Buch lesen: «Love's Prisoner»

CHAPTER ONE

SUZY set her knife and fork back down on her plate with an unsteady clatter. ‘You want me to include Piers Armstrong in my book?’ she enquired.

The portly middle-aged man who sat on the other side of the lunch table nodded. ‘If you do, sales will skyrocket.’

‘But you’ve already accepted the manuscript,’ she protested, her voice gathering up an edge of panic, ‘and the publication date has been arranged!’

‘That’s no problem. We can shove it forward by a couple of months,’ Randolph Gardener, editorial director of the Kingdom Publishing Company, told her, in jovial reassurance. ‘Armstrong’s unexpected release is a fantastic stroke of luck for you,’ he went on. ‘Of all the poor devils who’ve been held hostage of late, he’s the one who seems to have most gripped the public’s imagination, so he’s the chappie everyone will hand over their hard-earned cash to read about.’

Suzy frowned down at her prawn and mango salad which, with the seafood arced in a succulent pink fan and the fruit sliced into juicy golden leaves, was presented nouvelle cuisine style. Ever since the invitation had been issued a few days ago she had been looking forward to lunching here, at one of London’s most exclusive and élite French restaurants, but all of a sudden her appetite had disappeared. Vanished. She had envisaged receiving praise for a job well done, not being hit with a demand which was provoking an uncharacteristic yet none the less loud-hailing anxiety attack. Piers Armstrong’s release last month came as a personal name-tagged gift from heaven? Not in her opinion. While she had naturally been relieved when, after a year of being held captive by Central American guerrillas, he and his fellow hostage, a US photographer, had been freed, Suzy now wished she had worked faster on her book so that its processing could have safely, incontrovertibly passed the point of no return. She wished Randolph had not been able to identify what he apparently regarded as a wondrous window of opportunity.

‘My contract specified a hundred and fifty thousand words, so if Piers Armstrong is featured it means one of the other profiles will need to be dropped,’ she said, clamping down on her alarm and striving to sound unemotional and matter-of-fact. ‘That isn’t fair. Each of the men I interviewed very generously gave up several days of their time, and—’

‘No one will be dropped, because we shall be increasing the length of the book,’ Randolph informed her. He tasted his wine, rhapsodised knowingly on its excellence, then leant across to pat her hand with pudgy fingers. ‘I realise what a nuisance it is to have to yank yourself up by your bootstraps, get the adrenalin flowing again and produce another slug just when it seemed you could relax, but once the royalty cheques start to appear you’ll be the first to agree that the effort was well worth while,’ he said, speaking in the kind of soothing tones which air hostesses adopted to pacify passengers during turbulence.

Suzy took a sip of spa water. The royalties would be her major source of income over the next year or two and thus the amount she received was important, yet even so...

‘You were happy with my book as it stood,’ she said, her chin taking on a stubborn slant.

‘We were delighted,’ her host acknowledged, ‘and we would have been delighted to have gone ahead and published it as it stood—if Armstrong hadn’t suddenly resurfaced. However, my board and I feel the chance to include him is one which can’t be missed.’ He slid her a baited smile. ‘And now we’re also thinking of following the hardback edition with a paperback.’

Joy burst inside her like fireworks. A paperback would mean a far wider readership and could help lodge her name in the public consciousness. It would also vastly increase her royalties. Suzy battened down her joy. She refused to be lured.

‘I don’t see that Piers Armstrong’s insertion would make that much of a difference,’ she insisted.

Randolph heaved a sigh. After spending well over a year on research and writing, her reluctance to tackle an additional case history was only natural, yet he had felt certain that any hesitation would be brief and easily overridden. In all their previous dealings Suzy Collier had shown herself to be open to ideas and co-operative, so why must she be contrary now?

‘It’ll make a vast difference,’ he insisted. ‘You see, while the other men you’ve profiled are each of interest in their own way, none is a formidably tough war correspondent. Neither are any of them tall, dark and handsome.’

‘That matters?’ she protested.

‘It’ll be a tremendous plus point in marketing. Selling books is just like selling any other commodity, in that if you can identify an aspect which’ll spice up the consumer’s interest you go all out to promote it.’

