Merlyn's Magic (7 page)

Merlyn gave a negative shake of her head as Anne looked at
her enquiringly, knowing the other woman had expected her to have told
Rand who she was by now. Maybe she should have done, but he was already
unfriendly enough without that, and she had had no idea how long she
was going to be stranded with him in this way. Cold indifference she
could live with, armed warfare was something else! She would have told
him the truth before she left, Merlyn knew she owed him that. Although
she probably wouldn't have told him in quite this way.

'Because—'

'Because Anne and I have never met before,' Merlyn cut in
firmly, giving the other woman a reassuring look before meeting Rand's
challenging gaze at her admission. 'I'm an actress, and I—'

'Want to appear in that damned film they intend making
about my wife,' he finished thunderously. 'I should have known,' he
scorned. 'Arriving here in the storm with some tale about thinking this
was Anne's hotel, when all the time—'

'That wasn't a tale,' Merlyn defended herself heatedly.
'Do you really imagine I wanted our first meeting to be made that way?'

'Yes, I think that's exactly what you wanted.' He looked
at her in contempt. 'I think you planned yesterday down to the
last
detail
!'

All the colour drained from her face at his silent
implication that she had intended that they should make love last night
all along, that if the opportunity hadn't presented itself the way that
it had then she would have made it happen. It was completely
unjustified, but she
had
known who he was and she
had
made love with him, and that was all Rand
could see at the moment.

'Brandon, please.' Anne shot Merlyn a concerned glance.
'Merlyn only wanted—'

His icy gaze silenced his sister-in-law. 'I know you want
this film made, Anne, but I'm sure even you don't realise the lengths
your "friend" Merlyn went to to try and persuade me—'

'Anne, would you mind waiting for me outside?' Merlyn cut
in shakily before Rand could list those 'lengths'. She was avoiding
looking at him. 'I just have a few things to say to your brother-in-law,
and then I intend getting as far away from here as I can!'

'But—'

'Perhaps that would be best.' Rand's voice was harsh, his
gaze fixed relentlessly on Merlyn. 'Merlyn and I have a few things to
say to each other that might shock your sensibilities,' he added with a
sneer.

Anne looked at them each in turn, finally settling on
Merlyn. 'I'll be waiting in the Range Rover,' she said gently. 'You'll
have to leave your car here and collect it another time, I'm afraid; I
only just managed to get through with the four-wheel drive.'

Merlyn had no intention of
ever
returning to this house, for any reason. It was a hire-car, she would
pay the extra for the hire company to come and pick it up. She
certainly couldn't see Rand Carmichael again, for any reason. 'I won't
be long,' she assured the other woman.

'An actress!' Rand scorned as soon as they were alone.
'You should be given an award for your performance last night and this
morning.' He paced the room, glaring at her. 'A damned actress!' he
repeated disgustedly, his contempt obvious.

'I'm not a "damned" anything,' she snapped. 'And actress
isn't a dirty word!'

'You're the latest of Christopher Drake's offerings,
aren't you?' he accused, ignoring her anger. 'Did you go to bed with
him, too, to get even this far?'

In the circumstances it was an accusation which could have
been expected, but that didn't make it any more acceptable. She may
have been stupid last night, even more impetuous than she had ever been
before in her life, but one thing she was not was promiscuous!

'What a stupid question,' Rand derided himself. 'Of course
you've slept with him!'

'You were the one who wanted me last night,' she reminded
him chokingly.

'Yes,' he confirmed. 'I wanted you. Do you have any idea
why?'

She frowned at the violence of his aggression. 'You seemed
upset—'

'Upset!' he repeated with derisive mockery. 'A man kneels
before you sobbing like a baby and you think he was just upset!'

Merlyn moistened her lips. 'You didn't seem to want to
explain—'

'And you didn't want to ask!' he scorned hardly. 'You just
walked naked into my arms!'

