suzy's greeny-gold eyes darken. Her mother had been widowed before Suzy's birth, her father having been killed in a mountain-climbing accident. It was Suzy's belief that her mother had never got over the death of the man she loved, nor ceased blaming him for having died.
As she'd grown up Suzy had been the one who cared for her mother, rather than the other way around. Money had been tight, and Suzy had worked since her teens to help—first with a paper round and then at whatever unskilled work she could find.
Suzy remembered now that Kate often said she had an overdeveloped sense of responsibility and that she allowed others to put upon her. She couldn't imagine Colonel Lucas James Soames ever allowing anyone to put upon him, Suzy decided bitterly. If anyone were foolish enough to turn to him for help or compassion he would immediately reject them!
Suzy tensed, angry with herself for allowing the Colonel into her thoughts. And yet running beneath her anger, like a silent and dangerously racing river, she could still feel an unwanted ache of pain. Fear curled through her with soft, deadly tendrils. Why had she had such an extraordinary reaction to him? She wasn't that sort of person. Those emotions, that fierce rush of sexual longing, just weren't her! She gave a small shudder of distaste.
It was an experience she was better off forgetting—pretending had never happened, in fact!
And that was exactly what she intended to do!
* * *
Luke studied the schedules in front of him. Meticulously detailed plans for his upcoming work. The Prince had hinted that he would like him on board for his permanent staff, but that kind of role wasn't one Luke wanted. Perhaps his American mother's blood was responsible for that! He had never been someone who enjoyed mundane routine. Even as a boy he had liked the challenge of pushing back boundaries and continually learning and growing.
His parents had died in an accident when he was eleven years old. The Army had sent him home to his grandmother and the comfortable country house where his father had grown up. His grandmother had done her best, but Luke had felt constricted at the boarding school she had sent him to. Even then he had known he would follow his father into the Army, and the happiest day of his life had been the day he had finally been free to follow that ambition.
The Army had been not just his career but his family as well. Until recently. Until he had woken up one morning and realised that he had had enough of witnessing other people's pain and death. That his ears had grown too sensitive to the screams of wounded children and his eyes too hurt by the sight of thin and starving bodies. He had seen it happen too many times before to other soldiers to hesitate. His emotions were getting in the way of his professionalism. It was time for him to move on!
The Army had tried to persuade him to change his mind. There had been talk of further promotion. But Luke had refused to be swayed. In his own mind he was no longer a totally effective soldier. Given the choice between destroying an enemy and protecting a child Luke knew he could no longer guarantee he would put the former first.
And working for His Royal Highness was definitely not for him! Too tame after the demands of Army life. Although there were some similarities between the two! He started to frown. Female reporters! He loathed and despised them! They were a hundred times worse than their male equivalent, in Luke's opinion. He had seen at first hand the damage they could wreak in their determination to get a story. A shadow of pain momentarily darkened his eyes, and the newly healed wound just below his hipbone seemed to pulse.
And as for the lengths such women were prepared to go!
His mouth hardened. So far as he was concerned Suzy Roberts and her ilk were as contemptible as the rags they worked for.
Reporter? Scavenger was a more appropriate word.
He turned his attention back to his paperwork, but, maddeningly, she would not be ejected from his thoughts.
What the hell was the matter with him that he should be wasting his time thinking about Suzy Roberts? That auburn hair and the way her gold-green gaze fastened on him must have addled his brain.
Had she really thought he was so idiotic that he would be deceived by that obviously fake look of longing she had given him? That equally fake tremor he had felt run right through her body when he had touched her? And as for that faint but unmistakable scent he could have sworn he could still smell…
Angrily he got up and strode across the room, pushing open a window, letting in an icy cold blast of air. Perhaps the unintentional celibacy of his life over these last few years had suddenly begun to affect him. But to such an extent that he wanted a woman like Suzy Roberts?
Like hell he did! But the sudden tension in his groin told a different story.
It was late, and he had a business appointment to keep. Finishing what he was doing, he made his way from the office to the privacy of his own apartment, automatically watching and checking as he did so. Once a commando always a commando—even when he could no longer…
Suppressing thoughts he did not want to have to deal with, Luke walked into his suite and headed for the shower.
Stripping off, he stepped into it, the hot needle-jets of water glistening on his body as he moved beneath the shower's spray. The light fell on old scars on his chest, and the newer one low down on his body.