Suzy speared a prawn. ‘I don’t consider Piers Armstrong handsome,’ she said. ‘He may have beautiful eyes—pale grey and fringed with thick black lashes—but his face is too angular, his nose too hawklike, his jaw too blunt.’

‘Sounds as though you’ve studied the chappie in some detail,’ her companion observed, plastering a finger of toast with his favourite goose liver pâté.

The heat seeped into her cheeks. ‘I—I used to know him,’ she muttered.

‘Of course, you once worked on The View too— I’d forgotten. Well, even if Armstrong isn’t perfect feature by feature, the public—with an emphasis on the female variety—regard him as something akin to a film star, and if what you write could be illustrated by a few photographs of the fellow looking hunky, as my adolescent daughter calls it—’ Randolph guffawed ‘—you’d be guaranteed the number one slot on the non-fiction bestsellers list.’

Suzy bit into the prawn with sharp white teeth. The editorial director was fantasising. She knew enough about popular taste to know she had not the least hope of toppling the ubiquitous epistles on diets or keep fit or cookery; though that was not her aim. All she really aspired to for this, her first book, was decent crits and respectably encouraging sales. At twenty-six, she was only starting to climb the literary ladder of success. In any case, whatever their appeal, returned hostages were nine-day wonders, and by the time her work reached the shelves next spring the hullabaloo which Piers Armstrong’s release had created would be long over. As their liaison was long over, she thought, and her face clouded. Whether the war correspondent’s inclusion in her book could be construed as an asset or not, there was another reason—a significant and personal reason—why she rebelled against writing about him, but she felt disinclined to say this to someone who was no more than an acquaintance, and who could proceed to ask probing questions.

‘Didn’t you once mention knowing Armstrong’s father, the famous Hugo?’ Randolph recalled, as he munched.

Tall and patrician, with silver-white hair, Hugo Armstrong was a distinguished actor and occasional director, a man of considerable clout in the theatrical world.

Suzy gave a distracted nod. ‘I interviewed him for an article about stage trends in the nineties a month or so before his son disappeared, and we’ve kept in touch. Piers may not want to relive his experiences,’ she went on, doggedly pushing out another impediment.

‘Since his return a hundred and one reporters must have asked him about them, and he’s always obliged,’ Randolph retorted.

‘But he hasn’t been interviewed in depth, for a book.’

‘Everyone else who’s been approached has jumped at the chance of question-and-answer sessions with a pretty girl like you and, particularly as a one-time colleague, Armstrong will too,’ the editorial director asserted.

Suzy started to object, decided otherwise, and returned to her prawn and mango salad.

Randolph had already demolished his first course, and as she ate he poured himself a second glass of wine and subjected her to a covert scrutiny. His reference to her as ‘pretty’ had been a calculated ploy to cajole, yet he had been speaking the truth. With huge sapphire eyes, fine bone-structure and a soft, full mouth, the youngest writer on Kingdom’s list was quite a beauty. She also possessed a natural sexuality which, although she seemed unaware of it, had ensured that when they had walked into the restaurant every male had turned to drool over her—and to envy him. Were they under the impression that this slender creature in the pink linen suit and with her wheat-blonde tresses caught up in a sleek chignon might be his mistress? he wondered. Randolph sneaked a glance at the surrounding tables. It was flattering to think so. He hoped so. A wistful hand checked over his carefully cross-combed bald patch. If only he were twenty years younger, twenty-eight pounds lighter, and still in possession of a full head of hair.

‘As you’ll probably be aware, after the airport press conference Armstrong was whisked straight off to the Margaux Clinic for a thorough medical overhaul,’ Randolph continued, topping up his glass. ‘Yesterday I telephoned the clinic and although I was unable to speak to the chappie in person, the reply came back that he’s willing to see you.’

Suzy’s blue eyes opened wide. ‘You’ve made an appointment?’ she said, in horror.

‘For later this afternoon,’ came the smiling confirmation.

‘But—but Piers is still recovering,’ she protested.

‘Maybe, yet he’s agreed to a visit. So you can pop along when we’ve finished lunch and set up a series of meetings.’

Suzy felt at once knocked askew and annoyed. Renewing contact with Piers Armstrong had never featured in her scheme of things and she resented the editorial director’s taking it upon himself to organise so high-handedly without consulting her.

‘I have an appointment for later this afternoon,’ she said.

