'I have to. It's my job. There's no time to give everything the in-depth treatment.'
'Journalists!' His tone was scathing. 'You cause more harm than good. You come to places like this, knowing nothing of the people or their problems, stirring up trouble wherever you go. You spend your time sniffing around for stories, and if you don't find any you make them up. Why don't you tell it the way it is for once?'
'That's what I try to do,' she said stiffly. 'I'm not responsible for what other journalists write. But the local people don't make it easy for us. They won't speak to us, they don't want us here. You can't blame us if the reports we file are on the wrong tack if we never get a chance to talk to the people involved.'
'Do you want to meet the people at the top? The so-called rebels?'
Merril looked at him in astonishment. 'Of course I do. But how could you help?'
He put his head on one side and gave her that electric smile again. 'I can help—so long as you don't complain when the going gets tough.'
'What do you mean?'
He took her by the arm. 'Come and sit down—it's not worth the risk to break from here just yet. Trust me. I'll get you a story that'll make headlines. And that's a promise.'
They sat down in the protection of a corner of the building. Reaching up to the cloth around his head, he began to unknot it, revealing his face for the first time, and Merril gave an audible gasp.
'Look a mess, do I?' He grinned and ran the fingers of both hands through his hair, pushing it impatiently back out of his eyes. Merril could only stare. 'Mess' was the last word she would have used. He was beautiful. Like a blond god. The wicked honey-gold eyes were matched by a shock of streaky blond hair, long, wild as a pirate king's, and his blond stubble was the sort any pop celebrity would pay the earth for. She could only gape at him, feeling foolish, unable to think straight. Luckily his head was bent, so he missed her reaction, and by the time he looked up again she had pulled herself together enough to be able to give him a wry smile. 'You had me fooled,' she said shakily. 'You really are English.'
"Fraid so. Were you expecting someone more exotic?'
'Oh, I guess you'll do,' she replied with an air of nonchalance that was all facade. The dazed feeling came back again, and she closed her eyes.
'Right,' he eventually stood up, 'are you ready?'
'What—what for?' she demanded, trembling slightly.
'I thought you wanted to meet the so-called rebels? Or did you think it was all hot air?'
'I—but—' she stammered, still not quite believing him.
'What's your name?' he asked.
'Merril Park. What's yours?' she riposted, pulling herself together.
'And your paper is—?'
'News and Views,' she lifted her chin. 'But—'
'Merril—' He savoured the sound. 'OK, Merril Park of News and Views, let's go!'
She was blazingly conscious of his touch -again as he pulled her to her feet, and she followed in a daze as far as the door before wrenching herself free and asking, 'But where are we really going?' Suddenly she was frightened. She was alone in a strange country with a man she had only just met. Anything could happen and no one would ever know.
He noticed the flicker of fear in her eyes at once, because he swung back and stood in the doorway with his eyes crinkling in what was becoming a familiar bantering smile.
'There's no danger as long as you stay with me. Do you trust me?'
She held his glance. 'Yes, I trust you.' She knew it was true.
'All I ask is that you promise to write it up honestly.'
'Of course I shall!' she replied at once, insulted to be asked such a thing.
He held out a hand. 'Then let's not waste any more time.'
'But not even you can go marching straight into rebel HQ—' she broke in. As soon as the words were uttered she realised he was the type who would walk in anywhere he wanted.
'I warned you about making snap judgements.' His eyes held a wicked gleam as he watched her work it out.
'You mean—but you can't --You're not fighting for the rebels --?' Merril gaped at him just as she had done when he'd removed his head-cloth, but this time he was observing her reaction with a wide grin.
'I'm not fighting for anyone. This whole thing can be sorted out by negotiation if everybody will put their guns down long enough.'
'But you're involved with the rebels --' she gasped.
'You make me feel as if I've got two heads,' he laughed. 'Now, do you want to meet them or not? They'll be closing the garrison at sunset.'
