Dangerous Nights

With a glass of white wine in front of her, she met that hard, narrowed gaze over the corner table in the smoky bar, and remembered precisely, in painful detail, why she’d once felt that instant, devastating attraction…

‘You look well, Ana.’

The simple words were no more than a polite formality. She was imagining any husky quality in his voice, wasn’t she? Fooling herself that those cold eyes held a hidden gleam in their depths?

Taking a shaky breath, she silently lectured herself to be very, very careful. It would be fatal to read anything into this surprise meeting.

‘Thank you. So do you. So…what are you doing in Stratford?’ she managed stiffly. ‘Apart from hanging around the stage door holding programmes for plays you haven’t seen.’

Under the lazy, non-committal regard she had to summon all her poise to flip off the velvet hat idly, rake long fingers casually through her thick blonde hair. But she met his light green eyes with a calm brown gaze.

Some of the cast from tonight’s play in the main theatre were gathered around the bar. Curious glances were being angled in their direction. Out of the corner of her eye, she could. see Camilla and Pru respecting her privacy, but covertly noting Jed’s lean brand of sex appeal. Theatre gossip being what it was, her unknown companion would be the subject of delighted conjecture and discussion for at least three days.

‘Just passing through.’ The detached scrutiny was calmly raking her from head to toe. Where his eyes moved, she felt a shiver of physical response. Could he see the effect he had on her? She gripped her hands together in her lap, agonisingly conscious of his power over her. Beneath her loose, scoop-necked white sweatshirt, she was braless. Her small, high breasts had tightened involuntarily under that calculating appraisal…

‘So what’s new?’ She fortified her nerves with a sip of wine, appalled at the way her hand shook. ‘You spend your life “just passing through", don’t you?’

‘No worse surely than spending your life pretending to be someone else?’ There was a dangerous gleam in Jed’s eyes.

Despite her determination to fight her feelings, she found herself staring at his face, wide-eyed, almost mesmerised. She was trapped then, in that poker-player’s gaze. Jed had always possessed the knack of concentrating visually, unblinking, apparently indefinitely, without moving a muscle.

‘If that’s your definition of the acting profession, it just shows your miserable lack of culture,’ she managed at last, dropping her eyes. ‘So how long does “just passing through” mean this time? One night? One week?’

‘I’m not sure yet.’

He took a mouthful of his drink. He hadn’t switched his tastes in that area, she noticed, with a stab of resentment. Still iced mineral water with a wedge of lemon. Maybe he felt the need to be on red alert every waking moment of the day? Alcohol might blur that robot-style control of his…

He flexed broad shoulders, rested one booted foot on the rung of the stool beside him. Under the soft leather jacket, he wore a black polonecked jumper. It looked like cashmere. The fine wool faithfully emphasised the rock-hard contour of his chest, the ridged flatness of diaphragm and solar plexus. His body resembled his personality, she reflected uneasily. Hard and controlled. Constantly on guard. It was disturbing, she reflected, how much she remembered about him. More than disturbing. Terrifying…

‘So how are things?’ He followed up his non-committal reply with a soft query. ‘Are you enjoying being in Stratford?’

‘What do you think?’ Her caution slipped a little. ‘It’s brilliant. I wake up every day and think, I’m so incredibly lucky! Being with the Royal Shakespeare Company is something I always dreamed of doing. Never quite believed possible.’

‘You’re good. I’ve seen you do Shakespeare, remember?’ He dismissed her modesty with deadpan insensitivity. ‘I could have told you four years ago that you’d make it, Ana.’

Surely he couldn’t be referring to that humiliating episode in the garden, at Farthingley? The memory brought heat to her face. She couldn’t think of the last time she’d blushed…at least, yes, she could. It had been that weekend, at Farthingley. That forty-eight hours in her life when all her novice feelings and emotions had seemed to spring to the surface of her skin and glow like phosphorus…

But now here she was, confident Anastasia French, twenty-three years old, rising young star, currently appearing on one of the most famous stages in the world, blushing again, like a schoolgirl on her first date—she could hate him for that alone…

Catching Camilla’s eye, she dragged herself together. Was she as lobster-red as she felt?

‘What are you doing these days?’ she countered quickly. ‘Or is that still classified information?’

The grey-green eyes cooled.

‘I scrape along.’

Anastasia stared at him for a long moment. Then she slowly shook her head. ‘You “scrape along"?’ she echoed. She was quite unable to hide her angry frustration. ‘I’ve never met anyone like you, Jed Steele! You’re so…barricaded! You—you lead your life in total secrecy! That day I first met you, you were “scraping along” at my father’s house, doing some unspecified, totally mysterious job for him during that conference weekend. Most men I’ve met, normal men, admit to being…actors, or theatre directors, or…or musicians, or even businessmen, accountants, firemen, plumbers…’

‘Spare me your sordid memoirs, Ana.’ His eyes gleamed with rare humour.

Her jaw dropped. After a moment’s strangled silence, she said frostily, ‘I was giving hypothetical examples, not listing my sexual encounters!’

‘I believe you.’

She took a long breath. ‘Where have you been working recently?’

‘Abroad.’

‘Where abroad?’

‘Washington. Paris. Brussels. Geneva.’ A heavy gold watch glinted at his wrist as he reached for his glass. She stared at the lean shape of his hand, the long, well-shaped fingers, the flexible ripple of tendons under the duskily tanned skin. A sprinkle of dark hair roughened the back of his hand, disappeared up the strong wrist under the black cashmere. Wrenching her eyes away with an effort, dismayed at his power to mesmerise her like this, she cast around for a flippant retort.

‘I’ve got it. You’re an international jewel thief,’ she said decisively. ‘That’s how you get to drive black Porsches and own huge town houses in half a dozen different cities all over the world…’

‘How do you know what kind of houses I own?’

‘Something my father said, I expect. But don’t worry,’ she added with an edge of sarcasm, ‘he didn’t divulge anything else about you! Your guilty secrets are safe!’

Jed’s gaze was wryly non-committal. He watched as she impatiently drained her glass. ‘Would you like another wine?’

‘No. I’m going to head for bed…’

‘I’ll walk you home.’

‘There’s no need to bother. My digs are only just round the corner…’

‘It’s no bother.’ He stood up, reached for her jacket and held it out for her.

‘How gentlemanly.’ She couldn’t resist the acerbic tease, although she was trembling inside as she slid her arms in. ‘I’d have thought you were better at helping girls off with their clothes.’

‘That’s pretty childish, Anastasia. Don’t forget your hat.’

Flustered, she turned and snatched up the velvet hat, pulled it on hard, waved quickly to her friends, and escaped into the night air. Thank goodness it was so cold. Her cheeks felt as if they were on fire…

September was nearly over. An early frost had sharpened the air. The heady scent of petunias and nicotiana had been almost obliterated.

‘Why did you come to see me at the stage door tonight?’ she demanded as he began to walk with her. He had an easy, prowling way of walking. It reminded her of a very large panther, shadowing silently beside her.

‘Just…to say hello,’ he countered calmly. ‘Renew acquaintance.’

‘Why would you want to do that?’ She shivered as she glared up at his dark profile.

‘Does there have to be a particular reason?’ He sounded coolly preoccupied, almost cagey. ‘Is this the way you normally walk home? Alone?’

‘You are such a—a cold-blooded bastard!‘ she burst out involuntarily. She stopped to cross the road quickly, conscious only of the urge to get away from him.

‘Anastasia—’