Randolph tweaked at the white damask napkin which covered his lap. The girl’s beauty came accompanied by a full complement of brains, so why couldn’t she see that, whatever the hassle, the insertion of the war correspondent into her book was entirely to her advantage? Why wasn’t she grabbing this chance to dramatically boost her sales—and Kingdom’s profits—with both hands? A swift untasted drink was quaffed from his glass. He had sat down at the table in the expectation of wining and dining a biddable young companion who would hang on his every word, and he did not appreciate becoming embroiled in an argument which was threatening to ruin his digestion.

‘What time is your appointment, and where?’ he demanded, sounding like an irked schoolmaster.

‘Four-thirty, in Fulham.’

‘I’ve fixed for you to be at the clinic some time after three o’clock,’ he said, as a waiter removed their empty plates and replaced them with boeuf en crôute à la reine Marie for him and lemon sole for his guest. ‘It can be no more than a ten-minute taxi ride from here, so you have ample opportunity to call in and speak to Armstrong first.’

Suzy frowned. ‘Even so—’

‘The deadline for your manuscript may have been extended by eight weeks, but time is of the essence,’ he snapped.

Suzy helped herself to mange-touts from a dish which the waiter had proffered. It was clear that her host’s patience was fast running out and if she continued to protest she would not only sour their lunch date, but could place any future goodwill at risk—which would be short-sighted and counter-productive. Kingdom were a major company in the publishing world, and it would be foolish to offend them.

‘I’ll see Piers Armstrong today,’ she said resignedly.

Randolph beamed. ‘That’s a good girl,’ he said, and, after reaching across to give her hand another pat, he contentedly devoted himself to his fillet in its filo pastry case.

* * *

As directed, Suzy took the lift to the third floor and turned right on to a broad pastel-walled corridor. She checked her watch. Having secured her agreement to visit the private hospital, Randolph Gardener had proceeded to spend the rest of the meal chatting amiably and volubly, and—perhaps due to an over-indulgent intake of wine—had seemed immune to how the afternoon had begun to tick away. In the end, she had been forced to make her apologies and leave him still savouring a liqueur. On emerging on to the street, she had taken ages to find a taxi, and then the vehicle had travelled barely a mile before becoming snarled up in a traffic jam. So now time really was of the essence.

Still, her visit would not take long, Suzy comforted herself, as she kept track of the numbers on the pale oak doors. She was only here to pacify Randolph and go through the motions. Lacklustre motions. Her request for interviews would be so apathetic that Piers Armstrong would be certain to demur; at which point she would be out of the clinic—fast. A line etched itself between her brows. It was possible that this distaste for a collaboration could be two-sided and the ex-hostage might harbour misgivings of his own—but if that was the case, it would make securing his refusal so much easier.

Piers must have been surprised to be told that Suzy Collier required an audience, she reflected, standing aside to allow a porter with a trolley pass by. Though it would not have thrown him, and his equilibrium would not have been shattered. Randolph’s request might have made it annoyingly apparent that the war correspondent still possessed the power to unsettle her, but she would have been dismissed as no more than a blip in his sexual history long ago. Indeed, he had probably forgotten all about her.

Suzy’s heels rapped out a brisk staccato on the tiled floor. If Piers Armstrong had wiped her from his memory, she had not spent the past few years thinking about him—no, sirree! On the dénouement of their liaison, the ‘career woman’ button had been determinedly pushed, and the responsibilities and pressures which had resulted had left her little time to brood. Those responsibilities and pressures had also made her grow up. The girl who had once been far too gullible, far too naïve—as brutally demonstrated by her brush with the journalist—had matured into a poised and aware young woman. A young woman who was now nobody’s fool.

Suzy’s march came to a halt. Here was the specified room. She neatened the line of her cropped jacket and smoothed the high-waisted skirt over her hips. Opening her clutch bag, she found a mirror and tidied her hair. A slick of rosy lipstick was applied. She stared at her reflection. Don’t look so frightened, so tense, so agitated! she instructed herself. He can’t hurt you now.

Raising a hand, she rapped on the door.

‘Come in,’ said a deep melodious voice which, even after all this time, seemed woefully familiar.