Having finished showering, he stepped out onto the marble floor, padding naked into his bedroom to extract a pair of clean white boxer shorts from a drawer. The phrase 'going commando-style' might have a certain sexual edge to it when used to describe the choice not to wear any underwear, but from his own point of view weeks, sometimes months of living in the field, in one set of sweat and dirt-soaked combats had given him a very different take on the matter! To anyone who had experienced desert combat conditions the luxury of quantities of clean water was something to be truly appreciated.
CHAPTER TWO
Six months later
SUZY paused and studied the sleek yachts clustered in the harbour of the small Italian coastal resort. Two women walked past her, expensively groomed and wearing equally expensive designer clothes. Suzy had dressed as appropriately as she could for this luxurious resort, in white linen trousers and a brief sleeveless matching top, with sandals on her feet and the de rigueur sunglasses concealing her eyes, but no way was she in their league—and no way was she made for such an exclusive resort.
She had
tried to tell Kate as much when her friend had announced that since she and her husband could not take up the week's holiday they had been offered via their business they wanted to give the treat to Suzy instead.
'Oh, no, Kate, I couldn't possibly accept your generosity,' Suzy had protested.
'It isn't generosity,' Kate had retorted. 'You need this break, Suzy. You've been through a lot these last few years—nursing your mother and then losing her, working every spare hour you had to finish your degree, and then that awful job you had!'
Suzy had sighed. 'I shouldn't have handed in my notice, really. My tutor had been so kind, getting the intro for me, I feel so guilty.'
'You feel guilty?' Kate had exploded. 'Why on earth should you? You said yourself that you hated the way the magazine worked, its lack of morality with regard to how it got its stories and everything. And when I think of the way that slimy boss of yours tried to behave towards you! If anyone should be feeling guilty it's them, not you, Suzy! I'm surprised they're allowed to get away with treating you as they did. You know my opinion—you should have reported them for sexual harassment!'
Just listening to Kate's words had been enough to make Suzy shudder a little.
'It wasn't as easy as that, Kate,' Suzy had reminded her. 'For one thing I was the only female working there. No one would have backed me up.'
Hearing the strain in her friend's voice, Kate had shot her a quick look of concern before continuing, 'Suzy, I know how strong you are, and how independent, but please just for once put yourself first. You need this break. You need time to relax and reflect, to pick up the threads of your life and weave them into a new pattern. You need this breathing space! I want to do this for you and I shall be very hurt if you refuse.'
Put like that, how could she refuse? Suzy had acknowledged ruefully. And besides, there had been enough truth in what Kate had said to make her see that her friend was right.
She still shook with anxiety and nervous tension when she thought about the scene in the Down and Dirty office the day she had handed in her notice. The crude insults her boss had hurled at her still made her face burn with embarrassment and loathing.
'You aren't leaving—I'm sacking you,' he had told her furiously. 'No jumped-up little nothing is going to mess me about!'
He had then claimed publicly that he was sacking her because she had offered him sex in exchange for promotion—but privately told her he would rescind his claim if she agreed to go to bed with him.
Her flesh still crawled at the thought.
Roy Jarvis might be the magazine's editor-in-chief, but so far as Suzy was concerned he was the most morally corrupt man she had ever met. And her opinion was not just based on his attitude towards her, but on the way he ran the magazine and obtained its articles. Roy Jarvis's reporters were told to let nothing stop them in their pursuit of obtaining a story. She had been like a fish out of water in such an environment.
And Kate had been right, Suzy acknowledged unhappily now. She did need some time out to reassess her life. And her emotions.
Suzy closed her eyes and tried to swallow past the hard ball of pain and misery lodged in her throat. Panic prickled over her skin as she fought against allowing herself to think about the cause of her pain.
Instead she switched her mind to more easily dealt with issues. The difficulties of the past few years, then the misery of realising she was in a job she hated, and working with people whose morals she could never accept, never mind adopt, had all affected her. But she still needed to earn a living—somehow! And giving in to Kate and accepting this holiday was not, in her opinion, going to aid that.
No, but it might stop her from dreaming about a man she should have forgotten.
And this pretty Italian fishing village, perched precariously on the steep sides of a small bay, was surely a perfect spot in which to chill out and ground herself, to assess her own ambitions and think again about her original desire to become an archivist, perhaps. Her tutor had scorned her ambition, but Suzy had a deep longing for the cloistered quiet of such career.
