No Longer A Dream
No Longer A Dream
Carole Mortimer
Carole Mortimer is one of Mills & Boon’s best loved Modern Romance authors. With nearly 200 books published and a career spanning 35 years, Mills & Boon are thrilled to present her complete works available to download for the very first time! Rediscover old favourites - and find new ones! - in this fabulous collection…Waking up in the millionaire’s bed…To research her book, author Cat Howard has chased down arrogant film studio owner, Caleb Steele. So when she wakes up naked in his bed, she’s horrified! Five years ago, Cat’s world was devastated by the death of her beloved fiancé. She’s still grieving her loss, but her powerful attraction to Caleb feels oh-so right…!Cat's genuine innocence and fiery wit captivates Caleb and he’s determined to claim her. But can he convince her to let go of the past…?
No Longer a Dream
Carole Mortimer
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Table of Contents
Cover (#u2b343276-9f6b-5e70-b508-02ec9b18cd1c)
Title Page (#ua419594c-572f-506b-a4d8-952bc768e539)
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#uc68efd09-87f2-5c58-8758-299045a7bc28)
‘YOU have a delicious body, one of the most perfect I've ever seen, but I'm not in the mood for you right now, so could you get out of bed and get some clothes on?'
The velvet roughness of that American-accented voice, and the things it was saying, were enough to wake Cat from her heavy sleep, but it was the sharp slap on the tender flesh of her bottom that caused her lids to fly open.
For a moment she just lay there, the feel of the chocolate-brown silk sheet beneath her, sensuous against her nakedness. Nakedness! She looked down sharply, sure she blushed from head to toe as she saw she was indeed completely naked. She looked away quickly, falling on to her back, only to see herself again in the smoky brown glass of the mirrors directly above her. The whole ceiling was covered in mirrors!
Where was she? And who had that silky rough voice belonged to?
She was alone in the room now, so she could only put the questions to herself. And a couple of dozen more like them! Who's bedroom was this? What was she doing here? Who had undressed her? And why?
The last seemed the easiest to answer. Her first time in bed with a man and she didn't even remember it, didn't even remember the man! She covered her eyes with a groan, feeling sick.
‘It must have been some party.’ The velvety voice spoke with harsh amusement. ‘Would you like me to get you a hair-of-the-dog?'
She lowered her arm, didn't actually need to turn in the man's direction, could see his reflection in the mirrored ceiling. He was as naked as she was!
‘Have you gone back to sleep?’ he prompted hardly.
She wished she could sink through a hole in the floor and disappear, at the very least go back to sleep and forget this had ever happened. But she doubted she would ever sleep peacefully again, would always be frightened this nightmare was going to be repeated. For it had to be a dream; she didn't wake up in the bedrooms of men she didn't even recognise, let alone remember!
‘I can see that you haven't.’ He moved to stand over her, looking down at her. ‘I realise that you probably have a terrible hangover, but you've only yourself to blame.'
His voice definitely lacked sympathy, and Cat blinked hard as she looked up at him, unaware of just how much like her name she looked at that moment, her tumble of long blonde curls wilder than usual after a night in bed, her green eyes still sleepy.
‘Do you know where the bedclothes are?’ Her voice was a pained rasp, her throat feeling totally devoid of moisture, her tongue swollen and dry.
Dark brows rose over cold black eyes. ‘On the floor where you kicked them last night.’ He was totally indifferent to the fact that neither of them was wearing a stitch of clothing. ‘You're a restless sleeper.'
She wasn't usually—but then she had never shared a bed with anyone for the night before! She took advantage of his turned back, as he looked through the wardrobe that took up the whole of one wall, to pull the sheet from the floor over her body and up to her chin, sitting up to watch the man over its softness.
He had thick black hair, lightly sprinkled with grey, a finer, softer looking hair covering the whole of his body, and it was the rest of that body that made Cat gulp. This man was lean and powerful rather than muscular, his shoulders wide, his back taut with strength, his waist slender, his buttocks a muscular curve to his body, his legs long and fleshless. He was completely at ease, and yet the latent power was there.
Had she experienced that power? She didn't feel any different, but then that was no guarantee; maybe you weren't supposed to feel different! She had spent the last twenty-four years ‘saving herself’ and now she didn't even know what she had saved herself for!
The man turned impatiently. ‘Are you going to stay in there all day?'
The fact that she had never seen a man's body this intimately before was nothing to the shock she received when her embarrassed gaze finally reached his face. Caleb Steele! She couldn't believe it, but she would know that harshly attractive face anywhere. Even when he was standing across the room from her stark naked!
Black hair that was usually meticulously brushed back from his face fell forward in a damp swathe, eyebrows the same jet-black jutting out over cold black eyes, his nose an arrogant slash between high cheekbones, his sculptured mouth a hard, forbidding line. At almost forty he looked older, a cynical twist to his mouth, the same emotion reflected in those chilling eyes. He was also considered one of the most powerful—and dangerous—men in Hollywood!
He shrugged at her lack of reply, turning back to the wardrobe, taking a brown silk shirt from a hanger to shrug his shoulders into it. ‘Breakfast is out in the dining room. If you want any I would advise you to get up and get dressed,’ he rasped. ‘I don't sit down to eat with women who are only half-dressed!'
Caleb Steele, owner of the Steele film studios, an exclusive hotel and casino in Lake Tahoe, and with tremendous influence in some quarters of the media. He was also the man she had come to the party last night to meet. Well she had met him; God, how she had met him!
She cleared her throat painfully. ‘Mr Steele—–'
He turned around, tucking the dark brown shirt into the waist of black trousers, before sliding the zip up with a firm movement, his hands dropping down to his hips. ‘Caleb,’ he bit out in that Atlantic drawl. ‘Mr Steele is a little formal in the circumstances. That is my bed you're lying in,’ he pointed out mockingly.
She squeezed her eyes shut, but he was still there when she opened them again. She had guessed it had to be this man's room, from the sinfully mirrored ceiling, to the wide double bed, and erotic silk sheets. He gave the impression of a man who liked to be comfortable when he took his pleasure with a woman.
‘You also seem to have me at a disadvantage.’ He quirked those rugged dark brown brows enquiringly.
Oh my God, he didn't even know her name! ‘I'm Cat,’ she told him flatly. ‘Catherine Howard. And I've heard all the Henry the Eighth jokes I need, thank you.’ This occasion neither warranted nor necessitated one of the endless jokes she had been subjected to concerning her name over the years.
The firmly moulded lips didn't move by a fraction of an inch, and yet something, she thought it was the expression in his eyes, told Cat that he was amused. She agreed, this was hardly the time for outright laughter, about anything!
‘Was she one of the ones that lost her head?’ he derided, dealing with his unruly hair now as he stood in front of the mirror gracing the big oak dressing-table, looking more like the photographs Cat had seen of him: the film mogul that made even the most temperamental director or actor quake in their shoes.
She had attended the party given by this man's son with such high hopes after Luke Steele told her his father was going to ‘show up’ some time during the evening, knowing that Caleb Steele was probably the only man who could get her an interview with his father, Lucien Steele, the writer. Maybe if she had satisfied him in bed he still could, she thought bitterly.
‘Yes,’ she snapped, knowing that history claimed Henry the Eighth's fifth wife had even been guilty of the adultery he had accused her of, unlike a couple of the others, who had just outlived their attraction. ‘Was I—satisfactory?’ she asked with much more bravado than she felt. They said that your subconscious would only let you do what you really wanted to do; had she wanted to go to bed with this man that caused a shiver of apprehension down her spine even though he had only been casually mocking?
He slowly replaced the brush on the dressing-table before turning to look at her, arching one dark brow, the black eyes unfathomable. ‘Don't you know?’ he asked softly, that black gaze looking at her with new interest, playing over the tumble of honey-blonde hair, deep green eyes shadowed with embarrassment now, the small classical nose, and wide kissable mouth, only her shoulders bared to his view now as she clutched the sheet tightly to her, although the warmth of his gaze as it moved to meet hers seemed to say he approved of what he could see.
Cat moistened her mouth nervously. ‘I—er—I think someone must have put something in one of my drinks.’ Her throat was getting easier now, although she knew the reason for its dryness only too well. ‘I only drink orange juice, you see.’ She became flushed at his sceptical snort. ‘It's true,’ she insisted indignantly. ‘I'm allergic to alcohol!'
‘What happens when you drink it?’ His eyes were narrowed now.
She grimaced. ‘I pass out.'
He gave a derisive inclination of his head. ‘That would seem to be what you did.'
Before or after? She swallowed down her growing feelings of panic. ‘I tell you my drinks must have been tampered with,’ she defended, her cheeks still red. ‘I haven't drunk alcohol since I found out it puts me flat on my back.’ She drew in an angry breath at his knowing look. ‘I meant it makes me lose consciousness! After it happened to me the first couple of times I went to a doctor and he told me my body just won't accept alcohol.'
‘I would say that's a pretty shrewd analysis,’ Caleb Steele mocked arrogantly.
She glared at him. ‘You needn't sound so damned disapproving,’ she snapped. ‘You were the one that took an unconscious woman to bed!’ She gasped once she had made the accusation, although Caleb Steele didn't move a muscle.
‘You responded OK when I touched you,’ he drawled uninterestedly.
Her cry of horror was preceded only by the return of the heated colour to her cheeks. She had gone to bed with this man, made love with him. Oh God!
Caleb Steele showed little concern for her disturbed state. ‘What did you do the last couple of times it happened?’ he asked drily, leaning one hip against the dressing-table, completely relaxed, his arms crossed in front of his powerful chest.
Cat's gaze dropped from the bored interest she could read in his eyes as he waited for her answer. ‘I was with friends—–'
‘And this time you weren't.’ He straightened, the casual movement causing Cat to press back against the pillows, the sudden gleam in those fathomless black eyes mocking her nervousness. ‘This time the little cat was left amongst the wolves!’ he scorned contemptuously.
Wolf! She would lay odds on this man being the only wolf at the party last night, for all that it had turned out to be a little wild; and now that he had had her he was spitting her out again!
His eyes narrowed on her flushed face. ‘You aren't one of Luke's college friends, are you?’ He sounded as if that thought didn't please him at all.
‘No, I—–’ She broke off, the real reason she had gone to the party the previous evening, the remembered wish to make a good impression on this man, still paramount. She couldn't blurt it all out now, not when she had just spent the night with him. ‘I'm just an acquaintance, really,’ she amended.
He gave a slow nod. ‘And do you usually look this good in the mornings?'
She gazed back at him in alarm. Surely he hadn't changed his mind and was now in the mood to repeat what had happened between them last night? She clutched the sheet even tighter to her.
‘Relax, Cat,’ he drawled, the amusement back in his eyes, even if his mouth only showed a cynical twist. ‘I was referring to the fact that most women I know can't wait to run to the mascara bottle in the mornings.'
Most women he knew! She would bet that amounted to several hundred. Caleb Steele was known for the short and not always sweet affairs he had had since his divorce from his wife fifteen years ago. Any of those women showing the least sign of wanting permanence in his life was out like an old pair of shoes. Any women that tried to take on this man, even temporarily, was a braver one than she!
‘You have naturally black lashes, hmm?’ he mused as she made no answer.
‘No,’ she denied abruptly. ‘I have them dyed.'
‘You do?’ He didn't even bother to try to hide his surprise.
She nodded, all the time conscious of that reflected image above her, hating the mirrors, feeling as if she had no place to hide. ‘At the hairdressers,’ she supplied. ‘It's done all the time,’ she claimed at his cynical expression.
‘I know that,’ he derided, shaking his head in disgust. ‘I just didn't think you—there soon won't be many parts of a woman's body that are completely natural!’ he rasped.
His scorn irritated her. ‘The rest of me is real!’ she snapped. ‘Although what you said earlier isn't true; my body is far from perfect. My legs are too long for one thing—–'
‘I wouldn't know,’ he mocked. ‘I'm a breast man myself. And yours are a pair of the finest I've ever seen. Not too big, but not too small either, with a dusky rose nip—–'
‘Please!’ she groaned her dismay at his familiarity with her body.
‘Oh I did.’ He moved forward with a feline grace, sitting down on the bed, one arm resting on the bed across her, the other beside her. ‘Do you have any idea of the pleasure a man can get from the taste of your breasts, the soft little moans you give in your throat as your nipples are kissed and caressed to—–'
‘Please!’ He was making her feel giddy, his proximity alarming, what he was saying even more so, a mental picture of them the way he was describing burning in her brain, able to imagine his dark head bent over her as he sipped from those life-giving peaks, as she cradled him to her and—–
‘Yes, Cat.’ His black gaze held hers as he gently released the sheet from her suddenly relaxed fingers, as he softly pulled the sheet down to throw it back on the floor, leaving Cat's naked body exposed to him in all its silken glory. ‘It was just like that,’ he murmured huskily as his head slowly lowered and that hard mouth claimed one taut nipple with surprising softness and warmth, the rough rasp of his tongue sending aching pleasure down between her thighs.
