Fast And Loose

At the driver’s comment that they were entering Georgetown, Darcy peered eagerly out of the window. According to an article in the airline magazine which she had read on the plane, this was one of the District of Columbia’s most fashionable neighbourhoods. It boasted late eighteenth- and nineteenth-century homes, where high-society hostesses entertained luminaries from the diplomatic and political worlds, interesting shops and myriad fine restaurants.

Refined and yet vibrant with vitality, Georgetown was a desirable residential urban village, something like an American version of Hampstead, Darcy decided.

The address that Keir had provided turned out to be a gracious turn-of-the-century brick villa on a quiet, leafy street. She walked up the short drive, mounted a flight of stone steps to a white-glossed front door, and pressed the bell. Hastily finger-combing her hair, Darcy adopted an expression which was intended to portray both maturity and sang-froid.

‘Hi,’ Keir said as the front door swung open.

In close-fitting jeans and a navy open-necked shirt which revealed a smattering of dark blond hair in the V at his throat, he looked all male, all lean physique, all powerful. Seeing him again hit her like a blow somewhere between the solar plexus and the upper thigh.

Darcy snatched in a breath. She was not going to be fazed? Her hormones would be controlled or, at least, ignored? Wrong on each count. The idea had been a huge folly. Her brow furrowed. Yet to be attracted to a man whom she classed as an enemy was a skewed notion which indicated a troublesome schizophrenia.

‘Hello,’ she said, the word emerging irritatingly like a gasp.

Keir smiled the kind of smile which once she would have drowned in. ‘Come in. Let me take your jacket,’ he said, and hitched it up amid a row of his which hung on brass hooks.

‘Has Jed Horwood arrived yet?’ she whispered furtively as he ushered her through a hall with stained-glass windows and a grandfather clock, and into an airy living-room.

‘No, he——’

‘Good, because I want to ask you something before he does. Last week I rented out videos of several of his films and now, frankly, acting with His Machoness is beginning to seem more and more a dubious pleasure,’ she said, arrowing in on a third worry which had helped to keep her awake the previous night.

‘I know you promised to get the best out of him, but, after seeing how wooden he is, I doubt if he has any best. Not only that but the celluloid Jed Horwood is so brash and smug.’ Darcy pulled a face. ‘Seriously awful.

‘I realise that he might be different in the flesh, but if not it could be a dampener. His character and mine are supposed to feel an irresistible urge for each other and, while I’m perfectly capable of acting this out——’ the declaration was defiant ‘—it would help if Jed Horwood weren’t a jerk. So,’ she demanded, reaching the end of her hurried spiel, ‘please would you tell me what the real man is like?’

‘In a word——’ Keir pursed his lips ‘—obnoxious.’

‘I knew it!’ Darcy wailed. ‘In that case it’s going to take——’

He cut her off. ‘We’ll talk about Jed in a minute. Can I get you a coffee?’

‘Oh—please.’

‘Cream?’ he enquired, gesturing to her to come with him through an archway and into the kitchen.

‘Just a dash.’

As he lifted a bubbling percolator Darcy put her thoughts about Jed Horwood on hold and gazed around. Fitted in limed oak and equipped with state-of-the-art appliances, the kitchen was streamlined yet cosy.

Her eyes strayed back to the pale-carpeted living-room, to a cauliflower-check sofa, to a wall unit which held television and stereo, to green and white curtains which floated at the sash windows. Although elegant, like its owner, the decor was a little spartan for her taste, but the room was light, well-shaped and possessed potential.

‘I like your house,’ she said.

‘Thanks. The place was virtually falling apart when I bought it a few years ago and since then I’ve spent a lot of time abroad, so I’m still in the process of getting things how I want them.’

‘Abroad where?’ she asked.

‘South America, the Caribbean, and I was in India for three months earlier this year.’

So he spent the time between assignments on holiday. This surprised her for, no matter how fascinating the locations were, Keir seemed too active and vigorous an individual to swan around for quite so long.

‘Sugar?’ he enquired.

Darcy shook her head. ‘Don’t take it.’

Her gaze returned to the living-room. Unlike the homes of some entertainment people which she had visited, there were no silver-framed photographs showing him arm in arm with Hollywood megastars, no cavalcade of posters which advertised his productions and proclaimed his success to every passing visitor, no evidence of the awards she knew he had won. While she was reluctant to give praise, he did seem to have his place in the world in a pleasingly modest perspective.

‘Where are your trophies?’ she asked.

‘In a cupboard somewhere,’ he replied, and cast her a wry look. ‘You have your Best Actress statuette slap bang in the middle of the mantlepiece, highly polished and spotlit at night?’

