Sweet Vixen

'It's part of my job to know what's going on.' Perhaps the conversation could be steered on to more conventional lines. She must remember what Julie said about him, albeit in rather exaggerated terms: 'He's life or death for us, sweetie. We don't need the extra aggro that antagonis­ing him could give us. Be nice next time you see him.' Sarah would as lief be as nice to a tiger. This one had intelligence as well as speed and strength; a wicked combination.

'Then you didn't do your job very well this morning, did you?' he replied, not diverted. 'There were circumstances . . .'

'Julie explained,' he cut her off. 'What conclusions did you come to then, about me, from your file?'

'None,' she lied. 'I prefer to make my own judgements.'

'So do I. That's what I'm doing now.’ Just the kind of remark to set her at her ease! 'Do you like your job?'

'Yes.' He must know that already if he had listened to her conversation with Tom Forest.

'Ambitious?'

'In what way?' she asked carefully. 'How many ways are there?'

Sarah licked her lips. Why couldn't she treat him as she did any other person showing a casual interest in her job?

'I suppose I'm ambitious in that I want to be the best at what I do.'

'That's not ambition, that's human nature. Ambition is needing to be the best. According to Julie you're the best Editorial Assistant she's ever had, and that includes her stints in New York and Paris.'

His voice was slightly dry and Sarah searched his face for signs of sarcasm. There were none. Mind you, he was only repeating what Julie said, not complimenting her.

'She demands a lot and usually gets it,' Sarah said, giving credit where it was due. 'Julie's taught me practi­cally everything I know.'

'I doubt whether modesty was included.' That touched a chord of humour in Sarah but she didn't let herself smile. 'What about writing? If not being a journalist precludes you from editorship—' he had been listening '—do you not feel your job self-limiting?'

'No. There are other directions. I didn't want to be a writer, I still don't.'

'No talent?'

'No inclination.' Annoyed. Writing was like offering up a part of yourself on a platter for the world to pick over. Sarah had never even been tempted.

'Then you don't have any frustrated ambitions?'

'Why should I? Ambition isn't everything.'

'It is if there's nothing else,' he murmured and Sarah met his enigmatic gaze. Once again she had the feeling that for him, for the moment, she didn't exist. Had she imagined that faint bleakness?

'Well, I suppose wanting to be happy is an ambition, and in that sense everyone is ambitious,' she said slowly, looking out of the window at her elbow. The view was quite spectacular, the city below settling into dusk, lights beginning to prick on in the streets which criss-crossed down to Quay Street and the bright port illuminations. Over on the North Shore, beyond the out-flung arm of the harbour bridge, comfortable suburbia was also lighting up and to her right Sarah could see the shadowy hulk of Rangitoto Island receding into the darkening sky.

Unconsciously, Sarah's voice had contained the gentle reassurance that she had so often used when Simon was suffering from bouts of inadequacy, real and imagined. It was an automatic response that would have worried and disturbed her if she had realised she was doing it. She didn't, but the man opposite did, and was struck by the irony of this odd, prickly female offering him reassurance. His curiosity was aroused, too.

'That most difficult of all ambitions to achieve,' he said, prompting softly.

Yes. And the most fleetingly held. It ran like dry sand between your fingers . . . one moment you had it warm and soft in your hand, the next it was gone. Sarah's happiness with Simon had been like that. And now she had found a new, different kind of happiness. Content­ment. But already she could hear the rustling flurries of a rising wind that threatened to disturb it. Nothing stayed the same, no matter how much you wanted it to.

'Don't you think so?'

'I—' With a shock Sarah realised that she had nearly said what she was thinking, spoken the unspoken fear out loud. The shutters dropped immediately and the eyes which had been almost sea-green became hard as pebbles.

'Perhaps.'

'Perhaps?' His mouth twisted. 'You don't want to agree with me but you don't like to disagree. I think I preferred it when you were spitting at me, at least you were being honest.'

'There are times when honesty defers to diplomacy,' said Sarah undiplomatically, still agitated by the way he got under her skin.

'Fortunately I'm not hampered by any such restriction. Tell me, do you deliberately dress like that or is it merely innate bad taste?'