"From now on, if you have to see him, it will only be in the company of another member of the firm--preferably male. I don't like the man,"

Joss added, 'but I haven't been here long enough yet to judge how important his work is to the firm, and that must always be the prime consideration. "

He was looking at her as though he expected her to argue with him, but Sarah looked back proudly.

"I quite agree," she told him coolly.

"So, how important is it?"

She was floundering now.

"James Richards thought very highly of him," she said weakly at last.

"He has had quite a degree of success." She gnawed at her bottom lip, wanting to give a balanced and well-judged opinion that did not involve her own emotions.

"But..." Joss prompted, lifting one eyebrow as she stared at him in confusion.

"Come on, Sarah, it's obvious that there is a " but"," he drawled.

"So what is it?"

"David's work is aimed primarily at the female market. Just lately sales seem to have been falling off." She bit her lip nervously.

"I'm not happy with certain aspects of his latest work...1 want to discuss them with him."

"Discuss them with me," Joss ordered, sitting down in the chair David had vacated and picking up both the ma.n.u.script and her notes, and reading quickly through the latter.

"Mmm... So you don't like the way the s.e.xual pa.s.sages of the book come across, is that it?"

Sarah nodded her head. A strange sensation of heat seemed to be consuming her body. She wished Joss was not quite so close to her.

that she did not feel so weak.

She knew she had had every reason to feel tense when he drawled softly, "Do you think you have sufficient experience to base these criticisms on?"

She knew quite well he was not talking about her professional experience and hot colour stained her skin, her eyes widening and darkening, and then gathering herself together she said brittly, "Maybe not before ... but now, yes..."

There was a long silence, and then at last Joss said, "I see..." He stood up and picked up the ma.n.u.script.

"I think I'll read through this for myself."

He paused by the door, and Sarah looked up at him in a daze. What could she say? Thank him for his timely interruption and for his totally unexpected lover-like att.i.tude towards her. She touched her tongue to dry lips and stammered, "Thank you for what you did..

for..."

"For what?" He shrugged carelessly.

"I only told him the truth, and after all, that he should learn it was the whole purpose of your making love with me, wasn't it, Sarah? It would have been a pity to waste all that effort."

He left her feeling as though she had been physically a.s.saulted.

Every muscle in her body ached with tension she realised numbly, and yet he had rescued her. He could have simply walked past her office door. She shuddered violently as she dwelt on what might have happened if he had. David's maddened face swam before her eyes, and a sudden surge of nausea attacked her stomach. What on earth had made her refuse Joss's offer to take the author off her? Pride, she admitted wryly . pride and the knowledge that she could not afford to be seen to fall down on the job she needed it too much. How did she know that Joss was not already plotting to get rid of her? He couldn't possibly want to work with her . his apparent act of kindness could have cloaked an ulterior motive. He might have used David against her to prove to Steven that she wasn't professionally capable.

On Thursday evening Sarah rang Jane, as she did every week. Her normally calm sister sounded both fl.u.s.tered and excited.

"You'll never guess what," she told Sarah.

"The Menyweathers have invited us all to spend a week with them in their villa on Menorca and that includes the brats. It's all going to be a bit of a rush though, we leave on Friday evening. Apparently there are still some details about the contract that Tom wants to sort out with Ralph, and because they're spending the next month in Menorca suggested that we join them there."

"Jane, that sounds lovely." Sarah was pleased for her sister. It had been a long time since Jane had had a proper holiday.

"Mmm, there'll even be a maid, apparently, to teep an eye on the kids.

Lucidly we're all well stocked up with summer things, and Tom is paying for our flights because it's "business" " She gave a very un-Jane like giggle.

"I just don't know whether I'm on my head or my heels. Anyway, low are things with you?" Jane asked at last.

Sarah had already resolved to say nothing to her about Joss.

"Fine," she lied brightly.

"Rather lectic ... our new Editor in Chief starts next week."

She was glad that Jane had something else to occupy her mind otherwise Sarah was sure her sister would have guessed that something was wrong.

They chatted for several more moments, and then saying that she realised that Jane must have loads to do, Sarah rang off.

Her small flat, normally so warm and homely, seemed to stifle her tonight. She prowled her siting room restlessly, consumed by a hectic energy hat needed an outlet. Even though it had happened two days ago she had still not got over the shock of her interview with David and Joss's totally unexpected interruption. She gnawed tensely on her bottom lip. She was grateful to Joss of course . but beneath that grat.i.tude tension still lingered. The more she thought about it the more she felt sure he would contrive some way of getting rid of her.

After all, he could hardly want her working with him, could he?

Friday was a busy day and Sarah was conscious of a rare sense of desolation as she listened to her work mates discussing their plans for the weekend. Normally she quite enjoyed the weekends she spent in London. In winter she toured the art galleries; in summer the parks, and in the past she had always relished her solitude, enjoying her role as an observer; she got plenty of partic.i.p.ation in life when she went down to Jane's, but now it struck her for the first time that all her experiences of life were coming to her secondhand. all bar one.. She shivered slightly in her centrally heated office, glad that there was no one there to see the betraying surge of colour running up under her skin when she thought of Joss.

Now it seemed impossible that they had ever been lovers; on the two last occasions she had seen him in the office he had seemed too chilly and remote apart from those few brief seconds when he had played the possessive lover for David's benefit.

Her 'phone rang and she picked it up automatically, brightening when she heard Steven's voice.

"Come down to my office for a minute would you, Sarah?"

Wondering why he had summoned her, and remembering the last occasion on which he had done so, she took the time to renew her lipstick and comb her hair before doing his bidding.

This time, however, he was in his office alone. Disturbed by the intensity of her disappointment Sarah told herself she had been ridiculous in imagining that Joss might have been there in the first place. They all knew that he wasn't due to start working with them until Monday, despite his appearances in the office this last week.

Steven was facing his window when she walked in. He turned round and she saw to her dismay that he was frowning slightly. An even tempered very fair man in general, Steven occasionally suffered from black moods. All of his staff had learned to tread warily when they saw the warning signs of these rare occurrences.

"Joss has just been on the 'phone to me," he told Sarah without preamble, still frowning, although to her relief Sarah sensed that it was something unconnected with her personally that was disturbing him.

"It seems he's not going to be able to join us here at the office until next Wednesday at the earliest. One of the contractors he's employing on his new house is behind on the contract and Joss wants to stay in the Cotswolds until the job's completed."

Sarah could appreciate Steven's concern, but surely it hardly involved her to any great degree.

She soon discovered just how wrong she was.