Her head fell back, and as it did so she could see him in the mirror above exactly as she had imagined him, her skin creamy white in contrast to his black hair, her hand moving up even now so that her fingers could entwine in his hair as she held him against her, groaning anew as he moved to claim the other dusky nipple, drinking his fill of that one, too, Cat unable to look away from the beauty of their reflections above.
‘Dad, I—bloody hell!'
The shocked English-accented voice of this man's son as he burst into the room unannounced was what brought her back to her senses, gasping her dismay at what had happened, and at the identity of the intruder to their pleasure. Caleb Steele's son. Oh God, she groaned for what must have been the dozenth time since waking up to find herself in this man's bed.
Caleb slowly eased himself back, holding her horrified gaze with steady intensity. ‘Get out of here, Luke,’ he instructed coldly, not even turning to look at his son.
‘But, Dad—–'
‘I said get out!’ He didn't raise his voice, and he still didn't turn towards the door as his body partly shielded Cat's, but the icy anger was obvious in the tersely spoken order, every muscle in his body tensed in challenge of his authority. ‘We'll talk about this later.’ There was a threat rather than apology in his voice.
‘OK,’ Luke Steele sighed, the soft click of the door telling them he had obeyed the first instruction, too.
Cat's eyes were squeezed tightly shut as she denied the reflection of her nakedness, not in the mirrors this time, but in coal-black depths. Caleb Steele's eyes. She didn't know what had possessed her, what had possessed him; she wasn't exactly his usual type. She was too young to be one of his women; he had publicly stated on more than one occasion that any woman under thirty didn't have the experience or maturity he liked. Surely at twenty-four she was too young!
What was she doing lying here assuring herself she was too young for him? She had just spent the night with him, had been lost in his arms again seconds ago when his son burst in.
She felt the bed ease beside her as he stood up, the gentle caress of the silk sheet as it was placed over her. But still her eyes remained squeezed shut.
‘It's all right, Cat.’ That silky rough voice spoke softly. ‘He's gone now.'
She moistened her lips, lying rigidly still, feeling his presence as he stood beside the bed looking down at her, even though she couldn't see him!
‘But I haven't, hmm?’ Caleb read her mind, ‘Isn't it a little late to feel embarrassment in front of me?’ he derided.
It was that amusement in his voice that made her lids fly open, and she turned to glare at him. ‘I'm sure that you're used to waking up in bed next to a different woman every day of the week,’ she snapped. ‘But I'm not used to this at all!'
He wasn't in the least moved by her show of temper. ‘Every day of the week sounds a little excessive,’ he drawled mockingly. ‘Even I like to rest on Sundays.'
God, why was she even bothering to talk to this man when all she wanted to do was to get dressed and get out of here—or did she mean crawl out of here? She had arrived with such plans the night before, had hoped to get the information she needed; now she knew she would have to start all over again. She doubted Caleb Steele would appreciate her request when she had literally fallen into bed with him; it smacked too much like payment for the night! She might write what most people would consider ‘lightweight’ stuff but she took her job seriously, and trying in any way to influence a person to give her information was not the way she worked. She realised that after last night she would have to work doubly hard to convince Caleb Steele of that.
She sat up, holding the sheet to her. ‘Then as this is a Sunday I'm sure you would like to begin doing that,’ she encouraged firmly.
Black brows arched. ‘Would you be ordering me out of my own bedroom?'
‘I would be—asking you to think about it,’ she grimaced.
The stern mouth actually quirked this time, although he didn't show his teeth in a smile. Perhaps he never did actually smile or laugh; any photographs she had seen of him had always shown him grim-faced. She had assumed that to be because he considered the photographer to be infringing on his privacy. Now she wasn't so sure.
‘I've thought about it,’ he derided. ‘I'm quite happy where I am for the moment.'
‘I—your breakfast,’ she reminded a little desperately, not at all happy with ‘where he was'.
He gave an inclination of his head. ‘I've changed my mind about that. I think I'll order us something in here while you take a shower.'
Cat swallowed hard, judging the distance between the bed and the bathroom door. It was too far! Wide green eyes turned back to him, and she was sure they were panic-stricken.
He looked a little impatient with this display of modesty. ‘Take the sheet with you,’ he advised wearily.
‘Take the—oh. Yes.’ Her expression cleared.
But wrapping a sheet around herself that was both way too big and extremely slippery proved much more difficult than she had anticipated. It always seemed to be so elegantly done in films and on television, but after several minutes she still hadn't managed to get the sheet about her with any degree of safety.
‘Here.’ Caleb Steele finally took pity on her struggles, draping the loose sheet over her free arm while securing the end of it between her breasts. ‘Relax,’ he instructed drily without looking up from his task as she flinched at the intimacy. ‘Don't you know that this sort of modesty is a thing of the past? It's very well done, though,’ he drawled, stepping back to look at her with dispassionate eyes. ‘Maybe I could find a part for you. Did you have anything in mind?'
‘In mind?’ She was standing now, aware that she barely reached this man's shoulder in her bare feet, also aware that the two-inch heels on her shoes wouldn't make that much difference either.
He pulled a face. ‘The casting-couch may be long dead, but the bed isn't.’ He gave the latter a derisive look, its tumbled look showing evidence of their presence there together.
Cat swallowed hard. ‘You think—that is—you believe—–'
He once again crossed his arms in front of his powerful chest. ‘Did the director prove difficult?' he mocked. ‘If it was Maurice Goodson I'm not surprised.’ His mouth twisted. ‘He's a happily married man and never touches other women.'
‘I'm glad to hear it,’ she bit out tautly. ‘Maybe some of his scruples will rub off on you—–'
‘I'm not married,’ he told her coldly. ‘And not intending to be.’ He studied her between narrowed lids. ‘So if that's the role you're after, kid, forget it.'
She didn't know whether she was more angry at being called ‘kid’ or at the way he assumed she had gone to bed with him because she had in mind being the next Mrs Caleb Steele. She decided the latter more urgently needed rebuttal. ‘You flatter yourself if you think I would even consider marrying someone as cold and arrogant as you,’ she dismissed hardly. ‘And contrary to what you think there's more to life, my life, than using people for gain. The real world isn't like that!'
‘The real world is exactly like that,’ he derided pityingly.
‘Not my world,’ she insisted. ‘I don't want anything from you, Mr Steele. Whatever happened between us last night was not planned. I don't want payment, in any way, shape, or form for it. You—–'
‘You know,’ he remarked softly, almost conversationally, ‘it's as well we didn't get to do too much talking last night; I can't stand women that nag.'
‘You—you—–'
‘Go take your shower, Cat,’ he dismissed in a bored voice. ‘And take this with you.'
‘This’ was the shimmering green dress she had worn the evening before and which he had just picked up from the bedroom floor, reminding her more forcefully than anything else could have done that she had casually spent the night with this man. She felt as if she didn't know herself any more, so why should Caleb Steele!
She snatched the dress from his hand, looking around for the lace panties that were all she had worn beneath the clinging material, her cheeks colouring anew as she saw Caleb Steele was holding those out to her, too. They were really just the minutest scrap of pale green lace, and she crushed it within her hand.
‘We'll talk as soon as you've had your shower,’ he told her confidently, picking up the telephone at the end of the statement, talking crisply into the receiver as he ordered a full breakfast for both of them.
Cat hastily shut the bathroom door before his talk of grilled food made her physically ill. How could this have happened to her? She had come to the party last night in all innocence. Admittedly it was a little wilder than she had anticipated, the majority of the guests appearing to be around the nineteen or twenty mark as their young host was. She hadn't particularly liked that cynical young man from the beginning, and she had a fair idea that he had been the one who had doctored her drinks, seeming to dislike her as much as she disliked him. When his father had appeared on the scene she didn't know, but he obviously had, and with the alcohol in her system she had gone to bed with him. Which was very strange, because usually she just passed out!
She didn't believe she had made love with Caleb Steele, no matter what he said to the contrary!
She turned straight round and marched back into the bedroom, no longer caring that she wore only the draped sheet. ‘You're a lying, rotten, lousy—–’ She broke off as she realised Caleb Steele was no longer alone, that an older man had joined him, a well-dressed pleasant-faced man who appeared to be taking instructions when she entered the room. And from the cursory glance he gave in her direction, the blue eyes completely devoid of emotion, he found nothing unusual in seeing a sheet-wrapped woman walking about his employer's bedroom suite!
Black eyes met her stormy green ones with icy disdain. And then Caleb Steele turned away and resumed his business discussion with the man at his side.
Cat couldn't believe it, had never been dismissed in such a way before! It was just as if she were of no importance at all. She drew in an angry breath. ‘I said—–'
‘I heard you.’ His head snapped up. ‘It may have escaped your notice,’ he drawled with heavy sarcasm, ‘but I'm busy right now.'
Busy! He was busy. She was trying to regain her self-respect and he was busy! It may be clichéd, but who the hell did he think he was! The answer to that was all too obvious, but who he was and the amount of money he was worth, didn't much matter to her at this moment. Who she was, and the amount of money she wasn't worth didn't mean Caleb Steele could dismiss her like an old shirt! If he treated all of his women in this way it was no wonder his affairs didn't last.
‘You may be busy, Mr Steele—–’ her chin rose challengingly when his associate at last showed surprise—at her formality with the man who's bedroom she stood almost naked in. It was the erroneous impression her appearance gave that made her carry on in spite of the cold anger emitting from Caleb Steele. ‘But I want to talk to you. Now,’ she added firmly as she guessed he was about to dismiss her a second time. ‘Unless you would care to discuss what happened in that bed last night in front of an audience?'
The man at his side gave a choked sound, somewhere between a cough and a laugh, beginning to cough in earnest as that coal-black gaze was suddenly riveted on him.
‘You sound bad, Norm,’ his employer grated with icy insincerity. ‘Why don't you go and get yourself a cup of coffee and we'll continue with this later. When you're feeling better.’ The last was added threateningly.
‘Sure.’ The other man spoke for the first time, American like his employer. ‘I—er—nice to have met you, Miss—er—–'
‘Cat,’ Caleb Steele put in icily before she could make any reply. ‘And believe me,’ he drawled suggestively, ‘she more than lives up to her name!’ He flexed his shoulders as if something there pained him.
Like claw marks, from a cat! And she knew damn well that except for that fine covering of dark hair his back was smooth and unmarked.
A speculative light entered the man Norm's eyes. ‘Perhaps we'll meet again, Cat,’ he murmured in a somewhat puzzled voice, as if for once he were surprised at his employer's choice of a bed-partner.
‘I doubt that,’ she answered him but looked at Caleb Steele. ‘I wound to kill!'
‘Yes. Well,’ the older man looked flustered now, ‘I'll talk to you later, Caleb.’ He made a hasty exit before he was caught in the verbal war that seemed to be taking place in the bedroom.
Caleb Steele looked at her with expressionless black eyes. ‘And just how do you intend to wound me, Catherine Howard?’ he challenged in a softly threatening voice.
Her eyes flashed. ‘If I had any sense I'd stab you in the back the way my namesake should have done Henry the Eighth! You're as lying and deceitful as he ever was!’ She tossed back her mane of golden hair.
‘I am?'
Steel encased in velvet. There was no other way to describe that softly spoken threat. But she wasn't about to be intimidated by him; he had lied to her and he was going to admit it. ‘I didn't make love with you in that bed,’ she pointed to it angrily. ‘Or anywhere else last night!'
Dark brows rose. ‘You didn't?’ he drawled.
‘You know I didn't.’ Her eyes flashed. ‘I always pass out. I don't—don't—–'
‘Leap into bed with men you don't know,’ he finished coldly. ‘Then how did you wake up in my bed this morning?'
Delicate colour darkened her cheeks. ‘I don't believe you slept in it. I also don't remember you being at the party last night. I can't remember seeing you there, and—–'
‘I arrived late,’ he bit out, as if he were tired of the whole conversation. ‘And I did sleep in that bed last night. Next to you.'
She swallowed hard, knowing by the flat uninterested tone of his voice that he didn't lie. But she always passed out!
Her distress must have shown in her face, because something like compassion flickered in his eyes. ‘Cat—–'
‘I'm sorry,’ she bit out jerkily, swinging away, needing to escape back to the sanctuary of the bathroom. ‘I was rude to you just now in front of an employee.’ She couldn't think straight, needed to be alone away from the tumbled intimacy of this bedroom so that she could try to piece together the events of last night, try to make some sense of it in her own mind. ‘I—I'll apologise later if you would like me to. I—I'll go and take my shower now—–'
‘Cat!'
Again she ignored the steely command in his voice, running into the bathroom, locking the door behind her this time before collapsing back against it.
If only she could remember, if only she knew what had happened last night to make her want to make love to Caleb Steele. She couldn't believe she had wanted to make love with him; she didn't even like the man.
