"I haven't come here to talk about the d.a.m.n ma.n.u.script and well you know it. I want you, Sarah ... and I want you badly enough to go ahead and take you if you keep on playing games with me like this."

Now, thankfully, anger came to her aid, banishing her fear. Standing up, her face flushed with temper, Sarah faced him.

"You are the one who's playing games, David. I've told you right from the first that I have no s.e.xual interest in you whatsoever. You axe the one who keeps on raising the matter. I never have, and never will have any desire to become your lover..."

She saw the dark colour mottle his skin but banked down her apprehension.

"And we both know why that is, don't we?" he sneered.

"You're frightened of being touched by a real man ... or at least you like to pretend you are. There are a h.e.l.l of a lot of women like you, Sarah, who say no--when they really mean yes."

Anger touched her nerve endings in electric currents. She could scarcely contain her rage at David's arrogance and bullheadedness.

"When I say " no", I mean it," she told him fiercely, 'and so do the rest of my s.e.x. That's something you might do well to remember when you're submitting your heroines to what in actual fact is enforced rape. It might help boost your dropping sales if nothing else," she told him blightingly.

Immediately Sarah realised she had put herself in fresh danger. David had never liked having his work criticised and in the past she had always been too unsure of her own ground, of her own judgment, to force the issue. Now she was beyond that. A woman herself, she knew what her s.e.x wanted to read in their novels, and it was not some sick man's fantasy of what . of what he would like to do to her, Sarah recognised on a wave of nausea as she recalled one particularly unpleasant pa.s.sage from his latest ma.n.u.script, which had involved the captive heroine being tied up and forced to endure an act which Sarah now recognised from her own experience had been entirely one-sided and completely without pleasure for its female victim. No wonder David's books were no longer selling so well. If she thought about it she could see that gradually over the last couple of years, the s.e.xual pa.s.sages in them had become more and more s.a.d.i.s.tic.

"You b.i.t.c.h." He almost spat the word out at her, practically bellowing with rage.

"And just what the h.e.l.l do you know about it.. a frigid little virgin who was only put in the job because--' The door to her office suddenly swung open with controlled force.

Because she was facing the door Sarah saw Joss first, her eyes widening with shock and--yes--relief as he strode into the room. She hadn't realised he was visiting them today, and immediately hated herself for the weak feeling of relief seeing him brought.

"What the h.e.l.l's going on in here?"

He spoke without inflexion, his voice controlled and quiet and yet Sarah was immediately aware of the power behind it. David got to his feet, in what Sarah recognised as an instinctive attempt to dominate the younger man.

"And just who the h.e.l.l are you?" he demanded to know:

"Joss Howard." Joss introduced himself coolly.

"The new Editor in Chief."

A wary light crept into David's eyes, he looked from Sarah's pale face to Joss's implacable one and then shrugged and smiled charmingly at Joss.

"I was just saying to Sarah--' " I heard exactly what you were saying to her," came back Joss's clipped response. His eyes flickered momentarily, resting briefly in Sarah's pale face.

"And for your information," his voice dropped an octave, smooth and thick as melting honey, stirring up memories Sarah could very easily have done without, "I can tell you she is neither frigid, nor..." he paused and looked at Sarah, smiling at her in a way that made her toes curl into her shoes and heat shoot through her veins, 'any longer a virgin. "

Before Sarah could react Joss moved, coming to stand behind her, one hand resting on her shoulder, in the lightest of touches, and yet one so proprietorial that she could see the immediate reaction in David's eyes;

Anger glittered sharply there as his eyes moved from Sarah's face to Joss's. Sarah had the unnerving feeling that if Joss had not been there to protect her David would have physically a.s.saulted her. She had always known of his desire to possess her, but never guessed at the frightening intensity of it before now.

David got up.

"I've another appointment in fifteen minutes," he said curtly.

"I'll have to go."

It was Joss who escorted him out of her office, leaving Sarah feeling as though she had just survived some terrible cataclysm.

She was still sitting staring into s.p.a.ce ten minutes later when Joss came back, still trying to accept that he had actually done what he had. that he had, despite their quarrel earlier in the week, protected her from David.

"Here, drink this." He pushed a carton of coffee under her nose but until she touched it Sarah hadn't realised that she was shaking.

"Charming company you keep," he said curtly, watching her.

"He, I take it, is the would-be lover you were telling me about?"

"Yes." There seemed little point in denying it.

"Mmm... And this?" He gestured to the ma.n.u.script on her desk.

"His latest novel..."

Some of her distaste must have shown in her voice because Joss frowned and picked up the ma.n.u.script.

"From now on I'll deal with him," he told her flatly.

Instantly colour surged up under her skin. There was nothing she wanted to do more than to thank him, but stubbornly she felt that she must master her fear of David . that dealing with his ma.n.u.scripts was part of her job and that if she let herself be terrorised and brow-beaten by her authors she would not be worthy of the trust Steven had placed in her.

"No." She said it sharply and watched his eyebrows draw together, repeating more softly.

"No ... he's one of my authors, I must deal with him myself."

She couldn't look at Joss. If she did he would see how very much she wanted him to refuse to let her. The very thought of facing David again made her shrink in acute fear.

"How long have you been having problems with him?"

Joss walked over to her window and stood with his back to her. She had no way of seeing his face, but his voice was clipped, almost angry.

Sarah sighed. She could not blame him for his anger. Here he was just about to start a new challenging career, and already he was being faced with personality clashes. It was her job as an editor to get along with the writers in her orbit;

to smooth out problems and avoid strife.

"Right from the start," she admitted huskily, knowing it was pointless to lie.

"When he first came in with his latest ma.n.u.script, six months ago."

"And all this time you've said nothing to Steven?"

He was looking at her now, anger leaping across the distance that separated them, his eyes a deeply biting blue.

"How could I?" She spread her hands in a gesture of helplessness.

"Steven gave me this job against James Richards' advice. I wanted to justify his faith in me. If I had told him that I couldn't handle David..."

His mouth curled in acid disdain as he said softly, "Hasn't it occurred to you yet that if you had complained to Steven right at the start this whole thing could have been nipped in the bud. As it is now..." He frowned, and slid his hands into the pockets of his immaculately cut suit.