Brief Encounters

“No way, Gerard. Nothing creepy crawly, nothing with more than two legs, nothing flammable and nothing that is going to explode. This is a fashion show, not a demolition derby. Besides, I’m late with the insurance premium this quarter. I’m not even sure we’re covered.”

She heard him sigh into the phone. Gerard enjoyed bells and whistles and had been arguing that the party’s fashion show needed more special effects. Since Swan and Lynne couldn’t afford pyrotechnics and laser lights, Gerard had suggested they let the models provide the runway pizzazz. Swan had finally agreed that he could invite some of his more exotic friends to audition, but this was ridiculous.

“The marquis looks like fun, Swan. Are you sure?”

“I’ve never been more sure, Gerard. Do not send in the guy with the whip.”

Gerard clicked off, and Swan went back to work on the growing stack of portfolios provided by the models. Résumés and glossy head shots were strewn across the glass-topped coffee table she was using as a work surface. Most of the guys were wanna-bes rather than professional models, which was lucky because Brief Encounters was currently too broke to pay modeling fees. The party food and decorations were largely donated, thanks to Gerard’s ingenuity, and the men who’d shown up to audition were volunteering their time, hoping to get some exposure, probably—which shouldn’t be a problem in her underwear.

Swan held the back of her hand to her forehead and felt the stickiness. August was typically the hottest month of the summer, even at the beach, and the fifty-year-old villa wasn’t air-conditioned. Swan had dressed defensively, in capris and a tank top, but naked would have been too warm in this place.

The kicker was that she wasn’t even supposed to be doing this task. Lynne had cooked up the impromptu launch party idea, hoping it would generate some publicity. It was a good idea and Swan had gone along with it, but Lynne was the gregarious one, the free spirit who had a flair for this sort of thing, which was why she worked sales, marketing and PR. Swan was the organizer and the bean counter. She also did most of the actual designing, but other than a few fittings and alterations, she rarely worked with the models.

Lynne was supposed to have come back to run the auditions, but she’d left a message from San Francisco, saying that something big was up and she would call back later to explain. She’d also dropped the name of a huge international designer. Lynne loved being mysterious, but this wasn’t the time, not when they were facing their first-ever tour. At least Lynne had finalized all the details of their first runway show in Los Angeles, including the models, but Swan still had the launch party to deal with.

The music room door opened and the telephone repairman was all but pushed inside by Gerard, who grinned and waggled his fingers at Swan before leaving. The new model looked around as if he had no idea where he was or why he was there. A bad sign. Swan waved him into the room, but he didn’t budge.

“I’m here to—”

“Yes, I know,” she said brightly. “Great outfit. You’re my first repairman, and I must say, it works.”

And how it worked. This guy could have installed her phone any day of the week. Gerard hadn’t done him justice, she realized. If Lynne had been there, she would have given him the compliment she reserved for lifeguards and the Olympic water polo team: studly.

Of course, Swan was trained to notice such things, but the man’s legs were so long he must have had his blue jeans specially made. And who could miss the way he’d planted himself, his hips canted at an angle that emphasized their narrowness and the wide rake of his shoulders. The expression on his face was priceless, too. Bemused and quizzical, faintly suspicious. Male.

Swan felt heat stealing up the back of her neck and realized she was having a physical reaction right here in the music room. Was that possible? Something was tingling, and it wasn’t her bladder!

“Ma’am…?”

His voice snapped her out of her trance. What in the world was she doing? Fantasizing in broad daylight? The only question that should have been on her mind at that moment was, can he dance?

“The CD player’s over there,” she said, pointing at the boom box that Gerard had set up on an antique tea cart. The regal old piece sat by a wall of cherry bookcases that housed the room’s music library, and Swan wondered if the cart was appalled at the noisy machine that was vibrating its brass knobs and handles. She wondered if the whole house was appalled.

“Go ahead and put your music in,” she told him.

The heat had now spread to her face, but she resisted the impulse to fan herself as she sorted through photos. She found one she planned to call back, but now she needed a pencil to make a note of it. Of course, every pencil she owned was missing in action. When the August weather had started to get to her, she’d pulled her long auburn hair up into a loose bun to cool her neck. Patting around, she found a No. 2 Ticonderoga stuck in the waves. Her hair probably resembled a floor mop by now, but there wasn’t time to repair it. She tugged the pencil free, her hair miraculously staying in its knot, and her gaze drifted toward the model.

He was standing right where she’d left him.

“You didn’t bring any music, right?” Some of the guys had brought their own CDs and some hadn’t. “That’s okay,” she said as she hurried over to the boom box, popped in a disc and pushed the Play button. Hot, pulsing music filled the room. If you could dance, “Disco Inferno” was your song.

