Praise for Jackie Collins
‘Sex, power and intrigue – no one does it better than Jackie’
—heat
‘A tantalising novel packed with power struggles, greed and sex. This is Collins at her finest’
—Closer
‘Bold, brash, whiplash fast – with a cast of venal rich kids, this is classic Jackie Collins’
—Marie Claire
‘Sex, money, power, murder, betrayal, true love – it’s all here in vintage Collins style. Collins’s plots are always a fabulously involved, intricate affair, and this does not disappoint’
—Daily Mail
‘Her style is pure escapism, her heroine’s strong and ambitious and her men, well, like the book, they’ll keep you up all night!’
—Company
‘A generation of women have learnt more about how to handle their men from Jackie’s books than from any kind of manual… Jackie is very much her own person: a total one off’
—Daily Mail
‘Jackie is still the queen of sexy stories. Perfect’
—OK!
‘Cancel all engagements, take the phone off the hook and indulge yourself’
—Mirror
Also by Jackie Collins
The Power Trip
Married Lovers
Lovers & Players
Deadly Embrace
Hollywood Wives – The New Generation
Lethal Seduction
Thrill!
L.A. Connections – Power, Obsession, Murder, Revenge
Hollywood Kids
American Star
Rock Star
Hollywood Husbands
Lovers & Gamblers
Hollywood Wives
The World Is Full Of Divorced Women
The Love Killers
Sinners
The Bitch
The Stud
Hollywood Divorces
THE SANTANGELO NOVELS
Goddess of Vengeance
Poor Little Bitch Girl
Drop Dead Beautiful
Dangerous Kiss
Vendetta: Lucky’s Revenge
Lady Boss
Lucky
Chances
THE WORLD IS FULL
OF MARRIED MEN
JACKIE COLLINS
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, events or locales, is purely coincidental.
THE WORLD IS FULL OF MARRIED MEN. Copyright © 1968, 1984, 2013 by Chances, Inc.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this work, in whole or part, in any form.
ISBN number: 978-0-9857459-6-7 (paperback)
ISBN number: 978-0-9857459-5-0 (electronic book)
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication
Collins, Jackie. World is Full of Married Men.
I. Title.
PZ4.C7112 Wo3 PR6053.O425 823/.9/14
eBook editions by eBooks by Barb for booknook.biz
Visit Jackie at her website www.jackiecollins.com and follow her on
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Contents
A Note from Jackie
Also by Jackie Collins
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
About the Author
Jackie Recommends…
Jackie's Latest!
For Elsa with all my love
Chapter One
‘When I was fifteen, I was amazing, absolutely amazing! Dear Mummy was terrified to let me out on my own, she felt I was bound to come home pregnant, or something silly like that.’
The speaker was Claudia Parker. The listener was David Cooper. Claudia was in bed. She was a very beautiful girl, and she knew it, and David knew it, so everyone was happy. She had long, shiny ash-blond hair, which fell thickly around her face, and a deep fringe down to her eyebrows, which accentuated her enormous, slanty green eyes. The face was perfect, with a small, straight nose and luscious, full lips. She wore no makeup and no clothes, and was covered by only a thin silk sheet.
David sat at the end of the bed. He was forty and looked it. He had black, slightly curly hair and a well-lined strong face. His nose was rather prominent, and he wore thick, horn-rimmed glasses. He was a masculine-looking man and enjoyed a great deal of success with the opposite sex.
‘So eventually I left home,’ continued Claudia. ‘I mean it was just all too impossible and dreary. One night I sneaked out, never to return. Actually, I met this marvellous boy, an actor, and he brought me to London with him, where I’ve been ever since.’ She sighed and wriggled around under the sheet. ‘Got a cigarette, darling?’
David produced a packet of filter-tips from his dressing-gown pocket and handed one to her. She took a long drag. ‘Want to hear more of my lurid background?’
‘I want to hear everything about you.’
She smiled. ‘You’re so sweet. Not at all dull. I thought when I first saw you, you would turn out to be an absolute bore. But how wrong I was. I’m mad about you!’ She leaned over to where he was sitting. The sheet was left behind as she wound her arms around his neck and started to nibble at his ear. She had a quite fabulous body.
He pushed her back on the bed.
‘Want me, baby?’ she whispered. ‘Want me badly?’
He grunted his assent.
Suddenly she twisted herself free, jumped off the bed, and ran to the door. ‘You’re too much,’ she said, ‘but not now, darling. Maybe you can do it again so soon, but I need a little rest.’ She giggled. ‘I’m going to have a shower, then maybe we can get some lunch out; and then, baby, then we can come back and make it all night long!’
She vanished through the door, and David heard water running in the bathroom.
He thought about Claudia, and the way they had first met. Was it really only three weeks ago? He had had a particularly hard day at the office, and Linda, his wife, had been nagging him about all the extra work he seemed to be doing, and how she never saw him anymore. It was nearly six, and he was just getting ready to leave when Phillip Abbottson darted into his office.
