Rules Of The Game

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

‘I AM sorry about having to leave you in the lurch like this Van, but I really don’t have any option.’ A winning smile accompanied Gavin’s apologetic statement, and Vanessa quelled her urgent desire to tell her brother that ‘leaving her in the lurch’ as he put it, was one of the things he seemed to have a remarkable aptitude for. Even though she was the younger by two years, since the death of their parents, Vanessa had always felt a sense of responsibility towards her brother. ‘You know the sort of shots we want, don’t you,’ he called, as he opened the studio door, ‘the model’s already been told.’ He grinned at his sister, wicked amusement dancing in his deep blue eyes. ‘You can always close your eyes!’

Vanessa groaned as the door closed behind him. At times Gavin really was impossible. By rights she ought to have refused outright to help him out today, but then he had worked so hard getting the studio going, canvassing for work and building up his reputation until he was the most sought after photographer in Clarewell, but to expect her to do the photographs for this advertisement he was booked to do, simply so that he could go and hero-worship a ‘local boy made good’ who had recently returned to Clarewell!

Stifling her irritation she busied herself in the studio, checking the carefully arranged background ‘scene’, and pulling a slight face. When Gavin had persuaded the town’s largest employer to allow him to do the photography for their latest national advertising campaign they had agreed, but had stipulated a very small budget. Hardferns like many other companies were struggling to keep their lead on their competition, pruning down all extraneous costs, hence the ‘background’ depicting a lush tropical scene, instead of the real thing. Their new product was a revolutionary range of men’s toilet products, including a skin-care range, and as Gavin had told her, Hardferns were very anxious to promote their new range with a tough macho image.

It was Hardferns publicity department who had suggested using a virtually nude male model while stipulating that the advertisements had to be in the ‘best possible taste’. But it was Gavin who had dropped on her the bombshell that she was to be the photographer, and just so that he could go to the ‘Welcome Home’ celebrations at the town hall to laud the arrival of Jay Courtland, local football hero turned entrepreneur, who had astounded the press recently with his announcement that he intended to return to his home town and sponsor the ailing football team which had been responsible for his ultimate rise to fame as an England player. Now, at thirty-four, Jay Courtland had long since left the game—at least on the field, but rumour had it that he used the tactics he had developed there to assure him of a winning passage through the boardrooms he had conquered on his journey up the financial ladder. Was she the only person not to be impressed by his outwardly philanthropic gesture, Vanessa wondered sourly. Surely there were others who had drawn a parallel line between Jay Courtland’s desire to promote his fourth division home team higher in the league, and the ailing sportswear company which was the latest of his many acquisitions. Who could tell, with Jay Courtland’s support Clarewell might even make it as far as the Cup Final!

Suppressing her acid thoughts she freely acknowledged that they were partially motivated by Gavin’s desertion. He was the one who was supposed to be in charge of this morning’s session, and he knew how much she would dislike it. Her full lips pressed tightly together as she remembered the wicked amusement dancing in her brother’s eyes. ‘Twenty-two, and still a virgin!’ he had mocked her on her last birthday, and although she had wanted to deny his teasing assumption they had both known that she could not. That was the trouble about living in such a small town. Everyone knew everyone else’s business.

She glanced towards the back of the studio, frowning as her eye was caught by the portraits hanging there. They all featured the same woman. Hair like black silk hung water-straight down past her nude shoulders, her skin possessing the soft gleam of mother of pearl. Eyes the colour and depth of gentians shone out of a perfectly oval face, her nose and lips delicately carved, nostrils curled in a way that was faintly arrogant. It was a face that was intensely beautiful, holding both sensual allure and aloofness. It was in many ways the same face that Vanessa saw each morning when she glanced into her mirror, combing her dark hair back off her face, securing it into the confining clasp that kept it out of the way as she worked. But her face was all that she had in common with the girl in those portraits, she thought grimly.