Thoughts of the news editor waiting for her story came flooding back. Too bad if she was walking into danger, she would have to do it. When she looked back at her companion she knew that if she was going to be safe with anyone it would be with this tall, blond, ruffianly, widely grinning Englishman.
'There's one condition,' she informed him slowly.
'You're not in a position to impose conditions --' he objected.
'Not even if it's only to ask your name?' she smiled up at him, eyes wide, blue as the sky.
He tweaked a strand of hair from off her cheek. 'Merril --' his husky voice gave her name new meaning and she thrilled to the sound '—you drive a hard bargain.' He paused. 'Call me Azur. He turned abruptly to the door.
Hurrying after him, she called, 'That's not quite what I meant. I asked for your name, not some alias—' And before he could object again she added, 'But I suppose it'll have to do—for now!'
The next few hours passed rapidly in a whirl of colour and noise. Whether it was due to tiredness or simply culture shock as Azur suggested, Merril felt all she could do was drift with whatever happened next. It was disorientating to feel that she had put herself entirely into someone else's hands, for she had always striven to hold on to her independence, even when she knew it was foolish to do so. But Azur had that effect on her and, rebel or not, she knew she could trust him.
When she walked into the hotel around lunch time the next day she caused a major sensation. As she struggled through the crowd of journalists, it took all her self-control to parry the questions they flung at her without giving anything away. Rory, her photographer, came shouldering his way towards her, a smile of relief all over his face.
'Am I glad to see you!' he exclaimed. 'London hasn't been off the line since I told them you'd gone missing.' He looked her over. 'You look like a cat that's got the cream.'
'And I have, Rory, and I have!' Petite, blonde, and clad in a simple denim jacket and jeans, Merril looked like anything but a red-hot news reporter, but she gave him a ragamuffin smile, big blue eyes alight. 'I feel a bit worse for wear, but I'm all in one piece.'
'Come on, we'll go up to your room and you can tell me all about it,' suggested Rory, taking her by the arm.
She stepped back. 'No, first I ring London.' She noticed his surprise with satisfaction. 'I have a story to file, Rory. The sort commonly known as a scoop!'
Together they went into the communications room, leaving their rivals outside glumly surveying the closed door.
'Ray?' she asked as soon as she got through. 'I've got something for you. It's big.' Then she proceeded to tell the news editor of the paper she worked for what had happened. It was clear he, like everyone else, had assumed she had been kidnapped by the guerillas in the mountainous region north of Kirkuk.
Rory listened in, and when she finished he was smiling. 'You certainly hit the hot spots! Who was this Azur, then? An Englishman, you say?'
'I want a shower, a meal and a drink, in that order. Then we talk,' Merril told him firmly. Rory, five years her senior and an experienced press photographer, let her take over. He rubbed a hand over his sandy-coloured beard as she briefly quoted from her notebook what the rebel leader had told her that morning in the brief meeting Azur had managed to fix for her.
'It's a rum go, all right. But this Azur,' he returned doggedly to the same theme, 'who is he? How did he get to be a mediator between the two factions?'
&
nbsp; 'His people were out here when he was a child and he lived in the region until he was old enough to go to. school in England,' she replied shortly, not wishing to go too deeply into that side of her escapade. She stretched and yawned.
'You can't sleep now. We've got to catch the next flight out.'
But—' She thought longingly of her bed.
'All foreign journalists are to be out by midnight. It looks as if this thing is going to be bigger than we first thought.' Rory patted her on the shoulder. 'You'll get all the sleep you need on the flight. We're being sent via Rome.'
It was raining as they circled Heathrow next morning after spending an uncomfortable night at Rome airport and taking the first available flight on to London. The plane drifted down through layers of cotton-wool cloud graded like a colour chart, gradually darkening the lower they dropped. At ground level the runway gleamed like smoked glass. People were hunched forward, ducking into the upturned collars of raincoats as they hurried between airport building and bus.
The scene couldn't have been more different from the one Merril was carrying inside her head, the one nobody yet knew about. It was of a certain hillside at dawn, made lovely by the belling of goats on the hills, cicadas, the scent of wild thyme and . . . She shook herself and tried to concentrate.