The music was too loud to talk over, so she gave the model a directorial point of her finger. “You’re on,” it said. She moved to the music herself, shaking her shoulders and nodding encouragingly. She’d actually had to dance with one of the guys to get him going, and it looked as if she had another shy one on her hands.

Maybe that was the secret of this one’s appeal. Not just studly, but shy.

He was heart attack material, she admitted, wondering what she was going to have to do to inspire him. It was just plain hot the way his blue work shirt fell open at the neck and his tool belt hung on his hips. His hands were braced on the worn leather and he’d cocked his head, as if to say he wasn’t making a move until he was good and ready. But, boy, when he did. All he would have to do was to shake those shoulders and women everywhere would fall on their noses. Swan was teetering already. He could have sold underwear to a nudist colony.

This was the best raw material she’d seen all day, so to speak. She had to get him dancing. Okay, what would Lynne do? she asked herself—and not for the first time. Her partner had a bold, carefree manner that Swan had always admired. Lynne knew how to keep men guessing, which seemed to make them want her all the more. She was flirty and provocative, but whenever Swan tried that, she got into trouble. Maybe this was her chance to practice.

Swan walked briskly over to the model. To hesitate was death. As she approached, he gave her a searching look and a lazy smile that said he might be checking her out, as well. Not as shy as she thought? She felt an instant’s unease but dismissed it. Her mission was to find men with happy feet. Sure he looked good, but could he move? Could he dance and undress at the same time? Could he make a woman hot, maybe even her, who hadn’t been above 98.6 in years? And, more important, could he sell the thongs, briefs and tank tops that were going to be Brief Encounters’s showcase products?

“Maybe I can help,” she said. “Just relax and go with me.”

She braced her legs and rotated her hips, only to see his brows flatten skeptically. “Come on,” she coaxed. “You can do it.”

She began to sing along with the music and shake her shoulders, but still nothing. What? Was he practicing to be a palace guard?

With a sigh, she placed her hands on his hips and began rocking them back and forth, encouraging him to rotate. This was exactly what Lynne would have done, but it was so not Swan McKenna. Her heart was pounding as fast as the music.

“Yes, that’s it!” she said, thinking she’d felt him move. “Work with me. That’s right, work with me, baby.”

Work with me, baby?

She didn’t dare look up, or he would have seen the flush creeping up her neck. She gripped him harder, rotating wider. “Shake it one time for me,” she croaked.

What was happening to her voice?

“Ma’am?”

“No, keep moving,” she insisted. “I think you’re getting the idea.”

Swan was staring at the man’s rotating pelvis so hard she could have counted the teeth on his zipper. It didn’t take X-ray vision to know what was lovingly cradled inside those beautifully worn jeans. She could see the tell-tale bulge. It ran nearly the length of his fly, and as much as she didn’t want to be guilty of ogling him, there was nowhere else to look.

“You are so hired,” she said under her breath.

She wasn’t quite sure what happened next. Either her hands slipped or he suddenly mastered Bump and Grind 101, because his rotating pelvis came into brief heated contact with her thigh.

“You mean, like that?” he asked.

Swan gave out a little squeal and jumped back. She sounded like Gerard, but the unexpected contact had startled her. Had he actually brushed her leg with his crotch? Obviously this guy didn’t need any more help. He had the idea.

“Oookay,” she said, “that was progress.”

Swan was now red to her scalp. Nevertheless she ordered herself to meet his gaze and to hold it until she’d calmed down. He still looked a little perplexed, rather like a stag in headlights, but she wasn’t buying the innocent act. This was a business and she had a show to put on. Her entire future was riding on it and the futures of others, as well. She’d had to let their seamstresses go until things picked up, and that had been far harder to do than this. Besides, Lynne would never have been playing coy games with one of these guys. She might have coaxed him along with a few dancing lessons, but if he hadn’t caught on, he would have been sent on his way.

“Nice move,” she said, trying to sound faintly sardonic. “Now drop those jeans and show me what you got.”

Her partner would have been proud.

But the repairman was still hesitant and something in Swan took over again. This was where all the other models had balked, too. Not that she blamed them. She couldn’t have stripped for an audience, either. With her nerves she would have had to wear diapers!

Business, she reminded herself. You’re not asking him to expose state secrets, just the underwear you designed. All the models were supposed to be wearing Brief Encounters under their costumes.

“All right, I’ll help,” she told him, “but this is the last time.”

She walked back to him, snappily undid the tool belt that hung around his trim waist and let it drop. It landed on the floor with a heavy metallic thud.

Whoa. The ladies were going to scream when that happened. Swan could guarantee it. If he had anywhere near the effect on them he was having on her, Brief Encounters was going to sell out their stock at the first show.