Chloe was so startled by the greeting, she almost lost her grip on the ledge, which formed a seat at the deep end. Her head jerked up. She’d thought there was no-one on the terrace, that she had the pool to herself, but it was Max’s voice. Max was here. He stood barely a metre away, and her heart started hammering as her stunned mind registered the fantastic body of the man-naked but for a brief black swimming costume that left very little to the imagination.
He had the physique of an Olympic swimmer, broad shoulders and chest, strong arms, every male muscle impressively delineated, lean waist and hips, powerful thighs and calves, and his tanned skin gleamed as though it was polished. It was all so in her face, she couldn’t find the breath to speak.
He smiled apologetically. ‘Sorry to startle you. I was reading the newspapers under the pergola.’ He waved to where he’d been sitting. ‘When I heard you swimming, I thought I’d refresh myself, as well. Mind if I join you?’
‘No. No, of course not,’ she gabbled. It was his pool.
‘Did you sleep well?’
‘Yes. Like a baby.’ She grimaced at the phrase, reminded of the baby Laura would have, the baby she had been denied.
He saw the grimace and frowned. ‘Everything all right for you in the guest house?’
‘Perfect,’ she assured him, smiling to wipe out his concern.
‘Good!’ He grinned. ‘Let’s swim.’
He dived into the pool, barely making a splash and broke surface almost halfway down it, moving straight into a classic crawl. Chloe hitched herself onto the underwater seat and watched him as he swam the length and back again, using the few minutes trying to stop her heart from racing and her mind from dwelling on the fact that Maximilian Hart left every other man for dead when it came to physical attraction.
Tony’s physique was well-proportioned but it didn’t have that much male power. Amazingly, her mind hadn’t been churning over Tony and Laura since she’d been here. It was as though they had drifted off to a far distance and she was already immersed in an existence without them. Was it because Max put himself between her and them, blotting them out with his overwhelming presence, or was it the effect of the children’s house, giving her such pleasant distraction?
Both had played their part.
She was safe from the others if she stayed here, safe from horrible, hurtful arguments with Tony, safe from the pressure her mother would apply with every bit of emotional blackmail she could concoct.
But was she safe with a shark?
The thought popped into her mind as Max finished cutting through the water and hauled himself onto the seat beside her, his dark brilliant eyes teasing as he asked, ‘Did I scare you off swimming?’
She laughed to hide the tension triggered by his nearness. ‘No way could I keep up with you.’
‘I’ll go slow,’ he promised.
‘A very leisurely pace.’
‘You’ve got it.’
She plunged into the water ahead of him, wanting the activity to calm her down, soothe her twitching nerve ends. Max wasn’t coming onto her. He was just being himself. Besides, he had Shannah Lian. Of course she was safe with him.
They swam several lengths of the pool together. It was impossible not to be acutely aware of the man beside her, but Chloe managed to put the situation in enough perspective to feel reasonably comfortable with his company when she called a halt at the shallow end where she’d left her towel.
‘Enough?’ he asked.
‘For now,’ she answered, walking up the steps, so conscious of her own body under his gaze, she quickly snatched up her towel and wrapped it around her.
‘I hate to put a dampener on the day, but I think you should see what Lisa Cox has written in the entertainment section of her Sunday newspaper,’ he said as he followed her out of the pool.
She swung around in dismay. ‘Is it bad?’
‘Somewhat sensational,’ he answered sardonically, waving towards the eastern pergola. ‘Come and read it for yourself. I’ll pour you a cool drink that might make it more palatable.’
She fell into step with him as he headed back to where he’d sat, anxiety and apprehension overriding most of her awareness of his almost naked state. Nevertheless, when they reached the welcome shade of the pergola, she was relieved that he picked up a towel from one of the loungers and tucked it around his waist.
The newspapers were on a nearby table, which also held a tray with some long glasses and a cooler bag, obviously containing a pitcher of whatever liquid Max was going to serve her. He moved to the table, drew out one of the chairs for her, then tapped the top newspaper as he reached for the cooler bag.
‘This one. Take a seat, Chloe.’ He busied himself opening the bag and removing a large jug of fruit juice while he talked. ‘Apparently Tony broke the story. Out of spite, I should think, after the removalists had left to transport your personal possessions here. He’d demanded what authority they had and they’d shown him the fax, giving this address.’
Maximilian Hart’s mansion at Vaucluse…it was a big step up from the apartment at Randwick, while Tony was out in the cold, fired from the script-writing team, and powerless to stop what was happening. Chloe could see him wanting to do something spiteful, yet how could he exonerate his own behaviour?
‘Lisa Cox telephoned me late yesterday afternoon to get confirmation of your presence on my property and my comment on it,’ Max went on. ‘She wanted to speak to you, as well, but I’d left you reasonably happy in the children’s house and didn’t think you’d want to be stirred up by nasty innuendos, so I told her you were unavailable.’