A car had been sent from the paper and there was a message to go straight in to see the chief himself. It was only half-past two as the car crawled through the crowded London streets and eventually pulled up outside the offices in Fleet Street. To Merril it seemed like another century.
Ray Doyle came puffing excitedly round his desk the minute she came in through the glass doors of the news room. 'You little peach—I knew you could do it! I've always put my faith in you, you darling. I hope you appreciate it.'
'Yes, Ray,' she replied wearily. She was surprised to see that things looked much the same as when she and Rory had left. In only two days she felt as if her world had been turned upside-down.
'She's tired,' Rory said protectively.
'Of course she is.' Ray tried to pat her on the shoulder, but such gestures were alien to him and something in Merril's expression made him drop his hand. 'Come on through, the big man's waiting.'
Merril stifled a sigh. They were back with a vengeance now, back to the old hierarchy, the pecking order in which she was bottom of the line.
Ushered into the carpeted office of the chief editor, she was congratulated on filing a first-class story, though. It was uplifting to feel she was being noticed for what she herself had done and not, as usual, because of her father's fame. She had pipped everyone else at the post, even the foreign dailies who were notoriously tough in that part of the world.
'I don't know how you did it,' the chief beamed.
'By being in the right place at the right time,' replied Merril, quoting her father. She wasn't so jet-lagged that she didn't see the looks the three men exchanged.
Later she went back to the flat to unwind. Her flatmate Annie worked on a fashion magazine and arrived home just as Merril was coming out of the shower.
'Darling, you're back! I was so worried. Damian phoned me and told me what had happened—he was demented, poor dear! Your whole office was in an uproar.'
'Damian, demented?' Merril wrapped a big pink towel round herself and flopped down in an armchair.
'Have you eaten?' Annie gave her a sharp glance. 'When did you get in? Have you been into the office? What did Ray say? I bet that was one in the eye for him. Darling, you look all in. What can I get you?'
'I feel rather fragile. London doesn't seem real.' Merril was used to Annie. Despite the fashionable elegance of her manner, all gloss and Titian good looks, she had the proverbial heart of gold and proved it now by bustling around fixing drinks. 'Here,' she said, 'you enjoy this while I get some food on the go. When did you last eat?'
'Yesterday, I think. Or was it today? I really can't remember.'
While Annie cut and sliced in the kitchen, refusing any offer of help with a sharp slap as Merril tried to join in, she repeated what she had already said about Damian, adding, 'Have you seen him yet?'
Merril shook her head. 'He hadn't crossed my mind. And when you say demented, I think that's usual, isn't it?'
'Mean child! He's quite mad about you.'
'Oh, dear. It would take something like my going missing for twenty-four hours to spoil a beautiful and so far undemanding friendship.'
'A theatre critic might be quite fun.' Annie gave her a sharp glance.
'As husband material?'
'Well, why not?'
'But I'm not looking, Annie. Please! Not just now. I haven't come down to earth yet.' This was their one bone of contention. Annie had a lot of men-friends, but they were only friends and nothing more because they had been quickly relegated to the unsuitable-as-husband category. She couldn't understand why Merril wasn't as practical, and tried to help out by vetting Merril's men for her when she got the chance. It was always done in a spirit of helpfulness, and Merril usually hadn't the heart to resist, knowing that when it came to it she would do the choosing herself.
'It'd be like you to fall for this rebel chief,' Annie muttered now, slicing carrots and tipping them into a casserole with her usual dexterity. She happened to glance up just then and caught Merril's expression. 'Darling! I was only joking . . .'
Merril pulled herself together. 'You're barking up the wrong tree as usual, Annie. The rebel chief—and when you read my piece about him I hope you'll start calling him the opposition leader—must have been about eighty if he was a day. A lovely man, but definitely not husband material, not even in my book.'
'Then what was that strange, rather far-away expression on your face when I happened to look up just now?'
