Heading for Trouble! Read online

  ‘No,’ said Morgan.

  ‘Are you sure? I seem to remember hearing of something very similar some time ago—I can’t remember the name, but—’

  ‘Why don’t you put your research department onto it?’ said Morgan. ‘I’m sure if they dig around enough they can find someone to say it’s completely superfluous. After all, there are two sides to every question, and if not you can always invent one just to be sure of being impartial.’

  If she hadn’t been so nervous she would have been amused by the look of blank astonishment which greeted this outburst. But before he could reply Elaine threw herself into the conversation with the aplomb of the experienced chat-show host, and for the next hour the talk remained firmly fixed on current events. Elaine’s versatility on her breakfast show was nothing to the brilliance she showed now—she seemed to know about everything.

  Morgan fought down another pang of regret at the contrast between her own gaucheness and Elaine’s maturity. The whole point of having the man here was to give Elaine a chance to show her paces. She glanced down the table to see what sort of impression Elaine was making, and dropped her eyes hastily. He might be arguing with Elaine, but the cool grey gaze was still fixed unwaveringly on Morgan’s face.

  Just for an instant she felt a shameful, delicious frisson at his unexpected interest. But then cold sense pointed out the frightening, unflattering truth. He suspected something.

  Presently she sensed that he had looked away, and in spite of herself she found her eyes drawn slowly back down the table. Sure enough, the hawk-like face was now turned to Elaine. And now that she was no longer the centre of attention she had the opportunity to observe him at leisure.

  Even after more than a year she remembered well enough the contrast between the television image and the real thing. The physical toughness of the man, which you wouldn’t have guessed from the talking head, made it easier to understand how he had talked his way into and out of a series of guerrilla hideouts for an early, notorious season of Firing Line. So, oddly enough, did a charisma so strong that it was almost palpable. She could imagine him impressing men who lived by a code of unrelenting machismo—and then charming the socks off them.

  What she hadn’t remembered, because she hadn’t previously had a chance to see it, was his rather terrifying talent for being at ease with just about every subject under the sun. Here he was, talking, unbriefed, on subjects that Elaine had presumably worked up—and still he had her on the hop.

  But even as Morgan admitted, grudgingly, that he probably had the most powerful mind of anyone she’d ever met, even as she laughed, reluctantly, at his irreverent wit at the expense of the world’s movers and shakers she found herself gritting her teeth.

  Again and again he deployed the same tactic, putting forward a controversial, even shocking suggestion ‘for the sake of argument’, and then leaving Elaine to struggle to show why it was wrong. When watching this move on television Morgan usually shouted at the screen. Now, while her sister fought off humiliation at the hands of a man she seemed to care about personally as well as professionally, Morgan was forced to keep a low profile, to open her mouth only to put peas into it.

  While she managed to keep quiet, however, it didn’t occur to her to school her face to an air of pleasant interest, and it gradually settled into a stormy expression strangely at odds with the harem-like make-up. Kavanagh glanced her way from time to time with a rather odd smile, and once or twice tried to draw her into the discussion; each time she made a noncommittal remark, her eyes still hurling defiance, and refused to be drawn.

  But at last it was too much to bear. He had been talking with chilling satisfaction about a prominent local politician whose corruption had been exposed by Firing Line, and who was now serving time in a low-security prison. Morgan glared at him.

  His eye caught hers for a long moment. ‘But you seem to disapprove?’ An eyebrow flickered upwards; a lazy smile mocked her for daring to disagree.

  ‘I thought it was absolutely appalling, the way you took Corvin to pieces,’ she said, goaded. ‘Why did you have to keep needling him about his sixties idealism? He looked absolutely heartbroken by the end of the programme. What possible good did it do?’

  He gave a faint, indifferent shrug. ‘He got the post in the first place because he persuaded people that he’d be an improvement on the back-scratching lot who’d been running it for twenty years. It seemed fair enough to bring that up if he’d turned into something as bad as what he was meant to replace.’

