Phoenix Falling (6 page)

After that, it was like being in drama school, happily batting ideas back and forth as they became comfortable with the characters. The creative thrill of that was more intoxicating than the wine she'd drunk at dinner. Perhaps his desire to rehearse was a subtle and very effective form of seduction. There was intense intimacy in playing lovers and in the fitting together of their minds and acting styles.

Things were getting very tense between Sir Percy and Marguerite when Rainey flipped a page halfway through the screenplay. "The ballroom scene. It will be fun to learn the minuet. I wish I knew it now."

"Fake it." Kenzie opened a cabinet to reveal hundreds of compact disks. Selecting one, he put it in the CD player and the room filled with the delicate precision of late eighteenth-century dance music. He held out his hand. "Will you dance, my lady?"

He spoke coldly, a man who loved a woman he couldn't trust. Knowing the request was really an order, Rainey gave him her hand but lifted her head haughtily, a woman who didn't understand her husband's withdrawal, and was too proud to show her pain.

In stony silence they circled each other, gazes locked. Rainey felt a disorienting mixture of Marguerite's emotions and her own. Each of them was unsettled by her partner. In Marguerite's case, the reasons were obvious and would be resolved by the end of the movie, but Rainey's situation was far more uncertain.

Kenzie Scott was dangerously attractive, and he knew it. There was something very real here, yet he was a stranger to her, a man famously protective of his privacy. A man who could injure her deeply if she wasn't careful.

To relieve the electricity crackling between them, she said,

"You're really good at this. Do they teach period dancing at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art?"

"Yes, we learned all the major dances in movement classes."

"I envy your education." She spun away from him, their hands still linked. "The RADA graduates I've met are such good actors, prepared for everything."

"It's ultracompetitive—hundreds of hopefuls audition for a handful of places." He drew her toward him again. "The rejection is good preparation for an actor's life."

"You've known less rejection than most."

"I was a good instinctive actor," he admitted, "but instinct will only take one so far. RADA taught me the craft and discipline of acting. How to let a character play through me, rather than me playing the character. How to hit the same emotional point again and again and have it ring true each time. How to be a professional."

"You're making me even more envious. I learned piecemeal in various acting classes and workshops."

"Wherever you studied, you learned well, Rainey. I imagine that RADA students and atmosphere weren't much different from your workshops."

She laughed. "Everyone obsessed with acting, wildly melodramatic about their lives, and half the class sleeping with the other half, with partners changing regularly?"

His eyes glinted with humor. "Acting classes are the same the world around."

The music ended and they both slid back into character. "Farewell, my lady. I do not know if I shall return. "

Since the script called for a kiss, Rainey went into his arms. "Don't leave me like this, Percy! What have I done to deserve such coldness?"

Instead of Sir Percy's swift, unhappy kiss, Kenzie's mouth met hers with gentle exploration. She fell into him like a thirsty woman discovering water in the desert. He was so close that she saw he wasn't wearing contact lenses. Those incredible green eyes were real.

Hollywood had changed her from a rebellious girl to a self-protective woman. She had avoided casual affairs because it wasn't her nature to be casual and she couldn't afford distractions.

But dear God, how she had hungered for warmth. Amazingly, under Kenzie's movie star glamour he seemed to yearn for intimacy as much as she did.

His hands skimmed her back as the kiss deepened. Soft, expert, passionate. Weak-kneed, she whispered in a last halfhearted effort at defense, "I can see why you have a reputation as a terrific lover."

"If I slept with even a quarter of the women the gossip columnists claim, I'd have died of exhaustion years ago." He tugged her down onto the sofa so that she was lying full-length along his strong, beautifully fit body.

She buried her hands in waves of dark hair grown long for the part he was going to play. Too many men looked on kissing as merely a step on the road to intercourse. Not Kenzie. His mouth and hands learned her with luxurious patience. No attempts to rip off her clothing or rush to greater intimacy.

His restraint made her feverish with longing. Even as a hormone-crazed adolescent, she hadn't felt like this. As he kissed her throat, she said huskily, "So we're going to have an affair?"

"Yes. But not until we've finished shooting
The Scarlet Pimpernel
."

"You're kidding!" She pulsed her pelvis against his. "Granted, it's been a while since I had a personal life, but you feel quite ready now."

He caught his breath, then lifted her so that they were reclining side by side in the deep cushions. Stroking back her hair, he said, "Think of what waiting will add to the sexual tension in the movie."

She erupted into slightly hysterical laughter, torn between intense frustration and deep relief that matters would go no further tonight. She wasn't ready for what she sensed lay ahead. "That's diabolical—but you're right. Very well, Kenzie, we have a hot date for when this movie is over."

He raised her hand and kissed her fingers tenderly. "And, I hope, some warm and friendly ones before then."

That was when she lost her heart to him. But it was a long time before she admitted that, even to herself.

* * *

The phone on her stomach rang, jarring her back to the present. Putting the past where it belonged, Rainey began the next phase of work. She would create a movie, and with it a new direction for her life.

