Wild Melody (11 page)

she had been unfaithful to him. The man came across as a boorish

individual, and yet as the scene progressed, his grief and hurt came

compellingly through. It was powerful stuff, and Catriona was so engrossed

she entirely failed to hear the front door opening, and only realised she was

no longer alone when the study door swung open and Jason said grimly, 'I

thought I asked you not to meddle with anything on that desk.'

Flushing painfully, she scrambled to her feet. 'I didn't mean to pry,' she said.

'I knocked some of the papers on the floor by accident and started to read as

I was picking them up again. I—I couldn't put it down. Please forgive me.'

'There's nothing to forgive,' he said shortly. He held out his hand for the

papers and she passed them to him, feeling like a scolded child.

'I didn't know you wrote plays. I thought you only made documentaries and

things like that,' she said.

'Nobody knows, except Hugo and the select few.' He saw realisation

dawning in her eyes and nodded. 'Yes, you're right. I'm the Jon Lisle whose

work you so much admire, according to Sally.' His lips curled a little in a

mirthless smile. 'If you'd known it was me, your admiration would have

been lessened, no doubt.'

'No, it wouldn't,' she said, facing him. 'I think
Under the Skin
is marvellous

and I'm sure everyone else will too. And this one could be even better.'

He came round the desk and took the papers from her. 'Maybe it could at

that,' he said, almost absently. He gave her a taut smile. 'The important thing

is that no one must know who I am. I want the plays to be judged on their

own merits and not for anything I may or may not have done in the past in a

totally different field. Can you understand that?'

'Yes, I think so,' Catriona said thoughtfully.

'Then I'm in your hands.' He looked squarely at her. 'What are you going to

do?'

'I shan't do anything,' Catriona said, puzzled, then light dawned. 'You

mean—you think—that I'll tell everyone!'

'Well, it would be the perfect revenge if you felt you needed one,' he said,

lighting a cigarette.

Catriona stared at him helplessly for a moment, then she moved to brush

past him and away, tears pricking at her eyelids. He caught her arm in a

merciless grip.

'Where do you think you're going?'

She struggled. 'Let me go!'

'Try not to be such a fool,' he said calmly. He pulled her round to face him

and studied her. 'What's the matter? Did the suggestion hurt your pride?'

'You had no right to say what you did,' she flared.

'Perhaps not,' Jason agreed. 'I just had to make sure, that was all.'

'Now that you are sure—please may I go?'

'Not yet,' he returned equably. 'Now that my guilty secret is out, and

presumably safe with you, you could be a great help to me.' He gestured

towards the littered desk. 'It will take me half the night to do this on my own.

How about it? Are you a secretary bird as well as a home help?'

Catriona paused for a moment. She could recognise that from Jason Lord

this was almost an olive branch and some of her resentment began to fade at

the unexpectedness of it.

'I'd like to help,' she agreed quietly.

'Fine.' His voice was equally quiet. 'Shall we get started?'

At first they worked in silence, but gradually Jason began to talk to her

about television drama, and the impact he was hoping to make when his play

was shown.

'Are you hoping that playwriting will take over from everything else

completely one day?' she asked, rather shyly.

He smiled. 'It's too early to say. I'd like some critical reaction to
Under the

Skin
before I start looking to the future, though Hugo's seen the first draft of

the new play and he seems to like it and want to do it.'

'I don't suppose writing plays makes an awful lot of money either,' Catriona

said doubtfully.

His lips quivered slightly. 'Spoken like a canny Scot,'he said. 'But you can

forget any romantic visions of me starving in a garret for my art. I have

interests in several of my brother's companies, so I do have a source of

income apart from my TV work. But at the moment I'm quite heavily

committed to my documentary work, so I shan't be coming to any snap

decisions.'

'Your brother is much older than you, isn't he?' Catriona ventured.

'Eleven years. I was definitely an afterthought.' He eyed her. 'Planning on

becoming an interviewer, Miss Muir? I must find a place for you in my

team.'

'Oh no,' she said, blushing fierily and trying to subdue the unwelcome

thought that in this softer, almost teasing mood he was devastatingly

attractive. She wondered what her reaction would have been if they had

simply met as strangers at some social gathering and she had not been

forced to regard him as the uncle of the man she loved, then she chided

herself for being naive. If her search for Jeremy had not led her to his flat,

their paths would never have crossed. His world was peopled with women

like Moira Dane, who knew all the arts of attracting a man's attention.

She watched him covertly as he sorted through a sheaf of papers, frowning a

little.. He was an entirely different type from Jeremy, she decided, although

there was a faint family resemblance. Jeremy's good looks were still boyish

in many ways, but Jason Lord looked totally male and totally adult, she

thought, studying his firm-lipped, rather sensual mouth, and the

uncompromising lines of his cheekbones and jaw. She saw he was glancing

at her, his brows raised inquiringly, and hastily dropped her gaze back to the

notes in her lap, giving herself a mental kick as she did so.

It was several hours before the desk was finally cleared, and all the

papers—typescripts, notes and correspondence, collated and filed in the

small cabinet under the window.

Jason straightened with a groan. 'It's time we ate,' he said. His eyes

narrowed as he looked at Catriona. 'Did you have any lunch?'

'I forgot,' she admitted, and he sighed in exasperation.

'Right, grab your coat and we'll go out.'

'I can't go out like this,' she protested, indicating her shabby jeans and the

high-necked black sweater.

'Why not? They constituted almost your entire wardrobe at one time.'