What had Vikki said to her before she left for the party last night, ‘Be good'? And then they had both come back with the rejoinder about ‘being careful’ before Cat had laughingly taken her leave. She had no idea whether she had been ‘good', but careful she certainly hadn't been.
How could she have taken Caleb Steele as her lover when she belonged heart and soul to Harry?
CHAPTER TWO (#uc68efd09-87f2-5c58-8758-299045a7bc28)
SHE had been so buoyed up the evening before as she got ready for the party, overjoyed at the prospect of finally meeting Caleb Steele after weeks of writing for an interview to his London office and home when her publisher had told her he was the only way she would ever be able to speak to his father, the reclusive author Lucien Steele.
The series of articles she had done the year before on Hollywood marriages had proved to be a tremendous success, a publishing company approaching her about doing a book on the subject, with the condition that she covered four marriages of their choice, the rest being left to her discretion. Unfortunately, one of the marriages the publishing company had chosen had been that of Lucien Steele and the late Sonia Harrison. Of course, Cat could have gone ahead and written the chapter on this golden couple of the Hollywood of the forties without talking to Lucien Steele, but she hadn't wanted to do that. But to actually arrange an interview with him had proved more difficult than she had imagined, the now elderly man having disappeared from the Hollywood scene thirty years ago after the tragic death of his wife in a fire that had destroyed their mansion house, and absenting himself from London society a few years ago, too, to all intents and purposes disappearing off the face of the earth. Except that his son and grandson had to know of his whereabouts.
She had been warned of Caleb Steele's aversion to meeting the press whenever possible but she hadn't realised he could be so elusive, almost as bad as his father. Polite letters to his office had been ignored; telephone requests to have a meeting with Caleb Steele had been politely evaded by his secretary; a visit to his London home two days ago had introduced her to Luke Steele, his notorious son. Where the grandfather and father seemed to avoid publicity the grandson seemed to court it! He was always in trouble of one kind or another, always being asked to leave hotels and restaurants because of his outrageous behaviour, and had been thrown out of two universities at the last count.
But he had been very friendly towards her yesterday afternoon, and if she had been a little wary of his over-bright eyes and unkempt appearance she forgave him the minute he invited her to his party, assuring her that his father was going to be there.
She had even ignored the over-familiarity and the provocative remarks he kept making when she got to the party, and the way it seemed impossible to escape his company—or not to notice the amount of alcohol he was consuming.
She could remember all that, the noise, the loud laughter of too many people having drunk too much, could remember deciding shortly before eleven that Caleb Steele wasn't going to come to his son's party after all, remembered telling Luke Steele she was leaving, and then—nothing. The next thing she had been aware of was that slap to her bottom!
Promiscuity hadn't been something she consciously avoided, but something she ignored. That sort of relationship was for other people, not her. She had her friends, a lot of them, male and female alike, admittedly more of the latter than the former, but that was probably because a lot of men didn't believe there could be just friendship between a man and a woman. She believed the opposite, that friendship should come before the love. She and Harry had been friends from the moment they walked through the gate on their first day at school, when Harry had given a painful tug on the single braid that lay down her spine, and she had turned around and punched him straight on the nose! They had both been too proud to cry and so they had laughed instead. After that they had be come inseparable, their friendship surprising them both—if not other people—by turning to love when they were both fifteen.
And she had betrayed that love last night with a man like Caleb Steele!
She didn't even need to guess what Harry would think of the other man; she knew the two men would have disliked each other intensely, Harry so open and boyishly handsome, Caleb Steele hiding any emotions he might have behind that harsh face and cold black eyes. They were as different as night and day, one devil, one angel, and she—she had lain with the devil!
A brisk knock on the bathroom door made her jump nervously. ‘Breakfast is here, Cat,’ Caleb Steele informed her abruptly. ‘Either run the water and have a shower or come out and eat,’ he advised irritably. ‘You can't stay in there all day.'
She wished she could! Maybe other women could handle this situation confidently, but she couldn't. And she certainly couldn't sit down to breakfast in an evening dress!
‘Cat?’ his voice had sharpened. ‘Have you fallen asleep in there?'
Asleep? She didn't think she was ever going to fall asleep again—too afraid of what she would find when she woke up!
‘Answer me, Cat,’ he advised in a steely voice. ‘Or would you rather suffer the embarrassment of my having someone break the door down?'
She swallowed hard, barely breathing, trembling like a leaf about to fall from a tree. ‘I don't want any breakfast,’ she told him a quivery voice, on the verge of tears.
‘Cat?'
That velvet rasp sounded directly through the wood behind her head, and she moved hastily away, turning to stare at the door with wide eyes.
‘Cat, are you crying?’ He sounded incredulous at the idea.
Was she crying? Yes, she could taste the tears on her top lip, although she hadn't been aware of them falling. Why shouldn't she cry when her heart was breaking into little pieces!
‘Cat, open the door,’ he encouraged now, persuasively. ‘There's no need for this, Cat,’ he cajoled softly. ‘Would it help if I told you nothing happened between us last night? That I didn't even touch you until this morning?'
Hope flared in her over-bright green eyes, and then it faded, leaving her looking more miserable than ever. ‘Not when it isn't the truth,’ she said dully.
‘But it is,’ he insisted firmly. ‘I was damned angry this morning when I let you think we had made love. Open the door, Cat, and we'll talk.'
Why on earth was he so obsessed with her unlocking the door? What did he—no, he couldn't think that! God, if she were the type to commit suicide she would have done it years ago, and over a much more worthwhile man than Caleb Steele.
She straightened, her head back proudly. ‘I'll be out as soon as I've showered. Would you please order me a taxi so that I can leave immediately?'
For a moment that was silence on the other side of the door. ‘Very well,’ he bit out coldly, no longer so close to the door. ‘The hysterics are over, I take it? he derided.
She stiffened. ‘You can rest assured that I don't intend using your razor to cut my wrists!'
‘That might be a little difficult,’ he drawled. ‘I use an electric shaver!'
Cat bristled indignantly at his mockery. ‘I could always used it as a saw!'
A soft throaty chuckle answered her anger. ‘Your name does fit, Cat,’ he murmured admiringly. ‘You spit and claw right back, don't you?'
‘I thought you already knew that,’ she reminded bitterly.
‘I told you,’ he said softly. ‘I didn't make love to you last night.'
Was he telling the truth? She didn't know. But she desperately needed to believe that he was, slowly unlocking and opening the door, looking up at him anxiously, coal-black eyes staring straight back at her. And she could read nothing from them, years of deliberately shielding his emotions making that impossible. Cat continued to stare back at him.
‘You were already in my bed when I got home,’ Caleb Steele told her briskly. ‘And by that time I was too damned tired to care who I shared my bed with!'
Cat's face drained of colour, leaving two deep green pools of bewildered hurt.
‘How the hell old are you that it shocks you out of your mind to even think of sharing a bed with a man?’ He scowled at the accusation in her expression.
‘Old enough,’ she muttered.
‘For what?’ He turned away disgustedly, his hands thrust into the pockets of his trousers, pulling the material taut across his thighs.
‘For whatever,’ she returned sharply.
‘Eighteen isn't old enough for whatever!’ he rasped, scowling heavily. ‘Is there anyone that's going to be worried by your non-appearance last night?’ he suddenly frowned.
She thought of Vikki, and then as quickly dismissed her friend and flatmate. Vikki would probably be gleefully lying in wait for her when she got home, demanding to know all the details, had been urging her for years to take a lover.
‘You mean like a father or brother?’ She arched honey-blonde brows at him.
His mouth was tight. ‘Or a husband?'
Her laugh was brittle. ‘God, yes, I could be married, couldn't I?’ she said hardly.
‘Are you?’ Black eyes were narrowed, as if he didn't like the idea of sharing a bed with a married woman, under any circumstances.
‘No,’ she assured him flatly. ‘Nor engaged, nor seeing anyone seriously. I don't have a brother and my parents live in Cornwall, so you needn't worry about Daddy coming after you with a shotgun!'
‘Is that a possibility?’ Caleb Steele asked slowly.
‘Not if it's true that we didn't make love.’ There was a question in the statement.
‘And if it isn't true?’ he grated.
She shrugged. ‘Then my father is old-fashioned enough to want his grandchild to have a father. But you were telling the truth when you said we didn't make love, weren't you?’ Anxiety darkened her eyes, although her expression remained bland.
He considered her for long, timeless minutes before nodding abruptly. ‘I'd been in a meeting for over forty-eight hours; I have union trouble.’ There was a resigned twist to his mouth. ‘But yesterday was Luke's birthday—–'
‘It was?’ Cat gasped; it hadn't been like any other birthday party she had ever gone to!
‘It was,’ he nodded, giving an impatient sigh as he watched her continually hitch the sheet over her breasts in an effort to keep it in place, turning with leashed energy to push open one of the mirrored doors to his wall-length wardrobe, searching inside.
‘Do you have a mirror fetish?’ Cat burst out impetuously, fascinated by the way there were mirrors everywhere, even on two walls in the adjoining bathroom; it had come as something of a shock to see the tousled reflection of herself across the width of the luxurious room, the sunken jacuzzi meaning she had an unhindered full-length view of herself!
He turned briefly to give her a dismissive glance. ‘If you're expecting me to say they were already in the house when I moved in you're going to be disappointed,’ he drawled, taking out a dark brown robe. ‘Here, put this on.’ He held it out to her.
She gratefully took the robe, then looked down awkwardly at the sheet, wondering how she was going to go from one to the other and still maintain her modesty.
‘Let's not go through that again,’ Caleb Steele whipped the sheet from around her body, holding out the robe for her to put her arms into. ‘You were naked when I climbed into bed next to you last night, and you didn't even have the sheet on you when I woke up this morning!’ he dismissed impatiently.
‘That isn't the point,’ a red-faced Cat snapped, quickly turning to put her arms into the robe.
‘Because you're awake now?’ he mocked. ‘There,’ he murmured softly. ‘That's why I like mirrors.'
She froze, slowly turning her head to look at him, but he was staring up at the ceiling, and with the heated colour darkening her cheeks she reluctantly followed his gaze.
She had her arms thrust into the sleeves of the robe but he hadn't yet put the material in place about her shoulders, her back arched, her breasts thrust out invitingly. The reflection reminded her all too forcibly that earlier she had issued a similar invitation—and that he had accepted!
She pulled the robe about her in hurried movements, her cheeks burning as she tied the belt about her slender waist, the thigh-length robe reaching down past her knees, the sleeves falling down over her hands as she straightened her arms.
‘Let me.’ Caleb Steele moved to turn up the sleeves, treating her with all the resigned patience of an adult dealing with a recalcitrant child. ‘I could snap you in half and not even know I'd done it,’ he murmured as if to himself.
‘I'd know you had done it,’ she told him with feeling.
The coal-black eyes became even darker, the cynical light going out of them to be replaced by a surprising warmth, before that stern mouth actually curved into a grin, deep grooves etched into his cheeks, his teeth very white against his tanned flesh.
Cat's eyes widened like a surprised feline. ‘Why do you hide all that dental work?’ she once again spoke without thinking first. ‘I mean, you rarely smile,’ she tried to amend, grimacing her embarrassment as she knew she had failed.
This time he laughed outright, a rich deep sound, roughness once again cloaked in velvet. ‘Like everyone else I laugh when something amuses me.’ He still smiled. ‘And I'll have you know that these teeth are all my own, and they're the genuine uncapped variety!'
She stared at him in fascination, amazed at the difference his smile made. He looked almost handsome! And years younger, not quite so much as if every minute of his thirty-nine years had been spent amassing the power and money that made him the dangerous man he was.
‘Cat?'
She suddenly realised he was no longer smiling, but eyeing her watchfully as she openly stared at him. ‘I can see that now,’ she rushed into speech. ‘One of the front ones is a little crooked.'
He nodded. ‘If you were a guest at my son's party last night why didn't you know it was his nineteenth birthday?’ he asked icily.
This man would have been lethal as a courtroom lawyer, would have held the judge and jury mesmerised by the way he never missed even the slightest irregularity!
‘He didn't tell me,’ she answered truthfully.
‘If you're a friend—–'
‘I told you, I'm only an acquaintance.’ She bit her lip. ‘I—I went to the party last night because I wanted to meet you,’ she revealed, knowing honesty had to prevail now.
His eyes glazed over, his nostrils flaring, his mouth a thin angry line. ‘So it was all an act,’ he said disgustedly. ‘The surprise, the dismay, the shock,’ he added impatiently. ‘When I didn't show at the party you decided to wait for me, in my bed!’ He began to pace the room, shaking his head as he looked at her. ‘You ought to get an Oscar for the act you just put on in the bathroom,’ he grated. ‘I actually did feel a first-class heel for lying to you!'
