EVERNIGHT PUBLISHING ®
www.evernightpublishing.com
Copyright© 2018 Raven McAllan
ISBN: 978-1-77339-719-1
Cover Artist: Jay Aheer
Editor: Karyn White
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
DEDICATION
To:
DeAnne. Hope you like your namesake.
The RavDor Chicks, you keep me going.
Doris for her eagle eyed 'rediting' (red highlights as my beta) Karyn for her editing, Jay for the amazing cover and everyone at Evernight Publishing for their help and support.
Paul for his ability to know when I need a glass of wine, and when to take the dinner out of the Aga before it burns.
And last but not least, my lovely readers.
Thanks everyone.
DEANNE’S DILEMMA
Naughty Forties, 2
Raven McAllan
Copyright © 2018
Chapter One
How on earth could I feel sexy, wearing an all in one, holdy-in, pants-girdle-underwear torture thingy? It was designed to cut off circulation worn under the bridesmaid’s dress from hell, with my sodding still handsome as hades, movie star, ex-husband smirking next to me, and I swear that man has x-ray eyes.
Yes, that is a hold your breath, spit it out, nonsensical sentence, but it needs to be to let me vent.
Not only that, as if it wasn’t enough to contend with, the world's press was in helicopters, circling above us like a swarm of angry bees. The bride was in tears of joy, the groom, an equally handsome but TV star not movies, ditto. Everyone but me was drowning in happy-clappy, wedding heaven.
I swear if I could have ducked out, developed a rash, fever, even invented some hitherto undiscovered illness, I would.
Except the bride, my best friend and a doctor to boot, would tell me not to be a hypochondriac, and remind me we'd sworn as kids to be each other's maid or matron of honor, come what may. Even, she’d said darkly, if one of us was in labor. Not that I was, but wouldn’t that have been fun? I could just imagine it. Pant, pant, don’t push, say it … I do … argh.
Anyway, I digress. I plead guilty to that. It’s sort of in my nature. And after all, if I’d been doing it for over forty years, I wasn’t likely to change now.
Eighteen months, three weeks and four days earlier—yes, I do know how long exactly, even to the hours, six—I’d married. Sandy, today’s bride, had flown back from somewhere exotic to be my only bridesmaid for my first—and as far as I’m concerned only time around—wedding.
Once bitten and all that.
Hot-as-hades ex and I had married on a beach in Antigua, in a white under slip for me, sadly with black bra and thong showing, because that was all I had clean—it was a bit impromptu to say the least—and denim cutoffs for him. There was a good reason for my unusual attire, honestly. I hadn’t intended to get married in my underwear. Sandy bought us a dress each to wear, or rather her mum had, as Sandy had been goodness knows where for weeks prior to my big day. Probably up the Nile or something. The problem was, her mum’s taste, and idea of our sizes, was a bit off. Absolutely gorgeous they weren’t. I looked like a parcel in mine, badly wrapped. Plus, it was white, and with my over generous curves, and skin tone, which matched the dress, white and frilly wasn’t the best choice.
Sandy looked like the bride, not me, albeit her dress was purple, her mum’s favorite color. We stared at each other and burst out laughing.
“Right, mate, you’re in your slip.” She dragged the dress off me and stuffed it in a nearby bin. “I’ll go almost the same.” She whipped off the purple peril and stood up for me in a shocking pink bikini. The registrar or whoever it was didn’t even blink. I suppose he was used to weird tourists getting hitched in somewhat unconventional attire.
Not at all like today.
As the bride, Sandy was dressed conventionally, in a slinky white dress, which did all sorts of amazing things to her curves and awesome boobage. A long veil and train—plus, a blue garter and peekaboo bra. God knows why, she’d shoved me into a gorgeous but not my style off-the-shoulder number that my boobs were threatening to spill out of. The girls are on the generous side. All she said was that I’d thank her one day.
Not likely.
