Beaumont Brides Collection (Wild Justice, Wild Lady, Wild Fire)

by Liz Fielding

  ‘No.’ Luke Devlin was dangerous enough at a distance. If he was sitting at her shoulder she knew she might sign anything, do anything. ‘Thank you,’ she added, somewhat belatedly.

  She ducked her head, grateful for the heavy curtain of hair that fell forward to hide the quick blush that stained her cheeks. She read on, anxious to get the whole thing over with as quickly as possible so that she could get off this crazy roller-coaster and return to some semblance of normality.

  The majority of the agreement was straightforward enough, standard clauses. He didn’t want a great deal from them. No sponsor’s message, no display boards to proclaim his generosity in supporting local sporting events.

  There was a clause forbidding any other advertising immediately before or after “Holiday Bay” which was a little harsh, but since he was sponsoring the programme he was entitled to make that stipulation. Then she turned the page and alarm bells began to ring.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  FIZZ looked up and was disconcerted to discover that Luke was still watching her intently. It was almost as if he had been waiting for this, expecting it.

  She cleared her throat. ‘What does this mean?’ she asked. ‘All cast changes to “Holiday Bay” must be cleared with you first?’ She used the excuse of checking the wording of the document to look away.

  But he rose from the sofa and crossed the room to her. With one hand on the back of her chair and one on the desk, he leaned over her to read the wording for himself. ‘It’s clear enough, isn’t it?’ He turned his head and looked down into her eyes.

  She felt trapped by his contract, caged by his body even though he wasn’t touching her. ‘I understand the words, Luke, but I would hardly have thought the casting of a minor soap opera constituted a serious concern for a man as busy as you.’ He waited, but she had finally learned not to fall into that particular trap. ‘That’s all.’

  ‘It’s not an objection on principle, then?’

  Fizz knew she had made a mistake. It wasn’t all. Not by a country mile. But she hadn’t seen the danger and now he was toying with her, making the point that since she had accepted the principle that he could impose Melanie Brett on the cast, she was being petty on this particular issue. But she wasn’t.

  ‘Suppose one of the cast were taken ill suddenly and had to be written out?’ she asked.

  ‘Just keep me informed. I wouldn’t want anyone having a diplomatic illness simply to avoid working with Melanie.’

  ‘To avoid working with Melanie?’ She could scarcely believe her ears. ‘Why on earth would anyone do that? The cast are only too glad of the work.’ Most of them. She dropped her eyes. He wasn’t talking about most of them. He was referring specifically to her sister. She appeared in “Holiday Bay” somewhat grudgingly at the best of times, considering it beneath her dignity as a “serious” actress. With a soap queen to steal her thunder, she was likely to prove even more difficult, a fact that Fizz was well aware of. She decided to confront the problem. ‘Are you specifically referring to Claudia?’

  ‘Your sister?’ Fizz didn’t bother to answer. He knew well enough that it was her sister. He knew too damned much. ‘Is she likely to prove difficult?’

  ‘She does drop in and out of the cast to suit her other commitments, sometimes at short notice. Occasionally she has to record her lines where ever she happens to be and they are edited in. I wouldn’t want there to be any misunderstandings.’

  ‘Just make sure she doesn’t make a habit of it and there won’t be a problem, Fizz.’

  ‘You’ll really enforce this?’ She turned and looked up at him. ‘If I don’t adhere to the letter of this agreement you will stop the sponsorship money?’

  ‘Naturally. When you explain the situation to your sister I’m quite sure she’ll rally to your cause, go out of her way to help.’

  Fizz had her own views on that subject, but refused to be drawn. If the worst came to the worst she could play Claudia’s character herself, their voices were enough alike and she had done it before in an emergency. If it was edited in afterwards Melanie, and therefore Luke, would never know.

  ‘I’ll get Liz in, then, shall I?’ His chest brushed against her shoulder as he reached for the intercom switch and she jumped, her whole body responding to his touch. ‘Unless there’s anything else?’

  Fizz shook her head briefly. It wasn’t true. There was a question burning on her lips. Why? Why was he doing this? It simply wasn’t logical and every fibre of her being was screaming out beware in neon letters ten feet high. But as he leaned over her and she caught his elusive man-scent, the signals became terribly confused.

