LITMIR.BIZ

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      CHAPTER FOUR

      LUKE wouldn’t normally have been seen dead at a dance party. At thirty, he considered himself too old for such goings-on. He’d briefly gone through a stage for a couple of years after finishing uni where he haunted clubs, pubs and discos every Friday and Saturday night, but those days were long gone. His life was Campbell Jewels now.

      He’d only come here tonight as a favour to his mother. Apparently his kid sister, Mandy, had been coming here nearly every Friday night lately and his mother wanted him to check the place out. Luke thought she was being over-protective, since Mandy was twenty and a very sensible girl, but he’d promised to drop in and see for himself if there was anything to worry about.

      He stood in a corner of the room, shaking his head at what was before his eyes. How had he ever enjoyed this kind of thing? The screechingly loud music was enough to give anyone an instant migraine. Add to this the garish lights flashing on and off, the heavy pall of smoke and the crush of a hundred sweaty gyrating bodies in an area where possibly fifty might comfortably have fitted, and you had a scene he found quite repulsive.

      Still, Luke wasn’t too old that he couldn’t appreciate Mandy would quite like such an atmosphere, but he was perturbed by how open the drug use was. Nobody bothered to hide the pill-popping and marijuana-smoking. Luke had also seen a couple of suspicious-looking packages changing hands and quite a few empty syringes in the bins in the toilet block. He began to worry if Mandy made a habit of coming to this place she might end up not being so sensible.

      So Luke stayed in the dimly lit corner and waited, hoping she would show up and he could have a brotherly word in her ear. But after a further half-hour’s peering through the smoke haze Mandy still hadn’t turned up. He was about to leave when his attention was suddenly captured by a man dressed in black, an exceptionally handsome man with slick black hair, wicked black eyes and flashing white teeth.

      Luke was not at all surprised to see Damian Campbell in a place like this. Everyone around Campbell’s knew of his reputation for decadent living. He liked to mix with a young fast crowd. He liked his women beautiful, and he didn’t care if they were married.

      The girl with Damian was certainly beautiful, and very married.

      Luke recognised Gemma Whitmore from the photograph in last Sunday’s paper of her attending the première to Nathan’s Whitmore’s latest play. She’d been snapped alongside Celeste and Nathan’s adoptive father, Byron Whitmore.

      Now Luke was an astute man. He’d long known about the feud between the Campbells and the Whitmores. But one didn’t have to be too astute to have noticed that something was afoot between the two families. Celeste Campbell and Byron Whitmore were suddenly as thick as thieves. Yet while that old feud business seemed to have gone out of the window, Luke still didn’t think this extended to Damian draping himself all over Nathan Whitmore’s wife.

      Luke smelled a rat. And there wasn’t a bigger rat around Sydney than Damian Campbell.

      Luke watched his antics with distaste. The man was a real sleaze-bag. Under the guise of dancing, he was touching Mrs Whitmore wherever he could, finally putting her arms around his neck then curving his hands over her buttocks, pulling her hard against him.

      Suddenly, the girl wrenched away from him, swaying violently on her feet. The look on her face was one of total confusion. It was then that Luke realised she was under the influence of some drug or other. Alcohol was unlikely to produce that type of bewilderment. He decided to edge closer and see if he could pick up some of their conversation.

      ‘I...I don’t think I like it here, Damian,’ the girl was saying in a very slurred voice. Her hand fluttered up to her forehead. ‘I...I feel hot, and sort of funny. You’d better take me home.’

      ‘I’ll get you a cool drink first,’ Damian offered, and led her over to a wall where he virtually propped her against it. ‘Stay here. I won’t be long.’

      Luke didn’t know what to do. He didn’t want to tangle with Damian Campbell, especially not after just being given the job as sales and marketing manager at Campbell’s. But Gemma Whitmore’s reactions bothered him. Clearly, she wasn’t sure what was going on. Luke suspected she hadn’t knowingly taken drugs. If she had, she wouldn’t be acting so confused over her condition.

      With this thought in mind, Luke followed Damian to the bar and watched while the bastard slipped some powder into the orange juice, mixing it very well while his eyes darted slyly around. Damn, he was right! He was drugging that girl without her knowledge.

      Yet it wasn’t any of his business, was it?

      For a full ten minutes Luke argued with his conscience, then, with a resigned sigh, went in search of trouble. But Damian and the girl were no longer on the dance-floor or anywhere in the room. Swearing at himself, Luke raced outside to the car park where he spotted Damian leaning Mrs Whitmore against a car and kissing her. The girl’s arms were dangling limply by her sides, like a rag doll.

      Luke felt fury well up inside him. He didn’t stop to think any longer, didn’t stop to count the cost of his actions, just charged across the car park, whirled Campbell away from the girl and socked him one right on the jaw.

      No one was more surprised than Luke when Damian crumpled immediately, falling blessedly unconscious to the concrete. Luke didn’t think he’d even seen what hit him. Or who.

      ‘Hey!’ some bloke called out from a few cars away. ‘What’s going on there?’

      Luke didn’t stay around for any explanations. He swooped up the girl from where she had slid down to sit blank-eyed on the ground, and virtually carried her over to where his own car was parked. Stuffing her into the passenger seat, he raced around to get in and screeched away before anyone could collar him. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do, especially after a glimpse in the rear-view mirror showed Damian Campbell getting groggily to his feet.

      It was only after he’d driven several blocks and felt secure that no one was following that he pulled over to the kerb and tried to assess the situation. Mrs Whitmore was slumped down in the passenger seat, moaning softly. Hell, what had the bastard fed her? Clearly too much of something. She was almost out of it.

      There was nothing for it, really, but to take her home, to her husband. A glance at his watch showed eleven thirty-five. Would Nathan Whitmore be home? Luke had read about his hit play, the one he’d written and was directing. What time did plays end? And where was home, anyway? Mrs Whitmore was hardly in a position to tell him and she didn’t have any ID on her.

      Spying a public telephone box on the next corner Luke decided to try calling him. If his number was in the book, that was. Damn, but this was becoming complicated. Luke almost regretted getting involved in the first place till he took another look at Gemma Whitmore’s sweetly innocent face. How could he have left her with that devil?

      Luke had a change of luck. Nathan Whitmore’s number was in the book and he was home, answering quite quickly.

      Luke kept his voice crisp and businesslike, hoping like hell that Nathan Whitmore was a sensible and reasonable man. He’d heard he was a cool customer, but men were not always cool when it came to their wives, especially beautiful young ones like his.

      ‘Mr Whitmore, this is Luke Barton. Sorry to bother you at this hour, but it was an emergency.’

      ‘Do I know you, Mr Barton?’ came a rather tired query.

      ‘Not personally. You may have heard of me. I’m an executive at Campbell Jewels. I was recently promoted to sales and marketing manager.’

      ‘Then haven’t you rung the wrong person? Any emergency at Campbell Jewels is hardly a concern of mine. Though maybe you could try my father,’ he added caustically.

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