As children they had been inseparable. They were the same age, she and Nadia. Their fathers had been twins which was why they were so very alike; alike enough for those who did not know them to be confused, but the likeness was only superficial. For as long as she could remember, she had been the tomboy while Nadia had been the pretty-pretty one; the one the adults always fussed and cooed over. Even her own brother had not been immune.

She sighed, as she worked steadily setting up the equipment she would need. When their parents had been killed in a climbing accident, she and Gavin had turned quite naturally to their aunt and uncle, sharing a common loss. Gavin had just started up on his own then, and it had been Nadia who had persuaded him to take the photographs of her which she later submitted to the beauty competition which had changed all their lives. With hindsight Vanessa supposed they ought to have guessed that Nadia would win. Although physically their faces were the same, Vanessa had always felt like a shadow standing next to the sun when she was with Nadia. Nadia glittered and drew people into her orbit like a flame attracting helpless moths but unlike the flame she had no warmth to give her victims. She used them to fuel her own mammoth self-conceit, used them and discarded them, as she had discarded Gavin once she had accepted the modelling contract he had helped her to obtain. That Gavin had once loved Nadia Vanessa did not doubt, but her brother was not a child. He knew what their cousin was and what she wasn’t.

Vanessa sighed, brushing grubby hands along her jeans. Tight and faded, together with one of Gavin’s discarded shirts they were her normal working uniform. She rarely wore skirts or dresses, hardly ever used make-up, and did everything she could to minimise the similarities between Nadia and herself. Her refusal to do what Gavin called ‘making the most of herself’ annoyed him, she knew. He had often asked her to model for him but she always refused. On her eighteenth birthday he had given her a dress, a misty confection of silk chiffon in shades of blue to complement and match her eyes, and she had thrown it back at him in a fit of fury. ‘You bought this for Nadia, not for me,’ she had accused him, and they had quarrelled angrily about it.

‘Why don’t you admit that where Nadia is concerned you’re suffering from one hell of an inferiority complex?’ he had accused. She had denied it vehemently, but some part of her had recognised the truth. All her life she had been compared to Nadia, to her own discredit, much as her father had been compared to his older, and more forceful twin; and in an effort to fight against being dubbed ‘second best’ she had set out to make sure she was never, ever, taken for a poor carbon copy of Nadia.

Now they rarely saw her. She lived in London and her parents had retired to Bournemouth. She paid Vanessa and Gavin brief visits occasionally, always reducing Gavin to bitter invective, her smug smile when he hurled his acid barbs at her making Vanessa suspect that she enjoyed angering him, knowing as they all did that he was simply using his anger to mask his love and his pain. Gavin had once in a rare moment of misery confided to Vanessa that what hurt most was that he himself had been responsible for setting her feet on the path which had ultimately taken her away from him. He had never said as much, but Vanessa suspected that they had been lovers. It was hardly a secret that Nadia enjoyed the company, and caresses of the male sex. One only needed to open a newspaper or a magazine. The last time she had come home she had told them that she was hoping to break into films.

‘By doing what?’ Gavin had asked harshly, ‘Using the casting-couch route?’

Nadia had smiled sweetly at him, her long cat’s eyes slumbrous and mocking. ‘If necessary,’ she had purred back, reminding Vanessa of a cat toying with its prey, just waiting to pounce. Was her cousin’s well-publicised promiscuity the reason she herself had remained so cold and withdrawn with men? ‘Frigid’ was what more than one of her dates had called her, and although she had shrugged the slight aside her heart had ached, because she had known that they had been using her, wanting to possess her because they could not possess Nadia, wanting her merely as a substitute for her cousin, as she had been wanted all her life.

There were times when she wanted to tear Nadia’s portraits down from the studio walls. She supposed most people would have described her emotion as jealousy, but there was more to it than that. She wasn’t jealous of her cousin in so much as she wanted what Nadia had, she just wanted to be accepted for herself, not as Nadia’s shadow. Many women she knew would have been delighted to look as she did; to look exactly like a famous model. But she hated the way she looked; hated her water-straight black silk hair, her perfect features, her sapphire eyes, because they were also Nadia’s. Was her father going to be the only person who had noticed that her face had more character, that her eyes were warmer, her nature not shallow but generously giving?