Chapter 4

Kenzie entered his trailer and flopped onto the bed, bone tired after rising at an obscene hour to shoot several scenes with a costar who had to be elsewhere in the afternoon. He'd be glad when filming ended; by this time, cast and crew were heartily sick of each other. Not to mention the fact that it had been difficult to play a lighthearted rogue while in the midst of a divorce. But he'd soon be working with Rainey again.

On the verge of dozing off, he made a mental note to call his English friend and mentor, Charles Winfield. They chatted regularly, but he'd been so busy lately that by the time he thought of calling, it was too late to place a call to London. Today would be a good time....

Rinnnnnng!

The phone jerked him awake. Yawning, he lifted the handset without opening his eyes. Hearing his manager's greeting, he said, "Go away, Seth. The star's brain has quit for the day."

Undeterred, Seth said, "Sorry to wake you, but I just finished reading the screenplay of
The Centurion
."

The tone jerked Kenzie into wakefulness. "What did you think of it?" He hadn't had the time or energy to read the script yet himself, but surely Rainey wouldn't have taken revenge by persuading him to do a bad movie. That would rebound disastrously on her own career, and besides, Rainey was never petty.

"It's a terrific script," Seth said. "I had no idea Rainey could write so well. But Jesus, you really want to do this movie?"

"What are your objections?"

"John Randall isn't exactly a heroic figure. If this flick gets made and more than ten people see it, it's going to do strange things to your image."

Stonewalling with the skill of long practice, Kenzie said, "Sorry you feel that way, but I've given my word and signed the contracts."

"Contracts can be broken."

"But not my word. Good-bye, Seth."

He hung up, feeling a chill of apprehension. He hadn't wanted to admit to his manager that he'd been so careless as not to have read the screenplay himself. Besides not having the energy, he trusted Rainey's professional judgment. When they had been together, her advice on which scripts to choose and which to refuse had been impeccable. She wouldn't be passionate about making this movie if the material was weak.

So why had
The Centurion
upset Seth? It was time to dig the screenplay out of his briefcase, and actually read the damned thing.

* * *

Tires squealing, Kenzie slammed his Ferrari to a stop in front of Rainey's canyon cottage. He stalked to the door and hit the doorbell. After the opening chords of Beethoven's fifth symphony rang inside, Rainey opened the door, wariness in her eyes. "What an unexpected pleasure. Just passing by?"

He swept past her into the living room. "I can't do your movie, Rainey."

She spun to face him, eyes wide with shock. "But you promised! Why are you having second thoughts?"

He hesitated, wondering how to explain himself without saying too much. "I just read the screenplay."

"Today? You've had it for three days. There was plenty of time to read it before signing the contract."

"I was busy, and I took your word for it that the script was good."

Her face tightened. "Now you've read it and think it's dreck?"

"It's not dreck. Seth called and was impressed by your writing, but thought that my making this movie would be bad for my career. So I read the script, and realized I didn't want any part of it."

"Why not?" she asked, expression stony.

"You told me John Randall was tortured. You didn't mention that he was raped repeatedly, or that he fell in love with his captor."

"I told you he was abused and tortured, which is accurate, and he doesn't fall in love with Mustafa," she retorted. "It's all going to be a lot subtler and more impressionistic than that, especially the abuse scenes. Is that why you and Seth have panicked—because Mr. Action Hero isn't ever supposed to be a victim?"

How the hell was he supposed to answer that? He certainly wasn't going to explain his horror of being helpless, even if it was only acting.

Tamping down his temper, he said, "I can't do the role justice. As you said, Randall is a complex man who has to show a tremendous range of emotion. I'm not the best person for that. If you like, I'll help you find someone better for the role, but I can't and won't do it."

"You can't back out now! Everything is in place to start shooting." She glared at him. "You signed a contract, Kenzie. If you don't go through with this, I swear to God I'll sue you for your perfectly capped back teeth."

"Sue and be damned!"

Her face paled. "Did you agree to take the part with the idea of pulling out to torment me? What did I ever do to you to justify that?"

"Damnation, Rainey!" he snapped, angrier with her than he'd ever been. "What have I ever done to make you think I could be so maliciously cruel?"

"Do you want me to answer that?" she said bitterly.

Lord, no. He couldn't bear to increase the poisonous tension in the room. Then he saw tears in her eyes. His indomitable wife, who never cried except when a script required it, was on the verge of breaking down. "I don't want to fight with you, Rainey," he said wearily. "I'm not trying to make your life difficult. I just... can't do this movie."

She closed her eyes for a moment. "To be an actor is to be insecure. You think I don't know that? Every time we take on a role that's radically different from what we've done, it's like jumping off a cliff. But the roles that really make us grow and produce the finest acting are exactly the ones that are scariest. Though you've never played anyone quite as tormented as John Randall, I
know
you can do it, and brilliantly."

"Pushing limits is all very well, but every actor has a range of things he can do, and things he can't do. I can't be John Randall. I'm not talking actor nerves, Rainey. This role is beyond my range."

"I don't believe that. Some of your early BBC work hit the same notes needed for John Randall." She gazed at him earnestly. "You can do this, Kenzie, and I'll help every way I can. Is there any rewriting that would make you feel better about the script?"

"Are you volunteering to remove the sexual assaults and Randall's complicated feelings about Mustafa?"