Oh, I forgot to say, my name is DeAnne, DeAnne Taylor. I won't use h-as-h surname ever again. Not his real one, Higginbotham or his work one, Botham. Never ever.
Been there, done that, got the t-shirt, and burned it. Over.
In fact, if I really want to piss him off—and, oh boy, do I—I’ll address him by his Christian name. Tarquin. What a mouthful, eh? Tarquin Higginbotham. No wonder he goes by the name of Quinn Bloody Botham. I added the bloody bit. As I’m at a wedding I thought I’d best not think how I usually refer to him.
Oh, all right then. Tarquin Manners—yes, honestly, that’s his mother’s maiden name—Fucking Higginbotham. It might be a mouthful, but it has a certain ring to it, don’t you think? Not at all movie star like.
You wonder why I’m so vitriolic? You know, if I’m honest, so do I. Habit now I guess. Seven months, two and a bit weeks of marital bliss, during which he was away for six weeks and working long hours for most of the rest. I was at home, not working and bored rigid. Seeing tabloid show and tells about him and whomever and getting little reassurance.
Okay, yes, we were at it like rabbits when he was around, but that was no help to allay my worries when he was away. I had to pinch myself that he wanted me, not one of the glam-girls he was surrounded with. Then he just disappeared, no word of warning, nothing. So, as you can imagine, all that, plus one month of “what the fuck, where is the bastard, sod it, that’s it”, then eighteen months of negative thoughts is hard to change.
Oh, we’d had a spot… No, not a spot, that belittles it. A great heap of something, that he never even tried to explain, but then, if he had would I have listened?
Who knows? Water under the bridge.
“You look so fucking sexy when you scowl,” Quinn whispered in my ear, as the photographer fussed about and arranged us to her satisfaction. “Gets me hard and ready in no time at all. Reminds me of the time you got your dress caught in the back door, and it tore. Remember? You were in a right paddy standing there in the garden, naked from the waist down. I got a hard-on within a second. Almost split my zipper. Fucking bloody gorgeous pussy you have. It cried out to be fucked. Are you commando like that today?”
I wish. But I wasn’t telling him what was or wasn’t under this dress. “Go to hell.”
“I’m there my sweet, believe me, and it’s lonely.”
Shit, he really sounded as if he meant it.
“Tough. Your choice.”
He sighed. “Not really, but enough of that. Do you remember that you scowled, I laughed, you tried to hit me, I held your arms out of the way, and, shit, Dee you were so fucking sexy, you just had to be fucked. So, we screwed like rabbits up against the kitchen door.”
Oh God, my knees began to tremble. How could I forget that?
He pushed the rest of my dress out of the way and dropped his kecks and that was it. I screamed as my climax hit me, he followed suit, and we stood there with him still inside me, grinning like a pair of prize idiots and panting as if
we’d run a marathon. Then we heard a car draw up outside the front gate.
We stared at each other, and his cock slid out and deflated faster than a popped balloon. We were in full view of anyone who chose to walk around the house to the back garden. As the front door had never been opened during our tenure, everyone knew to call at the back.
I tell you I’ve never run indoors and upstairs so fast in my life.
Quinn followed me and remembered to shut the door behind him. With his jeans around his ankles he did more of a hobble than a run, but boy, was I impressed at his agility.
Mind you, agile was his middle name…
Oh, okay, it wasn’t, but he was fit in every way.
Hence, we made it upstairs in record time.
He just had time to wipe a cloth over his cock, stuff it back in his denims—his cock not the flannel, he had no need for padding or wadding—and do them up somewhat gingerly, as his dick was still semi-interested in a rerun—before there was a loud rap on the recently closed door.
We looked at each other and grinned—we both recognized that particular rappety-rap.
Quinn took the stairs two at a time to open the door. To the vicar.
I followed five minutes later, reeking of Eau de Issy.
Well, it was better than Eau de Quinn’s cum.
