Fire in the Blood

She remembered how he could forget everything but work, too obsessed to think of such mundane things as food, let alone her or any arrangement he might have made to meet her. Time had hardened his face: there was no spare flesh over that tough bone-structure, and there were some lines around his mouth and eyes that had not been there before.

He was still a magnetically attractive man, though: tall, slim-hipped, long-legged, dark, with brooding dark blue eyes and a strong, passionate mouth.

Their eyes met and held, and she felt a stab of such pain that she almost cried out with it.

Huskily, she said, 'I'd better go, I don't want to be late... goodbye, Sean...'

She didn't wait to hear his reply, she just fled, across the marble-floored foyer, towards the reception desk, where she muttered her name and was told to wait until Mr Erroll's assistant came down to escort her to the studio where they would be filming.

She had been nervous about the audition for a week, and meeting Sean on the way in hadn't helped, but Greg Erroll did his best to put her at her ease. He was one of the top men in television: an elegant, slightly built man in his

early forties, who dressed formally in a dark grey suit and a crisp striped red and white shirt. He had a bland face which was deceptive; it was his piercingly intelligent grey eyes that warned you about the real man behind the calm facade.

Nadine was so tense that she blurted out, 'I've never been able to act, I'm afraid!' and Greg Erroll smiled soothingly at her.

'We don't want you to act, Nadine. We want you to be yourself, which is much harder than it sounds. Some people stiffen up in front of a camera, but I don't think you're going to do that because you're used to cameras, you feel at home with them, don't you?'

'After seven years of modelling I ought to!' she said, relaxing a little, conscious of the fact that the two cameras in the studio were focused on her at that moment, for she was able to see herself on the screen standing to one side. They had found her best side, the right one: she watched them exploring the height of her cheekbones, her faintly slanted hazel eyes, her wide, full mouth, closing in on her skin, showing every pore. Nadine watched with professional interest; her face was so familiar to her that she could view it quite impersonally as if it belonged to someone else.

'How does it feel to be so beautiful?' Greg Erroll asked, and she laughed, giving him a startled look.

'I'm not, though.' She was quite sincere in that, gesturing to her image on the screen. 'Look at my eyes—they're such a weird colour, nothing in particular, not green or brown or blue, a sort of mixture of all of them. I hate that, and I've always wished I had hair of a different colour; either black or blonde. My nose is much too thin, too long... and my mouth is much too big, it unbalances the rest of my face.'

He listened, smiling in his bland, dry fashion. 'So how do you explain your success as a model?'

'I've no idea, I've often wondered. Probably just luck. I started with such a brilliant photographer, Jamie Colbert—I owe my whole career to Jamie.' She broke off, looking around the studio at the clutter of electric cables, overhead tracking-lights, screens, cameras. 'Sorry, I'm talking too much; you want to start the audition, I expect.'

'We have started,' Greg said, looking amused. 'But now I want to swap chairs with you, Nadine.' He stood up, and she automatically did so too, a little puzzled. 'Sit here,' he said, and she obediently sat in his vacated chair. Greg looked up at a cameraman. 'OK for you, Rodney?'

'Could we move her a fraction to the right?'

Nadine began to shift her chair. Greg stopped her. 'Far enough.' He looked up at the cameraman again. 'How's that?'

'Back a bit,' Rodney said, and Nadine shifted again. 'Stop there!' Rodney told her. 'That's it. Perfect.'

They went through a similar check with the sound man, and the lighting man, who discovered a sheen on her forehead, a sudden outburst of perspiration, no doubt, due to nerves, which meant calling up the make-up girl to dab her temples with powder. At last, everyone was satisfied, and then Greg Erroll handed her a piece of paper.

'Now, Nadine, I want you to interview me. I've jotted down a few notes on myself; read it through and then we'll start.'

Nadine had known that she would be expected to do a dummy run of an interview, but she had imagined that she would be given far more time to read a profile of him, and think of some questions to ask, rehearse a little before they did it for real. Dry-mouthed, she looked down at the scribbled sheet and was relieved that she could at least read his writing. She read it through hurriedly, then again, more slowly, absorbing the information and surprised by some of it. She had had no idea, for instance, that Greg Erroll, had gone to a stage school as a boy, before going on to university; or that he had been married twice and had one child, a daughter.

'Ready?' Greg said, after the shortest five minutes in her life; and, taking a deep breath, Nadine nodded.

It was a baptism of fire, but because it was all so casual she found it easier than she had anticipated. She was nervous as she started, but once she and Grieg were talking the questions came naturally because she was genuinely interested in him. He answered fluently most of the time, but once or twice clammed up, refusing to answer a question; and Nadine hurriedly went on to another topic, refusing to be thrown by the sudden blockage.

Greg suddenly called a halt, smiling as he got up. 'OK, that's it. Thanks, Nadine. I usually hate being interviewed, but with you it was fun.'

She stood up, too, a little shaky now that it was all over. 'Have we finished?' She couldn't believe it; the time had gone so fast. Huskily, she asked, 'How did I do? Was it OK?'

'I can't tell you until I've seen the run-through,' Greg told her cheerfully. 'Come on, I'll walk you to Reception.'

She had a sinking feeling that she hadn't impressed him, was not going to get the job.

'I have a few other people to look at before I make a decision,' he told her gently. 'But I won't keep you waiting for too long, I promise.'

Who else was he seeing? she wondered, but couldn't ask, of course. So she smiled hard and nodded.

'I understand.'