Her stomach churned and she felt a strong impulse to turn tail and run. What was she doing here? Suzy wondered. Why had she allowed herself to be steamrollered into calling on Piers Armstrong? She should have vetoed the suggestion of adding a section on him point-blank. She ought to have insisted that, as it had been accepted and fulfilled the terms of the contract, her book must be published, as was. Though could she do that? The small print would need to be checked.

‘Come in,’ the voice commanded again, a touch impatiently this time.

Suzy straightened her shoulders, summoned up a smile, and strode into a functional but comfortable magnolia-painted room made airy by a large picture window. A man with thick dark hair was sitting on the edge of a quilt-covered bed, idly leafing through a newspaper. In an open-throated midnight-blue shirt, black Levis and suede desert boots, no concession had been made to the fact that he was a patient. Her nerve-ends corkscrewed. Piers Armstrong had always dressed casually, and yet there was something in the way he held his body, in his personal dynamic, which imparted an aura of masculine elegance to the simplest of shirts and jeans. In the past, she had found this most appealing, and it registered that she still did. Her smile became a little strained.

‘Good afternoon,’ she said.

Piers rose to his feet. ‘Long time no see,’ he remarked drily.

Although she had watched his return on the television news, confronting him in the flesh was entirely different. His face looked thinner, the skin was stretched taut over his high cheekbones, and the crinkle lines at the corners of his eyes were deeper. When she had known him before, his hair had been cut short, but now the silky brown-black waves brushed against his shirt collar. Add a tan which he had picked up from somewhere, and Piers Armstrong looked darkly feral and romantic, like a modern-day pirate.

To her dismay, Suzy felt a catch form in her throat. When she had seen him on television she had wept, for his father’s sake and out of normal sensitivity to his plight, but—oh, heavens!—she must not weep now. Piers might misinterpret her tears and think she was crying over him as him, rather than over him as a returned hostage. She swallowed hard, twice. An innate sentimental streak meant that she would have been tempted to cry when faced with any person in his position, Suzy assured herself.

‘Yes, it must be—’ she paused, pretending to pinpoint a date which had been engraved in capitals on her heart ‘—three years since we last met.’ For a moment she wondered whether she ought to indicate the formality of her visit by shaking his hand, but decided against it. Infantile though it seemed, the prospect of even such run-of-the-mill physical contact was disturbing. ‘How are you?’ she asked.

‘Fine.’ His pale grey eyes travelled from the top of her blonde head, down the curves of her body, to her high-heeled sandals in a leisurely but all-encompassing appraisal. ‘You’re looking well. Very much the classy lady in the power suit.’

Suzy shot him a glance from beneath her lashes. Was that a compliment, or a dig at the change he must see in her? It was not only her character which had matured, but also her looks and her dress sense.

‘I’ve been out to lunch,’ she said, by way of explanation.

Piers gestured towards a chintz-covered armchair which, together with a small sofa and occasional table, formed a sitting area for visitors.

‘Have a seat.’

‘Thanks. So—you’re coming through your medical tests with flying colours?’ Suzy enquired, in a bright, conversational voice.

Although her stay would be as short as possible, she needed to comment on his situation. Indeed, after listening to the other hostages’ tales, she was well aware of how at a loss and disorientated Piers must be feeling and, as a caring human being, she sympathised.

He nodded. ‘The doctor’s verdict is that I’m in good working order,’ he said, and, as if to demonstrate, he flexed his shoulders.

‘You appear to be more muscular than I remember,’ Suzy remarked, her eyes drawn to the contours beneath the deep blue shirt.

‘Every time my captors untied me I made a point of doing press-ups and sit-ups,’ Piers explained, ‘so although I’ve never been puny I’m in better shape now than I’ve ever been.’ A dark brow arched. ‘You’d really see a difference if you saw me stripped.’

Her cheeks pinkened. Why had she commented on his physique? she wondered. It had been a mistake. The last thing she wanted was to revive memories—of how she had seen Piers stripped; of how, also naked, she had been held against his chest; of how they had once been lovers.

‘I don’t want to take up too much of your time,’ she began, primly switching into the work mode.

He strolled over to lounge a broad shoulder beside the window. ‘You may take all the time you wish,’ he said, gazing outside at the big city panorama of roofs and towering office blocks. ‘Anything to relieve the monotony and make the afternoon pass quicker.’

