Taming The Tabloid Heiress. Michele Dunaway
and distributes the show. He bought Joshua’s pilot.” Paula didn’t even turn around.
“Oh.” Kit leaned back in her chair. Frustrated that she wouldn’t know until tomorrow, she studied the crowd of people who called themselves LaFrofans. Second only to Trekkies in their loyalty and devotion, Kit knew that each had shelled out at least $1,000 to come on the cruise. The room was about 60 percent women, and many of them were obviously with husbands or significant others. The participants’ ages ranged from a few women Kit’s age to some appearing about seventy, with the average age somewhere around late thirties to early forties.
A confused awareness suddenly caused her spine to prickle. Someone was looking at her. Kit swiveled around in her seat to look behind her, her gaze instantly connecting with that of the man from the plane.
What in the world was he doing here? He stood watching her from the doorway, the look of surprise on his face quickly masked. He didn’t even have the decency to turn away. Instead he continued his obvious stare, a slight sardonic smile turning his full lips upward. Kit straightened her back when his raised eyebrows signaled his amusement, and then, after a haughty shake of her head, she turned forward again.
“What is it, Kit?” Georgia frowned. “Is anything wrong?”
“Uh, no. I just saw some guy I sat next to on the plane.” Whoever the man from the plane was, she could not acknowledge him now. It was better to pretend they’d never met. She had a job to do.
“Georgia!” Paula’s whisper seemed to echo, and Kit started. “Look! There! In the doorway! Look!”
Georgia turned around, as did just about everyone else in the vicinity of Paula’s loud whisper.
“Oh, my God! Oh, my God! It’s him!” Georgia’s voice came out in a breathless rush, and Kit thought Georgia was about to have a major heart attack.
The buzz hummed loudly in the room, and Georgia began babbling about how good he looked in black, and as the room erupted into a thunder of cheers and clapping, the man from the plane strode easily into the room and joined Bill Davies on the dance floor. Fans jumped to their feet, but Kit stayed rooted to her chair, doomed.
Oh, my God, Kit mentally repeated Georgia’s words, but with dread instead of enthusiasm. The man from the plane was none other than Joshua Parker, the man her roommates fawned over. Kit’s mortification flared. She’d never expected to see him again, the man she’d shared sexual innuendoes with. Yet here he was, and worse, he was someone famous!
Somewhere she must have crossed a leprechaun, because she certainly didn’t have the luck of her Irish ancestors.
“Sorry, Kit,” Georgia said, breathlessly fanning herself with her hand. “Every time I see him I can’t believe a man can be that beautiful. He’s been our idol since a group of us saw him at a convention eight years ago. I just can’t believe I didn’t sense him—he looks so wonderful in black. Don’t you think so?”
He’d look much better somewhere else. “He looks great,” Kit lied with a nod, inwardly seething behind her perfect poker face. She took a long, slow swallow from her glass, letting the cheap wine burn its way like bitter medicine down her throat. She’d almost accepted this man’s proposition, and worse, he knew she’d considered it.
Now here he was in front of her! Obviously comfortable in his environment of being center stage, Joshua easily answered questions and told light jokes. Kit had to give him credit, when he was with an audience he was a true performer, and they loved him.
He had changed again. This time he wore a simple black long-sleeved shirt and black weekend trousers. Both failed to hide his well-toned, lithe, six-foot body, and Kit could see why the women in the room were absolutely crazy about him. Not only had he given them their favorite television show, but he was gorgeous to boot.
Because of the lounge’s lighting, auburn highlights shimmered and danced through his hair. And those lips. Those lips that had so sexily asked her if she had ever made love on a plane.
Despite her resolve to be nonchalant and impassive, Kit wanted to drop right through the floor. If she had known she was going to see him again she never would have answered him the way she had on the plane.
As if he had a sixth sense of her scrutiny, Joshua turned and looked directly at her. He saluted her with his eyes, sending his straight brows arching upward gently before they turned downward at the corner.
Kit returned his gaze of devilish delight with a haughty, dismissive stare. The corner of his mouth tilted upward in secret amusement, and Kit watched a grin rake across his face. Then he broke eye contact and whispered something to Bill Davies.
Kit took another long, slow sip of her wine. He still could be a cowboy, she thought, massaging her battered ego. He had the primal, all-male desperado look, despite his wearing dress shoes and not cowboy boots.
Kit idly fingered her now-empty wineglass. She wasn’t sure how that happened, and she looked up in time to catch a small, self-satisfied smile crossing Joshua’s face. For a brief moment Kit felt challenged, and she concentrated on the introductions Bill Davies was making as the Last Frontier actors began to cluster together on the stage.
“Fellow LaFrofans, now that you’ve met everyone, we’re about to get started. Tonight is simply one big happy party. Mingle with your Last Frontier family and enjoy the evening. We have only one request. There are over eight hundred fans on the cruise, and over five hundred in here tonight. Please, no autographs. We have a long autograph session scheduled tomorrow, and we promise you will get as many as you need then. Tonight let’s just dance, drink and be decadent! Joshua?”
Joshua stopped whispering to the people Kit guessed to be the various actors and took the microphone from Bill’s outstretched hand.
“Thanks, Bill.” His voice was low and seductively husky. Given the collective sigh reverberating throughout the lounge, Kit figured that half the women in the room must have believed that they had died and gone to heaven. Knots formed in her shoulders as he continued.
“Tonight we’ve decided to start the fan cruise off on the right foot.” His French-Canadian accent caused her stomach to plummet. She took a sip from the new glass of wine in front of her. Not knowing what she was up against, some liquid courage couldn’t hurt.
“Each of the members of the Last Frontier family are going to go out into the audience like this.” Joshua threaded his way past several tables and moved to stand inches from Kit. “We’re each going to dance with one of the fans to start the evening. In the middle of the song, the DJ will invite the rest of you to join us on the dance floor.”
Kit didn’t know which was worse, the fact everyone was staring at her or the fact that Georgia was fanning herself with her hand and hyperventilating simply because Joshua Parker was standing behind Kit’s chair. Kit’s stomach churned, and for the first time in her life she understood fear-induced nausea.
“May I have this dance?”
Kit froze like a deer in the headlights. Despite her shock, her mouth opened. A “no” started to form but never materialized as Joshua’s strong and demanding fingers closed over hers. His firm grip burned, sending waves of desire pulsating through her.
Kit pulled to free herself from his tenacious grip, but instead Paula and Georgia gave her a helpful shove that sent her right into his waiting arms. Joshua smiled and passed the microphone to a steward, who appeared from nowhere. The touch of his fingertips against her elbow felt like a flame as he led her to the dance floor.
The lights dimmed, and the first song was a soft, almost waltz-like wedding reception number. Her concentration evaporated when Joshua Parker expertly took her hands. Years of dance classes came in handy, and she moved automatically while he held her at a polite distance. Laughter and squeals of delight reached her ears as other cast members retrieved their dance partners. Kit gritted her teeth and reminded herself that she had been in trickier spots before and survived the experiences. Barely, but she’d survived.
“You did this deliberately.”