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  ‘What was that?’

  ‘Nothing.’ She lifted her head, face strong.

  He contemplated her for a second, then said, ‘So, you’d better just drop the Little Miss Muffet act and be yourself. If we’re going to work together in the future, it’d better be with a clean slate.’

  ‘I quite agree.’

  ‘Good.’ He nodded, his features implacable. ‘Then while we have this heaven-sent opportunity to cut away the dead wood, I suggest we use it.’

  Christie blinked rapidly. ‘But… you just said you didn’t want to talk about the past!’

  ‘Not right at this moment. I still haven’t recovered from the horrifying shock of finding you here for the whole weekend with me!’

  ‘Horrifying shock,’ she said hoarsely, her mouth shaking. ‘Yes, of course. How stupid of me. How un- clean you must feel, just standing here talking to—’

  ‘No need for melodrama,’ he replied tightly. ‘I think we both know the truth of what happened between us, and why I feel as angry with you as I do. But that anger will lessen if we can manage to get together over this weekend, once I’ve come to terms with your presence here, and have some kind of civilised discussion about—’

  ‘How can we have a civilised discussion,’ she asked in a low, angry voice, ‘if you keep trying to tell me I’m an amoral whore who used you?’

  ‘Because that’s what you are,’ he bit out thickly. ‘And before this weekend is over, you will have admitted it to me.’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake!’

  ‘No, for your sake.’ His eyes were ruthless. ‘You do want this film, don’t you? I mean—you do want to play the lead role in Tigresse, don’t you?’

  She stared at him, her eyes suddenly as mutinous as they were hurt. That golden prize was dancing before her again: Lelie, Tigresse, best actress Oscar…it blurred before her eyes, but she still wanted it, had to have it, because everything would be all right if it was hers. It was a stupid thing to believe, but she did; she just did, and always would.

  ‘Well?’ he demanded, lifting that arrogant dark head. ‘Do you want the role or not?’

  Her mouth shook with anger, an anger she kept in check by sheer dint of long professionalism. ‘Yes!’ she clipped out thickly. ‘Yes, I do want the role!’

  ‘Then you’ll do as I say!’ he told her under his breath.

  She said nothing, but she was appalled by the impli- cations of what he was saying, and the demands he might make of her before he agreed to cast her in Tigresse, and give her the chance of that glittering, golden prize.

  ‘After dinner,’ Jared said, eyes narrowing on her face. ‘We’ll talk after dinner. Maybe a long walk on the beach. Somewhere no one else can overhear our conversation.’ He glanced at the watch on his hair-roughened wrist. ‘In the meantime, I haven’t even unpacked. I’ll see you at dinner. And you’d better be ready to confess to being exactly like Lelie, or you won’t be starring in Tigresse next year.’

  Turning on his heel, he strode off the balcony, leaving Christie just standing there, trembling from head to foot.

  She was alone on the balcony, and the sun was hot on her face, but all the glittering prizes in the world could not save her now as she felt success turn to ashes in her hands, stripping her of fame and power, leaving her nothing but a woman—in love with a man who hated her.

  The warm breeze lifted strands of her blonde hair. She moved her head gently to let them slide down her back, and a second later she was back in the past, twenty-five years old, innocent and in love with nothing but her career, standing in that little newsagent’s shop in Elstree High Street while a tall, dark-haired stranger stared at her across the greetings cards rack…

  ‘Hi!’ He had followed her out of the shop, measuring his long stride to her shorter one. ‘I hear the newsagent’s daughter is having an affair with the baker’s son.’

  ‘Everybody knows about that!’ She had laughed. ‘You must be new in town!’

  He had grimaced, laughing too. ‘I only got here two weeks ago. I thought it was hot news.’

  ‘Two weeks ago?’ Christie had tucked her Mars bar into her handbag, frowning thoughtfully as she allowed the very handsome stranger to follow her and chat her up. ‘You’re not working on the Jared Buchanan picture, are you? Over at the film studios?’

  ‘Yes, as a matter of fact, I am.’ Those dark eyes made her pulse skip beats. ‘Why? Interested in movies?’