She drew in a ragged breath, knowing she deserved his
accusations; she hadn't
wanted
to probe into why
he had been crying, she had just wanted to be with him. 'You didn't
seem in the mood to talk—'

'No—I'm as susceptible to the beauty of a
woman's naked body as the next man!' He looked at her with dislike.
'And when a wanton throws herself at you like that you don't stop to
ask questions, you just take!'

'It wasn't like that!' She shook her head protestingly. 'I
only wanted—'

'What you wanted you got,' he rasped. 'And you enjoyed
every moment of it! But there was something you overlooked in all your
greedy little plans—yesterday was the second anniversary of
Suzie's death!'

The room swam dizzily before Merlyn's eyes for several
seconds. The second anniversary of his wife's death! Anne had started
to tell her something on the telephone yesterday just before the line
went down, and she knew it had to have been this. If only she had
realised. But these last few weeks she had been so intent on
researching the living Suzie that the actual date of her death hadn't
registered as being yesterday. But if she had known would she really
have acted any differently when she found Rand sobbing so brokenly last
night?

'Unless of course you did realise,' that silky voice cut
in, dangerously soft, 'and decided I would be malleable on a day when
Suzie's death was so vivid to me!'

'You know that isn't true,' Merlyn gasped, shaking her
head in denial. 'I wouldn't do a thing like that. You—'

'I don't know a damn thing about you—except that
you can drive a man wild enough in your arms for him to forget
everything else for a short time!' His eyes were narrowed ominously. 'I
don't need to know any more than that about you. The answer is no,
Merlyn. N.O.—No! Even if I were ever to agree to this
travesty being made I wouldn't let a woman like you defile Suzie's
memory!'

Merlyn would take his other insults, but not that one.
Suzie Forrester had been a beautiful and lovely woman, but Merlyn
wouldn't accept being told she wasn't fit to portray her! All she had
done wrong was to want this man, and she wasn't even sure that had been
so wrong. She had gone to him when he needed someone, and at the time
he hadn't seemed to mind.

'You know all these things you're saying about me aren't
true,' she challenged him angrily.

'I told you, I know nothing about you—and I
don't want to know!'

'You know something about me you aren't willing to admit
to yourself,' she bit out. 'Why is that, Rand?' she cried bitterly.
'Does it make it difficult to put the blame for last night on me?'

His eyes were cold, angry slits between lush lashes. 'I
don't know what you're talking about.'

'You may have been a faithful husband, Rand, but you had
plenty of years before you met Suzie to experience every type of
lovemaking there is. And although you haven't admitted it, you have to
know that last night was my first time with a man!'

'I know
it had been a while for you—'

'The first time,' she insisted.

It had troubled her last night that Rand hadn't been aware
of her innocence, and then she had been so lost to the ecstasy they
were sharing that she had put it from her mind. But she knew he
had
to have been aware of that barrier he had breached, of the reason for
her tears.

She continued to watch him challengingly.

'You're an actress—'

'I couldn't
fake
something like
that!' she protested.

'Of course you could, it's done all the time in the
marriage bed,' he taunted.

Merlyn shook her head disbelievingly. 'Do you really think
that?'

'Yes!'

'Then I pity you—'

'I told you last night, I don't want your damned
pity—'

'After you had already taken it,' Merlyn shot back. 'If
Suzie could only see you now!'

He became deathly still, his body taut with tension. 'What
do you mean?'

She sighed, accepting that he would never believe he had
been her first lover—or he just didn't
want
to believe it. 'I feel as if I've come to know her rather well since
reading Anne's book—'

'It was incomplete,' he rasped.

'It was written from your wife's notebooks; you gave them
to Anne yourself.'

'Notes only tell a person's random thoughts, not what the
person was really like.'

'Anne knew her sister well enough to know what she was
"really like", and I've come to know her as well as I could without
actually meeting her. And I know she would be disappointed in
you—'

'Because I refuse to acknowledge the dubious virginity of
a woman who gave herself to me for gain?' he scorned viciously.

'You didn't just bury your wife two years ago,' Merlyn
told him shakily. 'You put your ability to care for other people in
beside her!'