‘Wrong! It’s also in a cupboard.’

He gazed at her in silence for a moment, then he opened the fridge. ‘I guess an apartment would’ve been easier to run than a house,’ he reflected, ‘but I like space.’ Keir returned the cream-jug to a shelf. ‘So do you,’ he said.

‘Me?’

‘I understand the bedrooms at the De Robillard are the size of aircraft hangars.’

Darcy grinned at his description. ‘Almost. My bedroom at home would fit three times into the room I’ve been given and twice into the bathroom,’ she told him, ‘which, in addition to all the usual facilities, has a Jacuzzi and a multi-purpose exercise machine.’

Standing with his long legs apart, Keir folded tanned arms across his chest. ‘And you figure that as an award-winning, big-shot actress you deserve nothing but the best?’

Her grin withered. The cobalt-blue eyes were critical and so was his tone. Darcy knew that back in London she had been over-zealous with the airs and graces, but now they had begun to rebound.

‘No, I don’t and it wasn’t my idea to——’ She swerved.

‘You’re thinking how my father liked to live in the lap of luxury and that I’m the same?’ Darcy demanded. ‘You’re mistaken. I’m not. But if he enjoyed driving around in Rolls-Royces and drinking fine brandies and cruising the Mediterranean on fancy yachts, so what? An appetite for good living is not a crime and even if it did mean he died penniless it——’

‘Rupert hadn’t crossed my mind,’ Keir said. He fixed her with piercing blue eyes. ‘But you seem knotted up about him.’

‘Rubbish,’ Darcy rejected sharply, and frowned. Her outburst had surprised her as much as it had obviously surprised him, and she had no idea where it had come from, no idea what had made her veer off into a spontaneous defence of her father or even mention him. It was, after all, a personal and disconcerting area.

Darcy readjusted her grip on the bulky pale blue bound copy of the script which she held to her chest. She was not going to attempt to explain or excuse herself—even if she could. ‘Carry on,’ she instructed.

‘Thanks,’ Keir said grittily. ‘Have you any idea how much staying at the De Robillard during your two months or so in Washington will cost?’

‘Er…none.’

All she knew was that the production company was picking up the tab. Should she tell him that Maurice had chosen the hotel and it had not occurred to her to query it? How she had simply assumed that the choice had been sanctioned? Darcy hesitated. But, if she did, once again she would appear to have left too much to her clever-dick agent and once again she would appear incompetent.

‘But you don’t care. Well, you may not give a damn about soaking the system and sending the expenses for the production shooting into orbit but I do,’ Keir rasped, and he brought his hand down flat on a worktop like the blade of a wide knife, making her jump. ‘As someone who’s to receive a share of the profits I intend to see that we make a profit and that it’s not frittered away by——’ he jabbed a finger ‘—you.’

Darcy’s chin lifted. She objected to being accused and so roundly denounced. She also refused to be heaped with all the blame.

‘And by Jed Horwood,’ she said.

‘What?’

‘If my accommodation is five-star his must be even more so,’ she declared, for the movie actor’s taste for the perks and privileges of stardom was notorious. ‘I’ve heard how on film sets he demands an elaborately designed trailer and expects his every wish to be met by a sizeable and fawning entourage, who are known as “doormats” because he likes to walk over them.

‘So while Jed’s in Washington he’ll doubtless be parading it in a super de luxe penthouse somewhere, with a coterie of servants, including a chauffeur and a chef and a personal fitness trainer, to look after him.’

Keir shook his head. ‘No,’ he said impatiently.

‘All right, Jed Horwood has rented a mansion,’ Darcy said, charging straight into an alternative scenario. ‘With a billiard-room and a swimming-pool, and a stretch limo waiting in the drive. And——’

‘While I hesitate to stop you in full flow,’ he said sardonically, ‘not that either. We’re working in the study,’ he told her, and, picking up the steaming mug of coffee, he strode off.

Darcy hesitated; then, left with no other option but to trail in his wake, she followed. She glared at his broad, navy-shirted back. Her espadrilles were flat, which meant that today she was several inches shorter. Today she did not feel protected by his presence; today she felt subordinate. Trifling. Small fry. Big man and the little woman, Darcy thought sourly as Keir led the way to a room at the back of the house. A big man with a neat rear end, muscled thighs and long legs, the hormonal part of her mind added.

To one side of the study stood a desk, bearing a telephone and computer, a swivel chair and a trio of filing cabinets, while the other half of the room contained a comfy chintz-covered ottoman and a glass-topped coffeetable. Three walls were lined floor to ceiling with books, while large windows in the fourth looked on to a garden, where sunlight dappled a patio and a lawn encircled with spring-green trees.