At least it was at that specific moment.
“Sweetness, the photographer wants you to move closer to me.”
Shit, that brought me back to the present with a thump. I’d forgotten where I was. It was a glower moment again. “In her dreams.”
“In your reality, sweet pea, remember where we are.”
Damnit, it was a well-deserved rebuke. I hate being in the wrong. Well, what woman doesn’t? I also hated being called sweet pea. It sort of makes me feel insignificant. I forget how pretty they are and what a gorgeous scent they share. Grudgingly, I moved two inches closer, and the photographer tittered.
“Anyone would think you don’t want to cozy up to a hot hunk of a movie star, petal. Go on, push your tush.” She flapped her hand like a limp stick of rhubarb. That thought almost made me giggle. I remembered something Quinn had once said about rhubarb and men’s…
“Dear bridesmaid, get your ass in gear.” The look she gave me was enough to have me pushing up daisies and Quinn or whoever choosing the hymns for my funeral. “We haven’t got all day. Lots to do.”
Silly cow.
“Don’t say it,” Quinn said with that bloody annoying way he had of speaking without moving his lips. I swear he was a ventriloquist in a previous life. “Just grit your teeth and think of ways we could dismember her.”
That makes me stifle a giggle as I remembered a particularly snotty director he’d had, and how each week we’d do “the ten ways to kill Kathy Cottner”. As I remember Quinn was ahead on originality, me on feasibility.
That was before, of course.
Resigned, I moved closer, and sod it, he put his hand on my bum and froze.
“What the fuck are you wearing? Armor?”
It was as good as. It even did up under the crotch.
I didn’t answer. Just moved my hand under the cover of my bouquet and pinched his cock. Hard.
He winced.
“Nasty. Got our bitch on, have we?”
You better believe it. “Who, me?” I did what I hoped was a wide-eyed and innocent expression. “Not me.”
“People.” The photographer glared at us. “If you wouldn’t mind paying attention.”
Well, we were, just not to her.
“Sorry, lots to do,” I said back. “Now look what you’ve done,” I hissed to Quinn. “One minute together and all hell lets loose again.”
Quinn looked at his feet. “I never screwed her, you know.”
Time to be honest.
I glanced down to see what he stared at. Nothing unless you counted a squashed dandelion and a few scurrying ants.
“I know. That wasn’t why I left.”
“So why did you?”
That was a question I asked myself more and more these days. The best I could come up with was a rabid case of insecurity. I mean him, drop-dead gorgeous, play your cards right and you can have me gorgeous, lauded all over the world. Lusted after, knickers in the post, lewd suggestions and pictures, arriving in a steady stream.
He could take his pick of most of the glamorous female population, and I found it hard to believe he really wanted me. In those days I was pasty-faced and prone to spots and blushing. Add to that the veiled hints and innuendos thrown at me … and the not so vague. Like the costar who confronted me in the loo and said why didn’t I just bugger off and let them be together? That was a doozy. She’d even got a list of times and places they’d screwed. It all sounded so plausible. Well, he’d not been with me on those dates.
Add to that, the “Quinn Botham’s woman is an ugly cow” thing I’d seen somewhere, and I was a mass of vulnerability. Plus of course I have a temper generally known as volatile, and stubborn with it.
Why I didn’t use the temper on my detractors I have no idea. Maybe I was scared what might happen if I did.
“I, er…”
“Please, people, concentrate. Let’s get the last few teensy-weensy pics done and then you can go and drink fizz.”
Ah, thank goodness. Bitchy Beatrix—photographer to the stars—to my rescue.
The helicopter noises seemed even louder, and I realized we’d moved out from under the canopy set up for the actual ceremony, into the garden. I also remembered something he’d said years ago when I’d queried his talking through clenched teeth stuff. “There’s a lot of lip readers out there. Some who are paid specifically to see what they can get hold of. Never talk where your lips can be seen.”