His mouth twisted. 'This isn't a scene from some B-movie
with some hackneyed happy-ever-after ending where the hero throws
himself into the heroine's arms as he realises he's fallen in love with
her! And I've heard all the lectures I need to from Anne.'

She flinched at his scorn; she hadn't expected her
criticism to suddenly transform him into a man who could love again,
she wasn't that naive, but she had hoped that his cynicism wasn't so
deep-rooted that he wouldn't even listen when someone was concerned
about him.

'Because
she
cares for
you—'

'And what's your angle, Merlyn?' he jeered softly. 'Or do
I really need to ask!'

It was useless trying to reason with this man, she didn't
even know why she felt the compunction to try. And yet she felt as if
she had let down Suzie's memory in some way by not being able to reach
Rand through the barrier of his bitterness.

'Anne's waiting,' she said abruptly. 'I hope you don't
mind if I leave my car here until I can arrange to have it picked up.
I—I hope you realise Anne knew nothing about—about
the things you're accusing me of?' She looked at him anxiously, having
done enough damage without ruining his relationship with his
sister-in-law too.

Grey eyes looked at her coldly. 'Anne could never be
involved in anything that sordid, I'm well aware that it was all your
own idea.'

He was meaning to be insulting, and he was succeeding more
effectively than he could guess. The last thing she would ever be
involved in would be sleeping with anyone to get herself a role on
screen or stage. And if Rand had known anything about her at all he
would have realised that.

But he didn't know anything about her, as she really knew
nothing of the man he was now. Two years ago he had been the loving
husband of Suzie Forrester, had been her constant support as she
struggled with the illness that wanted to take her away from him; God
was the only one that knew what he had become in the interim. Merlyn
and Rand were just two strangers who had made love, primitively,
mindlessly. She had broken all of her own rules with a man who cared
nothing for her, a man she had wanted in a way that was totally alien
to her cautious nature, and she would just have to learn to accept that
and get on with her life.

Nevertheless, she had to try one more time to explain her
actions to this man. 'I didn't plan what happened last night—'

'Would you just get out of here?' he cut in disgustedly.
'And tell your friend Drake not to send any more of the hitherto
unknown actresses up here who have shared his bed to get their chance
at the big-time; the next time my physical reaction might be a violent
one! If it makes
you
feel any better,' he added
contemptuously, 'you could probably have played Suzie; you certainly
felt like her when I was inside you!'

Merlyn blanched at his cruelty as he revealed what she had
feared, that he had imagined she was Suzie as he made love to her!

She turned blindly and stumbled out of the room, out of
the house, her eyes swimming with unshed tears as she climbed up beside
Anne in the Range Rover.

'I put your case—Merlyn?' Anne frowned at her
worriedly. 'My God, Brandon
didn't
hit you, did
he?'

Not anywhere that it showed. Inside, where it mattered,
she was battered and bruised, her last shreds of self-respect stripped
from her with Rand's last deliberately cruel taunt.

She blinked back the tears. 'Could we just get away from
here? I—I really don't feel like talking about it right now.'

'Of course.' Anne still looked concerned, putting the
Range Rover in gear, driving the large vehicle with a confidence born
of familiarity. 'Merlyn?' she prompted gently once they had been driving
in silence for several tension-filled moments. 'I know Brandon can be
impossible at times—'

'He's a cold, calculating bastard,' she stated flatly,
feeling as if he had stripped the very soul from her body.

Anne gave a ragged sigh. 'He's that, too,' she
acknowledged heavily. 'But he hasn't always been this way.'

'I'm sure even he was a pleasant baby,' Merlyn allowed,
feeling numb from the heart up.

The other woman gave a rueful smile. 'I meant a little
more recently than that.'

She knew exactly what Anne meant, knew that Rand
Carmichael had changed on the death of his wife. But he wasn't the only
person ever to lose the one he loved in that tragic way, and it didn't
give him the right to hurt her as he had, intentionally, coldly.

'I understand all that, Anne,' she said flatly, her eyes
revealing her inner pain. 'But it doesn't help me at the moment, maybe
later…'