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pearls and diamante which she fastened round Chelsea’s throat.

      ‘If you wore your hair up very simply and just decorated with the same flowers, you’d look absolutely stunning,’ she told Chelsea, scooping up her long hair to reveal the pure length of her slim throat.

      The effect was a bewitching one, Chelsea admitted, and although the dress was outrageously expensive, she found herself weakly agreeing with the girl that it might have been made for her.

      As indeed it might, she admitted a little later as she stepped out of the boutique, clutching a black and gold embossed box and a piece of paper on which the girl had scribbled an address where Chelsea could have a pair of shoes made up to match the dress. The boutique had also been able to provide the silk flowers to decorate her hair, and on a sudden impulse, as she was walking past the store, Chelsea hurried into Harrods and headed for the cosmetics department.

      Two hours later she emerged exhausted but delighted with the new make-up she had bought in colours far stronger than those she had normally used. The salesgirls had been more than willing to show her the latest winter styles, and Chelsea had been pleased and a little startled to discover her stage training came flooding back as she memorised and elaborated in her mind, adapting what they had shown her to suit not her own personality but the image she intended to project in order to lure Slade Ashford.

      The weekend before the party, Chelsea was surprised to hear someone knocking on her door and to discover Kirsty standing shivering outside in the cold east wind which was blowing.

      ‘Come on in,’ she invited her niece. ‘Do you fancy a cup of tea?’

      She had already noticed the storm signals flashing in Kirsty’s blue eyes, and the stubborn set of her mouth, and her heart sank as Kirsty shook her head and flung herself into a chair.

      ‘It’s impossible at home,’ she announced bitterly. ‘Anyone would think I was seven, not seventeen!’

      ‘Do you know,’ Chelsea remarked conversationally, ‘I’ve often noticed that people have a tendency to treat us the way we behave.

      There was a pregnant pause. She looked up and smiled guilelessly at Kirsty, adding sympathetically, ‘What’s wrong? Arguments over the curfew?’

      ‘You mean Mum hasn’t told you?’ Kirsty asked suspiciously.

      ‘Told me what?’ Chelsea frowned. ‘The last time I saw her she was full of preparations for the party.’

      ‘I want to go to drama school,’ Kirsty told her aggressively, ‘but they won’t let me.’

      ‘You’ve still got a year to do at school,’ Chelsea reminded her, her heart sinking a little. She and Kirsty had always been able to talk to one another, but here was her niece masking her involvement with Slade Ashford by pretending her quarrel with her parents was about her desire to go to drama school.

      ‘Yes, and then I’ll be eighteen; able to do exactly what I want.’

      Fear shafted through Chelsea.

      ‘The acting profession is a very gruelling and often heartbreaking one,’ she warned her niece. ‘You know I went to drama school?’

      ‘Yes, but you left.’

      ‘Not just because I realised that the stage wasn’t for me,’ Chelsea admitted. ‘I got involved with someone I met there—an older man.’ Beneath her lashes she studied Kirsty’s set face. ‘He was married, of course,’ she continued carelessly, ‘but I was far too naïve to realise that he was just using me—until it was too late. I’d hate that to happen to you, Kirsty.’

      ‘Things are different nowadays.’ Kirsty tossed her head and eyed her thoughtfully. ‘I never knew you were involved with a married man.’

      Chelsea winced at her choice of words.

      ‘He was very attractive—sophisticated and extremely worldly. I thought he genuinely cared about me, but of course he didn’t. How could he? We were worlds apart. I was a girl of seventeen who knew next to nothing about life, he was a man in his thirties who’d already experienced nearly everything it had to offer.’

      There was a small silence and then Kirsty got to her feet.

      ‘Mum’s told you about Slade, hasn’t she?’ she demanded scornfully, making Chelsea wince for her own clumsiness. ‘You just don’t understand—any of you!’

      She was gone before Chelsea could protest, black curls bouncing on her shoulders, her coltish jean-clad legs padded with scarlet striped leg-warmers a bright splash of colour as she ran quickly down the street.

      Cursing herself for mishandling the situation, Chelsea paced her small living room. There had been disappointment and wariness in Kirsty’s expression—and a barrier that had not been there before.

      As she watched her niece disappearing Chelsea resolved that no matter what it cost she would somehow rescue Kirsty from Slade Ashford.

CHAPTER TWO

      ALTHOUGH not a dedicated partygoer, Chelsea was not normally averse to accepting the many invitations that came her way; mainly as a means of in-depth study of the human race at play. Ann often protested that she spent far too much time watching from the sidelines when she could have been joining in the fun, but her experiences with Darren had left her wary and cynical and more especially reluctant to get involved.

      Tonight, though, was different. Normally she would have enjoyed the thought of attending Ann’s wedding anniversary gathering, but there was no thought of enjoyment in her mind as she made careful and thorough preparations for the evening, the maxim of her drama school tutors ringing warningly in her ears. ‘Immerse yourself completely in your part,’ had been their favourite command. ‘Remember that when you walk on the stage you are the character you are playing. If the audience is to believe it, you must believe it.’ Something told her that Slade Ashford was the most demanding ‘audience’ she was ever likely to meet, and so, as she lay in a deep bath of scented water, mentally relaxing and breathing deeply, she forced herself to put aside her own character and assume that of the woman who – for tonight – she was going to be.

      Her efforts were so convincing that by the time she was ready to emerge from her bath she had almost come to like the rich Oriental perfume she had chosen for her role – one that normally she would have avoided in favour of something more Establishment.

      No bra was necessary because of the way the bodice of her dress was boned, and smoothing fragilely sheer matching blue stockings over silkily perfumed legs, she paused for a moment to study her appearance objectively in her bedroom mirror. Her skin was creamily pale; her breasts firm and full, the, curve of her waist lending a delicate sensuality to the narrow-boned hips.

      Minute petrol blue briefs matched her stockings and suspenders. Her fingertips brushed accidentally against one silk-clad thigh and with a slight grimace of distaste Chelsea turned away from the mirror. She looked like a slave girl adorning herself for the market. Unbidden, a memory struggled to be unleashed from the chains in which she had bound it—herself at seventeen, bright-eyed, eager, and more than a little embarrassed as she spent her meagre savings on cheap fake satin undies, hardly daring to imagine how she would feel if Darren saw her in them.

      Fool! Fool! she goaded herself. Why remember all that tonight? And the ridiculous thing was that when Darren had tried to make love to her all she had felt was fear and revulsion. Frigid, he had called her, and with good reason.

      Stop it—stop it! Her teeth ground together with her efforts to deny the memories. She had never dreamed when she went round to read the script that night that Darren would … Somehow whenever she had envisaged them making love it had been in some secluded hideaway, remote and fairytale; not the house he shared with his wife. The moment she had realised that script-reading was the last thing he had on his mind, her desire had disappeared, too weak to overcome the suffocating awareness all around them

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