‘Because you are!’ Her eyes flashed. ‘It was cruel to make me believe we had—we had been lovers. Everything I told you was the truth, my drinks were doctored, and I have no idea how I came to be in your bed—–'
‘For God's sake don't start crying again!’ he rasped as the tears began to fall. ‘We'll get to the bottom of this once and for all,’ he bit out, picking up the receiver to dial. ‘Luke?’ he barked in the mouthpiece. ‘Get in here,’ he ordered as coldly as he had earlier told his son to leave. ‘And make sure your story is a good one!’ he advised threateningly before slamming down the receiver to once again pace the room.
For all the notice he took of Cat as they waited for the arrival of his son she might as well not have been here.
‘Do you always talk to him that way?’ she finally asked curiously.
His head snapped back, his hands thrust into his trouser pockets again. ‘What way?'
She shrugged. ‘Like one of the hired help,’ she frowned.
His mouth twisted. ‘If I spoke to Norm in that way he would leave.'
‘Your son doesn't have the same prerogative,’ she drawled.
‘But he does,’ Caleb Steele corrected in a hard voice. ‘He's his own man.'
Man sounded a little hopeful for the immature boy she had witnessed at the party last night, his youth obvious in the way he drank too much, laughed too loud, and was too familiar with a woman five years his senior. She doubted Caleb Steele had ever been that young, had been married and on his way to becoming a father at the same age.
‘Let me put that another way,’ he drawled, seeming to guess her thoughts. ‘Luke is independently wealthy from money given to him by his mother, and at nineteen he's over the age of consent.’ He shrugged broad shoulders. ‘If he doesn't like the way I talk to him he's free to set up on his own.'
The underlying friction of the father towards his son was unmistakable. But considering the amount of newsworthy trouble Luke Steele had been in over the last couple of years perhaps that was understandable. She had found the younger man to be totally brash and rude. And, secretly, she couldn't forgive his witnessing those moments of intimacy she had shared with his father earlier!
‘Don't look so worried, little cat,’ Caleb murmured throatily. ‘We won't come to blows over you.'
If they did she had no doubt who would be the victor. And she had a feeling Caleb Steele didn't either, despite the fact that he was twice his son's age. She also knew he didn't give a damn how she felt, that he once again believed the worst of her.
‘Do you get a lot of women throwing themselves at you?’ she frowned.
Black eyes narrowed to steely slits. ‘I've never actually had a woman I don't know waiting for me in my own bed before,’ he bit out.
‘I—–'
‘Come in, Luke,’ he called out to his son as a knock sounded on the door.
Physically father and son were very alike, although Luke's eyes were a deep blue. They both possessed that rugged attraction rather than handsomeness, but maturity had given Caleb that cynical light in his eyes where Luke displayed only recklessness. And in contrast to Caleb's tailored shirt and trousers Luke looked the height of casualness in faded denims and a loose sweater. The bravado in his stance was directed at both his father and Cat.
He nodded in recognition of her, his insolence barely contained. ‘Miss Howard,’ he drawled. ‘So nice of you to have stayed the night.’ In contrast to his father's American drawl his English accent sounded very precise—and insulting.
Cat knew that after the break-up of his father's marriage the boy had gone to live with his grandfather before being sent to school in England. The fact that the two even spoke with a different accent made them even less like father and son.
‘Did I have any choice?’ she returned tartly.
He gave a careless shrug. ‘You didn't look as if you wanted one earlier.'
Colour heightened her cheeks. ‘You—–'
‘Luke, what the hell is going on?’ His father's voice cracked between them like a whip. ‘Do you know anything about Cat being in my bed?'
Luke shrugged again. ‘Only what I saw this morning—–'
‘You know a lot more than—–'
‘Cat, I'm trying to find out what happened,’ Caleb cut in coldly.
‘Well you won't do that from your son,’ she snapped, glaring at the younger man.
‘Luke will tell me the truth.’ His voice brooked no argument—or deception.
‘I wish I had your faith,’ she muttered. ‘So far, in our very short acquaintance, your son has shown himself to be anything but truthful!’ she challenged.
Luke Steele didn't even blink an eyelid. ‘I would doubt you have been completely honest with my father either,’ he sounded confident. ‘Otherwise there would be no need for this conversation.'
Cat shot him a resentful glare. ‘I have told your father everything I know about last night. Unfortunately, he doesn't believe me,’ she added disgustedly.
‘Maybe you would like to tell me what you know, Luke.’ It was phrased as an invitation, but there was no doubt in anyone's mind that it was an order.
‘I think there's only one thing about Miss Howard that you will really be interested in.’ Luke spoke again in that confident voice, as if, despite everything, he was sure he had the upper hand.
Cat tensed warily, sensing danger.
‘Oh?’ his father prompted guardedly.
‘Cat is a reporter,’ Luke announced in a bored voice. ‘The one that's been asking to be introduced to Grandpop the last three months.'
If Cat had thought Caleb Steele's eyes were chilly before then she learnt a new meaning to the word at that moment, the black orbs as hard as pebbles and cold as ice! Luke was right, knowing she was a reporter did seem to be the only thing his father was interested in now.
‘You're that C. Howard?’ he bit out with icy accusation.
He made her sound—and feel—like some sort of low life that had accidentally wandered into his pampered world, as if just being in the same room with her contaminated him!
He turned furious eyes on his son. ‘If you knew who she was, what was she doing at your party?'
Luke looked taken aback by the attack, as if he had expected that little fact to be overlooked by his father's anger at finding her here at all. ‘I—well—she's been making a pest of herself, and so I thought—–'
‘I haven't been making a pest of myself,’ she disclaimed indignantly. ‘All of my letters to this family have been polite, the telephone calls, too.'
‘All twenty-one of them,’ Caleb Steele acknowledged in a hard voice. ‘Oh yes,’ he confirmed softly at her startled look. ‘I'm well aware of the amount of times you've called, and the reason for them.'
‘Then—–'
‘And you must be aware that they could be called harassment,’ he added coldly.
‘Nothing of the sort,’ she dismissed impatiently. ‘I always took no for an answer, and it was the only way I could contact you when you refused to even acknowledge my letters.'
‘The mere fact that I didn't acknowledge them should have been answer enough!'
She had known that, of course; she would have had to have been patently insensitive not to have done! But she wasn't the type of reporter that liked to write because of someone else's unhappiness or misfortune. She had discovered that long ago, and she never sent anything to print without first talking to the people involved, and also getting their OK on what she had written before sending it in. There was already too much misery in the world without having it constantly emblazoned across the front page of newspapers. Faint-hearted, some of her colleagues had called her in the early days, but she had felt comforted by the fact that she did at least have a heart of some sort! And that was the reason she couldn't in all conscience do the chapter in her book on Lucien Steele and his wife without talking to him first.
‘I only wanted to meet your father, talk to him for a while,’ she pleaded her case. ‘I told you, I'm writing a book—–'
‘My mother has been dead nearly thirty years,’ Caleb Steele scorned. ‘Most people today haven't even heard of her, let alone that she was married to Lucien Steele!'
‘You know that isn't true,’ she protested at that blatant lie about Sonia Harrison, one of the screen-goddesses of the forties and fifties. ‘They had a season of her films on only last summer!'
He sighed, his gaze steely. ‘She's still old news,’ he dismissed.
‘My publisher doesn't happen to think so.’ She shook her head.
‘So write your book,’ he invited harshly. ‘You don't need my permission to do that. But make sure you only write the facts, because as soon as the book is published I intend to have my lawyers go over what you've written about my parents with a fine toothcomb!'
She had already guessed that. If only she could make him understand that she had no intention of writing anything defamatory about either of his parents. ‘Look, I know that because of the fact that your father is into his seventies now there was a rumour a couple of years ago that he no longer writes his own books, but—–'
A harsh laugh interrupted her. ‘My father is more lucid at seventy-four than a lot of men are at half his age!’ Caleb Steele scorned. ‘The whole idea was ridiculous from the first.'
She was sure it was. But even if it weren't it was none of her business; she was only interested in the time the now elderly man had been married to Sonia Harrison. ‘I wish you would see—'
‘Oh, I do, Miss Howard,’ he assured her coldly, turning that icy gaze on his son once more. ‘I have yet to hear a reasonable explanation from you,’ he prompted hardly.
A flush darkened the young boy's cheeks, the expression in his eyes more reckless than ever. ‘I thought you should meet Cat,’ he shrugged. ‘Talk to her. And then maybe she would get lost.'
‘She was waiting in my bed for me!’ his father snapped disgustedly.
Cat paled. ‘I wasn't waiting for you!’ She turned glittering eyes on Luke Steele. ‘How did I get into your father's bed?’ she demanded to know, too angry to mince her words.
‘How should I—–'
‘Don't lie,’ she warned with controlled fury. ‘The last thing I remember about last night was telling you I was leaving.'
He returned her gaze unblinkingly. ‘And the last time I saw you you were on your way out.'
‘That's a lie—–'
‘I don't lie, Cat,’ he dismissed in a bored voice.
He was lying now, and she had a fair idea why; his father's anger was formidable, even to this self-confident young man. ‘Luke, can't you see you're just making matters worse?’ she encouraged. ‘You know very well I didn't get as far as leaving the party last night.'
‘I know it now,’ he nodded.
She gave a frustrated sigh. ‘If you're worried about your father's anger then surely you realise he's going to be twice as furious if you don't tell him the truth now?'
Luke gave a harsh laugh, glancing slyly at his father. ‘I'm not in the least concerned about Dad's anger,’ he scorned. ‘What can he do, stop my allowance, throw me out?’ He gave a derisive snort.
Caleb looked unmoved by his son's disgraceful behaviour. ‘So you aren't telling the truth?’ he pounced.
‘I didn't say that,’ his son drawled dismissively. ‘I just don't want Miss Howard to get the impression I'm frightened of you.'
‘Aren't you?’ his father threatened softly.
Luke blinked, disconcerted for a moment, and then the defiance was back in those restless eyes. ‘If that's all?’ he derided. ‘I'm meeting some friends this morning.'
‘Go,’ his father dismissed wearily.
With a malicious smile in Cat's direction he did so. Cat disliked him even more than she had yesterday, and with more reason! And yet something about his behaviour struck a chord in her memory.
‘They say it's tough being the child of a well-known father,’ Caleb Steele mused hardly. ‘No one mentions how difficult it is being the father of that child!’ He gave a ragged sigh, straightening his shoulders with fresh determination. ‘And don't quote me on that,’ he rasped warningly.
‘I'm not the type—–'
‘To “kiss and tell”?’ he finished scornfully. ‘All women are that type, reporters especially so,’ he bit out harshly. ‘It's a pity you haven't actually experienced my lovemaking so that you can give me a rating as a lover; publicity like that could be very beneficial to my social life!'
From what she had heard his social life didn't need any boosting, women falling over themselves to go out with him! And he obviously held every one of them in contempt for finding him attractive.
‘I think you should concentrate on straightening out your son rather than worrying about your social life,’ she told him tartly.
He became suddenly still. ‘What did you say?'
Steel cloaked in velvet again. She was coming to know some of the facets of this man's personality, and right now he was furiously angry at her for daring to interfere between him and his son. But she had finally realised what it was about Luke that was so familiar, recognised it and feared it. ‘At the moment your son could go either way,’ she spoke with quiet intensity. ‘He's teetering on the edge of falling down into that abyss of depravity that will totally destroy him, or coming to his senses and carrying on with his life.'
Caleb Steele scowled. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’ he demanded impatiently.
She gave a ragged sigh, desperate to make him understand how near his son was to losing all reason. ‘Luke is going through a trauma of some kind,’ she explained, ‘and the only way he knows how to deal with it is by going from one deed of recklessness to another. Last night—–'
‘Let's forget last night,’ he rasped. ‘There appear to be two schools of thought concerning that.'
She nodded. ‘And you naturally choose to believe your son,’ she said without rancour.
‘Naturally,’ he drawled harshly, watching her with narrowed eyes.
Cat shrugged acceptance of his loyalty. ‘One of these days your son is going to do something that's going to hurt someone else very badly, and then it's going to be too late to help him.'
‘You speak as if from experience,’ he probed slowly.
She knew the nightmare of waking up every morning with only feelings of despair, of knowing the day would only get worse not better, of feeling that way and knowing there was nothing she could do to stop it. Luke Steele showed signs of that inner trapped feeling she had carried about with her for over a year, she had seen it there in his eyes when he momentarily let down his guard. She didn't like him, or the things he was doing, but she understood him. Which was surely more than his father did!
‘Believe me, Mr Steele,’ she ignored the question in his tone, ‘if you don't soon stop Luke it could be too late. He's very angry at the world right now and—–'
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Carole Mortimer
Carole Mortimer is one of Mills & Boon’s best loved Modern Romance authors. With nearly 200 books published and a career spanning 35 years, Mills & Boon are thrilled to present her complete works available to download for the very first time! Rediscover old favourites - and find new ones! - in this fabulous collection…Waking up in the millionaire’s bed…To research her book, author Cat Howard has chased down arrogant film studio owner, Caleb Steele. So when she wakes up naked in his bed, she’s horrified! Five years ago, Cat’s world was devastated by the death of her beloved fiancé. She’s still grieving her loss, but her powerful attraction to Caleb feels oh-so right…!Cat's genuine innocence and fiery wit captivates Caleb and he’s determined to claim her. But can he convince her to let go of the past…?
