Wanting

‘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?’

Dear God, she didn’t believe this. ‘You mean you’ll give me the Rio contract if I go to bed with you?’ she said bluntly. ‘For how long?’

‘For as long as it takes,’ he said gently. For as long as it took for him to grow tired of her he must mean. She started to shake with repressed rage. How dare he insult her like this; how dare he suppose even for one moment that she was for sale?

‘And if I agree?’ Some biting urge to discover just how avaricious he actually thought she was prompted her to go on. ‘What proof do I have that….’

He looked at the phone. ‘I’ll arrange it whilst you’re here, provided you make a small down payment as proof of sincerity first,’ he added mildly.

‘I can’t believe you mean this,’ she said the words to herself more than to him but he heard her and his face tightened.

‘Oh, believe me, I do,’ he said softly. ‘You ran from me last night Heather, you made it plain just how much you loathed the thought of me. You rejected me—publicly. Publicly…’ he continued when she would have interrupted, ‘Terry knows… Jennifer knows. I’m not a man who likes being humiliated.’

If that was the case he shouldn’t have assumed that she would simply fall into his arms, Heather thought feverishly.

‘You need that contract,’ he told her. ‘As models go, you’ve reached your peak. This contract will set you up nicely for the rest of your life.’ He obviously didn’t know that she had money of her own, Heather decided; and that she could easily afford to fling his threats back in his face.

‘And if I don’t agree to become your… mistress, you’ll make sure I don’t get the contract.’

‘Clever girl,’ he mocked.

‘But why me?’

‘Why not me?’ he encountered. ‘What have all the other men in your life had that I don’t?’

If she told him he’d never believe her, Heather thought watching him silently menacing her, waiting for her to fall into his trap.

‘Come on Heather,’ he said grimly, suddenly very much at the end of his patience. ‘What difference can one more man make, and think of the benefits?’

‘I’m surprised you’re prepared to go to such lengths,’ she said dryly, trying to buy time to think. ‘I shouldn’t have thought a man like you would need to go to them to get female companionship.’

‘I don’t, normally, and I doubt I would now, if it wasn’t for the fact that I don’t like being made a fool of,’ he told her, his face hardening. ‘Everyone saw the way you avoided me last night; and half of them knew I’d deliberately set things up so that I could meet you… and like I said,’ his eyes rested on her body. ‘I want you.’

Well, you’re not having me. The words were on the tip of Heather’s tongue, but she suppressed them. No. She’d played along with him for a while; let him think he’d won her and then…. A tiny inner voice warned her that she was playing with fire, but she ignored it.

‘So it would seem,’ she agreed, dropping her voice to a soft purr.

‘And I’ll make you want me,’ he told her.

Did he honestly think he could? She almost laughed aloud. Here at least she was safe. ‘You think so?’

‘I know so.’

His arrogance almost robbed her of breath.

‘Come on, Heather, let’s stop playing games. I know the sort of woman you are, and your type doesn’t normally appeal to me, but there’s something about you, and it’s got right under my skin. You make me itch to possess you,’ he told her frankly.

‘I wonder what your co-directors would say if they knew about the offer you’ve made me?’ she murmured coolly.

He laughed. ‘If you’re threatening to tell them, I shouldn’t bother. You see, Heather, they’ve already made their choice and it isn’t you, but as I’m the major shareholder I can make them change that choice. If you go running to them, all they’ll do is assume it’s sour grapes.’

Was he telling the truth? What did it matter? She would have liked the contract but not to the extent that she was willing to barter herself for it.

‘Could I have some time to think about it?’ she asked, watching him.

He laughed and shook his head. ‘I promised myself that you’d share my bed last night, Heather, and I don’t take easily to frustration. I want your answer now; and your commitment. But we both know you’re going to say “yes”, don’t we?’ he said easily, infuriating her still further. ‘You’re too greedy to refuse.’

Battening down her anger, Heather looked at him, and then said carefully and clearly, ‘For the last time, there is nothing, no inducement you could offer, that would make me share your bed. Your ego is enormous; your arrogance unbelievable.’ She saw the colour sting along the high cheekbones and continued remorselessly. ‘I don’t need the Rio contract; and even if I did I’d refuse it. You dare to try and blackmail me into bed with you? What kind of man are you….’

‘I’ll show you, shall I?’ he ground out, reaching for her, so quickly that she was caught off guard, his fingers snapping round her wrists, imprisoning her, the strength of their tensile grip too much for her to resist. Suddenly she felt extremely vulnerable, and Heather knew with shocked insight that she had pushed him too far. As he held her she knew exactly what it was to experience fear. For a moment her anger had been so great that she simply hadn’t thought. Despite her height there was simply no way she could free herself from the grip of his hands, and panic, wild, and disordered shot through her, making her struggle frantically, poise and cool control forgotten as she felt the heat coming off his body and knew her struggles were arousing him.

