Love Play by Rosemary Rogers by Unknown Read Free Book Online

she
compromised on a pair of very brief denim shorts and a bare-midriff halter top
that actually belonged to her sister.
    Paul Drury and his wife would be coming to pick her up at eight for a
late dinner, which gave her a few hours in which to unwind and read the
newspapers. Why didn't Delight have any books? There were only magazines, none
of   them current.
    Pouring herself an ice-cold Perrier with a squeeze of lemon, Sara curled
up on the couch and took stock of her surroundings and her circumstances while
she tried to push away the rapidly growing feeling that she had bitten off much
more than she could chew. There was no getting away from the fact that she and
Delight were very different in their tastes and attitudes. How long would she
be able to keep up this ridiculous masquerade?
     
     
    Chapter 5
    Sara had developed a slight headache and no answer to her dilemma by the
time the electronic buzzer sounded. Damn that silly squawk box anyhow! She
still hadn't quite figured out which button to press!
    The voice that answered Sara's tentative 'hello?' sounded harsh and
unrecognisable, and she had to repeat herself before she could make any sense
of what he was saying. It sounded like one of those ancient radios that kept
cutting on and off amid crackling atmospherics.
    'Miss Adams? Paul Drury . . . me to pick you up.'
    His chauffeur? Another studio limo?
    'I'll be right down!' Sara shouted into the box, feeling herself
bristle. Paul Drury had better have his wife with him!
    She paused to glance at herself in the mirror one more time before she
dimmed the lights. Lots of make-up of course, but not too garish. A
spaghetti-strap Calvin Klein dress in a flower-patterned silk that came to just
below the knee. Huge Elsa Peretti hearts in her ears, and a matching one on a
thin gold chain around her neck. Very high-heeled shoes - she'd be lucky if she
didn't break her neck!
    Delight hadn't said anything about clothes, and as she slung the thin strap
of her small Louis Vuitton disco purse from her shoulder, Sara hoped she wasn't
overdoing it. But Delight did wear nice clothes and jewellery, particularly in
the evenings or when they went to places like Regine's in New York. Whatever Mr
Drury - or his wife - expected, she hoped they were going to be pleasantly
surprised.
    The lobby of the apartment building was small and unprepossessing, with
its drooping potted plants and ugly chairs arranged stiltedly around a
Formica-topped table. The tall man who stood there had been leafing through the
pages of an old magazine, which he dropped carelessly as Sara emerged from the
elevator.
    Not someone's chauffeur, for certain! The rich friend of Paul Drury?
Sara's thoughts became quite jumbled as she looked into a pair of coal-dark
eyes that seemed to burn into hers. He certainly wasn't American - at least he
wasn't like my American she had met so far. The suit he wore with casual
elegance had obviously been tailored for him to fit in all the right places
without being too tight. His hair was night-black and somewhat curly; neither
too short nor too long. But taking away from his obvious good looks there
was   an unrelenting harshness about the
planes of his darkly tanned face - the arrogant curve of his nostrils, and even
the accented voice that said pointedly: 'There is no doorman on   duty here, Miss Adams? That is not safe in a
city such as this, surely?'
    Sara had been staring at him, unable to help herself, when his words
jerked her back to reality - and her role.
    'It's perfectly safe - why shouldn't it be? You couldn't have got as far
as this if I hadn't unlocked the front door from upstairs. And you did mention
that Paul Drury had sent you . . .'
    He was the kind of insufferably arrogant man who, of course, did not
believe in compromise. She saw it in the lifted black eyebrow, even while she
was noticing, helplessly, that he had a slight cleft in his chin.
    'I suppose I am forgetting that you American women are all