No Longer a Dream
Carole Mortimer
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Table of Contents
Cover (#u2b343276-9f6b-5e70-b508-02ec9b18cd1c)
Title Page (#ua419594c-572f-506b-a4d8-952bc768e539)
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#uc68efd09-87f2-5c58-8758-299045a7bc28)
‘YOU have a delicious body, one of the most perfect I've ever seen, but I'm not in the mood for you right now, so could you get out of bed and get some clothes on?'
The velvet roughness of that American-accented voice, and the things it was saying, were enough to wake Cat from her heavy sleep, but it was the sharp slap on the tender flesh of her bottom that caused her lids to fly open.
For a moment she just lay there, the feel of the chocolate-brown silk sheet beneath her, sensuous against her nakedness. Nakedness! She looked down sharply, sure she blushed from head to toe as she saw she was indeed completely naked. She looked away quickly, falling on to her back, only to see herself again in the smoky brown glass of the mirrors directly above her. The whole ceiling was covered in mirrors!
Where was she? And who had that silky rough voice belonged to?
She was alone in the room now, so she could only put the questions to herself. And a couple of dozen more like them! Who's bedroom was this? What was she doing here? Who had undressed her? And why?
The last seemed the easiest to answer. Her first time in bed with a man and she didn't even remember it, didn't even remember the man! She covered her eyes with a groan, feeling sick.
‘It must have been some party.’ The velvety voice spoke with harsh amusement. ‘Would you like me to get you a hair-of-the-dog?'
She lowered her arm, didn't actually need to turn in the man's direction, could see his reflection in the mirrored ceiling. He was as naked as she was!
‘Have you gone back to sleep?’ he prompted hardly.
She wished she could sink through a hole in the floor and disappear, at the very least go back to sleep and forget this had ever happened. But she doubted she would ever sleep peacefully again, would always be frightened this nightmare was going to be repeated. For it had to be a dream; she didn't wake up in the bedrooms of men she didn't even recognise, let alone remember!
‘I can see that you haven't.’ He moved to stand over her, looking down at her. ‘I realise that you probably have a terrible hangover, but you've only yourself to blame.'
His voice definitely lacked sympathy, and Cat blinked hard as she looked up at him, unaware of just how much like her name she looked at that moment, her tumble of long blonde curls wilder than usual after a night in bed, her green eyes still sleepy.
‘Do you know where the bedclothes are?’ Her voice was a pained rasp, her throat feeling totally devoid of moisture, her tongue swollen and dry.
Dark brows rose over cold black eyes. ‘On the floor where you kicked them last night.’ He was totally indifferent to the fact that neither of them was wearing a stitch of clothing. ‘You're a restless sleeper.'
She wasn't usually—but then she had never shared a bed with anyone for the night before! She took advantage of his turned back, as he looked through the wardrobe that took up the whole of one wall, to pull the sheet from the floor over her body and up to her chin, sitting up to watch the man over its softness.
He had thick black hair, lightly sprinkled with grey, a finer, softer looking hair covering the whole of his body, and it was the rest of that body that made Cat gulp. This man was lean and powerful rather than muscular, his shoulders wide, his back taut with strength, his waist slender, his buttocks a muscular curve to his body, his legs long and fleshless. He was completely at ease, and yet the latent power was there.
Had she experienced that power? She didn't feel any different, but then that was no guarantee; maybe you weren't supposed to feel different! She had spent the last twenty-four years ‘saving herself’ and now she didn't even know what she had saved herself for!
The man turned impatiently. ‘Are you going to stay in there all day?'
The fact that she had never seen a man's body this intimately before was nothing to the shock she received when her embarrassed gaze finally reached his face. Caleb Steele! She couldn't believe it, but she would know that harshly attractive face anywhere. Even when he was standing across the room from her stark naked!
Black hair that was usually meticulously brushed back from his face fell forward in a damp swathe, eyebrows the same jet-black jutting out over cold black eyes, his nose an arrogant slash between high cheekbones, his sculptured mouth a hard, forbidding line. At almost forty he looked older, a cynical twist to his mouth, the same emotion reflected in those chilling eyes. He was also considered one of the most powerful—and dangerous—men in Hollywood!
He shrugged at her lack of reply, turning back to the wardrobe, taking a brown silk shirt from a hanger to shrug his shoulders into it. ‘Breakfast is out in the dining room. If you want any I would advise you to get up and get dressed,’ he rasped. ‘I don't sit down to eat with women who are only half-dressed!'
Caleb Steele, owner of the Steele film studios, an exclusive hotel and casino in Lake Tahoe, and with tremendous influence in some quarters of the media. He was also the man she had come to the party last night to meet. Well she had met him; God, how she had met him!
She cleared her throat painfully. ‘Mr Steele—–'
He turned around, tucking the dark brown shirt into the waist of black trousers, before sliding the zip up with a firm movement, his hands dropping down to his hips. ‘Caleb,’ he bit out in that Atlantic drawl. ‘Mr Steele is a little formal in the circumstances. That is my bed you're lying in,’ he pointed out mockingly.
She squeezed her eyes shut, but he was still there when she opened them again. She had guessed it had to be this man's room, from the sinfully mirrored ceiling, to the wide double bed, and erotic silk sheets. He gave the impression of a man who liked to be comfortable when he took his pleasure with a woman.
‘You also seem to have me at a disadvantage.’ He quirked those rugged dark brown brows enquiringly.
Oh my God, he didn't even know her name! ‘I'm Cat,’ she told him flatly. ‘Catherine Howard. And I've heard all the Henry the Eighth jokes I need, thank you.’ This occasion neither warranted nor necessitated one of the endless jokes she had been subjected to concerning her name over the years.
The firmly moulded lips didn't move by a fraction of an inch, and yet something, she thought it was the expression in his eyes, told Cat that he was amused. She agreed, this was hardly the time for outright laughter, about anything!
‘Was she one of the ones that lost her head?’ he derided, dealing with his unruly hair now as he stood in front of the mirror gracing the big oak dressing-table, looking more like the photographs Cat had seen of him: the film mogul that made even the most temperamental director or actor quake in their shoes.
She had attended the party given by this man's son with such high hopes after Luke Steele told her his father was going to ‘show up’ some time during the evening, knowing that Caleb Steele was probably the only man who could get her an interview with his father, Lucien Steele, the writer. Maybe if she had satisfied him in bed he still could, she thought bitterly.
‘Yes,’ she snapped, knowing that history claimed Henry the Eighth's fifth wife had even been guilty of the adultery he had accused her of, unlike a couple of the others, who had just outlived their attraction. ‘Was I—satisfactory?’ she asked with much more bravado than she felt. They said that your subconscious would only let you do what you really wanted to do; had she wanted to go to bed with this man that caused a shiver of apprehension down her spine even though he had only been casually mocking?
He slowly replaced the brush on the dressing-table before turning to look at her, arching one dark brow, the black eyes unfathomable. ‘Don't you know?’ he asked softly, that black gaze looking at her with new interest, playing over the tumble of honey-blonde hair, deep green eyes shadowed with embarrassment now, the small classical nose, and wide kissable mouth, only her shoulders bared to his view now as she clutched the sheet tightly to her, although the warmth of his gaze as it moved to meet hers seemed to say he approved of what he could see.
Cat moistened her mouth nervously. ‘I—er—I think someone must have put something in one of my drinks.’ Her throat was getting easier now, although she knew the reason for its dryness only too well. ‘I only drink orange juice, you see.’ She became flushed at his sceptical snort. ‘It's true,’ she insisted indignantly. ‘I'm allergic to alcohol!'
‘What happens when you drink it?’ His eyes were narrowed now.
She grimaced. ‘I pass out.'
He gave a derisive inclination of his head. ‘That would seem to be what you did.'
Before or after? She swallowed down her growing feelings of panic. ‘I tell you my drinks must have been tampered with,’ she defended, her cheeks still red. ‘I haven't drunk alcohol since I found out it puts me flat on my back.’ She drew in an angry breath at his knowing look. ‘I meant it makes me lose consciousness! After it happened to me the first couple of times I went to a doctor and he told me my body just won't accept alcohol.'
‘I would say that's a pretty shrewd analysis,’ Caleb Steele mocked arrogantly.
She glared at him. ‘You needn't sound so damned disapproving,’ she snapped. ‘You were the one that took an unconscious woman to bed!’ She gasped once she had made the accusation, although Caleb Steele didn't move a muscle.
‘You responded OK when I touched you,’ he drawled uninterestedly.
Her cry of horror was preceded only by the return of the heated colour to her cheeks. She had gone to bed with this man, made love with him. Oh God!
Caleb Steele showed little concern for her disturbed state. ‘What did you do the last couple of times it happened?’ he asked drily, leaning one hip against the dressing-table, completely relaxed, his arms crossed in front of his powerful chest.
Cat's gaze dropped from the bored interest she could read in his eyes as he waited for her answer. ‘I was with friends—–'
‘And this time you weren't.’ He straightened, the casual movement causing Cat to press back against the pillows, the sudden gleam in those fathomless black eyes mocking her nervousness. ‘This time the little cat was left amongst the wolves!’ he scorned contemptuously.
Wolf! She would lay odds on this man being the only wolf at the party last night, for all that it had turned out to be a little wild; and now that he had had her he was spitting her out again!
His eyes narrowed on her flushed face. ‘You aren't one of Luke's college friends, are you?’ He sounded as if that thought didn't please him at all.
‘No, I—–’ She broke off, the real reason she had gone to the party the previous evening, the remembered wish to make a good impression on this man, still paramount. She couldn't blurt it all out now, not when she had just spent the night with him. ‘I'm just an acquaintance, really,’ she amended.
He gave a slow nod. ‘And do you usually look this good in the mornings?'
She gazed back at him in alarm. Surely he hadn't changed his mind and was now in the mood to repeat what had happened between them last night? She clutched the sheet even tighter to her.
‘Relax, Cat,’ he drawled, the amusement back in his eyes, even if his mouth only showed a cynical twist. ‘I was referring to the fact that most women I know can't wait to run to the mascara bottle in the mornings.'
Most women he knew! She would bet that amounted to several hundred. Caleb Steele was known for the short and not always sweet affairs he had had since his divorce from his wife fifteen years ago. Any of those women showing the least sign of wanting permanence in his life was out like an old pair of shoes. Any women that tried to take on this man, even temporarily, was a braver one than she!
‘You have naturally black lashes, hmm?’ he mused as she made no answer.
‘No,’ she denied abruptly. ‘I have them dyed.'
‘You do?’ He didn't even bother to try to hide his surprise.
She nodded, all the time conscious of that reflected image above her, hating the mirrors, feeling as if she had no place to hide. ‘At the hairdressers,’ she supplied. ‘It's done all the time,’ she claimed at his cynical expression.
‘I know that,’ he derided, shaking his head in disgust. ‘I just didn't think you—there soon won't be many parts of a woman's body that are completely natural!’ he rasped.
His scorn irritated her. ‘The rest of me is real!’ she snapped. ‘Although what you said earlier isn't true; my body is far from perfect. My legs are too long for one thing—–'
‘I wouldn't know,’ he mocked. ‘I'm a breast man myself. And yours are a pair of the finest I've ever seen. Not too big, but not too small either, with a dusky rose nip—–'
‘Please!’ she groaned her dismay at his familiarity with her body.
‘Oh I did.’ He moved forward with a feline grace, sitting down on the bed, one arm resting on the bed across her, the other beside her. ‘Do you have any idea of the pleasure a man can get from the taste of your breasts, the soft little moans you give in your throat as your nipples are kissed and caressed to—–'
‘Please!’ He was making her feel giddy, his proximity alarming, what he was saying even more so, a mental picture of them the way he was describing burning in her brain, able to imagine his dark head bent over her as he sipped from those life-giving peaks, as she cradled him to her and—–
‘Yes, Cat.’ His black gaze held hers as he gently released the sheet from her suddenly relaxed fingers, as he softly pulled the sheet down to throw it back on the floor, leaving Cat's naked body exposed to him in all its silken glory. ‘It was just like that,’ he murmured huskily as his head slowly lowered and that hard mouth claimed one taut nipple with surprising softness and warmth, the rough rasp of his tongue sending aching pleasure down between her thighs.
Her head fell back, and as it did so she could see him in the mirror above exactly as she had imagined him, her skin creamy white in contrast to his black hair, her hand moving up even now so that her fingers could entwine in his hair as she held him against her, groaning anew as he moved to claim the other dusky nipple, drinking his fill of that one, too, Cat unable to look away from the beauty of their reflections above.