‘Listen, Dave,’ Phillip said, ‘do you have a spare moment to come down to the studio and make a decision for us? We’ve got two girls testing for the Beauty Maid soap product, and it’s a dead heat. We just can’t decide.’
Reluctantly David went with Phillip to the ground-floor studio in the enormous Cooper-Taylor advertising building. It was owned by his uncle, R. P. Cooper, who had two sons, and Sanford Taylor, with no sons but a son-in-law. Therefore, David came sixth in the line of importance, which in a business of such a size was quite important, but not important enough as far as David was concerned. He was in charge of the TV section, and since Beauty Maid soap was to be featured quite heavily on Channel 9, it was necessary to pick the right girl.
They entered the studio, and David immediately spotted her. She was sprawled in a canvas chair, wearing a white terry-cloth robe. Her hair was piled high on her head, and she was eating an apple. The other girl came into focus next. She was chocolate-box pretty, prim, and virginal-looking. However, her figure belied
her face. She had a huge bosom, the largeness of which was emphasized by the flesh-coloured swimsuit she was wearing.
‘What tits!’ muttered Phillip.
‘Is that all you ever think about?’ said David.
Phillip called for silence in the small studio and gestured to the Chocolate Box girl. She made her way onto the small set, where a fake bathroom was located. She climbed daintily into a large, round marble bath, flesh-colour swimsuit and all, and a prop man rushed eagerly over and sprayed her ample proportions with bubbles. Someone else thrust a large bar of soap into her hand, and then Phillip shouted, ‘OK, let’s do it.’
The cameras started to turn, and David watched the scene on a small closed-circuit screen.
The girl flashed a toothy smile at the camera. ‘I’m a Beauty Maid,’ she cooed. She lathered the soap in her hands and spread it luxuriously up her arms, first one, and then the other. ‘Beauty Maid was made for me. It’s so creamy, so smooth, so datable.’ She drew one long leg out of the bubbles and lathered that too. ‘Why don’t you try Beauty Maid, and then you can be a Beauty Maid too!’ She smiled at the camera again and shifted slightly, so that her ample bosom was well in focus.
‘Cut,’ shouted Phillip. ‘Miss Parker now, please.’
David turned to watch as Claudia changed places with the other girl. She had a pantherlike grace all her own. Her voice was low and sexy as she read her lines. When she was finished, she casually shrugged her way back into her robe and went and sat down. Chocolate Box still bounced around the set.
‘The Parker girl,’ David said to Phillip. ‘No contest.’
As he left the set, Claudia caught his eye. She smiled, and he felt a hint of promise in her smile. He returned to his office, packed up a few papers, called Linda to say he would be home for dinner, and then left.
Claudia was standing outside the building.
‘Hello,’ she said. ‘Small world.’
They talked for a few minutes about the tests, and Beauty Maid soap, and the weather, and then David suggested dinner. Claudia said she thought that was a divine idea.
They went to an intimate Italian restaurant in Chelsea, where David knew he was unlikely to be spotted by any of his or Linda’s friends. He called Linda on the phone and made his excuses. She sounded upset but understanding. Claudia called a boyfriend and cancelled him out. They ate cannelloni and talked and held hands, and there it all began.
Suddenly Claudia returned from the bathroom. ‘Darling, what have you been doing?’ she questioned.
David pulled her down on the bed. ‘Thinking about you, and how you picked me up.’
‘It’s not true!’ she protested. ‘You’re just a dirty old man who fancied me as soon as you saw me in that bath!’ She was wearing her white terry-cloth robe again. David ran his hands underneath it. She shivered. The phone rang. ‘Saved by the bell,’ she giggled and rolled over to answer it. It was her agent.
David dressed slowly, watching her all the time. She spoke animatedly on the phone, occasionally pausing to stick out a small pink tongue at him. Finally she hung up. ‘Oh, you’re dressed,’ she said accusingly. ‘I’ve got simply marvellous news. I have an interview with Conrad Lee tomorrow. He’s over here looking for a completely new face to star in his latest film; it’s all about the Virgin Mary or something. Anyway, I’m to see him tomorrow night at six, in his suite at the Plaza Carlton. Isn’t that exciting?’
David wasn’t pleased. ‘Why do you have to see him at night? What’s wrong with during the day?’
‘Baby, don’t be so silly. My God, if he wants to get laid, he can get it just as well in the morning as any other time.’ She marched crossly over to the dressing table and meticulously started to apply her makeup.
‘All right. I’m sorry I spoke. I just don’t know why you want this stupid career of yours. Why don’t you—’
‘Why don’t I what?’ she interrupted coldly. ‘Give it all up and marry you? And what do you suggest we do with your wife and kids, and all your other various family entanglements?’
He was silent.
‘Look, baby.’ Her voice softened. ‘I don’t bug you about things, so just forget it. You don’t own me, and I don’t own you, and that’s the way it should be.’ She applied lip gloss with a flourish. ‘I’m starving. What about lunch?’
They went to their little Italian restaurant and good humour was restored.