  ‘Of course!’ She had smiled shyly at him, unaccus- tomed to being so wildly and instantly attracted to a man. ‘I’m an actress.’

  He had stopped walking then, looking down at her in cool silence. Christie stopped too. It seemed natural. He was so gorgeous, and if he was threatening it was only in a very exciting way. The leather jacket and jeans he wore made her like him even more. She hated vain, strutting men, met so many of them in her profession. This man was so masculine and unpretentious that she assumed he was a cameraman, or some other behind- the-cameras kind of guy. Laid back at the same time as being dynamic, well spoken without being upper class, and as for those dark, passionate eyes…

  ‘What kind of actress?’

  ‘I’m in a soap.’ She had smiled, shrugging, almost ashamed of it because of the bad press soaps always got. ‘At Elstree, just across the road from you. I play Lucy Bellamy in Bellamy Place.’

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t watch TV. Are you well known?’

  ‘Only if you watch soaps!’ she had laughed. ‘But it’s a good career rung and, besides, I like living and working here for the moment.’

  A smile touched the hard mouth. ‘So you’d know about the social life in Elstree? I’m completely lost— don’t know where anything is; nightclubs, restaurants, that kind of thing.’

  ‘Well…’ She shrugged again. ‘I’m afraid I don’t go out much in the evenings. Everything revolves around work.’

  ‘Don’t you even know where I could get a good meal at night?’

  She thought for a second. ‘The King’s Head is sup- posed to be good.’

  ‘Great.’ The dark eyes had sparkled so charmingly at her that she had felt breathless. ‘Why don’t you have dinner with me there tonight?’

  A hot flush of excited attraction had burned her face. ‘Oh… yes, I suppose I could… well, thank you…’ She had looked away, aware she was stammering like a schoolgirl and embarrassed by her own shyness.

  He had smiled, saying deeply, ‘I’ll meet you there at seven-thirty.’ Then he had touched her hot cheek with one strong hand and walked coolly across the road leaving her pulses racing with awareness of that touch.

  She thought of nothing else for the rest of the day. The girls at the studios teased her mercilessly, aware she was mooning over a man for the first time in their long acquaintance with her, and delighted she had at least ‘joined the rest of us by meeting someone gorgeous’ I Christie had almost enjoyed their teasing: the handsome stranger was definitely worth it, and besides, mooning over a man was such a new experience to her that she savoured every moment of it.

  All her life, she had thought of nothing but her career. Men had asked her out, of course, but she had rarely accepted dates with them, and on the one occasion when she had found herself alone with a man at night, she had almost been forced into bed on a ‘date-rape’. Escaping that with nothing but a few unpleasant fum- blings followed by a struggle, she hadn’t wanted to get close to a man again. That was four years ago, though, and this was now. She couldn’t wait to see her handsome cameraman again.

  But he was no cameraman, as she found out when she walked towards the King’s Head, saw a long black limousine pull up outside it, and watched her handsome stranger step out, still in jeans and leather jacket.

  ‘Hey!’ A man in the rear of the limo called out. ‘Jared—-what about your wake-up call?’

  He strode back to the car, and bent to the window. ‘Keep it at five a.m. I might be busy, but I doubt it. She doesn’t seem that kind of girl and, besides, we’re over budget as it is.
We have to stick to schedule.’

  ‘OK, Jared. You’re the director.’

  Christie caught her breath as she heard those words, and stumbled out of the shadows into the glowing light of the fish and chip shop next to the pub.

  Jared turned, seeing her.

  There was a long, stunned silence. The pub sign creaked over the white steps, cars drove past in the cold night, red tail lights flashing hot in the January air.

  ‘You’re Jared Buchanan?’ Christie had whispered.

  His mouth hardened. He patted the roof of the limo, pushed away from it, and strode coolly over to Christie, his hands shoved deep in the pockets of his dark jacket.

  ‘Does it make any difference?’

  ‘Of course it makes a difference!’ Her eyes were ap- palled. ‘My God, you must know it does, or you would have told me sooner.’