Placing her script on the table, Darcy sat down. A budding home-maker, she always took an interest in other people’s houses and if this one were hers she would, she decided, put leafy pot plants on shelves and windowsills and bring the spirit of the garden indoors.

‘Thank you,’ she said, accepting the mug which Keir handed to her. She took a sip of coffee. ‘So where is Jed Horwood staying?’ she asked a mite tetchily.

‘He isn’t.’ Swinging his chair round to face her, he levered his long body down into it. ‘He’s quit the production.’

Stunned, Darcy looked at him. ‘Crikey.’

‘Succinctly put.’

‘But—but the play’s still on?’ she faltered, struggling to absorb this latest item of shock news and make the necessary mental adjustments. ‘It is,’ she said, answering her own question, for Keir had summoned her here in order for them to make a start. ‘I’m relieved that Jed’s gone—extremely—but——’ she was intrigued and a little apprehensive ‘—who’s playing the male lead now?’

Keir stretched out his denim-clad legs, leaned back in the swivel chair and gave an idle swing. ‘I am.’

She stared. Her whole stomach turned over. For a moment she was on the brink of yelping, squeaking and screaming a protest—You can’t, you mustn’t, no!—but in the next she remembered how she would not—repeat not—be fazed.

She drew in an unsteady breath. She had been right to feel apprehensive, but Keir was joking, using a devilish black humour to tease her…wasn’t he?

‘You?’ she said, without expression but with a great deal of care.

His lips curved into a wry smile. ‘Life’s a bitch, isn’t it?’

Darcy sat as if carved from ice. This was no joke. Keir Robards playing the male lead, playing opposite her, was fact—chill, hard, entrapping fact.

‘You wouldn’t be my first choice,’ she said tautly, and could not resist adding, ‘Nor my last.’

‘But you’ll rise to the occasion?’ he enquired, and his voice carried the hint of a dare.

Her eyes glittered. ‘Like a rocket,’ she informed him.

‘I must remember to stand well back when you light the blue touch-paper,’ he said drily.

‘It would be advisable,’ she responded. Darcy took a drink of coffee, though a stiff whisky would have done a better job of calming her nerves. ‘Why you?’ she asked.

‘Cal Warburg, who I assume you know is head of the production company——’

‘I do. I’m not that unaware,’ she protested.

‘Relieved to hear it. Anyway, Cal felt it’d be impossible to find another movie star of anywhere near equivalent fame at such short notice,’ he continued, ‘and as I’m still remembered as an actor he approached me. He reckons that my appeal, such as it is, will draw in sufficient punters to keep the production viable.’ He frowned. ‘Personally, I feel it’s a high-risk situation.’

Darcy looked him dead in the eyes. ‘Me too.’ Mr Warburg might play the flattery game but she preferred to tell the truth—and if Keir was offended, tough! ‘And let us not forget,’ she continued, ‘that as it’s a long time since you acted——’

‘Five years.’

‘—you might also be rusty.’ Darcy shone a see-through smile. ‘Very.’

‘While Jed Horwood may not be the worst actor in the world, he comes close,’ Keir said, unruffled by her barb. ‘So no matter how out of practice I am I’ll still be a darn sight better. However,’ he went on, ‘if I’d refused to do the part the play would’ve been pulled.’

‘You expect me to be abjectly grateful?’ she demanded.

‘And sink down before me on your knees to perform an act of worship? That won’t be necessary.’ He slid his hands into his trouser pockets—an action which pulled the denim tight across his thighs and made her searingly aware of his masculinity, and conscious of a sexual innuendo. ‘Unless, of course, you’re eager to express your appreciation in such a way?’

‘I’m not.’

A dark blond brow arched. ‘You might like it.’

‘Wish on,’ Darcy retorted, and he laughed.

Being directed by Keir had been hard enough to swallow, but now she was expected to act with him! Nervousness quivered in the pit of her stomach. The play’s basic storyline revolved around the two main characters splitting up, meeting again and going through the trauma of making up. This included clinches, kisses, and reached its climax in a scene of highly charged passion when his character overpowered hers. On a bed.

Darcy’s nervousness spiralled into blind panic. Her errant hormones meant that there had to be a million pitfalls in the physical intimacy which was demanded. Could she cope? No. Yes. No. She must; she had no choice.

A breath was taken. ‘And to persuade you Mr Warburg designed an even handsomer financial package?’ Darcy asked.

‘He did. He made me an offer which I couldn’t refuse.’

Her smile was frosty. ‘While I’m doing the role for a pittance.’

‘You are,’ Keir acknowledged, ‘but you’re also doing the role because it fulfils a dream.’