‘Dad, I—bloody hell!'
The shocked English-accented voice of this man's son as he burst into the room unannounced was what brought her back to her senses, gasping her dismay at what had happened, and at the identity of the intruder to their pleasure. Caleb Steele's son. Oh God, she groaned for what must have been the dozenth time since waking up to find herself in this man's bed.
Caleb slowly eased himself back, holding her horrified gaze with steady intensity. ‘Get out of here, Luke,’ he instructed coldly, not even turning to look at his son.
‘But, Dad—–'
‘I said get out!’ He didn't raise his voice, and he still didn't turn towards the door as his body partly shielded Cat's, but the icy anger was obvious in the tersely spoken order, every muscle in his body tensed in challenge of his authority. ‘We'll talk about this later.’ There was a threat rather than apology in his voice.
‘OK,’ Luke Steele sighed, the soft click of the door telling them he had obeyed the first instruction, too.
Cat's eyes were squeezed tightly shut as she denied the reflection of her nakedness, not in the mirrors this time, but in coal-black depths. Caleb Steele's eyes. She didn't know what had possessed her, what had possessed him; she wasn't exactly his usual type. She was too young to be one of his women; he had publicly stated on more than one occasion that any woman under thirty didn't have the experience or maturity he liked. Surely at twenty-four she was too young!
What was she doing lying here assuring herself she was too young for him? She had just spent the night with him, had been lost in his arms again seconds ago when his son burst in.
She felt the bed ease beside her as he stood up, the gentle caress of the silk sheet as it was placed over her. But still her eyes remained squeezed shut.
‘It's all right, Cat.’ That silky rough voice spoke softly. ‘He's gone now.'
She moistened her lips, lying rigidly still, feeling his presence as he stood beside the bed looking down at her, even though she couldn't see him!
‘But I haven't, hmm?’ Caleb read her mind, ‘Isn't it a little late to feel embarrassment in front of me?’ he derided.
It was that amusement in his voice that made her lids fly open, and she turned to glare at him. ‘I'm sure that you're used to waking up in bed next to a different woman every day of the week,’ she snapped. ‘But I'm not used to this at all!'
He wasn't in the least moved by her show of temper. ‘Every day of the week sounds a little excessive,’ he drawled mockingly. ‘Even I like to rest on Sundays.'
God, why was she even bothering to talk to this man when all she wanted to do was to get dressed and get out of here—or did she mean crawl out of here? She had arrived with such plans the night before, had hoped to get the information she needed; now she knew she would have to start all over again. She doubted Caleb Steele would appreciate her request when she had literally fallen into bed with him; it smacked too much like payment for the night! She might write what most people would consider ‘lightweight’ stuff but she took her job seriously, and trying in any way to influence a person to give her information was not the way she worked. She realised that after last night she would have to work doubly hard to convince Caleb Steele of that.
She sat up, holding the sheet to her. ‘Then as this is a Sunday I'm sure you would like to begin doing that,’ she encouraged firmly.
Black brows arched. ‘Would you be ordering me out of my own bedroom?'
‘I would be—asking you to think about it,’ she grimaced.
The stern mouth actually quirked this time, although he didn't show his teeth in a smile. Perhaps he never did actually smile or laugh; any photographs she had seen of him had always shown him grim-faced. She had assumed that to be because he considered the photographer to be infringing on his privacy. Now she wasn't so sure.
‘I've thought about it,’ he derided. ‘I'm quite happy where I am for the moment.'
‘I—your breakfast,’ she reminded a little desperately, not at all happy with ‘where he was'.
He gave an inclination of his head. ‘I've changed my mind about that. I think I'll order us something in here while you take a shower.'
Cat swallowed hard, judging the distance between the bed and the bathroom door. It was too far! Wide green eyes turned back to him, and she was sure they were panic-stricken.
He looked a little impatient with this display of modesty. ‘Take the sheet with you,’ he advised wearily.
‘Take the—oh. Yes.’ Her expression cleared.
But wrapping a sheet around herself that was both way too big and extremely slippery proved much more difficult than she had anticipated. It always seemed to be so elegantly done in films and on television, but after several minutes she still hadn't managed to get the sheet about her with any degree of safety.
‘Here.’ Caleb Steele finally took pity on her struggles, draping the loose sheet over her free arm while securing the end of it between her breasts. ‘Relax,’ he instructed drily without looking up from his task as she flinched at the intimacy. ‘Don't you know that this sort of modesty is a thing of the past? It's very well done, though,’ he drawled, stepping back to look at her with dispassionate eyes. ‘Maybe I could find a part for you. Did you have anything in mind?'
‘In mind?’ She was standing now, aware that she barely reached this man's shoulder in her bare feet, also aware that the two-inch heels on her shoes wouldn't make that much difference either.
He pulled a face. ‘The casting-couch may be long dead, but the bed isn't.’ He gave the latter a derisive look, its tumbled look showing evidence of their presence there together.
Cat swallowed hard. ‘You think—that is—you believe—–'
He once again crossed his arms in front of his powerful chest. ‘Did the director prove difficult?' he mocked. ‘If it was Maurice Goodson I'm not surprised.’ His mouth twisted. ‘He's a happily married man and never touches other women.'
‘I'm glad to hear it,’ she bit out tautly. ‘Maybe some of his scruples will rub off on you—–'
‘I'm not married,’ he told her coldly. ‘And not intending to be.’ He studied her between narrowed lids. ‘So if that's the role you're after, kid, forget it.'
She didn't know whether she was more angry at being called ‘kid’ or at the way he assumed she had gone to bed with him because she had in mind being the next Mrs Caleb Steele. She decided the latter more urgently needed rebuttal. ‘You flatter yourself if you think I would even consider marrying someone as cold and arrogant as you,’ she dismissed hardly. ‘And contrary to what you think there's more to life, my life, than using people for gain. The real world isn't like that!'
‘The real world is exactly like that,’ he derided pityingly.
‘Not my world,’ she insisted. ‘I don't want anything from you, Mr Steele. Whatever happened between us last night was not planned. I don't want payment, in any way, shape, or form for it. You—–'
‘You know,’ he remarked softly, almost conversationally, ‘it's as well we didn't get to do too much talking last night; I can't stand women that nag.'
‘You—you—–'
‘Go take your shower, Cat,’ he dismissed in a bored voice. ‘And take this with you.'
‘This’ was the shimmering green dress she had worn the evening before and which he had just picked up from the bedroom floor, reminding her more forcefully than anything else could have done that she had casually spent the night with this man. She felt as if she didn't know herself any more, so why should Caleb Steele!
She snatched the dress from his hand, looking around for the lace panties that were all she had worn beneath the clinging material, her cheeks colouring anew as she saw Caleb Steele was holding those out to her, too. They were really just the minutest scrap of pale green lace, and she crushed it within her hand.
‘We'll talk as soon as you've had your shower,’ he told her confidently, picking up the telephone at the end of the statement, talking crisply into the receiver as he ordered a full breakfast for both of them.
Cat hastily shut the bathroom door before his talk of grilled food made her physically ill. How could this have happened to her? She had come to the party last night in all innocence. Admittedly it was a little wilder than she had anticipated, the majority of the guests appearing to be around the nineteen or twenty mark as their young host was. She hadn't particularly liked that cynical young man from the beginning, and she had a fair idea that he had been the one who had doctored her drinks, seeming to dislike her as much as she disliked him. When his father had appeared on the scene she didn't know, but he obviously had, and with the alcohol in her system she had gone to bed with him. Which was very strange, because usually she just passed out!
She didn't believe she had made love with Caleb Steele, no matter what he said to the contrary!
She turned straight round and marched back into the bedroom, no longer caring that she wore only the draped sheet. ‘You're a lying, rotten, lousy—–’ She broke off as she realised Caleb Steele was no longer alone, that an older man had joined him, a well-dressed pleasant-faced man who appeared to be taking instructions when she entered the room. And from the cursory glance he gave in her direction, the blue eyes completely devoid of emotion, he found nothing unusual in seeing a sheet-wrapped woman walking about his employer's bedroom suite!
Black eyes met her stormy green ones with icy disdain. And then Caleb Steele turned away and resumed his business discussion with the man at his side.
Cat couldn't believe it, had never been dismissed in such a way before! It was just as if she were of no importance at all. She drew in an angry breath. ‘I said—–'
‘I heard you.’ His head snapped up. ‘It may have escaped your notice,’ he drawled with heavy sarcasm, ‘but I'm busy right now.'
Busy! He was busy. She was trying to regain her self-respect and he was busy! It may be clichéd, but who the hell did he think he was! The answer to that was all too obvious, but who he was and the amount of money he was worth, didn't much matter to her at this moment. Who she was, and the amount of money she wasn't worth didn't mean Caleb Steele could dismiss her like an old shirt! If he treated all of his women in this way it was no wonder his affairs didn't last.
‘You may be busy, Mr Steele—–’ her chin rose challengingly when his associate at last showed surprise—at her formality with the man who's bedroom she stood almost naked in. It was the erroneous impression her appearance gave that made her carry on in spite of the cold anger emitting from Caleb Steele. ‘But I want to talk to you. Now,’ she added firmly as she guessed he was about to dismiss her a second time. ‘Unless you would care to discuss what happened in that bed last night in front of an audience?'
The man at his side gave a choked sound, somewhere between a cough and a laugh, beginning to cough in earnest as that coal-black gaze was suddenly riveted on him.
‘You sound bad, Norm,’ his employer grated with icy insincerity. ‘Why don't you go and get yourself a cup of coffee and we'll continue with this later. When you're feeling better.’ The last was added threateningly.
‘Sure.’ The other man spoke for the first time, American like his employer. ‘I—er—nice to have met you, Miss—er—–'
‘Cat,’ Caleb Steele put in icily before she could make any reply. ‘And believe me,’ he drawled suggestively, ‘she more than lives up to her name!’ He flexed his shoulders as if something there pained him.
Like claw marks, from a cat! And she knew damn well that except for that fine covering of dark hair his back was smooth and unmarked.
A speculative light entered the man Norm's eyes. ‘Perhaps we'll meet again, Cat,’ he murmured in a somewhat puzzled voice, as if for once he were surprised at his employer's choice of a bed-partner.
‘I doubt that,’ she answered him but looked at Caleb Steele. ‘I wound to kill!'
‘Yes. Well,’ the older man looked flustered now, ‘I'll talk to you later, Caleb.’ He made a hasty exit before he was caught in the verbal war that seemed to be taking place in the bedroom.
Caleb Steele looked at her with expressionless black eyes. ‘And just how do you intend to wound me, Catherine Howard?’ he challenged in a softly threatening voice.
Her eyes flashed. ‘If I had any sense I'd stab you in the back the way my namesake should have done Henry the Eighth! You're as lying and deceitful as he ever was!’ She tossed back her mane of golden hair.
‘I am?'
Steel encased in velvet. There was no other way to describe that softly spoken threat. But she wasn't about to be intimidated by him; he had lied to her and he was going to admit it. ‘I didn't make love with you in that bed,’ she pointed to it angrily. ‘Or anywhere else last night!'
Dark brows rose. ‘You didn't?’ he drawled.
‘You know I didn't.’ Her eyes flashed. ‘I always pass out. I don't—don't—–'
‘Leap into bed with men you don't know,’ he finished coldly. ‘Then how did you wake up in my bed this morning?'
Delicate colour darkened her cheeks. ‘I don't believe you slept in it. I also don't remember you being at the party last night. I can't remember seeing you there, and—–'
‘I arrived late,’ he bit out, as if he were tired of the whole conversation. ‘And I did sleep in that bed last night. Next to you.'
She swallowed hard, knowing by the flat uninterested tone of his voice that he didn't lie. But she always passed out!
Her distress must have shown in her face, because something like compassion flickered in his eyes. ‘Cat—–'
‘I'm sorry,’ she bit out jerkily, swinging away, needing to escape back to the sanctuary of the bathroom. ‘I was rude to you just now in front of an employee.’ She couldn't think straight, needed to be alone away from the tumbled intimacy of this bedroom so that she could try to piece together the events of last night, try to make some sense of it in her own mind. ‘I—I'll apologise later if you would like me to. I—I'll go and take my shower now—–'
‘Cat!'
Again she ignored the steely command in his voice, running into the bathroom, locking the door behind her this time before collapsing back against it.
If only she could remember, if only she knew what had happened last night to make her want to make love to Caleb Steele. She couldn't believe she had wanted to make love with him; she didn't even like the man.
What had Vikki said to her before she left for the party last night, ‘Be good'? And then they had both come back with the rejoinder about ‘being careful’ before Cat had laughingly taken her leave. She had no idea whether she had been ‘good', but careful she certainly hadn't been.
How could she have taken Caleb Steele as her lover when she belonged heart and soul to Harry?