  ‘Would I?’ A dark regret filled his eyes as he shrugged. ‘I’m not so sure. It’s so rare that I’m taken on face value. Most people I meet just see dollars and cents when they look at me. As for beautiful young actresses…’ His mouth twisted cynically. ‘You can imagine what they see.’

  Christie looked into his hard face and struggled to overcome the sense of inferiority that was swamping her.

  ‘I get so sick of it,’ he said deeply. ‘Everybody wants to use me to further their own careers. Sometimes I dream about meeting people who’ve never heard of me or my work.’

  ‘You could go and live in Outer Mongolia,’ she had said with a shy smile.

  He touched her cheek. ‘Or I could have dinner with you.’

  Christie leapt with response, her heart pounding. ‘Oh but…I know who you are now. It wouldn’t be the same. I thought you were just a handsome cameraman, someone I could—’

  ‘Be yourself with?’

  She had nodded slowly, flushing.

  ‘Then carry on thinking of me like that,’ he had said softly, taking her hand. ‘And let me be myself with you.’

  So they went into the pub together, took an intimate table in the shadows in the corner, and ate steak and kidney pie washed down with lager and lime. Christie still felt inferior to him every time she remembered with a shock that she was dining with Jared Buchanan. But most of the time, he was right: they were able to forget and pretend and just be themselves without thinking of power or prestige or fame.

  Later, he walked her home along the cold, dark streets.

  ‘I suppose you’ll go off me,’ she said sadly, her arm linked through his, leaning her head against his broad shoulder as they ambled along, ‘and never want to see me again, if I tell you I want to be famous.’

  ‘No.’ He had had a smile in his voice. ‘I won’t go off you.’

  ‘It’s what I’ve always dreamed of. My name in lights…’ Her eyes had flickered up to the dark sky. ‘I want to be like them. See? They live above the rest of the world, and nobody can hurt them, because they’re just too far away.’

  He had slipped his arm around her, turning her, saying deeply, ‘I live up there, Chris, and it’s not what I thought it would be.’

  ‘People who get there always say that.’

  ‘That’s because it’s true.’

  Her hands had slipped so naturally around his strong neck. ‘All cliches are true. But we have to find that out for ourselves, don’t we?’

  ‘The only cliche I can think of right now is—kiss me…’ His dark head moved down slowly as his arms tightened around her, giving her time to get away, but she couldn’t do anything other than raise her mouth to meet his and, when the kiss came, it was a love song.

  The world spun on its axis, her mouth was opening beneath his and her eyes were closed before she knew what was happening, letting that tender kiss turn so rapidly to fire, to real passion, the onslaught so deep and fast that they were both helpless in the grip of fierce excitement as they clung together beneath the cold, distant glitter of the stars.

  ‘I knew it would be like this…’ he muttered hoarsely against her mouth, his breathing as ragged as his heartbeat. ‘I thought about it all day—tell me you did, too.’

  ‘All day…’ she moaned breathlessly through bruised lips.

  ‘Let me come into your flat and kiss you some more!’

  She stiffened in his arms. ‘No…’

  He closed his eyes and said thickly, ‘Chris, please… I won’t try anything, I promise. But I don’t want to go home yet. I want to be with you some more. Just a cup of coffee and a long kiss. That’s all I—’

  ‘Look,’ she said huskily, ‘I don’t know you well enough yet, and it may seem all right now, but how would it look in court if anything went wrong? “Yes, m’lud, I let a stranger come into my flat and—”’

  ‘All right,’ he said with a wry grimace. ‘I see your point, even if it is a little insulting. It’s a man’s world, we built it, we run it, and we have to pay the price for the men who take advantage of it.’

  Christie had laughed, but it had been the first sign of his out-and-out chauvinism, and she should have been warned.

  ‘So…’ He had touched her cheek. ‘I’ll let you go tonight, but only if you promise to see me tomorrow night.’

  She promised, and their love-affair began.

  They became inseparable very quickly. For the first week they were with each other every night, but he left her at her front door and did not go further than a long kiss under the stars. But gradually her trust grew, and they began to spend evenings at home together, always at her place, and always accompanied by long, long kisses interspersed with deep conversation.