What on earth had brought on that mood of introspection, she jeered, with self-mockery as she adjusted the silver umbrella reflector she was intending to use, before turning her attention to the spotlights so that they focused on the ‘sandy beach’, with the backdrop of soft supposedly South Pacific scenery and the deep blue of the water glimpsed enticingly through it. On the ‘beach’ prominently displayed were the products featured in the first of the ‘ads’. A tanning lotion with a lot of heavy emphasis on its macho appeal in the advertising blurb. The caption for the ad. she was shooting today made Vanessa shudder. It was All he needs to wear is Sunskin, and if she hadn’t known better she might have assumed that Gavin had deliberately set her up to take the session in his place.

Their father had been an explorer and both of them had learned about cameras and photography early. If her work was not quite as inspired as Gavin’s she did have an intuitive ‘nose’ for human interest work, and had sold several of her photographs to national dailies.

She glanced at her watch. Half an hour before the model was due. How would he feel when he realised that a woman would be behind the camera? All she could hope was that he was professional enough not to share her nervousness. Their budget was so slender that it would eat into their profit if Gavin had to re-schedule the session.

They had managed to keep on their parents’ home on the edge of the town and Gavin had converted the cellars into his darkroom although he rented a studio in town.

She was just about to make herself a cup of coffee when she heard footsteps on the stairs leading up to the studio. Definitely masculine they caused tremors of apprehension to flutter along her spine. Not because she doubted her ability to do the job, but simply because … Because she was going to have to photograph a nude male! She made herself conclude the sentence. What was there to be so apprehensive about? The model was the one with the right to those feelings, not her. How Nadia would laugh at her if she could see her now. Vanessa glanced at her cousin’s mocking portrait and smoothed sweat-damp palms over her shabby jeans, lifting her chin, unaware that the proud sparkle in her eyes made her look even more like the woman in the photograph, for once her features over-shadowed the made-up glamour of her cousin’s.

The studio door was thrust open, and Vanessa tried to ease the dry tension in her throat. ‘Hi!’ she said casually, turning to fiddle with the spots so that she wouldn’t have to face the newcomer and risk betraying her embarrassment. ‘If you’ll just strip off behind the screen.’ She jerked her head in the direction of the tatty wooden screen in one corner of the room. ‘I’ll just finish getting ready here and then we can make a start.’ He was earlier than Gavin had said, but at least that meant she wouldn’t have to wait around getting steadily more nervous.

‘I beg your pardon.’ His voice was deep, edged with a harshness that made her spin round, her eyes widening as she took in the lean powerful length and breadth of his body. He was older than she had anticipated, somewhere in his thirties she guessed, and possessed of such an air of physical virility that she blinked dazedly as she studied him. This man was dynamite; so potently male that he could have sold ice to Eskimo women simply by looking at them the way he was looking at her now. Her fevered, desperately nervous glance was caught and impaled by eyes of tawny gold, mountain lion’s eyes, ringed with yellow fire, pure amber when the light caught them, her own bemused image thrown back at her as she stared up at him. Tall herself, he towered over her, making her feel as fragile and vulnerable as a wind-flower in the eye of a storm.

Gradually she became aware that she was exhibiting all the classic symptoms normally associated with a massive teenage crush on some remote idol. Her heart was pumping at what felt like ten times its normal rate; her pulses racing in time. Her legs felt like the best quality feather down, and she knew, just knew, that it was only willpower that was holding a betraying blush at bay. And this was the man she was supposed to …

No! her mind shied away, and she wondered furiously if Gavin had known. For some reason she had visualised the model as blond and boyish, a beach-boy personified; not this dark-haired, golden-eyed predator whose face was as classically flawless in its way as her cousin’s, and whose eyes moved automatically over her body, assessingly, insolently, she told herself angrily when his glance came to rest on the heaving thrust of her breasts.