‘Dream? What dream?’ she demanded.

‘The dream Rupert had. Although he would’ve dearly loved to work on Broadway he never managed to get there, so he pinned all his hopes on you, his cherished only child. And if he’s looking down from heaven when we open there I have no doubt he’ll be bursting with parental pride.’

Darcy shot him a suspicious look. Was Keir being snide or mocking? Neither. His remarks had been the straight-forward truth as he saw it.

She took another mouthful of coffee. But what was her truth? Although she could well remember her father telling her how thrilled he would be if, one day, she were to appear on Broadway, she had not been consciously aware of aiming to fulfil his expectations.

And yet, while her role was undoubtedly a prime one, in addition to the low salary there were other aspects which had troubled her—like the high sexual content and a demand for partial nudity. These concerns had been brushed aside, but would she have brushed them aside if the production was to have been staged in London? Her winged brows lowered. She suspected not. She suspected that they could have proved a stumbling block.

Darcy sighed. She had never analysed what had motivated her to rush headlong to do the play, but now her father’s hopes seemed to have been the major influence—although an unconscious one. So how should she answer Keir? Should she admit to the truth and attempt to defend what seemed to be flawed reasoning, or should she lie through her teeth?

Looking across at him, she saw that no answer was required for just as she had been engrossed in her thoughts, so was he.

‘I’m not sure whether or not I made the right decision,’ Keir muttered, rubbing contemplative fingers back and forth along the hard edge of his jaw.

‘Why’s that?’

‘Because I’d decided never to act again.’

Darcy lanced him with a look. ‘And that’s because you prefer to order other people around,’ she said, recalling the remark he had made at the Brierly, but turning it into a denunciation. ‘Because you enjoy being in charge and cracking the whip.’

‘You make me sound like a control freak,’ he protested.

‘You’re not?’ she challenged.

Keir shook his head. ‘I set high standards for myself and for those I work with, so I admit that the whip does get cracked on occasion—but only when it’s necessary. Although I used to get a buzz out of acting a role and getting it right,’ he went on, ‘I find being a director far more satisfying. And it does have one significant plus,’ he added, as if talking to himself.

The plus would be money, Darcy thought acidly. For actors, the super-lavish pay-days came from making films, not from working on the stage as Keir had done in the main, though he had appeared in one or two lowbudget films. Yet, given full-house audiences, his current percentage deal could be lucrative. And top-notch film directors could command million-dollar fees.

‘But the lure of a big fat cheque overcame your better judgement?’ she enquired.

A muscle clenched in his jaw. Keir clearly resented her charge and for a moment seemed about to justify himself—how? she wondered—but then he shrugged. ‘I guess. In addition to rescuing you from Jed Horwood’s acting, my taking over also saves you from another fate worse than death,’ he said, as if feeling a requirement to redeem himself in some kind of way. ‘Having to hang out with the guy.’

‘How hang out?’ Darcy questioned.

‘Going drinking with him and his cronies until the wee small hours, or being expected to put in lengthy attendances in his dressing-room while he regales you with monologues on what a marvellous human being he is, or maybe even sleeping with him.’

‘Sleeping with him?’ she repeated. ‘My behaviour may have been…less than circumspect once upon a time——’

‘Nice turn of phrase,’ Keir inserted.

‘—but you can’t believe I’m that easy?’ Darcy protested indignantly. ‘Surely you don’t consider me to be a tramp like some of Jed Horwood’s past partners? Or a nymphomaniac?’ she asked, and gave a terse, inward laugh. If only he knew the reality.

‘I don’t,’ Keir replied equably. ‘However, you must’ve heard how the guy takes it for granted that he’ll bed each of his leading ladies, if not every other actress in the cast?’

‘I have, but he wouldn’t have bedded me.’ A picture of the star’s self-satisfied swagger and oily smile swam before her. ‘Jed Horwood would not have laid one finger on me,’ Darcy declared forcefully.

‘Not like I did,’ Keir murmured, and his blue eyes tangled with hers, ‘when you were a virgin.’

CHAPTER THREE

A TIDE of hot colour swept up her face. Seven years melted away and, once again, Darcy was back in Keir’s bedroom at the Brierly Hotel, sitting on his knee in her low-cut dress and shamelessly flirting. As she had slid her fingers inside his shirt and touched the curls of coarse hair on his chest he had stroked her breasts.

At the memory she felt her nipples pinch and tighten. She was aware of that blissful ache. Abruptly Darcy remembered the silky top that she was wearing and how it clung like a second skin to her body. Ye gods, Keir wouldn’t notice her flagrant nipples, would he?

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