seeing the lines of dissipation and cynicism beside his nose and mouth, the worldly air that encircled him despite his casual clothing. God, no wonder he had coldly dismissed her; she was passably attractive, but the women he photographed were beautiful and sophisticated.
‘It’s soaking into your denims,’ he turned to her to remark patiently.
‘I—I beg your pardon?’ Katy jumped nervously as he spoke.
‘Your tea—you’re spilling it all over you.’ He took her cup out of her unresisting fingers and began mopping her up with his paper napkin. ‘Couldn’t you feel it dripping down on you?’ he asked, as if she were a particularly stupid child.
‘I—er——’ She licked her lips nervously, completely overwhelmed as he touched the inside of her thigh, purely to mop up the liquid, of course. ‘Yes,’ she nodded vigorously.
He shook his head. ‘Then why the hell didn’t you stop doing it?’
‘I—I—You see, Mr Wild, I——’
‘Ah,’ he nodded understanding, ‘you know who I am.’
‘I heard the air hostess,’ she confirmed, wishing he would stop touching her like that.
‘And you would like to take your clothes off for me.’ He finally sat back, discarding the tissue paper with a certain amount of disgust.
‘Certainly not!’ Katy gasped.
He studied her critically for several minutes. ‘You’ll never make it on the face alone. The bone structure is good, but it isn’t enough on its own. The clothes would have to come off. I’m sure that under that loose shirt and denims there’s a beautiful body just waiting to show itself.’
‘And I’m sure there’s no such thing!’ she told him indignantly, the totally assessing look in his eyes making her feel like wrapping her arms protectively about herself. ‘I’m not taking my clothes off for you or any other man!’
‘Why not?’
‘Why not? Because—well, because I—I don’t even know you!’
Once again he seemed amused by her. ‘What difference does that make? I think you could be very photogenic. Are your eyes really grey or is it my imagination?’
‘They’re grey,’ she snapped confirmation.
‘A lovely smoky grey. And hair the colour of toffee.’
‘Caramel!’ Katy corrected crossly.
He shrugged. ‘Okay, caramel. And there’s a beautiful body under all those clothes, right?’
‘Mind your own business!’
‘Beautiful bodies, female ones, are my business.’ He pulled a card out of his denim shirt pocket and handed it to her. ‘When you get back to London give me a call and we’ll try some practice sesssions.’
‘Practising for what?’ she asked spitefully.
His mouth hardened, his eyes glacial. ‘I’m thirty-six years old, give me sense enough not to chase after schoolgirls!’
‘I’m not a schoolgirl. I’m eighteen.’
‘Wow!’ he taunted sarcastically, picking up the card she had put on the arm of his seat and bending forward to put the card down the open vee of her shirt, leaving it nestling between her breasts. ‘If the rest of you looks as good as they feel,’ he removed his hand, ‘then I think I may be able to put some work your way.’
‘You can keep your work!’ She took out the card and ripped it into tiny pieces in front of him before putting it in the ashtray. ‘And anything else you have to offer.’
‘Okay,’ he shrugged. ‘If that’s the way you want it.’
‘It is,’ she told him firmly.
She didn’t know whether she was relieved or not when he finally seemed to fall asleep again. Her thoughts were much too chaotic for her to even attempt to sleep herself. No man had ever touched her so intimately, and especially so publicly. Colour flooded her cheeks as she remembered his suggestion that he photograph her nude.
‘Well?’ Gemma turned to her expectantly.
Katy didn’t even pretend not to know what her sister meant. ‘You were right, it is him.’
‘I thought so!’ Gemma’s eyes sparkled excitedly. ‘What did he give you just now?’
It had been too much to hope that Gemma hadn’t seen that interchange! ‘Just his card,’ Katy revealed reluctantly.
’Just his card?’ her sister repeated dazedly. ‘And did I see you rip it up?’
‘You did. I have no desire to be photographed in the nude.’
Gemma spluttered with laughter. ‘He wanted to photograph you?’
‘My body,’ Katy corrected disgustedly, his remark that she would never make it on her face alone still rankling.
‘And you turned him down?’
‘Of course I did,’ she said crossly. ‘I told you, I don’t want him photographing me.’ She didn’t like his totally analytical gaze, didn’t like the way he had dismissed her face and instead assessed her body as photographable. She pitied his wife if he had one—how awful to be stripped down to the bare bone, so to speak. After all, no one was perfect, and this man was more than qualified to pick out any blemish or imperfection. ‘Besides,’ she added, ‘you know it isn’t possible. And Mum and Dad would never allow it.’
‘If Adam Wild wanted to photograph me I wouldn’t let Mum and Dad stop me,’ Gemma said scornfully.
‘And Gerald?’ Katy asked dryly.
‘It wouldn’t bother me.’ He sat forward to answer for himself. ‘I might get quite a kick out of seeing my girl-friend’s picture in a centrefold.’
It was the sort of stupid remark Katy would have expected from him. Despite his fair good looks, Katy had always considered Gerald one of the silliest men she knew. Part of her dislike could be due to the fact that he had first started dating Gemma when Katy was going through the worst of her puppy fat and spots stage, and he had never forgotten it. He had teased her unmercifully then, his barbs often cruel and hurtful, and he still did so, every chance he could. Katy stayed away from him whenever she could.
‘Gemma didn’t get the offer,’ she reacted strongly to him. ‘And I have no intention of taking it up.’
Gerald’s brown eyes passed over her scornfully. ‘I can’t see what the man saw in you,’ and he turned away.
‘Idiot!’ Gemma snapped at her resentfully, before she too turned away.
‘Tell him I have a thing about firm uptilted breasts,’ remarked a soft taunting voice from next to Katy.
She