‘We’re wasting valuable time,’ she told him in a clipped voice trying not to betray her inner agitation. They were two professionals for heaven’s sake, hired to do a job, and here she was, mooning over him like some crazed adolescent. ‘The screen’s over there,’ she gestured to it again. ‘I hope it’s warm enough for you.’ He was dressed in jeans and a cotton shirt, open at the throat, and she had to drag her eyes away from the tawny vee of flesh exposed. Gavin had turned up the heat before he left, saying impishly, ‘we don’t want our bronzed hero covered in goosebumps, do we?’

When he didn’t move, Vanessa frowned. He was studying her with lazy insolence, tinged with curiosity as though she were something outside his normal experience. It couldn’t be embarrassment that held him immobile. She doubted that she had ever seen any man less likely to suffer from embarrassment. Far from it. He probably got a kick from knowing that millions of women would be drooling over his naked form, she thought waspishly, trying to ignore the tiny voice that demanded to know how she knew they would drool.

When he didn’t make a move Vanessa said crossly, trying to hide her nervous tension. ‘You are aware that these shots are to be in the nude aren’t you? Gavin did tell you?’ She looked pointedly at the small set. ‘I’ve put the stuff out already, we haven’t got much time, so—–’

Before she could protest he strolled over to the set and picked up the suntan cream, an amused smile curving his mouth. His bottom lip was full, and just for a moment she wondered what it would be like to feel its hard warmth against her own. She realised that while she had been daydreaming he must have said something because he had moved away from the ‘set’ and was studying the portraits on the wall. He glanced from them to her and said suavely, ‘Quite a change. When did you decide you preferred being behind the camera to being in front of it? From these …’ he tapped the portraits, ‘I would have thought you had already found your forte.’

‘Please hurry up and get undressed,’ Vanessa snapped, too on edge to correct him and tell him that she wasn’t Nadia.

‘So impatient,’ his golden glance mocked her, encompassing her flushed face, and the sparkling anger of her sapphire eyes, ‘and so very flattering. Women are seldom so direct!’ His eyes continued to mock her, and Vanessa had to clench her fingers into her palms to prevent herself from snapping a hostile retort. ‘Okay,’ he drawled when he saw her expression. ‘I get the message.’ He picked up a board carrying the slogan the company were using to launch the product and his eyebrows rose, laughter gleaming in the amber depths of his eyes, before he strolled across to the screen.

Vanessa busied herself checking her Nikon, steadily refusing to admit the increasing tension building up inside her, trying to blot out the brief rustling of clothes.

‘Ready?’ He walked towards her as nonchalantly as though he were still wearing his jeans and shirt instead of only … With a tremendous effort of will Vanessa dragged her eyes away from his lithe body, telling herself she was a coward for being relieved that he had not dispensed with his clothing entirely, but had retained a pair of very brief briefs. His body was tanned and supple, his ribcage and stomach hard and flat. His body struck her as being that of an athlete rather than a man who spent hours in the gym building unflatteringly overdeveloped muscles. Rich colour stung her face as he drawled, ‘Where exactly do you want me?’ And she sensed that he was amused by her embarrassment. Stifling it, she pointed to the small ‘beach’ watching professionally as he sat down on it.

The set was designed for a reclining shot and she suppressed a sigh as she asked him stiltedly to move. She had worked with several male models but he was the most physically over-powering she had ever come into contact with—and the least professional … He seemed to have little or no idea of what was expected of him, and when she complained for the third time about his pose, he said lazily, ‘Well then you’d better come over here and show me exactly what you do want.’

The spotlights were hot, but they alone were not responsible for the prickles of perspiration she could feel breaking out on her skin as she directed his movements. At one point her breasts were on a level with his eyes and although her body was perfectly respectably concealed by the clothes she was wearing his glance seemed to strip that protection away, her face and body hot with colour as she tried to deny her physical response to his scrutiny. As he moved in obedience to her commands, his forearm brushed against her breasts. She stepped back instinctively almost overbalancing, forced to witness the amusement in his eyes—amusement which darkened to something else—something alien and half frightening as he witnessed her immediate rejection of their physical intimacy.

