Untamed

‘Rick,’ he put in with that smoothly charming voice. ‘I prefer Rick.’

She shot him an irritated glance. ‘Well, my refusal to talk about Rod Bartlett is simply because I don’t have any more to say on the subject.’

‘Probably not,’ he gave a throaty chuckle. ‘You were pretty vocal in your letter. Now what was it you said about the fact that Rod Bartlett hasn’t returned to this, his home-town, for almost twelve years? Ah yes,’ his mouth twisted with humour. ‘ “Perhaps Mr Bartlett is too ashamed to show his face here—or any other part of his anatomy that cinema-goers are now so familiar with.” I think I have that more or less right, don’t I?’ he mused.

Hot colour had stained her cheeks at his word-perfect quote from her letter. She had written it with searing contempt, little dreaming it would cause such a stir. The first reporter to come here and try to interview her had come from the magazine itself, and after her had come a steady stream of them, all looking for some as-yet undiscovered scandal in Rod Bartlett’s past. Keilly hadn’t been about to tell them anything, and she didn’t intend Rick Richards to be any different. She just wanted to forget she had ever written the damned letter.

‘But not you, Keilly?’

‘Not me what?’ she frowned at the question, not understanding it.

‘You aren’t familiar with the anatomy of Rod Bartlett?’

‘How dare you!’ she flared indignantly. ‘I’ve never even met the man!’

‘I meant up on the big screen,’ he mocked.

Her mouth twisted with derision. ‘I have no wish to see Rod Bartlett up on the “big screen” or anywhere else. He just doesn’t interest me.’

Rick nodded. ‘But why did you use the word ashamed? Does he have a wife and ten kids hidden down here somewhere?’ he mocked.

‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ she snapped.

‘Then what is the big secret?’

‘There isn’t one!’ she almost shouted her exasperation. ‘I just don’t happen to agree with the general consensus that Rod Bartlett has the sex appeal of Rudolph Valentino, the good looks of Paul Newman, Steve McQueen, and Robert Redford all rolled into one dynamic package! I’m entitled to my opinion, Mr Richards.’

He held up his hands defensively. ‘I’m not disputing that. It just seemed to me, and obviously to others too, that it was a very personal attack. Too personal in some ways.’

Once again the colour darkened her cheeks, and she was relieved to see they were nearing the hotel where she lived with her aunt and uncle. ‘I told you, Mr—Rick,’ she amended at his raised brows. ‘I’ve never met the man.’

‘No,’ he gave her a considering look. ‘You look a little young for him.’

She bristled resentfully. ‘He prefers older women, I understand.’

‘You mean Veronica King?’ the man at her side voice softly, his expression unreadable in the gloom of dusk.

‘Of course,’ she said dismissively. ‘Everyone conveniently forgets, six years later, that the two of them lived together, that the poor woman was so devastated by the rumours of his other women that she crashed her plane and killed herself rather than go through the humiliation of losing him to someone who could give him more than she could.’

‘You seem so certain that’s the way it happened?’

‘The newspapers were sure too at the time!’

‘The same newspapers you now think exaggerate everything about the man?’

She gave Rick a look of intense dislike, hating the way he twisted her words to confuse her. She knew how selfish Rod Bartlett was, she didn’t need the newspapers to tell her anything about him. ‘I have to go in and shower, Mr Richards,’ she told him distantly. ‘If you’ll excuse me.…’ His hand on her arm stopped her going into the cheery warmth of the hotel that had become her home on the death of her mother fifteen years ago, her aunt and uncle taking her into their family without a qualm, their daughter, her senior by six years, becoming the elder sister she never had.

‘Have dinner with me,’ he invited huskily.

Her eyes darkened with confusion. ‘I always eat with my aunt and uncle,’ she refused.

‘Couldn’t you make tonight the exception?’

She felt almost as if she were drowning in the sensuous warmth of liquid blue eyes, held mesmerised by him as he compelled her to accept. ‘I—I suppose I could,’ she heard herself say. ‘As long as you don’t intend to talk about Rod Bartlett all evening,’ she warned firmly.

He grinned, suddenly looking younger. ‘I promise you I won’t quote a single word you say about him.’

‘You do?’ she blinked, strangely believing him when she hadn’t trusted any of the other reporters who had pestered her.

‘I do,’ he nodded. ‘Now do you want to eat here at the hotel or do you know of any good restaurants nearby?’

Keilly’s eyes widened. ‘You’re staying here?’

‘Of course,’ he sounded mockingly scandalised. ‘You don’t think your aunt would give your whereabouts to just anyone, do you?’ He smiled, looking rakishly attractive, a little like the pirates must have done long ago, the beard and moustache suiting him.

She brought her thoughts up sharp as she caught herself wondering what it was like to kiss a man with a beard. She had agreed to have dinner with the man, nothing else. Although in the circumstances it might be better if they ate right here at the hotel.

‘Coward,’ Rick murmured after she told him her decision, bending so close his breath warmed her ear. ‘And I’ve been told on good authority that it doesn’t tickle at all,’ he murmured throatily.

She moved jerkily away from him, almost as if she had been burnt, looking up at him with wide eyes.

‘They’re very expressive,’ gentle fingertips moved across her lids, ‘I can almost read every thought you have.’

‘As long as it remains only almost,’ she said waspishly. ‘I’ll meet you in the dining room in an hour—er—Rick.’

‘I’ll be waiting, Keilly,’ he added softly, watching until she disappeared through a door behind the main desk marked ‘Private’.

Keilly felt his gaze on her the whole time, wondering if she hadn’t perhaps been a little impetuous in agreeing to have dinner with him; she had treated the other reporters with a bluntness that bordered on rudeness. It wasn’t even as if she knew anything about Rick, only his name, that he was staying at the hotel, and that he was interested in her dislike of Rod Bartlett. It was the latter part that bothered her. All reporters seemed to have an inborn natural curiosity, a need to probe until they unearthed what they were looking for. And if Rick Richards did that this time he would be hurting a lot of people. Damn the flash of temper that had given her the courage to write that scathing letter and so draw attention to herself and Selchurch!

She erased the dark frown from her brow as she went through to the kitchen to see her aunt, kissing her affectionately. ‘Dinner smells good,’ she greeted warmly, the aroma of food being cooked filling the room.

Her aunt smiled, small and plump, enjoying running the relatively big hotel in this small northern sea-side town, having built up a steady clientele the last twenty-five years. ‘Did Mr Richards manage to find you?’

Keilly’s gaze was suddenly evasive, not wanting to disclose that he was yet another reporter looking for a story. They had been plagued with them this last month, and she knew it worried her aunt. ‘Yes, he found me,’ she acknowledged lightly. ‘I’m going to have dinner with him, in fact,’ she added brightly.

‘Here?’

‘That’s right,’ she nodded. ‘I’m going to be a guest for a change,’ she teased.

Her Aunt Sylvie joined in her humour, although she still looked a little puzzled. ‘Is he a friend of yours? I don’t remember you ever mentioning him.’

For a brief moment she toyed with the idea of agreeing he was a friend, and then she dismissed the idea. She would need Rick Richards’ cooperation for such a ploy, and she had no reason to suppose he would give it. ‘He’s another reporter,’ she admitted with a sigh.

‘Oh dear,’ her aunt gave a rueful grimace. ‘And he seemed such a nice young man too.’

The thought of Rick ever being thought ‘a nice young man’ was amusing enough in itself, but the fact that her aunt thought his profession precluded him ever being such was hilarious. Keilly began to giggle, finally laughing outright.

‘What is it, dear?’ her aunt looked troubled.