  This was as good as a red flag to a bull. Morgan forgot her promise to be tactful and discreet and behave like a civilised adult; how dared he pretend that he only brought up legitimate points, when he really just played to the crowd? Infuriated, she sailed in with a comprehensive list of every disgraceful bit of showmanship she could remember.

  ‘And what about Cy Burgess?’ she concluded. ‘Or Everard Macready? What about the time you read out letters that union leader—what was his name? Mick Bryson?—had written to the wife of the owner of FairWay? Was that necessary? I suppose you thought it was absolutely marvellous when he actually passed out on stage.’

  The electric grey eyes widened as she went on, and by the time she had finished his clever, mobile face showed an odd mixture of emotions—surprise, amusement, perhaps a touch of respect, but above all a maddening self-satisfaction. Remorse, it seemed, was conspicuous by its absence.

  ‘Morgan,’ he said at last, ‘as far as I can see you’ve caught just about every broadcast of the programme for the last three years—and that despite loathing everything about the way I go about things.’

  He cocked an eyebrow. ‘I hate to say this, but as far as I’m concerned that means I must be doing something right. For better or worse, that’s what television’s about—not just covering worthy issues, but getting people to watch you week after week after week.’ His mouth curled into a rather cynical smile. ‘Whatever you say about my methods, if you keep watching I must be doing a pretty good job.’

  ‘But don’t you personally have any opinion of whether it’s right to treat people that way?’ Morgan demanded. ‘What do you do—give them all an apology and a pat on the back afterwards—no hard feelings, it was just business? That may be good enough for the Godfather, but don’t you think you should come up with something better if you’re going to take the moral high ground?’

  He began to look slightly annoyed. ‘I try to make sure of my facts; assuming I’ve got those right, I don’t think what I say calls for apology. That doesn’t mean I have a licence to insult people at will; if I get hold of the wrong end of the stick, of course I offer a retraction.’

  Morgan scowled.

  ‘For God’s sake, you can’t seriously think I do it for the sheer fun of being rude to people?’ His voice roughened with impatience.

  ‘Of course you enjoy it!’ Morgan retorted. ‘You love twisting the knife—and some people love to watch you do it, though why I can’t imagine. It may be good TV, but don’t you ever wonder whether the kind of spectacle you provide limits the stories you can cover? No—because you revel in hacking people apart.’

  There was a stunned silence around the table. Mr and Mrs Roberts looked shocked, the children thrilled, Elaine gallantly cheerful, as if one of her morning TV guests had passed out in a drunken stupor. Only Richard Kavanagh seemed unfazed. If anything, he looked more animated than he had all evening. The queer light eyes positively blazed under the black brows, and a smile tugged at his mouth.

  ‘I like to think my weapon is the rapier,’ he murmured. And then, with an apparent shift of ground, he added, ‘But I’m quite capable of taking an interest in subjects and people where there’s not a hint of wrongdoing.’

  He smiled. ‘Look, sterling probity may not make for very interesting TV, but that’s not to say it doesn’t exist, or that I’m incapable of appreciating it when I find it—you may not have noticed, but just at the moment I’m not actually on the air.’ And then, while Morgan t
ried to think of a polite way of saying, Tell that to the Marines, he slid his blade home.

  ‘So why don’t you tell me a bit more about your work with the poor little homeless children with no school of their own?’ The amusement in his voice invited her to share the joke, but this home thrust stopped Morgan in her tracks.

  ‘I’d be happy to,’ she lied. ‘When we’ve more time.’

  ‘It’s so nice to have the chance to meet fans face to face,’ he said lazily, ‘and find out what they really think.’ The fist inside the velvet glove, thought Morgan; he was threatening to let Elaine know what she’d been up to. But her scrape of this afternoon paled to insignificance beside the mess she’d be in if he remembered where he’d seen her before, or, for that matter, decided to take a real interest in the charity.

  ‘I didn’t think you had much time for your fans,’ she replied coolly. ‘After all, I don’t suppose you care for being treated as somebody’s personal property.’ She met his eyes squarely, daring him to take up the gauntlet.

  ‘That,’ he said mildly, ‘depends very much on the person.’ And he gave her an outrageously charming smile.

