Heading For Trouble!

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‘Well, I didn’t take it very seriously,’ she said. ‘After all, it’s just what you do on your programme all the time. If I’d been a fan I’m sure it would have given me a terrific thrill to see the real thing.’ Her amused, husky voice endorsed his dismissal of the idiocy of fans. ‘Let’s forget all about it,’ she added magnanimously.

‘It’s not quite what I do on my programme...’ he began, with a slight edge to his voice.

‘I know,’ Morgan said sympathetically. ‘Censorship is such a nuisance.’ She closed her lips tightly on the little bubble of laughter that came on the heels of the words.

Again he surprised her by laughing. ‘You don’t know how much,’ he agreed. ‘You little devil, you’re enjoying this, aren’t you? And, come to think of it, you’ve already had your pound of flesh. If you could have seen your face in the kitchen! Mouth as prim as pie, and those great, wicked eyes laughing at me. “It’s terribly nice of you,” ’ he mimicked in a saccharine falsetto.

‘But Richard,’ protested Morgan, smiling in spite of herself, ‘you insisted.’ And at his roar of laughter she found herself helplessly joining in.

‘More fool me,’ he said at last, when he had stopped laughing. ‘Morgan, why don’t you come out with me tomorrow? I’ve got some digging around to do—come along and hold a spade and I’ll buy you lunch.’

She sobered abruptly as she realised how completely she had lowered her guard. How did he do it? In the space of something like five minutes he’d turned the situation on its head. The fact was that he’d neatly cut the ground from under her feet, making it almost impossible for her to keep him at a distance—but she hadn’t even noticed. The laughter in those brilliant eyes had gone to her head like champagne—and for one insane moment, she realised in disgust, she’d actually been tempted to accept.

Well, she’d always wondered how he kept up the supply of victims on Firing Line, and now she knew: however often people had seen the kind of treatment they could expect, they probably thought it would be different for them. But the fact was that this was just part of the game. The jokes were neither here nor there; if he thought you had something to hide you could expect no mercy.

‘I’m afraid I’ve already made plans for tomorrow,’ she said. For a moment she thought that he was about to ask what plans but, if he was, he managed to keep his interviewing instincts under control.

‘Well, how about a goodnight kiss to show there are no hard feelings?’ Two strides brought him to her; one hand rested on her shoulder, the other cupped her chin.

Morgan glared up at him. ‘I’m not quite ready to fall on my back yet,’ she said sarcastically. ‘And I don’t come when you snap your fingers, either. In words of one syllable, I am not one of your fans.’

He looked taken aback, one bold black eyebrow shooting up in surprise. She would have liked to think it was just another example of his arrogance—assuming that she would want to be kissed by him—but it was probably sheer astonishment at her unsophisticated reaction to something he took so casually.

‘Congratulations,’ he said. ‘People hardly ever do use words of one syllable when they say “in words of one syllable”. Have you noticed?’ He bent his head; his lips brushed her cheek. A faint scent—an oddly potent mixture of freshly washed cotton, male skin and the citrus of washing-up liquid—tantalised her nostrils, and then it was over.

‘Just to show there are no hard feelings,’ he repeated, straightening up and dropping his hands in his pockets. ‘For sinking my car in a swamp, leaving me to wash every piece of crockery in five counties, and making me out to be the worst thing since the Spanish Inquisition. Want to slap my face for taking liberties?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said Morgan.

‘Disappointed?’

‘Of course not.’ Her face tingled as if an electric current had been sent through it.

‘Liar.’ He grinned. ‘I won’t suggest you reciprocate, anyway—I could have sworn you didn’t give a damn about this afternoon, but there’s no reason why you should make empty gestures if it sticks in your craw. I know I’ve a filthy tongue sometimes, and I don’t mean just four-letter words.’

Morgan detected genuine self-reproach in his voice this time and was instantly stung by pangs of guilt. She hadn’t really cared about all the insults he’d heaped on her—and, as for the bad language, she knew seven-year-olds who could have taught him a thing or two. She couldn’t even fuel her indignation at his sexual presumption, since it seemed that he hadn’t meant to make a pass at all.

‘Of course I don’t care about this afternoon,’ she said, and impulsively, without giving herself time to think about it, she put one hand behind his neck to pull his head forward and kissed him lightly on the cheek.

This time the shock ran through her mouth and the tips of her fingers. She stepped back in confusion, as if he could actually tell what she felt—but surely she wasn’t that transparent?—and said hastily, trying to cover up with a joke, ‘Anyway I suppose it’s a compliment in a way. I mean, you did say I should sell my body in Hollywood. But perhaps you say that to all the girls.’

‘Only if they’ve got the figure for it,’ he said instantly. She’d already worked out that flirting came as naturally to him as breathing, but in spite of his smile there was a look in his eyes which she didn’t like—the keen, probing look of someone confronting a problem that did not make sense. ‘It’s sweet of you to put my mind at rest, Morgan,’ he said in the slow, drawling voice which was used to such devastating effect on Firing Line. ‘And I’m naturally glad to hear I haven’t mortally wounded you. But if you didn’t mind about this afternoon, why the hell have you been avoiding me?’