'I know that,' she said unhappily.

'But it won't do any more, is that it? Oh, country mouse, what have we done

to you?' He was silent for a moment. 'Is it really your clothes that are

bugging you, or do you not want to repeat the distressing experience of

eating in my company?'

She flushed like a peony, remembering the lunch party at the studio. 'It's just

my clothes.'

'Then that's easily settled. There's a good Italian place, not far from Sal's. I'll

take you there to change first as long as you swear to be quick.'

Swearing it was one thing, performing it quite another, Catriona found as

she looked over her small stock of clothes, wondering what to wear. In the

end, prompted by Jason's impatient pacings in the living room only a few

feet away, she decided on one of her newest purchases, a midi-length skirt in

violet wool worn with a white silk blouse with long full sleeves, fastening at

the back with a mass of tiny buttons. She thought she had managed to fasten

it quite successfully, but when she reached the top she found she had only

one buttonhole left for two buttons and had to start again. She had to twist

herself to see in the mirror and her arms were beginning to ache as she

worked away. She groaned out loud when she realised she had again missed

a button almost halfway down.

If only Sally had been there, but she had left a note to say she had gone to the

cinema with a friend from drama school days. Catriona began awkwardly to

unfasten the blouse again when Jason rapped on the bedroom door.

'What in hell's name are you doing?' he called. 'You've got three minutes to

get out here.'

Catriona immediately became all thumbs. 'I'm sorry,' she called back. 'I'm

having bother with some buttons and . . .'

Her voice died away in sheer shock as the bedroom door was flung open and

Jason stood surveying her.

'My God,' he said disgustedly. 'Is that all?'

He was across the room and fastening them before she could say or do

anything to prevent him, and instantly all her old hackles rose. The nerve of

him, marching into her room like this without "so much as a by your leave!

she raged inwardly, standing completely rigid in an attempt to ignore the

warmth of his fingers on her bare skin.

'There,' he said as the last button was secured.

'Thank you,' she returned stiffly. 'You're very kind.'

'I'm very hungry,' he said. 'If you'd given me a shout five minutes ago, we

could have been eating by now.'

'How foolish of me.' Catriona picked up her bag from the bed and walked to

the door. She gave him a cool, sweet smile. 'I'm just not used to having a

man to help me dress, I'm afraid.'

'But I thought as I'd once undressed you, you'd make an exception in my

case,' he said, and grinned unpleasantly as the colour flared in her cheeks.

'You've a short memory, haven't you, darling? The next time it happens I'll

try and make it more memorable for you.'

Mortified tears sparkled on her lashes, as she stared im- potently at him. 'I

don't know how you can remind me of that awful night,' she said in a low

voice. 'I feel nothing but shame when I think of it.'

'Then you're a fool. If anyone should have any regrets, it's myself.'

'What have you to regret?'

'That I let you sleep alone.' His mouth curved sardonically at the sight of her

startled face. 'After all, I meant to jolt you out of caring for Jeremy. I might

as well have made a good job of it while I was about it.'

'And you really think that one night with you would have —cured me?' If

she hadn't been so angry, she could almost have laughed at the insufferable

arrogance of this creature, who imagined he was so irresistible to women.

'You flatter yourself, Mr Lord.'

'Do I?' He was beside her and she found herself with her last coherent

thought wondering why she had ever thought his eyes wintry when they

could glow with such a strange and unfamiliar light. . .

He took her by the hips and pulled her towards him, grinding her body

against his own so intimately that she cried out in outrage—a protest

instantly stifled as his lips came down on hers.

And what had any kiss she had ever received to do with this achingly sensual

exploration of her mouth by his, until tremblingly but inevitably her lips

parted to his insistence. For a moment, even then, she tried to rebel as the

kiss deepened to a shattering intimacy she had never dreamed of, then

blindly, wordlessly, she succumbed, her shaking hands twining themselves

in his dark hair.

His hands slid from her hips to her waist, then probed the quivering nerve

endings along her spine. She felt as if even their breathing had become part

of each other. That without his mouth and body pressed against hers, she

would wither and die in some strange never-known way.

As if she was in a dream, she felt the buttons at the back of her blouse give

way under his fingers, shivering as he caressed her bared flesh, his hands

lingering over her shoulders and the base of her throat as he eased the soft

silk away.

She clung to him still, trembling at the sensations he was so knowingly

arousing, yet wanting him to go on touching her. With a sound that was half

a sigh, half a groan he lifted his mouth from hers and stared down into her

flushed face. He raised his hand and gently traced the lines of her jaw to the

pulse in her throat, then followed the slender line of her neck to the

vulnerable hollows at its base. And paused.

Catriona glanced down and saw his fingers curving round the silver chain

that held Jeremy's ring.

Their eyes met, his puzzled and with the first stirring of anger in their

depths.

'You can't still be hoping,' he began. 'Not even you with that incredible

optimism of yours . ..'

She tore herself out of his arms, her hand closing protectively over the ring.

'I suppose to—a man of the world like you'—she made the phrase sound

like an insult—'a word like fidelity or loyalty has little meaning.'

'Applied to Jeremy, they're practically meaningless,' he said slowly.

'Applied to yourself. . He looked her over and his lips curled sardonically.

Crimson with anger as well as shame, she pulled her loosened blouse up

over her shoulders. How could she have let him—
him
of all people behave

like that? No one, not even Jeremy, had ever been permitted to kiss or touch

her in that way. She had always had too much self-respect—Aunt Jessie had