Golden Fever. Carole Mortimer

into her bedroom, moving forward to the balcony once he had left the room. There were about a dozen people sitting around the pool, but only one person actually in the water.

      Her mother was draped decorously on one of the loungers. She was already forty years of age, despite her claim of being thirty. She was wearing a black bikini, two scraps of material that were only just decent, so it was no wonder she didn’t want to get it wet. It would probably dissove in the water! Her beautiful face was partly obscured by huge, round sunglasses, but Clare knew her eyes were deeply brown beneath them, her skin clear and youthful. Her hair was a deep auburn, thick and naturally straight to just below her shoulders, although having seen photographs of her mother as a child Clare knew it was kept that rich red colour by artificial means; her hair was really a mousy brown.

      She considered her mother the most beautiful woman she had ever seen, magnetically so, and she could see the men in the party were all in love with that beauty. All except the man in the pool …

      She looked at him with interest, mainly because he wasn’t one of the men who paid court to her mother. He was swimming the length of the pool with long, easy strokes, black hair plastered over his forehead, worn longer than was fashionable at the moment, although he didn’t look as if fashion particularly bothered him.

      As he swung out of the pool Clare gasped her recognition. Rourke Somerville! He was the man starring with her mother in her latest film, the one everyone was raving about at the moment. One of her friends at school had a poster of him on her bedroom wall, and at the time Clare had thought the picture flattered the actor; now she knew that if anything it understated.

      Rourke Somerville had the physique of an athlete, was tall, extremely so, with wide powerful shoulders, a slim waist, and muscular thighs, his only clothing a pair of black swimming trunks, and by the look of his tan he didn’t always wear them! His legs were long and firmly muscled, the whole of his body covered lightly with black hair.

      As if sensing her scrutiny he suddenly looked up at the balcony she stood on, and Clare quickly ducked back into the room, but not before she had taken in every devastating feature. He had towelled his hair dry on stepping out of the pool, and it now hung in damp waves about his face, as black as night. His brows were the same dark colour, jutting over the deepest blue eyes Clare had ever seen, his lashes long and thick. His nose was long and straight, arrogantly so, his mouth full-lipped, the lower lip sensually so, his jaw square and determined, giving the impression of a haughty disregard for anyone’s wishes but his own. A gold medallion hung about the wide column of his throat, suspended there by a thick, chunky gold chain; even the single piece of jewellery he wore was totally masculine.

      She wanted to go down and join them, to perhaps talk to Rourke Somerville. How jealous Diana would be when she wrote and told her about it! Her friend knew everything about him, his Irish-American parentage, his upbringing in an orphanage until he was sixteen years old, the way he had worked his way up to the top of his profession, until now, at the age of thirty-four, he could pick and choose the parts he played for any fee he demanded.

      In one of the infrequent letters Clare had received from her mother she had been full of praise for her co-star. And it seemed they were still friends, otherwise he wouldn’t have been invited here. She wondered what Perry, her mother’s boy-friend for the last year, would think of that.

      She was in the process of putting on her bikini when the door opened. Already wearing the yellow briefs that matched the top, she had paused to study her body in the full-length mirror before putting on the bra-top. Her breasts were full and pert, the tips rosy peaks, her waist flat and slender, her hips and thighs reed-thin. Until this last year she had had puppy-fat to contend with, and added to her height she had felt like an elephant. Fortunately she had slimmed down, and might even have considered a career in modelling if it weren’t for her full breasts.

      To the man now standing in the doorway she must have looked as if she were blatantly admiring herself. She snatched up the bra of her bikini, clutching it in front of her as she stared at Rourke Somerville in fascinated horror.

      His gaze was frankly appraising as he came farther into the room, closing the door behind him, still wearing only the brief black trunks. ‘I thought I hadn’t imagined you,’ he murmured, his voice having a magical lilt to it that charmed without effort. ‘Where have you been hiding yourself?’ he asked huskily.

      ‘I—Why, nowhere.’ But she wished she could hide herself now, knowing this man had taken in every naked inch of her—and by the glint in his eyes he had liked what he saw!

      He walked slowly over to where she was, unsuccessfully, trying to hide herself, plucking the bikini top out of her nervous fingers, holding her hands down at her sides as he slowly looked at her. The eyes he finally raised to hers had flickering flames lighting their deep blue depths. ‘I’ve certainly never met you before,’ he said throatily.

      Clare licked her lips, not realising how provocative the movement was. ‘You haven’t?’ she delayed, her embarrassment fading, and a languorous warmth starting to invade her lower limbs under his avid gaze, her eyes the colour of rich, molten gold.

      Rourke Somerville smiled, his teeth very white against his tanned skin. ‘I would have remembered you,’ he murmured, releasing her hands to run his fingertips lightly over the flatness of her stomach, a devil entering his eyes as his hands came to rest at the top of her bikini briefs. He laughed softly in his throat as he heard her catch her breath, those sensuous hands moving up towards her breasts now, his gaze fixed firmly on her flushed face, smiling as he watched her reaction to his caresses.

      She flinched as he touched her breasts. Ten years of convent education had not prepared her for the sensuality of this man. The nearest the nuns had ever come to discussing sex had been in the Biology class, and then it had only been mentioned briefly as part of life’s cycle.

      But this man was everything the nuns had ever warned her about in a man—and everything the other girls had ever whispered about in their secret fantasies!

      ‘Please don’t do that!’ She shuddered as his hands resumed their exploration of her lower body.

      He raised heavy lids. ‘Why not?’

      ‘Because—well, because——’

      He shook his head. ‘But I want to touch you. You’re like sunshine, do you know that?’ One of his hands moved to cup her chin, rubbing his thumb caressingly over her lips. ‘Young, fresh, and bright.’

      ‘Please——’

      ‘No need to ask, Sunshine,’ he said huskily, his head bending towards hers. ‘I have no intention of leaving this room until I’ve at least kissed you.’

      Dating boys hadn’t exactly been encouraged at the convent, although Clare had had her fair share of dates. But they had been with boys, boys of her own age, and Rourke Somerville was definitely a man, in every sense of the word.

      As his mouth moved druggingly over hers he pulled her thighs in between his, their bathing suits no barrier to the throb of Rourke’s body, and her lips parted willingly beneath his.

      His hands moved beneath her bikini to cup her heated flesh, moving his thighs against her as he held her steady, leaving her in no doubt of his full arousal.

      Clare panicked. Everything was moving too fast for her inexperience, and she wrenched her mouth away from, his, pushing at his hands. ‘Please—stop!’ She looked at him with darkened eyes. ‘Stop …’ she groaned as his lips moved to the sensitive cord in her throat.

      ‘You don’t really want me to do that,’ he taunted softly. ‘And I don’t want to either.’

      ‘But I do!’ she cried, finally managing to push him away, her breathing heavy as she escaped his arms. Rourke watched the heaving of her breasts until she snatched up the blouse she had worn for the flight, pulling it on over her nakedness.

      Rourke shrugged, making no effort to hide the arousal of his own body. ‘What’s the panic?’ he shrugged.

      She gave him an angry glare. ‘The panic