CHAPTER TWO (#uc68efd09-87f2-5c58-8758-299045a7bc28)
SHE had been so buoyed up the evening before as she got ready for the party, overjoyed at the prospect of finally meeting Caleb Steele after weeks of writing for an interview to his London office and home when her publisher had told her he was the only way she would ever be able to speak to his father, the reclusive author Lucien Steele.
The series of articles she had done the year before on Hollywood marriages had proved to be a tremendous success, a publishing company approaching her about doing a book on the subject, with the condition that she covered four marriages of their choice, the rest being left to her discretion. Unfortunately, one of the marriages the publishing company had chosen had been that of Lucien Steele and the late Sonia Harrison. Of course, Cat could have gone ahead and written the chapter on this golden couple of the Hollywood of the forties without talking to Lucien Steele, but she hadn't wanted to do that. But to actually arrange an interview with him had proved more difficult than she had imagined, the now elderly man having disappeared from the Hollywood scene thirty years ago after the tragic death of his wife in a fire that had destroyed their mansion house, and absenting himself from London society a few years ago, too, to all intents and purposes disappearing off the face of the earth. Except that his son and grandson had to know of his whereabouts.
She had been warned of Caleb Steele's aversion to meeting the press whenever possible but she hadn't realised he could be so elusive, almost as bad as his father. Polite letters to his office had been ignored; telephone requests to have a meeting with Caleb Steele had been politely evaded by his secretary; a visit to his London home two days ago had introduced her to Luke Steele, his notorious son. Where the grandfather and father seemed to avoid publicity the grandson seemed to court it! He was always in trouble of one kind or another, always being asked to leave hotels and restaurants because of his outrageous behaviour, and had been thrown out of two universities at the last count.
But he had been very friendly towards her yesterday afternoon, and if she had been a little wary of his over-bright eyes and unkempt appearance she forgave him the minute he invited her to his party, assuring her that his father was going to be there.
She had even ignored the over-familiarity and the provocative remarks he kept making when she got to the party, and the way it seemed impossible to escape his company—or not to notice the amount of alcohol he was consuming.
She could remember all that, the noise, the loud laughter of too many people having drunk too much, could remember deciding shortly before eleven that Caleb Steele wasn't going to come to his son's party after all, remembered telling Luke Steele she was leaving, and then—nothing. The next thing she had been aware of was that slap to her bottom!
Promiscuity hadn't been something she consciously avoided, but something she ignored. That sort of relationship was for other people, not her. She had her friends, a lot of them, male and female alike, admittedly more of the latter than the former, but that was probably because a lot of men didn't believe there could be just friendship between a man and a woman. She believed the opposite, that friendship should come before the love. She and Harry had been friends from the moment they walked through the gate on their first day at school, when Harry had given a painful tug on the single braid that lay down her spine, and she had turned around and punched him straight on the nose! They had both been too proud to cry and so they had laughed instead. After that they had be come inseparable, their friendship surprising them both—if not other people—by turning to love when they were both fifteen.
And she had betrayed that love last night with a man like Caleb Steele!
She didn't even need to guess what Harry would think of the other man; she knew the two men would have disliked each other intensely, Harry so open and boyishly handsome, Caleb Steele hiding any emotions he might have behind that harsh face and cold black eyes. They were as different as night and day, one devil, one angel, and she—she had lain with the devil!
A brisk knock on the bathroom door made her jump nervously. ‘Breakfast is here, Cat,’ Caleb Steele informed her abruptly. ‘Either run the water and have a shower or come out and eat,’ he advised irritably. ‘You can't stay in there all day.'
She wished she could! Maybe other women could handle this situation confidently, but she couldn't. And she certainly couldn't sit down to breakfast in an evening dress!
‘Cat?’ his voice had sharpened. ‘Have you fallen asleep in there?'
Asleep? She didn't think she was ever going to fall asleep again—too afraid of what she would find when she woke up!
‘Answer me, Cat,’ he advised in a steely voice. ‘Or would you rather suffer the embarrassment of my having someone break the door down?'
She swallowed hard, barely breathing, trembling like a leaf about to fall from a tree. ‘I don't want any breakfast,’ she told him a quivery voice, on the verge of tears.
‘Cat?'
That velvet rasp sounded directly through the wood behind her head, and she moved hastily away, turning to stare at the door with wide eyes.
‘Cat, are you crying?’ He sounded incredulous at the idea.
Was she crying? Yes, she could taste the tears on her top lip, although she hadn't been aware of them falling. Why shouldn't she cry when her heart was breaking into little pieces!
‘Cat, open the door,’ he encouraged now, persuasively. ‘There's no need for this, Cat,’ he cajoled softly. ‘Would it help if I told you nothing happened between us last night? That I didn't even touch you until this morning?'
Hope flared in her over-bright green eyes, and then it faded, leaving her looking more miserable than ever. ‘Not when it isn't the truth,’ she said dully.
‘But it is,’ he insisted firmly. ‘I was damned angry this morning when I let you think we had made love. Open the door, Cat, and we'll talk.'
Why on earth was he so obsessed with her unlocking the door? What did he—no, he couldn't think that! God, if she were the type to commit suicide she would have done it years ago, and over a much more worthwhile man than Caleb Steele.
She straightened, her head back proudly. ‘I'll be out as soon as I've showered. Would you please order me a taxi so that I can leave immediately?'
For a moment that was silence on the other side of the door. ‘Very well,’ he bit out coldly, no longer so close to the door. ‘The hysterics are over, I take it? he derided.
She stiffened. ‘You can rest assured that I don't intend using your razor to cut my wrists!'
‘That might be a little difficult,’ he drawled. ‘I use an electric shaver!'
Cat bristled indignantly at his mockery. ‘I could always used it as a saw!'
A soft throaty chuckle answered her anger. ‘Your name does fit, Cat,’ he murmured admiringly. ‘You spit and claw right back, don't you?'
‘I thought you already knew that,’ she reminded bitterly.
‘I told you,’ he said softly. ‘I didn't make love to you last night.'
Was he telling the truth? She didn't know. But she desperately needed to believe that he was, slowly unlocking and opening the door, looking up at him anxiously, coal-black eyes staring straight back at her. And she could read nothing from them, years of deliberately shielding his emotions making that impossible. Cat continued to stare back at him.
‘You were already in my bed when I got home,’ Caleb Steele told her briskly. ‘And by that time I was too damned tired to care who I shared my bed with!'
Cat's face drained of colour, leaving two deep green pools of bewildered hurt.
‘How the hell old are you that it shocks you out of your mind to even think of sharing a bed with a man?’ He scowled at the accusation in her expression.
‘Old enough,’ she muttered.
‘For what?’ He turned away disgustedly, his hands thrust into the pockets of his trousers, pulling the material taut across his thighs.
‘For whatever,’ she returned sharply.
‘Eighteen isn't old enough for whatever!’ he rasped, scowling heavily. ‘Is there anyone that's going to be worried by your non-appearance last night?’ he suddenly frowned.
She thought of Vikki, and then as quickly dismissed her friend and flatmate. Vikki would probably be gleefully lying in wait for her when she got home, demanding to know all the details, had been urging her for years to take a lover.
‘You mean like a father or brother?’ She arched honey-blonde brows at him.
His mouth was tight. ‘Or a husband?'
Her laugh was brittle. ‘God, yes, I could be married, couldn't I?’ she said hardly.
‘Are you?’ Black eyes were narrowed, as if he didn't like the idea of sharing a bed with a married woman, under any circumstances.
‘No,’ she assured him flatly. ‘Nor engaged, nor seeing anyone seriously. I don't have a brother and my parents live in Cornwall, so you needn't worry about Daddy coming after you with a shotgun!'
‘Is that a possibility?’ Caleb Steele asked slowly.
‘Not if it's true that we didn't make love.’ There was a question in the statement.
‘And if it isn't true?’ he grated.
She shrugged. ‘Then my father is old-fashioned enough to want his grandchild to have a father. But you were telling the truth when you said we didn't make love, weren't you?’ Anxiety darkened her eyes, although her expression remained bland.
He considered her for long, timeless minutes before nodding abruptly. ‘I'd been in a meeting for over forty-eight hours; I have union trouble.’ There was a resigned twist to his mouth. ‘But yesterday was Luke's birthday—–'
‘It was?’ Cat gasped; it hadn't been like any other birthday party she had ever gone to!
‘It was,’ he nodded, giving an impatient sigh as he watched her continually hitch the sheet over her breasts in an effort to keep it in place, turning with leashed energy to push open one of the mirrored doors to his wall-length wardrobe, searching inside.
‘Do you have a mirror fetish?’ Cat burst out impetuously, fascinated by the way there were mirrors everywhere, even on two walls in the adjoining bathroom; it had come as something of a shock to see the tousled reflection of herself across the width of the luxurious room, the sunken jacuzzi meaning she had an unhindered full-length view of herself!
He turned briefly to give her a dismissive glance. ‘If you're expecting me to say they were already in the house when I moved in you're going to be disappointed,’ he drawled, taking out a dark brown robe. ‘Here, put this on.’ He held it out to her.
She gratefully took the robe, then looked down awkwardly at the sheet, wondering how she was going to go from one to the other and still maintain her modesty.
‘Let's not go through that again,’ Caleb Steele whipped the sheet from around her body, holding out the robe for her to put her arms into. ‘You were naked when I climbed into bed next to you last night, and you didn't even have the sheet on you when I woke up this morning!’ he dismissed impatiently.
‘That isn't the point,’ a red-faced Cat snapped, quickly turning to put her arms into the robe.
‘Because you're awake now?’ he mocked. ‘There,’ he murmured softly. ‘That's why I like mirrors.'
She froze, slowly turning her head to look at him, but he was staring up at the ceiling, and with the heated colour darkening her cheeks she reluctantly followed his gaze.
She had her arms thrust into the sleeves of the robe but he hadn't yet put the material in place about her shoulders, her back arched, her breasts thrust out invitingly. The reflection reminded her all too forcibly that earlier she had issued a similar invitation—and that he had accepted!
She pulled the robe about her in hurried movements, her cheeks burning as she tied the belt about her slender waist, the thigh-length robe reaching down past her knees, the sleeves falling down over her hands as she straightened her arms.
‘Let me.’ Caleb Steele moved to turn up the sleeves, treating her with all the resigned patience of an adult dealing with a recalcitrant child. ‘I could snap you in half and not even know I'd done it,’ he murmured as if to himself.
‘I'd know you had done it,’ she told him with feeling.
The coal-black eyes became even darker, the cynical light going out of them to be replaced by a surprising warmth, before that stern mouth actually curved into a grin, deep grooves etched into his cheeks, his teeth very white against his tanned flesh.
Cat's eyes widened like a surprised feline. ‘Why do you hide all that dental work?’ she once again spoke without thinking first. ‘I mean, you rarely smile,’ she tried to amend, grimacing her embarrassment as she knew she had failed.
This time he laughed outright, a rich deep sound, roughness once again cloaked in velvet. ‘Like everyone else I laugh when something amuses me.’ He still smiled. ‘And I'll have you know that these teeth are all my own, and they're the genuine uncapped variety!'
She stared at him in fascination, amazed at the difference his smile made. He looked almost handsome! And years younger, not quite so much as if every minute of his thirty-nine years had been spent amassing the power and money that made him the dangerous man he was.
‘Cat?'
She suddenly realised he was no longer smiling, but eyeing her watchfully as she openly stared at him. ‘I can see that now,’ she rushed into speech. ‘One of the front ones is a little crooked.'
He nodded. ‘If you were a guest at my son's party last night why didn't you know it was his nineteenth birthday?’ he asked icily.
This man would have been lethal as a courtroom lawyer, would have held the judge and jury mesmerised by the way he never missed even the slightest irregularity!
‘He didn't tell me,’ she answered truthfully.
‘If you're a friend—–'
‘I told you, I'm only an acquaintance.’ She bit her lip. ‘I—I went to the party last night because I wanted to meet you,’ she revealed, knowing honesty had to prevail now.
His eyes glazed over, his nostrils flaring, his mouth a thin angry line. ‘So it was all an act,’ he said disgustedly. ‘The surprise, the dismay, the shock,’ he added impatiently. ‘When I didn't show at the party you decided to wait for me, in my bed!’ He began to pace the room, shaking his head as he looked at her. ‘You ought to get an Oscar for the act you just put on in the bathroom,’ he grated. ‘I actually did feel a first-class heel for lying to you!'
‘Because you are!’ Her eyes flashed. ‘It was cruel to make me believe we had—we had been lovers. Everything I told you was the truth, my drinks were doctored, and I have no idea how I came to be in your bed—–'
‘For God's sake don't start crying again!’ he rasped as the tears began to fall. ‘We'll get to the bottom of this once and for all,’ he bit out, picking up the receiver to dial. ‘Luke?’ he barked in the mouthpiece. ‘Get in here,’ he ordered as coldly as he had earlier told his son to leave. ‘And make sure your story is a good one!’ he advised threateningly before slamming down the receiver to once again pace the room.
