A Bad Boy is Good to Find(39)

Maisie’s smile remained firmly in place. “I’ll send Raoul up. Oh, and Con, if you want to go shirtless again, that’s just fine.”



“You don’t have to really go shirtless, you know.” Lizzie sat in front of the dressing table mirror, trying to get the comb through her snarled hair.

“I’m a performer under contract. I wear what the director tells me to.”

She glanced at his reflection in the mirror. Was he smiling? “Well, I’m the real director here and I’m telling you to wear a shirt.”

“What if I don’t want to?” He buckled his black leather belt.

“If you don’t want to, then don’t,” she snapped. “I just think it’s rather undignified.” The waistband of his Italian slacks sat low enough to reveal the top of the fine line of black hair below his belly button. Low enough to be unpleasantly suggestive.

“Since when are you concerned about me being dignified? I figure this whole trip is designed to rob me of any false dignity I might have assumed. And you know what? I’m okay with that. I guess dignity isn’t all that important to me in the grand scheme of things.”

He moved up behind her, his low-slung waistband clearly visible in mirror. He put his hands on her shoulders and started to massage. “But I think it’s sweet that you still care enough about me to defend my rights.”

“I don’t care about you one bit. If you want to prance around half naked it’s fine by me. Go for it.” She deliberately avoided looking at his broad fingers as they dug into the tender knots at the base of her neck.

“Jesus, you’re wound up. Did you sleep at all last night?”

“Yes.” No.

Not a frigging wink. She’d rather die than let him know that, though. She glanced at his face in the mirror.

“What are you laughing at?”

“I’m not laughing.”

“Your eyes are laughing.” She bristled, tightened up the shoulders he was trying to loosen.

“I’ll tell them to stop. Relax, let your shoulders go.”

She pushed her shoulders down, bent her neck forward and closed her eyes. Con had magic fingers and could zero in on a tension point from fifteen paces. “You’ve missed your calling, you know,” she moaned, as he unkinked a hump beside her spine. “You could have been a masseur.”

“Maybe I’ll be one yet.”

“I’m serious. I’ve had a lot of professional massages, especially out at Las Gordas, and you’re better than any of them. It’s amazing how you can be so gentle and so firm at the same time.”

She instantly regretted the compliment. One with sexual implications, no less. “You could hang out a shingle, Come and Get Conned. I’m sure you won’t have trouble attracting female customers.”

Her barbed suggestion caused a slight hiccup in his massaging rhythm, then he continued with renewed vigor. “You wouldn’t mind your husband putting his hands all over other women?”

“You’re not my husband.” Why did it hurt to say that?.

“I will be soon.” He dug his thumbs into her neck with insistent pressure.

“Not for long.”

A movement inside the door made her start. “Raoul!”

When had he come in and how much had he heard? Con’s hands fell from her shoulders. He hadn’t heard Raoul either.

“Hey,” said Con.

“Hey yourself,” replied Raoul, giving his bare chest a lingering once-over. “What’re you trying to do, raise the temperature around here even higher?” He fanned himself, straight-faced.

“Maisie’s orders. Do I look like an ass?”

“Best piece of ass I’ve seen in weeks. But we digress. I have work to do.” He turned to Lizzie, still poker-faced. “Heard you need some primping. Can see it’s true. You look like you’ve been in a boxing ring. Where’s your icepack?”

“What icepack?”

“The one you are supposed to keep ready to reduce puffiness around your eyes in the morning.”

“I didn’t know I was supposed to have one.”

“Ignorance of the law is no defense. They’ve probably got some iced-up shrimp downstairs we could use instead.”

Con chuckled.

“Hey, I’m just kidding.” He smiled, revealing unnaturally even white teeth between his thin lips. “There can be a lot of tension on a set and I like fooling around. Don’t take me too seriously. Anyway, the hairdresser still hasn’t shown up, so I’m doing double duty again. If things get ugly, we can go into my personal wig collection.”

“Raoul does celebrity impersonations. In drag,” said Con. “Goes onstage at the Copa.”

Lizzie forced a laugh. She snuck a nervous glance at Con, who was slicking back his hair with a comb, biceps artfully displayed by the motion.

Raoul savored the view with her for a moment.

“I don’t really see her in the Monroe or the Joan Crawford, do you?” He raised an eyebrow at Con. “Maybe the Veronica Lake?” He lifted up a semi fried hank of Lizzie’s frizzy, flattened hair. “But you’re definitely going to need one of my wigs if you keep trying to straighten. This humidity is a red-hot bitch.”

“I like it curly.” Con put his comb down on the dressing table in front of her. “I think Lizzie’s hair is beautiful in its natural state. Wild and lovely, just like her.”

He leaned in, all spicy scent and warm muscle, and planted a featherlight kiss on her cheek. Left her skin humming and her face heating. Bastard. “You always look beautiful to me, babe,” he said. “See you downstairs.

She noted with deep satisfaction that he picked up a shirt on his way out.

“You’re a lucky woman,” said Raoul after Con had left the room.

“Yeah,” said Lizzie, with no conviction whatsoever. How much had Raoul overheard? And what might he do with that information?

“So, shall we wash it and see what happens?”



“Lizzie, darling!” Maisie beckoned to her from the floodlit dining room.

She came down the stairs rigid with self-awareness since she’d noticed a camera trained right on her. Raoul had used some kind of greasy gel on her hair that made it hang in stringy tendrils about her shoulders. She looked like a wet wood nymph. He’d talked her into wearing cutoff jeans by some SoHo designer and a halter top with a built in bra, so she was a wet wood nymph who’d dipped into Daisy Duke’s wardrobe. She’d been rather impressed with her swamp-sexpot look in the age-spotted bedroom mirror, with Raoul standing behind her claiming jealousy. In full view of the crew, with 3200 Kelvins of artificial daylight blasting her from every direction, she felt like a balloon in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade.

“Wow.” A grin spread across Con’s face. “I like this look.”

She cringed at the blush creeping up her chest, which was pushed into view by a large quantity of industrial-strength underwire.

Maisie stood off to one side, grinning like the Cheshire cat. “Cut!” She strode forward. “Goodness, Lizzie, Raoul does get creative doesn’t he? Shame it took so long, but I imagine it was a lot of work.” She picked up a clump of “wet look” hair. “I was just telling Con about our plans for the day. We’re going to drive over to Mudbug Flats—” She lingered over the name a bit—“after breakfast. You two are taking a sweet little white Jeep we’ve rented. Of course, they’ll be a cameraman in the car with you, but the rest of the crew will be in a van.”