AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He had felt the unmistakable tremorings of desire as he had studied them. But, having seen them, had wondered aloud to Scott whether the final images weren’t just too sexy. Scott had shrugged and given him a knowing look.
‘Oh, come on, Darian—you don’t use a young and beautiful model to do anything but sell sex,’ he had pointed out. ‘Do you?’
Selling sex.
Put like that, it sounded off-putting, and Darian had grimaced with a slight element of distaste—but that hadn’t stopped him finding her number and ringing her, had it?
‘They’re terrific,’ he said softly.
‘Good. I’m pleased.’ She waited. She knew that she wanted to see him again, in fact she had to see him again, but she was perceptive enough to know that she was dealing with a man who would always be pursued, and natural predators did not like to be pursued.
‘I wondered if you’d like to have dinner with me?’ he asked. ‘As a kind of thank-you for turning in such a fantastic job.’
Lara very nearly asked him whether he always asked people out to dinner on the strength of their having done a good job, but she knew she couldn’t risk scaring him away.
This, after all, was precisely why she had fought to get the job in the first place. To get closer to Darian, to find out as much as she could about him before she told Khalim what she knew.
‘I’d love to,’ she murmured. ‘When?’
Human nature was a funny thing, Darian decided as a contrary feeling of disappointment washed over him. He hadn’t expected it to be quite so easy, but why on earth should it make her seem marginally less desirable because she had not played games with him?
Because women always made it this easy for him, that was why. Had he hoped that her spikiness and spirit would make him have to battle for a bit to get her to agree to have dinner with him—and hadn’t there been a part of him which had been anticipating that battle?
‘I don’t suppose you’re free tomorrow night?’
Lara heard the slight cooling of his voice and knew immediately that she had been too eager. ‘Not tomorrow night, I’m afraid.’ She paused, waiting.
Darian relaxed. There was nothing more off-putting than a woman who dropped everything because she wanted to see you—or, worse, a woman who had a social diary with great yawning gaps in it. But then he thought about her sparkling blue eyes and her perfect figure and guessed that Lara Black would not suffer from a lack of anything to do.
‘Thursday, I’m flying to Paris for the day,’ he mused. ‘And I’m back late. How about Friday?’
She paused for just long enough to sound as though she was consulting a diary—after all, he wasn’t to know that she was standing dripping in the bathroom, with her body tingling not just from the cold but from the effect of that rich, deep voice and the thought of seeing him again.
Because you need to see him, she reminded herself firmly. ‘Friday’s fine,’ she said calmly.
‘Shall I pick you up?’
To her horror, she felt her breasts tighten in response to the sudden softening of his voice, and the face which looked back at her through the blurred and misty mirror was startled. And confused. She didn’t want to be attracted to him—certainly not this attracted. So she’d spend one evening with him, she told herself. That was all. ‘Okay,’ she said slowly.
‘Good. Give me your address, and I’ll see you around eight.’
Darian parked the car, expertly edging into the tiny space available at the address she had given him, and as he switched the powerful engine off he registered that he was surprised.
So she lived in Notting Hill, did she?
Which meant that she was successful. Property in this part of West London was astronomically expensive these days, ever since it had become ‘the’ place to live, with rock stars and Hollywood actresses
swooping in to buy up every graceful house available.
Except that no one had heard of Lara Black—not really. So how come all the outward trappings of success? Scott had told him that she had done a few forgettable plays and a couple of television commercials where she had either been playing a vegetable or lost in a crowd of people drinking cola. But she’d been in nothing major to date.
He climbed the elegant steps to the house and pressed the button for Flat B. She probably rented, he reasoned. Or shared with a group of other impecunious women, pooling their resources so that they could live in an area with a prestigious address.
The door opened and Darian’s eyes narrowed as he was greeted by a tall man with a lock of hair flopping into his eyes. Darian was rarely taken off-guard, but this time he was—amazed to be staring into the face of a stranger who was instantly recognisable. You would have had to have been living underground not to have recognised the star of the film which had broken all records at the international box-office last year.
What the hell was Jake Haddon doing here?
‘I’m looking for Lara Black,’ growled Darian.