For all the notice he took of Cat as they waited for the arrival of his son she might as well not have been here.
‘Do you always talk to him that way?’ she finally asked curiously.
His head snapped back, his hands thrust into his trouser pockets again. ‘What way?'
She shrugged. ‘Like one of the hired help,’ she frowned.
His mouth twisted. ‘If I spoke to Norm in that way he would leave.'
‘Your son doesn't have the same prerogative,’ she drawled.
‘But he does,’ Caleb Steele corrected in a hard voice. ‘He's his own man.'
Man sounded a little hopeful for the immature boy she had witnessed at the party last night, his youth obvious in the way he drank too much, laughed too loud, and was too familiar with a woman five years his senior. She doubted Caleb Steele had ever been that young, had been married and on his way to becoming a father at the same age.
‘Let me put that another way,’ he drawled, seeming to guess her thoughts. ‘Luke is independently wealthy from money given to him by his mother, and at nineteen he's over the age of consent.’ He shrugged broad shoulders. ‘If he doesn't like the way I talk to him he's free to set up on his own.'
The underlying friction of the father towards his son was unmistakable. But considering the amount of newsworthy trouble Luke Steele had been in over the last couple of years perhaps that was understandable. She had found the younger man to be totally brash and rude. And, secretly, she couldn't forgive his witnessing those moments of intimacy she had shared with his father earlier!
‘Don't look so worried, little cat,’ Caleb murmured throatily. ‘We won't come to blows over you.'
If they did she had no doubt who would be the victor. And she had a feeling Caleb Steele didn't either, despite the fact that he was twice his son's age. She also knew he didn't give a damn how she felt, that he once again believed the worst of her.
‘Do you get a lot of women throwing themselves at you?’ she frowned.
Black eyes narrowed to steely slits. ‘I've never actually had a woman I don't know waiting for me in my own bed before,’ he bit out.
‘I—–'
‘Come in, Luke,’ he called out to his son as a knock sounded on the door.
Physically father and son were very alike, although Luke's eyes were a deep blue. They both possessed that rugged attraction rather than handsomeness, but maturity had given Caleb that cynical light in his eyes where Luke displayed only recklessness. And in contrast to Caleb's tailored shirt and trousers Luke looked the height of casualness in faded denims and a loose sweater. The bravado in his stance was directed at both his father and Cat.
He nodded in recognition of her, his insolence barely contained. ‘Miss Howard,’ he drawled. ‘So nice of you to have stayed the night.’ In contrast to his father's American drawl his English accent sounded very precise—and insulting.
Cat knew that after the break-up of his father's marriage the boy had gone to live with his grandfather before being sent to school in England. The fact that the two even spoke with a different accent made them even less like father and son.
‘Did I have any choice?’ she returned tartly.
He gave a careless shrug. ‘You didn't look as if you wanted one earlier.'
Colour heightened her cheeks. ‘You—–'
‘Luke, what the hell is going on?’ His father's voice cracked between them like a whip. ‘Do you know anything about Cat being in my bed?'
Luke shrugged again. ‘Only what I saw this morning—–'
‘You know a lot more than—–'
‘Cat, I'm trying to find out what happened,’ Caleb cut in coldly.
‘Well you won't do that from your son,’ she snapped, glaring at the younger man.
‘Luke will tell me the truth.’ His voice brooked no argument—or deception.
‘I wish I had your faith,’ she muttered. ‘So far, in our very short acquaintance, your son has shown himself to be anything but truthful!’ she challenged.
Luke Steele didn't even blink an eyelid. ‘I would doubt you have been completely honest with my father either,’ he sounded confident. ‘Otherwise there would be no need for this conversation.'
Cat shot him a resentful glare. ‘I have told your father everything I know about last night. Unfortunately, he doesn't believe me,’ she added disgustedly.
‘Maybe you would like to tell me what you know, Luke.’ It was phrased as an invitation, but there was no doubt in anyone's mind that it was an order.
‘I think there's only one thing about Miss Howard that you will really be interested in.’ Luke spoke again in that confident voice, as if, despite everything, he was sure he had the upper hand.
Cat tensed warily, sensing danger.
‘Oh?’ his father prompted guardedly.
‘Cat is a reporter,’ Luke announced in a bored voice. ‘The one that's been asking to be introduced to Grandpop the last three months.'
If Cat had thought Caleb Steele's eyes were chilly before then she learnt a new meaning to the word at that moment, the black orbs as hard as pebbles and cold as ice! Luke was right, knowing she was a reporter did seem to be the only thing his father was interested in now.
‘You're that C. Howard?’ he bit out with icy accusation.
He made her sound—and feel—like some sort of low life that had accidentally wandered into his pampered world, as if just being in the same room with her contaminated him!
He turned furious eyes on his son. ‘If you knew who she was, what was she doing at your party?'
Luke looked taken aback by the attack, as if he had expected that little fact to be overlooked by his father's anger at finding her here at all. ‘I—well—she's been making a pest of herself, and so I thought—–'
‘I haven't been making a pest of myself,’ she disclaimed indignantly. ‘All of my letters to this family have been polite, the telephone calls, too.'
‘All twenty-one of them,’ Caleb Steele acknowledged in a hard voice. ‘Oh yes,’ he confirmed softly at her startled look. ‘I'm well aware of the amount of times you've called, and the reason for them.'
‘Then—–'
‘And you must be aware that they could be called harassment,’ he added coldly.
‘Nothing of the sort,’ she dismissed impatiently. ‘I always took no for an answer, and it was the only way I could contact you when you refused to even acknowledge my letters.'
‘The mere fact that I didn't acknowledge them should have been answer enough!'
She had known that, of course; she would have had to have been patently insensitive not to have done! But she wasn't the type of reporter that liked to write because of someone else's unhappiness or misfortune. She had discovered that long ago, and she never sent anything to print without first talking to the people involved, and also getting their OK on what she had written before sending it in. There was already too much misery in the world without having it constantly emblazoned across the front page of newspapers. Faint-hearted, some of her colleagues had called her in the early days, but she had felt comforted by the fact that she did at least have a heart of some sort! And that was the reason she couldn't in all conscience do the chapter in her book on Lucien Steele and his wife without talking to him first.
‘I only wanted to meet your father, talk to him for a while,’ she pleaded her case. ‘I told you, I'm writing a book—–'
‘My mother has been dead nearly thirty years,’ Caleb Steele scorned. ‘Most people today haven't even heard of her, let alone that she was married to Lucien Steele!'
‘You know that isn't true,’ she protested at that blatant lie about Sonia Harrison, one of the screen-goddesses of the forties and fifties. ‘They had a season of her films on only last summer!'
He sighed, his gaze steely. ‘She's still old news,’ he dismissed.
‘My publisher doesn't happen to think so.’ She shook her head.
‘So write your book,’ he invited harshly. ‘You don't need my permission to do that. But make sure you only write the facts, because as soon as the book is published I intend to have my lawyers go over what you've written about my parents with a fine toothcomb!'
She had already guessed that. If only she could make him understand that she had no intention of writing anything defamatory about either of his parents. ‘Look, I know that because of the fact that your father is into his seventies now there was a rumour a couple of years ago that he no longer writes his own books, but—–'
A harsh laugh interrupted her. ‘My father is more lucid at seventy-four than a lot of men are at half his age!’ Caleb Steele scorned. ‘The whole idea was ridiculous from the first.'
She was sure it was. But even if it weren't it was none of her business; she was only interested in the time the now elderly man had been married to Sonia Harrison. ‘I wish you would see—'
‘Oh, I do, Miss Howard,’ he assured her coldly, turning that icy gaze on his son once more. ‘I have yet to hear a reasonable explanation from you,’ he prompted hardly.
A flush darkened the young boy's cheeks, the expression in his eyes more reckless than ever. ‘I thought you should meet Cat,’ he shrugged. ‘Talk to her. And then maybe she would get lost.'
‘She was waiting in my bed for me!’ his father snapped disgustedly.
Cat paled. ‘I wasn't waiting for you!’ She turned glittering eyes on Luke Steele. ‘How did I get into your father's bed?’ she demanded to know, too angry to mince her words.
‘How should I—–'
‘Don't lie,’ she warned with controlled fury. ‘The last thing I remember about last night was telling you I was leaving.'
He returned her gaze unblinkingly. ‘And the last time I saw you you were on your way out.'
‘That's a lie—–'
‘I don't lie, Cat,’ he dismissed in a bored voice.
He was lying now, and she had a fair idea why; his father's anger was formidable, even to this self-confident young man. ‘Luke, can't you see you're just making matters worse?’ she encouraged. ‘You know very well I didn't get as far as leaving the party last night.'
‘I know it now,’ he nodded.
She gave a frustrated sigh. ‘If you're worried about your father's anger then surely you realise he's going to be twice as furious if you don't tell him the truth now?'
Luke gave a harsh laugh, glancing slyly at his father. ‘I'm not in the least concerned about Dad's anger,’ he scorned. ‘What can he do, stop my allowance, throw me out?’ He gave a derisive snort.
Caleb looked unmoved by his son's disgraceful behaviour. ‘So you aren't telling the truth?’ he pounced.
‘I didn't say that,’ his son drawled dismissively. ‘I just don't want Miss Howard to get the impression I'm frightened of you.'
‘Aren't you?’ his father threatened softly.
Luke blinked, disconcerted for a moment, and then the defiance was back in those restless eyes. ‘If that's all?’ he derided. ‘I'm meeting some friends this morning.'
‘Go,’ his father dismissed wearily.
With a malicious smile in Cat's direction he did so. Cat disliked him even more than she had yesterday, and with more reason! And yet something about his behaviour struck a chord in her memory.
‘They say it's tough being the child of a well-known father,’ Caleb Steele mused hardly. ‘No one mentions how difficult it is being the father of that child!’ He gave a ragged sigh, straightening his shoulders with fresh determination. ‘And don't quote me on that,’ he rasped warningly.
‘I'm not the type—–'
‘To “kiss and tell”?’ he finished scornfully. ‘All women are that type, reporters especially so,’ he bit out harshly. ‘It's a pity you haven't actually experienced my lovemaking so that you can give me a rating as a lover; publicity like that could be very beneficial to my social life!'
From what she had heard his social life didn't need any boosting, women falling over themselves to go out with him! And he obviously held every one of them in contempt for finding him attractive.
‘I think you should concentrate on straightening out your son rather than worrying about your social life,’ she told him tartly.
He became suddenly still. ‘What did you say?'
Steel cloaked in velvet again. She was coming to know some of the facets of this man's personality, and right now he was furiously angry at her for daring to interfere between him and his son. But she had finally realised what it was about Luke that was so familiar, recognised it and feared it. ‘At the moment your son could go either way,’ she spoke with quiet intensity. ‘He's teetering on the edge of falling down into that abyss of depravity that will totally destroy him, or coming to his senses and carrying on with his life.'
Caleb Steele scowled. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’ he demanded impatiently.
She gave a ragged sigh, desperate to make him understand how near his son was to losing all reason. ‘Luke is going through a trauma of some kind,’ she explained, ‘and the only way he knows how to deal with it is by going from one deed of recklessness to another. Last night—–'
‘Let's forget last night,’ he rasped. ‘There appear to be two schools of thought concerning that.'
She nodded. ‘And you naturally choose to believe your son,’ she said without rancour.
‘Naturally,’ he drawled harshly, watching her with narrowed eyes.
Cat shrugged acceptance of his loyalty. ‘One of these days your son is going to do something that's going to hurt someone else very badly, and then it's going to be too late to help him.'
‘You speak as if from experience,’ he probed slowly.
She knew the nightmare of waking up every morning with only feelings of despair, of knowing the day would only get worse not better, of feeling that way and knowing there was nothing she could do to stop it. Luke Steele showed signs of that inner trapped feeling she had carried about with her for over a year, she had seen it there in his eyes when he momentarily let down his guard. She didn't like him, or the things he was doing, but she understood him. Which was surely more than his father did!
‘Believe me, Mr Steele,’ she ignored the question in his tone, ‘if you don't soon stop Luke it could be too late. He's very angry at the world right now and—–'
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Кэрол Мортимер
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: Carole Mortimer is one of Mills & Boon’s best loved Modern Romance authors. With nearly 200 books published and a career spanning 35 years, Mills & Boon are thrilled to present her complete works available to download for the very first time! Rediscover old favourites – and find new ones! – in this fabulous collection…Waking up in the millionaire’s bed…To research her book, author Cat Howard has chased down arrogant film studio owner, Caleb Steele. So when she wakes up naked in his bed, she’s horrified! Five years ago, Cat’s world was devastated by the death of her beloved fiancé. She’s still grieving her loss, but her powerful attraction to Caleb feels oh-so right…!Cat′s genuine innocence and fiery wit captivates Caleb and he’s determined to claim her. But can he convince her to let go of the past…?