He poured the juice into two glasses and sat one in front of her, a flash of inquisitive appeal in his eyes. ‘I hope you don’t mind my running interference for you with Lisa.’
She shook her head. ‘I’m sure you handled the situation better than I would have.’
He shrugged and took the chair opposite hers, the expression in his eyes changing to a hard, ruthless gleam as he flatly stated, ‘I told her the truth.’ His mouth twisted cynically and his voice took on a mocking tone. ‘Tony had reported that you’d left him for me, omitting the salient facts like his infidelity and impregnating your personal assistant. I laid them out and apparently your mother has confirmed them, while hitting out at me for taking you away when you should be with her, being comforted as only a mother can comfort in such stressful circumstances. She made no mention of having her services as your agent terminated.’
Chloe grimaced at his summary of Tony’s and her mother’s spin on what had happened. ‘I’m sorry, Max. I did warn you there’d be a backlash to protecting me as you have.’
‘Makes me more determined to keep doing so.’ His eyes flashed intensity of purpose at her. ‘You need a complete break from them, Chloe. Best that you stay here the two months, avoid all aggravation. As I said, it’s no problem for me if you do, and it will hold you clear of them so you can work out your own future.’
He liked being in charge of a battle zone, Chloe thought. A born warrior. And she liked being protected by him. Probably too much. But she could learn how best to stand up for herself from him.
‘I’d better read the whole thing,’ she muttered, opening up the newspaper and lifting out the entertainment section.
The story was headlined Maximilian Hart’s Star Hit by Scandal. It held much more detail than Max had given; rantings from Tony about Max taking her over, using his power to alienate her from their marriage; her mother taking a similar stance, saying Max had inserted himself between mother and daughter with no regard for what was appropriate or what was in Chloe’s best interests. They more or less painted him as a ruthless manipulator, which wasn’t the truth at all.
Max had stated the truth-that she’d been deeply shocked and distressed by the disclosure at the launch party that her husband had been having an affair with her trusted personal assistant who was now pregnant to him, and she hadn’t wanted to go home to either her husband or her mother, so he’d offered her his guest house as a ready refuge where she was welcome to stay as long as she liked. The story ended, saying Chloe Rollins had not been available for comment.
‘You could sue them for slander over the things they’ve said about you,’ she murmured fretfully.
‘Irrelevant,’ he said carelessly, then shot her an ironic smile. ‘Much better not to give them a stage to star on. Let them fade into insignificance as the show moves on.’
Chloe returned some irony of her own. ‘You know what the most sickening part is? Both my mother and Tony talked me out of having a baby because starring in your show was more important.’
His gaze dropped from hers as he frowned over this new information.
‘I guess you wouldn’t have wanted me if I had been pregnant,’ she put to him, interpreting his frown as confirmation that her mother and Tony had been right about that.
He shook his head. ‘Nothing would have changed my determination to star you in that particular vehicle.’ His eyes targeted hers again with their riveting power. ‘If you had been pregnant, Chloe, I would have had the storyline altered to accommodate it.’
‘Really?’
His mouth twitched with amusement at her wide-eyed wonderment. ‘Really.’
‘Then they were wrong.’ It was weird how much satisfaction that gave her, as though it totally vindicated her current course of action. ‘Not that it matters,’ she added. ‘It would be a worse mess now if I had got pregnant, with Tony fooling around with Laura behind my back. And I bet my mother knew about it, too. Nothing escapes her eye.’
‘I’d say that was a fair assumption,’ Max dryly commented. ‘She showed no outrage or disgust over their behaviour when I confronted them at the hotel. Only anger over the boat being rocked.’
Anger…Chloe winced, having been belittled by it too many times. And she’d always hated the strident way her mother dealt with other people, even with the man sitting opposite her, making sure she saw and covered all the angles. It was an agent’s job, but the manner in which it was done…Chloe imagined Max had quite enjoyed severing the business connection with her mother. It was a huge relief to feel free of it herself.
She sipped her drink, noticing that Max seemed to have drifted into a private reverie, gazing out across the pool, his eyes narrowed as though he was thinking through a problem, assessing its effects, how to deal with it. After a few minutes, he turned to her with a curious, inquisitive look.
‘Tell me…you’re only twenty-seven, Chloe…are you desperate for a baby?’
She flushed, embarrassed at having babbled on about having one, knowing many women waited until their early thirties before starting a family. ‘Not desperate, no,’ she quickly denied, then with a rueful little shrug, confessed, ‘I just wanted to have something I knew was real in my life. My mother would twist things around. Tony did, too. But a baby…well, there’s nothing more honest about a baby, is there?’