‘Sunday’s such a dreary day,’ said Claudia. ‘It just sort of sags along.’ She drank her red wine with relish and smiled at the short, fat proprietor, who grinned happily back. ‘Do you know, everyone believes they are beautiful; I’m sure of it. They look in the mirror, and they see two eyes, a nose, and a mouth, and that’s it, they think – what a gas!’
Her laughter lit up the restaurant, and David laughed with her. She was such a beautiful, vital girl. He had had affairs outside marriage before, but this was different; this time, for the first time, he wished he was free.
‘I met this man once,’ said Claudia. ‘He promised me a yacht in the south of France, a villa in Cuba, lots of jewels and all that jazz, and then he just disappeared. I heard later he was a spy and got shot. Isn’t life funny?’
After lunch they drove through the West End looking for a film they would like to see.
‘Look at all those nuts,’ exclaimed Claudia, watching a large procession heading toward Trafalgar Square. ‘Can you imagine spending all your spare time rushing around tying yourself to embassies, and sitting down all over the place? And all the fellas have beards. I wonder why.’ She snuggled up closer to David. ‘Let’s forget about the movie. Let’s go back to my place and screw. I feel like getting laid again, don’t you?’
Who was he to argue?
Chapter Two
BAN THE BOMB, the banner attached to the stout lady’s back announced quite clearly.
PEACE EVERYWHERE, declared a large notice held aloft by a bearded young man.
END NUCLEAR WARFARE, stated a ragged piece of cardboard clutched gamely by a harassed woman, also clutching two scruffy-looking children by the hand.
This group, along with several hundred others, marched slowly into Trafalgar Square. Many had arrived before them, and there was a milling crowd around Nelson’s Column and the fountains.
Linda Cooper was already there. She was squashed between an earnest-looking group of young girls with long, untidy hair and grubby-looking outfits, and a bespectacled gentleman who kept up a constant muttering to himself.
Linda was an attractive woman in her early thirties, with short auburn hair partly concealed beneath a chiffon scarf. She wore a cream Chanel suit which looked out of place in the company she was with. One would imagine that ten years earlier she had been very pretty indeed, but the prettiness had been replaced with an expression of resignation. There were little lines, a certain amount of tiredness, and slightly too much makeup, but the overall effect was attractive.
She glanced around. It seemed funny to be standing there, part of the crowd, without David. It was so seldom that she did anything or went anywhere without him, but more and more lately there had been long business trips and late meetings, and he seemed to have become so completely involved in his work, almost to the exclusion of all else. She sighed. It was only by chance really that she was at the meeting today. David was away, and suddenly she felt she must get out of the house and do something different for a change. The children were in the country with her parents for the weekend. She had declined to go, thinking that David would be home, but at the last moment he had had to rush off as usual. She had found herself alone, and eventually decided she couldn’t bear to sit around the house all day, so she had phoned Monica and Jack and they had asked her over to lunch. But it was a mistake; they were really David’s friends from his bachelor days, and she always sensed a certain forced gaiety about them, a sort of ‘so David finally married you’ attitude, ‘well, he could have done worse.’ After an hour and a half she excused herself on the pretext that she had
to get home, there was so much to be done before the children arrived. What, she could not imagine, but Monica and Jack didn’t argue, so she left.
It was while she was driving home that she noticed the marchers and the banners and the crowds, and on impulse she parked her Mini in a side street and made her way into Trafalgar Square, which appeared to be the general gathering point.
It was a subject she had often thought about and secretly wished that she could be part of. To protest seemed the very least one could do, if not for oneself, for one’s children.
The end of an era was taking place. Nineteen sixty-nine and people were speaking out. She wanted to be one of them.
The bespectacled man standing beside her suddenly looked at his watch. ‘It’s three o’clock,’ he announced excitedly.
There was a sudden surge forward of the crowd, and a general shouting and yelling. Small groups of people seemed to disintegrate from the mass and rush toward the road, where they promptly sat down in front of the traffic. Linda was carried forward with the crush and found herself near the edge of the pavement. There were a lot of policemen pushing and dragging and lifting the squatters from the road. As soon as one person was removed, another immediately took his place. The mob was delighted. They chanted various slogans and cheered and booed the police. The large blue police vans gradually began to fill up, but undaunted, new squatters appeared.
Linda felt marvellous. ‘Ban the Bomb,’ she shouted. She was protesting about the bomb. She was actually involved in a meeting of worldwide interest. She was, in a minute way, helping to protect the future of her children. It was an exciting experience.
‘Ban the Bomb,’ joined in the people near her.
‘Come on, darlin’.’ A dark-haired young man grabbed her by the arm, and together they rushed onto the road. They sat in the face of an oncoming taxi, and the irate taxi driver growled, ‘Bloody barmy, the lot of ’em.’
Linda had a feeling of complete exhilaration, and then a pink-faced constable was grabbing her under the arms and pulling her to the side of the road. She started to struggle and another policeman joined them and took hold of her legs. There was a moment of immodesty as she felt her skirt hike up above her knees and then they unceremoniously dumped her back on the pavement.