  ‘Did you always want to be famous, Jared?’

  ‘Always. I believed everything would be all right if I could just have enough power, fame and money. But it doesn’t solve any of the old problems.’

  ‘What were the old problems?’ She had held her breath as she asked him that, lying in the lamplight of her front room, entwined on the sofa with him, afraid to tell him of her background and her own reasons for wanting fame.

  ‘I’m an orphan. I was orphaned at birth and put in a home.’

  She stared, and didn’t breathe for several seconds.

  ‘It made me angry,’ he said deeply. ‘Living in that awful orphanage with all those other lost boys, and no Wendy to look after us.’

  ‘Oh, my love…’

  ‘I used to lie awake at night and dream of a real mother, what she’d look like, how she’d cook for me, and how she’d love me. I’d fall asleep smiling, then wake up to find myself being dragged out of bed by the nearest bully, and I’d know I was back in the real world, having to fight just to keep my position in the lost- boy hierarchy.’

  Understanding lit her soul as she whispered, ‘And you’d think to yourself: when I’m famous, no one will dare do this to me.’

  He had laughed ruefully. ‘Childish, I know, but—’

  ‘It’s the way it takes root,’ she had nodded, stroking his dark hair. ‘Just as it did in me…’ And, finally, she was able to tell him about her own childhood, feeling the inexpressible relief that someone understood.

  ‘Do you think you’ll ever get there?’ Jared asked her. ‘Up in the sky with the stars?’

  ‘I…’ She had floundered then, suddenly reminded of his towering professional status compared to her, and so she had just laughed and said, ‘Maybe. Who knows? But what does it matter tonight? I’m in love, and every- thing’s all right so long as you’re here.’

  Everything was all right, too. She felt loved for the first time in her life, and the previously forbidden world of close personal intimacy was opening up to her with every second she spent in Jared’s company. It did not change her ambitions; it just added a new dimension to her life.

  One of the most powerful dimensions was that of the senses.

  Jared’s long kisses on the couch were turning into passionate sessions that were getting closer and closer to full lovemaking. Night after night they lay together touching, kissing, exploring each other’s bodies. He was tea
ching her the true meaning of desire—and of frustration.

  Eventually, neither of them could go on without con- summating their love, but it was Jared who finally halted the crazed frustration they were living with and brought them into the final dimension of love.

  ‘I can’t go on like this much longer…’ he said hoarsely as they lay semi-naked together one night on the couch, both sheened in sweat and panting with pent-up desire. ‘Darling, I know you’re scared, but we’re almost there, and I really am reaching the end of my tether.’

  ‘So am I,’ she had moaned against his hot neck, the ache between her thighs so consuming she could feel the blood pounding round her body, racing hard and fast to that engorged nub of flesh and the slippery heat below it. ‘I think I’m going to explode if I don’t surrender soon!’

  ‘Surrender tonight,’ he had urged with a deep groan, and she had whispered yes, which made him groan even more as he kissed her, then swept her into his arms and carried her to the dark bedroom, laid her down on the bed, and took her into fulfilment by slowly stripping her naked, stroking her, whispering wicked words of love to her, his own powerful naked body moving slowly against her without entering her. His expertise left her a quiv- ering wreck of flesh beneath him as she went into climax, gasping hoarsely in disbelief.

  ‘It won’t hurt so much now, darling,’ Jared told her hoarsely as he entered her, but when his rigid manhood pushed against the barrier of her virginity he gave a rough cry, lost control and thrust into her hard, fast, shaking from head to foot as he went into violent climax.

  Christie just lay beneath him in stunned silence. Was it supposed to hurt like that? And be over so quickly? Her own pleasure was still pulsing through her body, but she had expected his to last longer.

  ‘I’m sorry…’ Jared had groaned in abject horror as he lifted his head, gasping for breath. ‘I was so excited I couldn’t stop myself… but if you knew how it felt to feel you…inside…a real virgin. Chris, I’ve dreamed of it all my life. I didn’t fall in love with you because you were a virgin, but it does make it all perfect.’