'Your imagination.' Merril averted her face and began to busy herself with the gin and tonic Annie had thrust into her hands.
'And how long have we shared a flat?'
'You're a horrible witch, Annie. You haven't been in the flat five minutes and already you think you've sussed me out!' Merril lifted her face in a last attempt at subterfuge. 'How on earth could I meet and fall for someone in less than twenty-four hours?'
'It need only take seconds. The secret glance across a crowded room.'
'You certainly have the right job. I suppose that's the sort of stuff you sell your readers. "Darlings, wait for that magic moment when his eyes meet yours—" '
'So I am right. How exciting! Is he one of the journalists? One of the French ones?' Annie put down her knife and smiled infuriatingly at Merril's upturned face.
'When I've put some clothes on and had a taste of this concoction you're throwing together,' she replied with dignity, 'then, possibly, I might just have something to tell you . . . Trouble is, I can predict exactly what you're going to say—"not good husband material, darling"—well,' Merril stood in the doorway, 'you can guess what I'll say to that!'
It was Annie with the phone in her hand who woke her. 'It's for you.' She threw the receiver on to the bed where Merril could reach it.
She must have gone out like a light. Struggling to sit up, she darted out a hand, then let it freeze as she woke fully. Her heart dropped like a ton of bricks. She had been dreaming she was back in the hotel room in the Kirkuk mountains, and for one wild minute had imagined it was a certain husky-voiced 'rebel' on the line . . . Regaining her composure, she took the call, knowing even before he spoke that it was Damian. She let him rattle on for a few minutes, then made her excuses. Later, in fresh jumper and skirt, hair washed and dried, she went to join Annie in the living-room where the table was already set. She didn't need any invitation to launch into a detailed account of her meeting with Azur.
'It was exactly what you're always talking about, Annie,' she began. 'Eyes across a crowded room. Except that in this case it was a street full of gunmen. And I only noticed his eyes when he dragged me to safety in ah empty house.'
'How exciting! So the rumours were all true? You were kidnapped?'
&
nbsp; Merril shook her head. Then with a deep breath she began to tell Annie what had happened, only letting her words trail away when the official part of her story came to an end.
Annie gave her a sidelong look. 'But then what happened?' she demanded. 'You must have spent the night with him --?'
'It's true, we had to stay in hiding until nightfall, then we walked for hours into the hills. He took me to a ruined farm and we slept for a few hours—' Merril shot a disparaging look at the expression on Annie's face. 'I know what you're thinking. And yes, it could have been tricky—but I knew he was totally trustworthy. I've already told you that—'
'But you've also admitted you fancied each other—'
Annie's words didn't do justice to the way Merril felt about Azur. She recalled the night, the silence of the countryside, the sliver of moon that slipped slowly from one side of the open window to the other. Sunrise.
She knew she was hooked. There had been something powerful between them from the very first. His outrageous good looks were simply a bonus —wicked honey-gold eyes, that shock of streaky blond hair, long, rough, wild, that electrifying smile ...
She gave a shaky laugh. 'I don't know what's happening to me. I've never fallen for anyone like this before. And it's all so hopeless, isn't it? I don't even know his real name. He was very definite—no biographies. It works both ways. All he knows about me is my name and the paper I work for.'
'But the night,' prompted Annie, 'what about the night?'
Merril was lost in thought for a moment, then she gave a rueful smile. 'It wasn't like you imagine. I told you, I knew I could trust him—in every way.' When Annie gave a knowing little smile, she went on, 'He showed me a sort of hay-filled mattress thing in one of the rooms. "We'll have to sleep on that," he said. "If you're worried, we can put a knife between us—like the sword between Tristan and Iseult..." of course I trusted him.'
Suddenly she found hot tears gushing from her eyes, and Annie put a friendly arm around her shoulders.
'There, there,' she comforted. 'You've been through an awful lot. You need a good hot meal and nice long rest. I hope Ray Doyle has given you the rest of the week off?'
Fantasy Lover Page 2