Skirting the pretty harbour, with its chic and very expensive restaurants, Suzy headed for the steep path that led to the top of the cliff.
Half an hour later she had reached it, and she paused to study the magnificent view and to take a couple of photographs to show Kate.
Another hill rose up a short way along the path, and Suzy headed for it, wondering what lay beyond.
Its incline was steep, and she was a little out of breath when she finally made it to the top. She gasped, her eyes widening in delight as she looked down into the lush valley below her at the stunningly beautiful Palladan villa at its centre. She just had to get a photo of it to show Kate and her husband.
Rummaging in her bag, she found the small digital camera Kate had insisted on lending her.
'If you get any really good pictures we can put them on our Web site,' she had announced when Suzy had tried to protest.
The camera was obviously expensive, and Suzy had said as much, but Kate had dismissed her concern, shrugging it aside as she reassured her, 'It's insured—and if you do lose it—which I know you won't—then we shall replace it.'
Dutifully Suzy had photographed everything she thought might be of interest to her friend, and she knew that Kate would love this wonderful villa in its beautiful setting. From her vantage point Suzy could see the layout of its formal gardens within the high walls surrounding them, and the lake that lay beyond with its picturesque grotto.
Carefully she focused on the villa, pausing for a moment, as sunlight glinted on the metal casing, to stare in bemused awe at the sight of four imposingly large men in military uniform heading for an even equally imposing large black Mercedes, almost hidden from view beyond the entrance to the villa. What an impressive sight! She had to get a photograph of it—and of them! Who on earth were they?
* * *
On his way across the courtyard—having escorted the private security officers who had arrived to check out the villa without giving any warning, and against Luke's strict instructions, to their huge Mercedes with its blacked-out windows—Luke froze as he caught the unmistakable glint of sunlight on metal. Automatically he reached for his binoculars, training the powerful lens on the steep hillside above the villa.
He had done everything he could to avoid having to take on this commission, but pressure had been put on him, via his old commanding officer and certain other people, and reluctantly he had given in—although not without first enquiring grimly why on earth MI5 operatives could not be used.
'Because it is so sensitive, old boy,' had been the wry answer he had received. 'And because we don't have anyone in the field of your calibre.'
Reluctantly Luke had bowed to the pressure he'd been under.
Making sure that the Foreign Secretary was able to conduct a very politically sensitive meeting with the President of a certain turbulent African state, without either arousing the curiosity of the press or certain factions within the African state required optimum vigilance. And why on earth anyone had ever thought it a good idea to conduct such an exercise so close to a popular Italian resort—visited by the rich and famous and followed there by the paparazzi—Luke had no way of knowing.
Of course he had tried to initiate a change of venue, but he had been overruled.
A smooth-talking suit from MI5 had announced that no one would suspect that the Foreign Secretary would be seeing anyone political whilst enjoying a holiday with his children.
Children? Luke had baulked furiously at that point. No matter how many reassurances or platitudes the MI5 suit might choose to utter, this was potentially a dangerous mission.
The African President was insisting on bringing his own private guards with him, and he was a man who was obsessed with a fear of betrayal—both at home and abroad. If things should go pear-shaped Luke did not want to have to worry about two young children as well as their father. He had said as much to Sir Peter Verey when they had been introdu
ced, suggesting that his children might be better left with their mother.
'My dear chap,' had been Sir Peter's drawled response. 'I wish I could oblige, but you see my ex-wife is insistent that they come with me. Thinks I'm not doing my fatherly duty and that sort of thing.'
Luke knew all about Sir Peter Verey's ex-wife. She had left him for a billionaire industrialist who had little liking of his predecessor's offspring, with the result that she had placed both children at boarding school.
Luke frowned as he swept the hillside for whoever had been responsible for that telltale glint.
The resort less than a couple of miles away seethed with celebrities and minor continental royals, all of whom seemed to be followed by their own pack of predators, feeding off them as if they were carrion.
It didn't take Luke's trained eye long to find its quarry—in fact, he reflected in disgust, it did not need a trained eye to spot her at all. She was standing there openly photographing the villa. She? Luke frowned as he studied the familiar features. Suzy Roberts! It was as little effort for him to conjure up her name as it had been for him to recognise her face. Suzy Roberts, reporter for Down and Dirty magazine. Automatically he swept the area around her to see if she was on her own, before focusing on her once again.