Phoenix Falling by Mary Jo Putney Read Free Book Online Page B

where the costume designer was supervising as her assistants tucked and tacked a low-cut chemise and frothing, lace-trimmed petticoats around Rainey. The effect was deliciously provocative even though the garments covered her far more thoroughly than modern clothing.
    "Your unmentionables look very authentic," he observed.
    Rainey grinned. "I'll bet you learned a lot about period undies when you did work for the BBC. These have to be right since they're going to appear on camera."
    The knowledge that he would peel that chemise from her slim body accelerated his pulse, even though there would be a production crew present when that happened. "Making a television version of Les Liaisons Dangereuses was a graduate course in eighteenth-century lingerie. In the process I learned that it's powerfully arousing to remove layer after layer to find the hidden woman."
    "Really? I thought men found it powerfully arousing when females wear only about two ounces of nylon."
    "That, too."
    A young female assistant wrapped a boned corset around Rainey and began tightening the laces. "Now we'll fit the ball gown over this, Miss Marlowe."
    Rainey gasped as the corset tightened. "I may die of suffocation!"
    "There's a trick to corsets," Kenzie said. "Inhale deeply while she pulls the laces, and you'll have an inch or so more room in the gown."
    She promptly sucked in a lungful of air to expand her chest and waist. The costume designer on the other side of the room said disapprovingly, "An inch more on the corset will look like two inches on camera."
    "Better a live, chunky actress than a thin, dead one," Rainey retorted.
    The designer smiled at the idea that Raine Marlowe could ever be considered chunky. "You can see why women in this era weren't very liberated. It took most of their energy just to breathe."
    "The men weren't much better off." Rainey studied Kenzie's long satin coat, striped waistcoat, tight breeches, and high, gleaming boots with more than professional interest. "Amazing how long it took the human race to invent jeans and T-shirts."
    Kenzie gave her his best courtly bow. "Ah, Marguerite, much elegance has been sacrificed to the squalid little god of comfort."
    She immediately dropped into her role. Expression sultry, she lifted a carved ivory fan from a table and waved it languidly. "I vow, my lord, that you quite outshine me, as the glorious peacock outshines his drab peahen."
    "My plumage has but one purpose, and that is to attract the most desirable female in the land." On impulse, he pressed his lips to the slender nape exposed by her upswept hair. Her skin was warm and silky firm.
    She shivered and caught her breath, yearning and vulnerability apparent on her face. When he stepped back, their gazes caught as wordless messages hummed between them. Messages, and promises.
    A poster of a similar kiss was used to illustrate the movie. It embodied such tender, erotic power that it ended up in the bedrooms of hundreds of thousands of schoolgirls. Critics raved that the onscreen chemistry between the Pimpernel leads threatened to melt the film stock.
    But that was later. At the time, Kenzie had known only that Raine Marlowe was like a spun glass butterfly—delicate, strong, and utterly captivating.
    * * *
    He rounded a tight curve and found a straight, empty stretch of road ahead. He accelerated the Ferrari in a long, smooth surge of power, wishing he had the time to drive to the Mojave. There was something deeply purifying about the desert. But for now, the Santa Monica Mountains would do.
    Flashing lights appeared in his rearview mirror. Bloody hell. Swearing at himself, he pulled onto the shoulder.
    Behind him a motorcycle cop braked in a shower of gravel. After checking Kenzie's license tag in his computer, he swung from his bike and swaggered to the car. No doubt he was enjoying the prospect of proving that a badge was more powerful than an Italian sports car. Kenzie opened the driver's window and resigned himself to