  She couldn’t be sure if it was her head that was afraid of Mr Luke Devlin, or her heart. Not that it made any difference. She needed him and he knew it.

  Ten minutes later it was over. The agreement signed. The deed done. Pavilion Radio was, for the moment, saved. But at what cost? Even if he had no ulterior motive, her peace of mind had been wrecked beyond recall.

  ‘I think this calls for a little celebration,’ Luke said, as he walked her to her car beneath the shelter of an umbrella borrowed from his secretary. ‘Melanie is throwing a house-warming party tomorrow evening. Will you come?’

  ‘I’ve made other arrangements for tomorrow evening,’ she objected, without hesitation. To stay at home with a good book and try and forget Luke Devlin existed.

  ‘I’d like you to come and so would Melanie. And a night out will do you good.’ She glanced at him sharply. What did he know about her private life? Or lack of it? ‘You spend too much time worrying about work. Who knows, perhaps your father could find a window in his busy schedule to come along as well,’ he added, with just a touch of irony. ‘And your sister too, if she’s in Broomhill. Naturally the invitation extends to the staff at the radio station, but I think Melanie has already covered that.’

  ‘You’ve found a house, then?’

  He shrugged. ‘I took your advice and settled for Winterbourne Manor.’

  She steeled herself. ‘Does Melanie like it?’

  ‘You saw the alternatives, Fizz. We’re moving in today.’

  We. Luke and Melanie. They were a pair. An odd pair, not right for each other. He was too dominant, she was too young. But it was none of her business. For heaven’s sake girl, get a grip.

  ‘And throwing a party tomorrow? That takes stamina,’ she remarked, with a careless ease that she dredged up from some deep well of strength.

  It certainly fooled Luke because he smiled. ‘No, we just hired a good firm of caterers. And we have a housekeeper whose middle name is efficiency.’

  We. We. ‘And did Melanie throw hysterics about the seclusion?’ she asked, jabbing herself with the girl’s name.

  ‘I told her that you thought it the best available.’ His smile was slow, wide, oddly seductive. ‘But it was the four-poster that clinched it.’

  Fizz swallowed. ‘It’ll work every time.’

  ‘Will it?’ They had reached the car and Luke took her car keys and as he bent to open the door for her he glanced up, his eyes directly level with her own. ‘I’m sorely tempted to put so bold an assertion to the test.’

  A little gasp escaped her before she bit down hard on the anger that welled up in her throat. How dare he flirt with her with his lover’s name still warm upon his lips? Her heart pounding so loud beneath her coat that she was sure he must hear, she raised a well-shaped brow.

  ‘Are you indeed? Won’t Melanie object?’ she asked, hoping to shame him.

  ‘I won’t tell her if you don’t.’ He touched her lips lightly with the tip of one finger, his dark eyes heavy lidded against the sudden shaft of sunlight that sliced almost horizontally through the lowering clouds. Then he took her hand and dropped her keys into her palm, wrapping fingers about them before stooping to open the door for her. Stunned into silence she slid quickly behind the wheel without a word, just desperate to get away. ‘Until tomorrow, Fizz,’ he said.

  She wasn’t sure whether it
sounded more like a threat, or a promise.

  *****

  Luke stood for a moment in the car park and watched Fizz drive away. He should be feeling elated at how smoothly his plans were going. Instead he felt oddly frustrated. Coming to grips with Fizz Beaumont was like trying to catch Scotch mist.

  She was elusive, defying him to work out just what made her tick.

  She lived like a nun and yet the way she looked at him when he caught her off guard made him catch his breath, driving an urgent heat through him. Yet when he attempted the mildest flirtation she shut up like a clam. He was confused and that made him angry.

  Liz Meynell looked up from her PC as he returned to his office. ‘The report you were expecting arrived while you were with Miss Beaumont,’ she said, retrieving her dripping umbrella and handing him the envelope unopened as instructed. ‘Shall I get your call to Germany now?’