  Morgan made the interesting discovery that a smile could have all the impact of a punch in the solar plexus—even when you were actually furious with the owner. The man was a public menace; she could feel her resistance crumbling, could actually feel the corners of her own mouth turning up in involuntary response to that look of extravagant admiration. It didn’t even seem to matter that she knew it was an act—she knew how ridiculous she must look beside Elaine, and still she felt herself warming to him.

  She bit her lip fiercely and glared at him. He was here to be impressed by Elaine, not to flirt with Elaine’s sister.

  ‘Are you finished with your plate?’ she asked abruptly. While they had been scrapping everyone had finished eating. Escape was at hand.

  Morgan turned to her stepmother. ‘You’ve been slaving for hours, Leah, and tomorrow will be just as bad. Go and lie on a sofa somewhere,’ she said firmly.

  She stood up and began collecting the rest of the dishes and carrying them out to the kitchen.

  Chairs scraped in the dining room; she could hear people moving towards the front room. Alone at last!

  ‘Here, let me give you a hand,’ said a voice behind her.

  Morgan realised too late that she had walked into a pit of her own digging. But how could she have guessed that the monster killer ego would condescend to help with the washing-up? And now, just when she needed to think on her feet, that strange, stupid breathlessness had come back and she was distracted by an uncomfortable consciousness of his closeness.

  The deep, drawling voice had spoken almost in her ear, and as she whipped around automatically to face him she found that they were only inches apart. Unbidden, the thought flashed through her mind that Elaine, raising her mouth to kiss him, had stood no closer than she was now. And she was taller than Elaine.

  What on earth was the matter with her?

  ‘Don’t be silly; you’re a guest,’ she protested, backing away hastily.

  ‘I try to be a good one,’ he replied virtuously, and laughed at her sceptical look.

  ‘But you should be—that is, wouldn’t you rather talk to Elaine?’ Morgan began nervously stacking dishes in the sink and allowing hot, soapy water to rise around them.

  ‘Ah, Elaine. I take it that dazzling performance was for my benefit? Don’t look so horrified, Morgan; I said it was dazzling, didn’t I? More credit to her for making an opportunity for herself. But I can’t, offhand, think of a tactful way of telling her to consider herself auditioned, so I thought I’d come out here and make myself useful.’

  ‘Naturally you wouldn’t dream of saying anything that might cause offence,’ said Morgan.

  ‘Well, not without a studio audience,’ he said shamelessly. ‘Why don’t you let me wash while you dry, since you know where everything goes?’ His voice was not precisely gloating, but there was no doubt about it—he certainly thought that he’d won this round hands down. And now he had her where he wanted her—over the washing-up he would give her the kind of grilling which had tripped up people who were cleverer, wilier and more experienced at downright lying than she would ever be. Unless…

  Morgan’s eyes swept rapidly round the kitchen. ‘Wash as you go’ was not a precept that Leah had ever taken to heart; every surface was piled high with pots, pans, mixing bowls and every conceivable implement which could be used in the preparation of a dinner for eight. The sink was now filled with the dinner dishes, as was the counter beside it. And this scene of chaos had given her an idea of breathtaking simplicity—and, it had to be said, outrageous bad manners. But at least it would save her from a tête-à-tête with Richard Kavanagh.

  Morgan took a deep breath. She looked resolutely into the soapsuds; she didn’t dare look up at him. ‘It’s awfully nice of you,’ she said. ‘Are you sure?’ It was still not too late to back out.

  ‘Quite sure.’ He had tossed his jacket over the back of a chair and was already rolling up his sleeves. There was probably a warning somewhere in the contrast between his casual, trendy clothes and the lean muscle of the arms being laid bare; Morgan ignored it. So he thought he’d outflanked her, did he?

  ‘Well, if you insist,’ said Morgan, stepping away from the sink. She raised limpid eyes to his face. ‘We always leave things to drain,’ she explained in a matter-of-fact, helpful tone of voice. ‘It’s more hygienic than drying with a dish towel. You can just leave everything in the rack. Thanks very much for offering; I have had rather a long day. It’s terribly nice of you.’ She managed to meet his eyes with a straight face.