‘Beautiful and clever,’ he murmured softly, ‘the dove fleeing from the hawk, not knowing that her very flight promotes his pursuit, unlike you, who I am sure knows very well what effect she has on the male sex.’ Vanessa started to protest, the words stifled in her throat as he reached out carelessly and unbuttoned the top of Gavin’s shirt exposing the pale curves of her breasts, one lean, brown finger tracing a lazy path down from where the pulse thudded at the base of her throat to the valley between her breasts. ‘Your skin is so pale and soft, an enticement to any man to taste and touch it. Is that why you keep it this colour? Because you know that when a man looks at you, so pale and fragile, he can’t help visualising your body beneath his own? Pale and beautiful like the moon, but not as cold one trusts?’ There was amusement in his voice, as though the words he was saying to her were perfectly common-place.

‘And you, I suppose, are the sun,’ she snapped back at him, disturbed by the effect he was having on her, by the liberty he had taken without her doing a thing to stop him.

‘Is that how you see me?’ His teeth were white against the dark tan of his face, his eyes a shower of gold as he smiled at her.

‘Very symbolic, don’t you think?’ Somehow he had moved and his fingers were at her nape, propelling her slowly towards him. ‘I think of you as the moon, and you think of me as the sun. If those two planets were ever to come together, the effect would be cataclysmic, wouldn’t you say?’ His voice was light, but his eyes … Vanessa shuddered as she read the message so explicitly portrayed in his eyes, and knew that he was already anticipating making love to her, and quite unashamedly letting her know it. This man is dangerous an inner voice warned her. Like the sun he will burn and destroy you if you get too close, and her skin as he had said was pale, far too pale for her to risk being scorched by any sun-god.

She jerked away from him, resisting the pressure of the fingers playing against her nape, and overbalancing. To support herself she flung out her hands, grasping the nearest solid object, recoiling when she realised it was his shoulder, his skin warm beneath her tense fingers, his body relaying a thousand differing and yet similar sensations to hers. So gradually that she was barely aware of it, her fingers uncoiled, their touch a gently feminine caress, her eyes registering her bemused and conflicting emotions. The brief, searing contact of a warm male mouth against the pulse beating so desperately at the base of her throat, made her jerk back, her eyes widening in dismay. He laughed, softly, deep in his throat.

‘I am not Dracula you know, intent on stealing away your life blood, although I must admit when you look at me like that, like a frightened doe hearing the sounds of the hunter it does tempt me to …’ He was tending his head to her throat again, and she was completely powerless to stop him Vanessa thought wildly.

The sudden, shrill ring of the telephone arrested them both, and Vanessa made good use of his momentary relaxation to slip away from him. The phone was in the back part of the studio, in the small room that Gavin used as his office. It was a call from someone enquiring about wedding photographs and by the time she had dealt with it Vanessa had managed to convince herself that she had imagined that frightening pull on her senses, that surge of feeling so intense that for one moment she had been in danger of drowning under it.

Forcing herself to appear calm she walked back into the studio and then came to an abrupt halt. There was no sign of the model! She walked over to the screen and glanced behind it. His clothes had gone too. Frowning she walked back to her camera, and then noticed the note propped up on it. Just remembered I have to go somewhere—next time can I suggest I ‘pose’ somewhere more comfortable! Dark colour surged into her face. She couldn’t ignore the suspicion that he thought it had all been a game. Anger surged through her as she contemplated the implications of his note. What did he think she was? Some sort of … of sexual deviant who enjoyed photographing nude men! She was so angry that her hands were trembling. She paced the studio furiously, rehearsing what she was going to say to Gavin when he returned. If this was his idea of a joke! If he had deliberately set this whole thing up! She knew her brother disapproved of her single state and of her life-style. She was missing out on life he had told her, but if he thought he was doing her a favour by introducing her to some … some studio lothario …