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Chapter 53 - Chapter 50

'I'd like to do the interview with you today.' He sounded annoyed himself and Paula wasn't missing anything at all; her face was tragic.

'Two o'clock,' Kip said tersely, glancing over his shoulder, and then he walked off with every line of his body showing temper.

'He dotes on you,' Ray observed wickedly, his eyes keenly on Neil's face. 'He's terrified something will happen to you.'

It was obvious what he was doing and Natalie was totally fed up with being piggy-in-the-middle. She rounded on him with flashing green eyes.

'Look, just shut up and let's get going!' If she dared not say it to Kip at least she could take it out on Ray and his wide grin acknowledged it.

'Just an observation,' he quipped. 'Let's roll.'

As they drove over the dam, Kip's car was parked across the other side of the road. He had been careful to place himself well out of any possible shot, having seen Natalie's photographs, but he was watching them all the same and Natalie tried her level best to look as if she wasn't standing up in the back.

Paula was driving and Neil was working out his commentary, which would be superimposed later in the studio. He might as well have stayed behind today, Natalie thought bitterly. He liked to be on the spot,

though, to get the most out of the commentary, and after all he was supposed to be producing this.

She carefully held the boom clear of the camera, picking up the sound of the dam, lifting it to catch the sound of a bird that screeched in the air high above them and then lowering it again. It was hard work and needed care but all the same she seemed to see Kip's eyes burning into her angrily as they passed and it took all her resolution not to simply gaze back at him as tragically as Paula was looking this morning.

By the time two o'clock came around they were well on their way. Natalie and Ray were used to working together; they also had a very friendly working relationship, and Natalie was pleased to have as little as possible to do with Neil. Today if he so much as spoke out of turn she didn't know how she was going to hold her tongue.

Of course, having done very little, he grumbled that they had to break off to interview Kip, and Natalie could see trouble brewing there. Kip was not the sort of man to shrug any churlishness off as just one of those things. If Neil couldn't pull himself together and act with his customary smiling skill then Kip would simply walk off and leave them to it—end of interview.

'He's jealous,' Ray pointed out when she muttered her fears to him. 'Our boy likes to have his cake and eat it too. It's making him wild to see you with Kip Forsythe.'

'There's nothing between us,' Natalie protested, but he simply looked at her scathingly and did some muttering of his own.

'Then you're crazy. If I wanted you in bed as much as he does I'd drag you there by the hair.'

'For heaven's sake!' Natalie blushed bright red and Ray leered in satisfaction.

'The trouble with you, Natalie, is that you never grew up. The world is different now from the days of Grandma. Grasp your happiness while you can.'

'And the same to you,' Natalie said tartly.

'My happiness is engaged,' he murmured, his wicked smile dying, and she felt simply awful and mean.

'Oh, I'm sorry, Ray. I wish we'd never come out here.'

'An oversimplified solution. I'm staring my problem in the face daily. The venue isn't significant.'

Somehow it shocked her into comparing happiness with happiness. If Kip didn't love her, at least he wanted her. She had no doubt at all about that and, against all her instincts, she believed him about Annette. Ray was daily facing his torture. She should be more light-hearted about things. At least she could be pleasant to Kip. She was happy enough in his company if she could just control the urge to throw herself into his arms. They even talked the same language, liked the same things, both being devoted to their work.

Her new reflections showed on her face when they met him for the interview, and she had already planned that, to get the maximum impact out of it.

'I thought if we started with Kip standing against the dam and then cut to the actual workings of the dam we could kill two birds with one stone,' she said brightly, smiling at Kip, to his utter mystification.

His eyes narrowed and no doubt he was busily working out what she was up to but she saw his hps quirk with an amusement that was reflected in his eyes and she knew he had not the slightest qualm that whatever she threw at him he could handle.