  ‘Not yet, Liz. There are some private calls I need to make first.’ He bent and picked up a letter that had blown onto the floor and putting it on the desk. ‘Does this happen every time the door is opened?’

  ‘Not always. I think it must be a combination of events creating a wind tunnel.’

  ‘Get someone in to sort it out will you? We can’t have confidential letters blowing about the place. And I’ll let you know when I want that call to Germany.’

  He shut the door to his office.

  *****

  ‘Fizz?’

  She stirred at the sound of her name. She had spent the remainder of the afternoon looking through scripts for “Holiday Bay”, trying to find the right moment to introduce Melanie. Anything to distract her mind from Luke Devlin, the touch of his finger against her lips, from the look in his eyes.

  The on/off marriage of the two main characters was winding up to a wedding. The arrival of the beautiful young Australian could be used to tighten the suspense, the anticipation that something would go wrong. But how? It was important not to waste such an asset. Now at the sound of her name she eased her neck and sat back.

  ‘Hello, Jim, come in. What can I do for you?’

  ‘It’s more what I can do for you,’ he said, sitting down and accepting her offer of coffee. ‘You know how little information we were able to come up with on Luke Devlin?’ She nodded. ‘Well, I thought I’d try another approach. A friend who works in one of the press agencies pulled the file on Melanie Brett for me.’ Fizz looked up sharply from pouring the coffee. The relationship was common knowledge? ‘Not that I found anything useful about Devlin, but I came across this and since Melanie’s joining the cast of “Holiday Bay”, I thought you ought to see it.’ He pushed a photocopy of a press cutting across the desk.

  ‘That’s official now,’ Fizz said, picking up the sheet of paper. ‘Did Kelly record an interview with Melanie for the magazine this afternoon?’

  ‘Yes, she edited it last night. It’s a good piece. And all the presenters have their instructions about running the promos.’

  ‘Good. We want to get the whole of Broomhill Bay talking about it.’

  ‘You may not be quite so eager for everyone to be talking once you’ve read that, Fizz.’

  She looked down at the photocopy in her hand. ‘What newspaper is this?’

  ‘A Sydney daily. That’s from the gossip and entertainment page.’

  ‘But this is Claudia,’ she said, puzzled, staring at a blotchy photograph of her sister smiling from the page, alongside a picture of Melanie.

  ‘She was over there last year touring Shakespeare with your father, remember?’

  ‘Was she? In Australia?’

  ‘Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Japan. A couple of other places.’

  ‘I knew they’d gone to the Far East, I hadn’t realised ... I suppose I should listen more.’ But when Claudia and her father started talking “theatre”, she tended to switch off.

  It was a defence mechanism. Automatic.

  Australia. The word had an ominous ring to it and as Fizz began to read the press cutting she realised that she had been right to expect the worst. The cold that ran through her veins had nothing whatever to do with the ambient temperature of her office.

  “After her triumphant portrayal of Portia to her father’s Shylock,” the reporter had written, “I went backstage to talk to Claudia Beaumont and was immediately struck by her likeness to our own sweet Melanie Brett, a point I mentioned to the actress. Miss Beaumont seemed amused by this and remarked that it would always be possible to tell the two of them apart. Melanie was the one who played in soaps while she was the one who could act. Miss Beaumont is certainly a fine actress, but her likeness to Melanie is, after all, illusory.”

  ‘Your sister may look like an angel, but she has a tongue that could cut skin at twenty paces,’ Jim said, when Fizz remained silent.

  ‘Possibly, but she isn’t stupid enough to make a remark like that. At least not to a newspaper man.’

  ‘On a high after the performance she may just have been careless.’

  ‘Or he may just have made the whole thing up.’ She stared at the fuzzy pictures. They hadn’t been great to begin with and photocopying hadn’t helped. ‘Are they alike?’ she asked, after a while. ‘I hadn’t noticed any particular resemblance. It’s hard to see much from this.’

  Jim considered. ‘Not really, but Claudia had her hair dyed blonde for Portia, remember.’ He took the clipping from her and studied it. ‘There’s a superficial likeness I suppose. Something about the mouth perhaps. I suppose this guy spotted it and thought it would make a good story. It wasn’t likely that Claudia would ever see it.’ He glanced at her, frowning deeply at the photographs. ‘Does it matter? The likeness?’