  Once out of the kitchen, she stumbled down the hall, doubled over with laughter, hands clapped to her mouth, until she staggered at last to the coat-rack, buried her face in a coat, and howled.

  When she had herself under control—more or less under control—Morgan returned to the sitting room to join the rest of the family.

  ‘Where’s Richard?’ asked Elaine in a discontented tone.

  ‘Oh, he insisted on doing the washing-up,’ Morgan said cheerfully.

  ‘What?’

  ‘He wouldn’t take no for an answer,’ Morgan added smugly.

  ‘Oh, my God,’ said Elaine in horror. ‘Well, I’d better go and give him a hand.’ She hastened out of the room.

  And now, for the first time that evening, Morgan was able to relax. But as she picked up a magazine and leafed idly through it she was suddenly, wryly, aware of a faint sense of anticlimax.

  She had actually got the better of Richard Kavanagh! But the problem was she couldn’t be there to savour her victory—to see his face as he tackled the washing-up, or was joined by Elaine, keen to score a few more points over the soapsuds. And, even worse, she found herself actually looking forward to his return from the kitchen. He wasn’t the kind to take defeat lying down; what would he do next?

  Morgan reminded herself sternly that she wasn’t supposed to be crossing swords with him at all. In fact, looking back over the evening, she couldn’t understand what had got into her—she had meant to be so quiet and unobtrusive! She had promised Elaine to act conventionally. Where had it all gone wrong?

  An image came to her of cool grey eyes, amusement lurking in their depths. He made me do it, she protested to herself. He deliberately set out to thwart me at every turn; was I supposed to take that lying down? And as for keeping him company in the kitchen… An older, more sinister image came to her—of those same grey eyes glittering in winter moonlight…

  Everything he’d said at dinner showed that he hadn’t changed; the merciless predator who took pleasure in the hunt wasn’t far beneath the surface. She had to keep him from remembering her, and keep him from going anywhere near A Child’s Place. But that was no reason, she reminded herself, to jeopardise Elaine’s chances. As long as he stayed she must simply keep out of his way. From now on she would have to do better.

  CHAPTER THREE
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  ‘TELL me the story of Gareth again, Morgan.’

  Morgan looked up from her unread magazine an hour later to find Ben standing beside her. ‘I can’t watch TV ’cos Sarah and Jenny are watching The Little Mermaid,’ he explained.

  Morgan grinned at this flattering invitation. The little boy climbed onto the sofa beside her, and the two were soon lost in the story of the humble kitchen boy who came to the aid of a haughty lady. Each time the boy defeated a knight in battle the lady exclaimed that it was luck, and a shameful thing that a brave knight should be brought low by a dirty kitchen boy. And about a third of the way into the story the hairs rose on the back of Morgan’s neck, and she knew that Richard Kavanagh had come into the room.

  She forced herself not to look up. Gareth defeated a red knight, a green knight, a blue knight, a black knight and a giant, and still the lady despised him. From the corner of her eye Morgan saw a pair of white-trousered legs prop themselves against a table, the scrubbed cotton taut over the long, lean muscle of his thighs.

  ‘And then he returned to the court of King Arthur and jousted in disguise, and defeated every knight who came at him, even Sir Gawain,’ she said, her voice even huskier than usual from nervousness. She could just imagine what Kavanagh would make of this. ‘And then he went to the king and said, “I am the brother of Gawain, but I wished to be made a knight for my own efforts, and not because of my brother.” And he was knighted that very day, and Sir Gareth married the lady and lived happily ever after,’ she concluded hastily.

  The silence at the end of this seemed to stretch out interminably. At last, in spite of herself, Morgan’s eyes were drawn slowly up to the face of the man watching her.

  She had expected to see the spark of devilry which had been lurking in his eyes all evening, perhaps anger, certainly the promise of vengeance to come. But the hawkish face had an expression of almost brooding intensity; it was impossible to believe that its bitter cynicism had been prompted by anything so trivial as being unexpectedly landed with the washing-up.