LITMIR.BIZ

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and began to help him—he was so easy to get on with, but she knew deep down that was only because she didn’t fancy him, nor he her. If she had, or he had, then their no-effort compatibility simply wouldn’t exist. It wasn’t that Lara was a cynic where men were concerned; she just preferred to think of herself as someone who was realistic.

      They ate supper and watched a video of one of Jake’s films, while he tore his own performance to pieces. In fact, Lara’s resolve not to think any more about the situation lasted all the way until bedtime, but then she lay sleepless, looking at the ceiling for a long time, while moon shadows danced before her eyes and doubts began to creep into her mind.

      She had the strangest feeling she was courting danger, as if she was standing on top of a high cliff and preparing to walk over the edge into the unknown—an unknown far more scary than just her usual uncertainty about the future. But that was just her imagination, she told herself as she finally drifted off to sleep. All actresses were cursed with an excess of imagination.

      And in the morning everything looked different—as it so often did. It was funny how daylight seemed to put everything into perspective. She told herself that she was being stupid and ridiculously melodramatic—as if unable to separate her working life from her real life. Except that when she stopped to think about it ‘real’ life had taken on a very different meaning ever since her friend had married into Maraban’s royal family!

      Even Lara’s mother had been taken aback by it all, and she was fairly used to the bizarre. In the past, if Lara had telephoned blithely to say that she was appearing as a tomato on a commerical for a new brand of soup, her mother had been merely interested. Yet for once she had been lost for words when Lara had announced that she was being Rose’s bridesmaid when she married her prince, and would be wearing cloth of gold and a fortune in ancient jewellery for the day.

      It had been easy enough to find the number of Wildman Phones, but not so easy to find the courage to dial the number, and when she did her nerve nearly failed her. But her drama training saved her. Pretend it’s a job, she told herself—and maybe in a way it was. If not a job, then a mission—to be a good friend to people she cared about.

      She drew a deep breath. The only way to get past receptionists was not to sound nervous or diffident but to brazen it out. ‘Darian Wildman, please,’ she said smoothly, as if she had known him all her life.

      ‘I’m afraid that Mr Wildman is out of the office all day.’

      Damn! Lara gave an exaggerated sigh. ‘That man! Why the hell didn’t he bother telling me? And he’s left a whole stack of important papers behind,’ she said, half to herself, then sighed and adopted a confidential one-woman-talking-to-another tone. ‘Do you know where he can be reached?’

      There was the briefest of pauses. ‘Sure. He’s out casting all day. Let me see…yep! Hold on, I’ve got the address here—do you have a pen?’

      The receptionist obviously wouldn’t have won any prizes for maintaining the privacy of her boss, thought Lara.

      ‘Fire away,’ she said calmly.

      The receptionist rattled off an address in Golden Square, which Lara knew was right in the centre of London, just a breath away from Nelson’s Column.

      ‘What’s he doing there?’ Lara asked casually.

      ‘Oh, he’s been there all week—they’re casting to find the face of Wildman Phones,’ said the receptionist chattily. ‘Why? Are you an actress or a model?’

      Lara’s heart gave a great leap in her chest, but she tried to keep the excitement from her voice. ‘Well, actually,’ she said, ‘yes, I am.’

      CHAPTER TWO

      THE taxi drew up outside a tall building which looked like an old warehouse—and that, thought Darian wryly, was precisely what it was. It was a dark, monstrous shell of a place which now housed the most modern of photographic studios.

      ‘Shall we go in now, Darian?’ asked the man by his side, his voice touched by a slight edge of anxiety.

      Darian’s eyes had been shuttered, but now they widened by a fraction so that just a glint of gold light gleamed from between the thick black lashes. He turned to look at Scott Stratton, the head of an advertising agency known to be one of the best in the business—famous for its slick, award-winning campaigns and its ability to match client needs with consumer expectations. Or at least it had been up until now, when casting after casting had so far stubbornly refused to find the new face of Wildman Phones. Maybe Darian was being too choosy—an accusation which had been thrown at him often enough in the past—but he was certainly uncompromising, and he would not be satisfied until he found exactly what he was looking for. He just wasn’t sure quite what that was.

      Or who.

      ‘Sure, Scott,’ he murmured. ‘I’m ready.’

      Scott glanced at him. ‘Need anything? To make notes?’

      Darian gave a glittering smile. ‘No, thanks. I won’t need them. I’ll know her when I see her.’

      They walked into the building together, and stood in the chrome-walled reception area.

      ‘They’re all up there?’ asked Darian, jerking his dark head towards the spiral staircase which led up to the studio.

      He spoke softly, but even so the two women who were busy flicking through the models’ cards at the far end of the room immediately stopped what they were doing and turned round to look at him, as if awaiting a command. But then, people always did that when they encountered him. Darian was used to it. They seemed to shrink to his will whenever he exerted it—and even when he didn’t.

      ‘Yeah,’ answered Scott. ‘Ready and waiting.’

      ‘Then bring on the parade,’ said Darian mockingly, putting his foot on the bottom rung of the staircase, faded denim straining over one taut, muscular thigh as he did so.

      ‘Er, not parade, Darian,’ corrected Scott. ‘If you say that they parade then that makes them sound a bit mindless, doesn’t it? Makes them sound as if they’re taking part in some second-rate beauty contest, and models are very sensitive about that kind of thing. Particularly in these politically correct days.’

      Darian laughed and turned his head, and as he did so he heard the faint but unmistakable intake of breath from one of the secretaries as she looked at him. He was used to that, too. He guessed it was because his eyes were not run-of-the-mill that the fairer sex always seemed to get transfixed by them. When he was younger he had found the effect a little disconcerting, and later he had rather enjoyed it, but now he was so used to it as to feel nothing more than faint amusement. Another man might have used the power of those eyes more ruthlessly, but Darian did not. He had no need to.

      ‘Far be it from me to contradict you, Scott,’ he said, choosing his words carefully. ‘But, putting political correctness aside, surely a casting session is exactly like a beauty contest? Though admittedly not a second-rate one—not in this case—not if they’re going to be representing Wildman. Twenty females about to be assessed on their looks and their sex appeal—how else would you define it?’

      ‘But it isn’t just looks and sex appeal we’re searching for, is it?’ questioned Scott seriously. ‘Otherwise someone we’ve shown you already would surely have come up to standard?’ He sighed. ‘You’ve seen loads of beautiful women this week.’

      ‘You think I’m being too choosy?’ asked Darian.

      Scott shrugged and then shook his head. ‘I admire your perfectionism, if you must know. Your search for that indefinable something or someone—a person who will embody everything you want to say about your company. I guess that’s the secret of your success. Am I right?’

      Darian shrugged. ‘That’s part of it.’

      But only part. Darian put a lot of his success down to a restless and relentless seeking nature. He never did anything long enough to

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