Now I know why he’d studied the dandelion.
Chapter Two
“Time to catch the bouquet, peeps. Come on, all in a huddle, and get ready.” Sandy waved her bouquet in the air like she was marshalling a plane into the gate area or about to lead a line of tourists up the Wallace Monument. That’s a bloody great tower sort of thing with umpteen hundred steps inside it. You often see someone waving a flag, umbrella, or—once I was told, but as I didn’t see it, I can’t say if it’s true or not—a pair of tighty-whiteys to shepherd their flock up, down, or around it.
Strangely enough, it’s to honor William Wallace, you know, of Mel Gibson fame. He did a lot of fighting and rampaging around here. Along with Rob Roy Macgregor. Here is Stirling and the Trossachs in Scotland. Is it any wonder I’m a sucker for man in a kilt? The first time I met Quinn he was wearing a kilt of the clan MacFarlane, his dad’s mum’s clan. And he was a true Scotsman! I know, because I peeked as he gave me a twirl. The spin around, not the chocolate bar.
He told me that his Granny Mac was from the islands and had the second sight. Well if she did she’d be turning in her grave now at how things had worked out.
“Sergeant Sandy at the ready,” Quinn muttered into my ear with a laugh. “Why now not later?”
“She said because people might be too tiddly to take part later.”
“Fair enough. Go on, what are you waiting for?”
That bloody stupid tradition. No way was I lining up with Leslie, Sandie, and Rhonda—my co-bridesmaids, our other mates there, and any hopefuls from the milling crowd. “Been there, done that, got the divorce papers,” I said flippantly. “Not my scene.”
Well, that’s not strictly true, we aren’t divorced. We just sort of split up and, apart from a few sex-shaped slips, never got back together.
“Coward.”
There’s my dilemma. Am I, or is it self-preservation?
“Not for me,” I said in what I hoped was a firm, no-nonsense way. “You do it.”
He smiled. The sexy, “come to bed, I only have eyes for you, liar, liar pants on fire” smile that gives his fans wet knickers. The one that I mistrust. Yes, okay the one that gives me wet knickers as well, and boy, in this non-stretch crap I’m wearing that’s the last
thing I need.
“Go on, put your money where your mouth is.”
“I might at that. Come on.” He dragged me so fast across the lawn, I wouldn’t have been surprised to see tracks in the grass. Why he needed me, I have no bloody idea.
I soon found out.
One of the helicopters circled lower.
Quinn scowled. “Where’s the bloody security when you need it? Alistair’s agent was supposed to sort it all out.”
“Got appendicitis,” I muttered as I look down. Sadly, not at my feet. They were hidden under the girls and “the dress”. “The stand in is a stand in for the stand in, if you get me. He’s got mumps. The stand in, not his stand in. The guy who had to oversee this at the last minute is young, new, and it seems way out of his comfort zone.”
Quinn winced, and I swear his hand moved to cover his cock. “Poor bugger. I forgive them then. Almost. This is going be a three-ring circus though if they’re not careful. We’ll all be on page whatever it is.” He rolled his shoulders and maneuvered me in front of him. Damn, now I couldn’t hide behind his back.
“Let’s just not do it.” I suggested. “Can you see the headlines if you catch it? You’d never live them down. Quinn Botham seems to be in touch with his feminine side. Is there something he’s not telling us?”
He chuckled. “My street cred down the pan? ‘Poor Quinn Botham had to go for the bouquet to find romance’. I bloody love it.”
He would.
Sandy stood in front of us all and fixed us with her doctor’s gimlet eye. The one that makes you believe the jag—what everyone but us Scots call a jab or an injection—won’t hurt. Alistair, by her side, grinned his saturnine grin that put the fear of the gods into his opponents on the successful TV series he was in, and made women swoon. He was another one with a panty-dropping voice.
DeAnne's Dilemma (Naughty Forties Book 2) Page 1
