Wild Lady by Liz Fielding

Author:Liz Fielding [Fielding, Liz]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Contemporary, Fiction, Romance, General, Adult
ISBN: 9781854877185
Google: 5yrV2fLufxAC
Publisher: Scarlet
Published: 1997-02-15T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE

“DARLING, you were sensational!”

Claudia barely stopped herself from flinching as Charley Long, the host of Late Date, flung himself at her to kiss her effusively on both cheeks. He might think she had been sensational, she knew that she had been outrageous.

She had flirted with the show’s host. She had flirted with the other guests. She had exposed more bosom than she cared to think about and had lived up to her image, or depending upon your point of view, down to it, with a fervor that now the show was over made her feel positively sick. And to make matters worse Melanie was looking at her as if she was a stranger, someone she didn’t know any more.

It was hardly surprising. Claudia scarcely recognized herself. But since being herself didn’t seem to impress anyone half so much as being the person they all seemed to think she was, did it matter?

“We’re going on to a party, darling,” Charley was saying. “You are going to come aren’t you?”

“A party?” The last thing on earth she felt like doing was going to a party. But she didn’t want to go home either because when she got home everything of Gabriel would be gone. Her apartment would feel empty in a way that it never had in all the time she had lived there alone. “Fantastic!” She turned a blinding smile on Melanie. “What about you, Mel, do you want to come along?”

“It’s awfully late, Claud,” Mel said doubtfully. “Don’t you think you ought to go home?”

Her sister’s pretty face was creased in concern but Claudia didn’t want anyone to be concerned about her. “No one is forcing you to come, darling,” she said, just a touch sharply.

Darling. Could that false tone be catching, she wondered, from some cold miserable spot deep inside her, along with the shallow posturing, the pretense? Did it even matter since it was simply a game and no one was fooled by it, no one hurt by it? Only the real thing could hurt. She was just beginning to understand how much.

Charley slid his arm around Claudia’s waist and pulled her against him. She hated the feel of his soft hand squeezing her waist, hated the overpowering muskiness of his after-shave. Hated everything about him that was so different from the hard-edged physique, the outdoors scent of Gabriel. But Gabriel didn’t want her. Gabriel thought she was capable of lying and cheating and anything was better than facing that, facing up to the fact that she would never see him again, never be held as if she was something special. Never know what it would be like to love someone who loved you in return.

So she let Charley in on her smile. “I’m sure this dear man will look after me. Won’t you, darling?” she prompted.

“It will be my pleasure,” he murmured, reassuringly.

Melanie was not reassured. “Do you really want to go? I just thought -” she began, but Claudia didn’t want to hear what she thought.

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