When his body touched hers she shrank from it, shocked by the sensations coursing through her; totally alien and yet in some way, intensely familiar, as though some part of her had always known they were there but had rigorously held them at bay. As she looked up into Race’s eyes she saw his expression change, sharpening, watching; whilst her body started to tremble in primitive response to his touch. She didn’t understand what was happening to her. He was everything she loathed and detested, and yet…

His hands slid from her waist to her back finding and stroking along her spine. She tried to remind herself that Race was simply trying to punish her, but her body refused to listen. The moment he touched her it had been like the beginning of a nightmare; all her defences swept away, not by him, but by her reaction to him. She still hated and loathed everything that he was but he was right; inexplicably, horrifyingly, she wanted him! The knowledge was enough to make her freeze in his arms, hoping that his anger had died down enough for her to reason with him.

‘Heather.’

She heard her name and looked up, gasping as his hands slipped up to her shoulders holding her against his body, his mouth searingly hot against hers, his tongue probing the tense outline of her lips. Her head was swimming with the rage of need suddenly out of control inside her. No man had ever made her feel like this; she didn’t even like him, she kept repeating soundlessly, but her body wasn’t listening. Race had already found the buttons on her shirt, his fingers impatient as he tugged them open, her startled murmur giving him the access he wanted to the moist interior of her mouth. She tried to fight against the insidious pull of the desire she could feel building up inside her, forcing herself to remember why she had come here, but it was as though all her barriers had suddenly come down, as though Race’s touch was the magic key to turn the locks she had always secured against his sex.

And she wasn’t alone in her desire. What had started out as anger had changed swiftly—for both of them. In the heat of his body against hers, she could feel his arousal; see it in the glitter of the eyes that searched her face, his mouth wry as he pulled away to mutter thickly, ‘My God, I don’t believe this. One moment I want to wring your neck, the next all I can think about is having you in my bed, feeling you burn up against me, wanting me in the same way I want you. And you do want me, don’t you, my lovely Heather?’

Perhaps if he hadn’t bent his head to touch her throat with his lips, his hand stroking sensuously against the curve of her breast she might have found the strength to deny him. What she was doing was wrong; every instinct she possessed told her that— every instinct bar one, and that one clamoured above all the rest for satisfaction. Her body, starved of all that he was offering it for so long, blindly over-rode the danger signals from her brain. When Race left her to close the curtains she simply stood there, swaying slightly, her gaze fixed on the log fire burning in the grate, her body knowing without her having to look, the exact moment when he came to stand behind her, gently removing her jacket and hat, his hands on her shoulders turning her to him, a smile darkening his eyes as he murmured, ‘I think I prefer the outfit you had on last night——’

She opened her mouth, and he laid his fingers across it. ‘No, don’t say anything. Last night when I saw you I thought you were the most exciting thing I’d seen in years. I wanted you so badly I could have taken you there and then—like an adolescent,’ he told her with a grimace, ‘and then you ran.’ His eyes smouldered darkly over her face. ‘No woman runs away from me, Heather—no woman makes a fool of me the way you did. I want you. And you want me too,’ he told her, ‘I know you do.’

That was the trouble, Heather thought weakly, closing her eyes as his hands reached for her blouse, she did. So badly that she was shaking with it, unable to marshal any coherent or logical thoughts, her whole being concentrated on the man in front of her and the ache gradually spreading through her body.

She let him remove her blouse, shuddering strongly when he peeled it back to reveal the pale flesh of her breasts, inadequately concealed in the lace bra she was wearing. She felt him tugging down the zip on her skirt but even when it joined the rest of her clothes on the floor she felt incapable of protest. She felt his hands tremble as he reached for the fastening of her bra, and as his hands moved slowly upwards, cupping her aroused breasts, anguish and desire mingled inside her, her eyes closing involuntarily as Race bent his head, his mouth burning her skin, her body on fire from his touch, shaking in his arms as he pulled her tautly against his hips, letting her feel the extent of his arousal.

‘You’re burning me up inside, Heather,’ he muttered hoarsely against her skin. ‘Feel.’ Somehow his shirt had come unfastened, and his skin was damply hot beneath her palms, her body arching instinctively against the rhythmic thrust of his. He was taking her too far, too fast, warning bells jangled in her brain, the intensity of her own response, confusing her, deafening her to the urgings of her mind, her body fused against him by the heat of their mutual need. She could feel him tremble as his mouth explored the column of her throat, his teeth nipping the delicate flesh.

Common sense intruded for a moment as she turned her head and saw the totally absorbed and intensely aroused expression on his face, fear streaking through her. What was she doing letting this man make love to her? She didn’t know him; she didn’t like him. She tried to pull away but his hands slid to her hips, holding her, the darkness of his head against her breast unleashing a wild tide of sensation that obliterated everything else. When he picked her up and carried her over to the leather chesterfield by the fire, she made no demur. For a long time he simply stared down at her, slowly examining every inch of her flesh until her body seemed to burn beneath the heat of his exploration. His hand caressed her thigh making her clench her hands and writhe in pleasure against him, her eyes flying open as he muttered something urgently, removing his jeans and coming to lie beside her, the heat and power of his body overwhelming her for a second so that she tensed in fear until she felt the seductive warmth of his tongue against her nipples, the suddenly harsh and changed tenor of his breathing, telling her that the caress gave him as much pleasure as it did her. The instinctive arching of her body against him, her nails raking urgently against his skin, made him groan and reach for her hips.