Suzy’s lips compressed. A man whose career had had him constantly moving from one trouble spot of the world to another, Piers Armstrong possessed a low boredom threshold—as she knew to her cost, she thought astringently. It was obvious that he would be chafing against being confined to the clinic; as he would have chafed against being held hostage. But while she had not been exactly falling over herself to see him, she objected to being informed that all she represented was a better-than-nothing diversion who had been granted admittance into his presence simply because he was fed-up!

‘Pity I didn’t bring some tiddlywinks, then we could have had a game,’ she said, a touch tartly.

His mouth tweaked. ‘It would have put a hell of a kick into my afternoon.’

‘When are you due to be discharged?’ she asked.

‘At the weekend, and it can’t come soon enough,’ Piers said, with feeling. ‘But to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?’

Suzy looked at him in surprise. ‘You don’t know?’

‘I was in the middle of some tests when the receptionist rang to say you wished for a pow-wow, so I couldn’t ask.’ He thrust her a sardonic look. ‘However, I doubt if you’re here merely to enquire about the state of my health.’

‘I’ve come to ask if you’d agree to—to my interviewing you,’ Suzy said, the need to ask him for a favour, albeit one she did not want, making it difficult to prise the words from her throat. ‘Though if you’re sick and tired of speaking to people, I shall understand,’ she added, at speed.

Piers’ brow furrowed. ‘You want to interview me for the Pennant?’ he enquired, referring to the newspaper which she had worked for after she had left The View—and broken with him. ‘But I’ve already spoken to a man from there.’

‘No, I left them over twelve months ago, and now I’m writing a book for Kingdom Publishing on the worldwide hostage scene,’ she told him. ‘It includes a number of case histories which detail how people have reacted to being kidnapped and the effect it’s had on their feelings, their beliefs and their lives, with an accent on the human/family side. What I require are some sessions which would enable me to compile a similar case history on you. However, I—

Piers snapped upright. ‘You’re jumping on the bandwagon of my being held hostage too?’ he demanded, his voice as rat-a-tat as a terrorist’s machine-gun.

Suzy recoiled, taken aback both by the unexpected accusation and by the force of his hostility.

‘I’d simply be doing a job,’ she protested.

‘You’re another rip-off merchant, another opportunist,’ he grated, and gave a bleak scornful laugh. ‘I should have known!’

She recognised this as an allusion to the past, and her chin lifted.

‘It’s Kingdom’s idea that you should be featured in the book, not mine,’ she told him. ‘And it was Randolph Gardener, their editorial director, who rang to fix an appointment for this afternoon—rang to fix it without my knowledge.’

Piers studied her through narrowed eyes. ‘After having already been asked to endorse such things as a security system and a hamburger—’

‘A hamburger?’ she echoed, in astonishment.

‘Crazy, isn’t it? I’m well aware that there are those who perceive me solely as a commercial proposition,’ he continued, ‘so presumably Kingdom are eager to include me because they believe my name in the blurb will pump up sales?’

‘Well...yes,’ Suzy admitted, wishing he was not so astute.

While they had been speaking, she had undertaken a swift assessment. Not only was Piers Armstrong in good physical shape, he seemed mentally sturdy, too. At a loss? Disorientated? No way. All the other ex-hostages she had met had been psychologically scarred by their experiences and, while his year of captivity had been shorter than some, she had assumed that he too would be altered. Maybe a touch diffident, maybe less certain. The assumption was incorrect. Her erstwhile lover had always been magnificently secure, and he continued to exhibit an indomitable self-assurance. His ordeal appeared to have already been worked through and set aside, which, Suzy decided, must be because his often dangerous career had made him better able than most to cope with stress.

‘So you’re here because of the fistful of dollars factor,’ he said, his lip twisting in derision.

‘Personally I couldn’t care less about any extra money which your inclusion may or may not generate,’ she replied. ‘And,’ she added, feeling compelled to make it clear that any influence he might have once had over her had long since disappeared, ‘the book was started before you were kidnapped, so I had absolutely no reason to think that there would ever be any need to write about you.’

Piers’ shirtsleeves were rolled up above his elbows and he began to re-roll one which was coming loose. ‘Why choose hostages as your subject?’ he enquired.