  ‘How can it possibly matter?’ she asked, firmly ignoring the prickle of apprehension that shimmied down her spine. The tightening of Julian’s famous gut-reaction. ‘And since there is absolutely nothing we can do about it you might as well go ahead and put out the news bulletin.’

  Jim rose heavily to his feet. ‘You’re the boss.’

  ‘Right now that isn’t a comfort, Jim, but thanks for bringing this to me. Forewarned is forearmed.’

  ‘And weapons will be fingernails at point blank range. Perhaps you should sell ringside seats for the first recording session,’ he said, trying to raise a smile from her.

  But Fizz barely noticed. ‘You won’t have to wait that long. I’ve a feeling the bout has been arranged for Saturday night and everyone’s invited.’

  But by eight o’clock on Saturday evening, her sister had not arrived in Broomhill. She had her own, self-contained apartment in their father’s home that she used when she was in Broomhill. Fizz had called there in the afternoon hoping to see her, talk to her before the party, warn her what to expect. But if she wasn’t home by Saturday afternoon she must have a date in London and it was unlikely that she would be home until sometime on Sunday, if then. A reprieve.

  She dropped in again just after eight, to pick up her father, who couldn’t see the point in going to a party and not having a drink. But he wasn’t ready.

  ‘You go on, darling. I shan’t be staying long and it’ll be easier if I get a taxi.’

  ‘I can wait.’ She wasn’t in any hurry to arrive at Winterbourne Manor.

  He glanced at his watch. ‘No. You get off and have some fun.’ Fun! She anticipated it being about as much fun as a visit to the dentist, but she didn’t say anything. If her father had decided to take a taxi, nothing on earth would move him. ‘Fizz,’ he said, as she turned for the door.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I like your dress. It’s a treat to see you looking so thoroughly grownup.’

  ‘I am twenty-five, Dad.’

  ‘I know. But you always seem so unsophisticated compared to Claudia. Sometimes, because you didn’t become one of us I think perhaps we’ve undervalued your talent. But you’ve done a great job at the radio station. I’m really very proud of you.’

  ‘I couldn’t have done it without you.’

  ‘Oh, I
know that.’

  ‘You needn’t be quite so quick to agree with me,’ she laughed.

  ‘I only meant that you’d never have got the franchise. But everything else is down to you. I really think it’s time for me to step back and put out the word that Miss Felicity Beaumont is the boss. Looking like that no one could doubt your -’

  ‘No, Dad.’ Edward Beaumont raised a pair of well-honed eyebrows at this unseemly interruption. Having prepared his little speech, he didn’t expect to have his thunder stolen. ‘I need your name to help me through the next three months. I suspect that Mr Devlin is an old-fashioned male chauvinist. I don’t think he’d be happy handing his money over to a mere woman.’

  ‘But I thought you were going to tell him.’

  ‘Trust me, Dad. It really wasn’t a good idea.’

  *****

  Winterbourne Manor was ablaze with lights as Fizz edged her way down the long curve of the drive and found space to park a little way from the house. For a moment she sat there, quietly gathering herself.

  She rarely went to parties unless they were business functions that couldn’t be avoided. Not because she was naturally unsociable, but because she had long ago realised that the women sought her out in the hopes that they might be introduced to her father, the men because they wanted to meet her sister, or worse, remembered her mother and wanted to reminisce about seeing her perform one of her great roles.

  No one ever seemed to be aware of her as an individual. She had got used to it, but she didn’t put up with it unless she had to.

  But at least tonight wasn’t going to be as bad as she had feared. She leaned back against the worn leather seat and thanked whichever kindly god watched over radio stations and younger sisters for the fact that Claudia had decided to stay in London for the weekend.

  She had no illusions about who would have to persuade her glamorous sister into making some kind of public apology to Melanie, but it wouldn’t be easy. She had been trying to get hold of Claudia ever since Jim’s bombshell landed on her desk so that she could warn her, but she wasn’t at home and hadn’t bothered to switch on her answering machine.