Savage Interlude. Carole Mortimer

       CHAPTER ONE

      ‘YOU had no right to do it, James. No right at all!’ Kate smoothed back her almost waist-length hair, now pulled back and secured on the top of her head, the gold flecks in her brown eyes more vivid in her anger. ‘Why must you always interfere?’ she demanded.

      James looked up from the script he had been casually perusing, a faint smile to his cynical lips. ‘I had every right, Kate. Humphries is not for you.’ He threw the script down on the sofa beside him.

      Tears filled her eyes. ‘No one will be for me if you carry on like this. As fast as I become interested in someone you effectively get rid of him.’ She sat down dejectedly in the chair, throwing one bare leg over the arm.

      He snorted with laughter, getting up to refill his glass with a liberal amount of whisky. ‘You’re only eighteen, Kate dear. Stop trying to latch on to the first man you meet. You have plenty of time to meet the man of your dreams,’ his lip turned back in a sneer, ‘you don’t have to rush it.’

      Kate pouted sulkily. ‘But I really liked, Nigel. He could be fun.’

      James shrugged. ‘Can’t they all? And take that sulky look off your face. Damien Savage will be here soon, and with you glowering at him like that he isn’t likely to stay long.’

      ‘Good,’ she returned childishly. ‘Who wants to meet Damien Savage anyway?’

      ‘I do,’ he told her dryly. ‘This film script isn’t bad.’

      ‘Up to your standard, brother dear?’ she taunted.

      He frowned his displeasure at her flippancy. ‘I’ll stop you seeing Susan if you don’t stop picking up her mannerisms,’ he warned darkly. ‘And don’t call me brother, you know I don’t like to advertise the fact that we’re related.’

      ‘Neither did your father,’ she put in shortly.

      ‘Our father,’ he corrected.

      ‘Mm, that was a closely guarded secret until he died.’

      ‘Stop grouching,’ he grinned. ‘He made provision for you in his will, didn’t he?’

      ‘Oh, yes. And dragged me from obscurity into a life of gaiety. Like hell he did!’ she added fiercely. ‘He forced you to accept me into your life, took me away from the people I knew, and now half the people we know think I’m little more than your—–’

      ‘Calm down, Kate! My—our—father was a much respected man in the business world, and I’m not exactly unknown myself. And there’s my mother to think of. What do you think it would do to her if it came out that her husband had fathered you?’

      ‘It wouldn’t help your reputation much either,’ she grimaced. ‘So in the meantime everyone thinks I’m your mistress, woman, whatever.’

      ‘And they think I’m a cradle-snatcher. What the hell, I couldn’t give a damn about what people think. It does me no harm to be thought to have my mistress in residence, none at all. And this way I can protect and look after you as our father intended.’

      ‘So I’ve noticed. For the past two years, since I insisted on leaving that dreadful boarding school you sent me to, I haven’t been able to do anything, see anyone without your say-so. It’s so restricting!’

      ‘Now come on, Kate. You aren’t exactly deprived of meeting people. Look at the crowd we have this weekend.’

      ‘All of them your friends,’ she flashed back at him. ‘The distinguished, the famous, the handsome, the notorious James St Just. You’ve appeared in so many films that have been shown all over the world that we can’t go anywhere or do anything together without you being recognised.’

      ‘You knew that when you demanded to be taken away from school.’

      ‘Yes, but I didn’t ask to come and live with you instead. I thought the school was bad, but this place is like a prison in comparison!’

      ‘Don’t exaggerate. You have everything you could wish for here—clothes, money, friends. You want for nothing.’

      ‘Except love.’

      He laughed at her woebegone face. ‘I love you, funnyface. What more can you want?’

      ‘Indeed,’ drawled a voice behind them, the faint American accent only slightly noticeable. ‘It would appear that Miss Darwood has what numerous women in the world would gladly give up everything else for.’

      ‘What the hell—–!’ James sprang to his feet, turning to face the intruder. ‘No one is allowed in this part of the house—Damien! By all that’s holy! But I told Jennings to show you out to the pool when you arrived.’

      Green eyes narrowed. ‘I didn’t come all this way to be fobbed off to the pool with your other guests. I’m sorry I interrupted your těte-à-těte with Miss Darwood, but I have a limited time in England, and all of it accounted

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