‘I didn’t, it was chosen for me,’ said Suzy, watching the movements of his tapered fingers as he tightened the blue cotton over the smooth brown muscle of his arm. ‘When I worked at the Pennant I was assigned to cover the return of first one man and then another who’d been taken captive. Randolph Gardener happened to read my articles, liked them, and contacted me to ask whether I’d be interested in a commission to write a book. As I was growing weary of being sent haring off around the country at a moment’s notice, it seemed like a good idea. Even though it meant giving up a decent salary,’ she added, determined to show he could not pin the charge of ‘gold-digger’ on her.

‘So how do you manage?’ Piers asked.

‘By living off my savings and the interest on some money which my grandmother left me, plus I sell the occasional freelance article and do a regular monthly piece for the Pennant.’

‘What kind of a piece?’

‘Something which offers a fresh angle on a topical news event, either at home or abroad. With regard to my book,’ Suzy went on, deciding she had better say a little more about it, just in case Randolph Gardener should ask, ‘I’ve done five profiles, so far. One features a French businessman who—’

‘Was held for a million-dollar ransom in a cave in the Dordogne,’ said Piers.

‘That’s right. You remember him?’

‘I do.’ Pale grey eyes snared hers. ‘However, while I’ve no doubt the guy must have been overjoyed to merit inclusion in your tome,’ he drawled, ‘there’s no way I would ever agree to you writing about me.’

Suzy’s lips thinned. Engineering his refusal was one thing, being given such a blunt and disdainful thumbs-down was another. She could understand him having one or two misgivings, but there was no justification for him to be so unflatteringly, demeaningly, overwhelmingly anti.

‘You don’t think I’d make a decent job of it?’ she demanded. ‘I may have done women’s page stuff when I was with The View, but if you’d read anything I produced at the Pennant you’d know that when I moved on there I moved into serious reportage.’

A brow lifted. ‘You don’t say?’

‘I do,’ Suzy shot back, piqued to think that knowing her must have had so little impact that, once they had split, Piers had never bothered to read anything she had subsequently written. ‘Do you imagine Randolph Gardener would have given me the commission if I’d been going to scribble away at the soap opera level? No chance. He reckons I have an instinctive perception which has nothing to do with age or experience, plus I’m diligent and tenacious. Maybe I have yet to rise to the heady heights of winning awards like you, but I can assure you that my appraisal of the hostage situation is intelligent, sober and well crafted,’ she informed him fiercely.

‘Congratulations,’ said Piers with such a mocking bow of his head that she felt an acute urge to hit him. ‘However, your writing skills are not the issue.’

‘No?’ she said dubiously.

‘No,’ he replied.

Suzy inspected her watch. The minutes were galloping by, but before she left she needed to know why he was so averse to being included in her book. It would be a book of some value, dammit!

‘You’re anxious to be off?’ he enquired.

‘I have to be in Fulham in half an hour,’ she told him.

‘What’s happening there?’

‘I have appointments to view a couple of flats. Look, about—’

‘You’re leaving your place in Putney?’

Suzy gave a brief nod. ‘About—’

‘Why?’ Piers asked, interrupting again.

‘The house has been sold to someone who wants to turn it back into a family home, so I’m under notice to quit.’ She sighed. ‘I’d found somewhere else and thought everything was settled, but at the last moment the rent was increased and I couldn’t afford it.’

‘When’s your deadline for moving out?’

‘Two weeks today. I’ve been dashing around looking at all kinds of places, but I’ve acquired a few goods and chattels—’

‘I remember your home-making streak,’ Piers muttered.

‘—and finding furnished accommodation with sufficient space to take everything and which is in my price range isn’t easy.’

He strolled back over to the window. ‘You aren’t in the market for shacking up with a boyfriend?’ he enquired.

Suzy shook her head. ‘No.’

Piers slid his hands into the hip pockets of his denims and rested his shoulders back against the wall, a position which contrived to thrust forward his pelvis.

‘Gone prissy in your old age?’ he asked.

She recognised the query as the gibe he intended.

‘It isn’t a question of that,’ she replied.

‘You don’t have a boyfriend?’

‘I do,’ Suzy said quickly.

His question had sounded like a challenge, and to admit to the truth—that she was presently unattached—would have seemed like an admission of failure.