Riley Murphy's Blog, page 14

The Unloved Wanderer

Meet Shermatta!

Okay, here’s the first part of the scene. I’ll be posting the second (Larz’s part) over the weekend. For those of you who missed the setup click here to read about it. I’ve posted info at the bottom about what’s going to be added to our giveaway items, so be sure to check that out. Now? Onto the story. I’ll put into bold all the words you guys sent in. Between this first half of the scene and the next I managed to write in all the word suggestions and had fun with the story ideas you guys left in comments. Thanks so much for those. With that in mind, after I post Larz’s scene over the weekend I’ll need more help with this little story so keep the wheels turning as you read.

The Unloved Wanderer

Scene one: Shermatta

There was nothing auspicious about the occasion. It was a necessary evil for Shermatta — Sherm to her one friend in the world—a mere trip to the grocery store for sustenance. The only important item on her list was her lone stealthy snack, an avocado. She’d given up everything else that could harm her bestie, Esmeralda, but she couldn’t squelch her cravings for the leathery-green fruit no matter how she tried. Therefore the single decadent delight had to be perfect, and there was only one way to tell. The prospective consumer needed to examine the dry little button on the stem end for color. Green meant go-ahead buy and enjoy. Brown meant bag it and tag it for garbage.

She’d been at the stand in her local market for ten full minutes, wading through the copious pile of unripe fruit to find the one. Surely there had to be a jewel among the rocks. Not that the uniformed shoppers who breezed by and grabbed those she’d already cast off as no good, cared. They may as well have tossed their hard-earned dollars in the bin, but that was none of her concern. She just wished they’d adopt a similar attitude and quit making her their business.

She knew the interlopers, otherwise identified as the smelly, perfume-wearing women who stalked through the produce aisle with their second-skin-workout gear on and sporting perfectly affected make-up, covertly examined her. She wasn’t fooled by them while they took their sweet time palming the tomatoes for their salads. If they’d spent half as much time picking their avocados as they did studying her, they’d have found the one in the pile, she was sure. She was also sure the same gym-dwellers, in fear of gaining an ounce, used the spritzer dressing product that “misted” one’s lettuce leaves instead of the more fattening pour bottle kind.

She snorted.

To her way of thinking, misting salad fixings was akin to making warm caramel custard without any sugar. It would look appetizing enough when it was put in front of you, but the taste? Dreadful. Salad was meant to be dressed not sprinkled. Unless those sprinkles were bacon bits.

Sherm loved bacon bits.

She curled down and hunkered over the last section to pick through, determined to ignore the enthralled-with-her patrons, that stared. Plucking an avocado to examine, she found it too hard. The next one was too soft. The next had the dreaded brown button. The next was split.

She grunted and shifted closer. There had to be one here, but when the next four turned out to be duds she growled and continued more aggressively to find the jewel. Pitted green fruit toppled and tumbled as she searched.

“Holy crap! Is that a guy?”

She heard the rude little bugger and pegged him for a tween. Gutsy, but blissfully ignorant.

“How about eggplant for dinner honey?”

Clearly the mother was trying to distract her little treasure. Distract and overlook, that’s what was wrong with today’s youth. A mother would rather explore her child’s feelings than give them something to feel, like the flat of a palm against a kid’s buttock. God forbid a parent should use corporal punishment to correct bad behavior. Oh no, better to—

Sherm lost her train of thought the second a milky-white arm shot in front of her. The skin was nude except for one long coiled black hair that spiraled out of the center of a flat brown mole. The spot held her transfixed. It was an impressive growth to be sure, but then when the limb disappeared from her view, the combined aromas of camphor and mothballs lingered.

She closed her eyes to savor the memories these scents conjured. Springtime. That’s what she recalled. Nail fungus always visited her at that time of year and there was no better cure for it than camphor.

She breathed in once more and another memory hit her.

Wintertime. Ah, the closed in and locked up feeling of suffocating in dry artificial heat for a full season washed over her. Thoughts of tossing those scented orbs with flagrant abandon in her closet to keep the moths at bay, flourished. There was nothing like the aroma. A veritable stew of old people scented air that reminded her of her Gammy. Her poor departed Gammy who had been the one to introduce Sherm to the simple beauty of the avocado in the first place.

But  her quest to find the perfect fruit would have to wait for now, because she needed more of the heady elixir of home. Of Gammy. Of…

She scrutinized the tiny man with the ghost-white skin and inwardly sighed. She knew what she needed more of—him!

Meet Larz!

As I’ve said I’ll post Larz’s half of scene one on Saturday. Then it’s onto the next one. Heheheh…

The giveaway

We already have two signed books and the mystery box from last week…

This is what I’m adding to the above stuff:

It’s a large Aries magnetic clip and a flat 4X6 fridge magnet of “The boys”. When I post Larz’s scene I’ll be adding an item with David on it.

Thanks for stopping by!

Riley

Happy New Year!!!

Before I post Sherm and Larz’s story scene, I want to share a little bit of New Year cheer with you. Honey and I got a notice from the water department yesterday morning that our meter was moving too fast so we should check for leaks. Yay! I could detail to you the whole long and very depressing story in narration, but dialogue is so much more fun. So let me share bits of conversations with you so you get an overall feel for the dilemmas that faced us. First with the leak and then with…well, you’ll see.

This is Honey after he reads the doorknob hanger notice from the city. “That’s it? No, you’re losing X amount of gallons per hour or anything? Without knowing the volume it would be damn near impossible to determine the source of the leak.”

I must have looked like I cared about what he was saying because he explained.

“If the needle is moving a little that could be a leaking toilet gasket or an outdoor spigot needs a washer or something. Now, if it’s moving fast it’s a break in the line outside or in the slab.” He turned the yellow card over again. “The guy didn’t say anything about amounts?”

“Nope.”

“A**holes! Let me call them, but before I do I’m going to test something. I’ll be shutting off the water for a few minutes.”

He heads outside and comes back in five minutes later. He’s scowling. “The break is between the meter and the house. Since it’s on our property it’s our responsibility so I’ll be out front digging.”

“You know where the leak is?”

“I think so.”

Five minutes later I’m in working in my office and Honey calls, “Hey, can you come and look at this for me?”

I throw down my pen because this always happens when he does stuff around our house. I always get called in. But then I come around the corner and see him leaning into the laundry room from the garage, and I stop dead.

“Do you think it needs stiches? #$#@!!! light! I banged into it when I stood. I have to fix it by the way, but it needed to be fixed before I really broke it so no loss there.”

Yeah, there was no loss anywhere, but from the blood pouring out of his forehead. Seriously, if I had hit myself that hard I’d be crying and rocking in a corner. He had a lump the size of a golf ball and the split was an inch and half long.

“Can you snap it up? I got to get this done, if I’m going to get back to the jobsite. Stiches? Or can I tape it together with some duct tape?”

Did I mention that duct tape is his go-to medical supply when he slices himself? He tapes up fingers, biceps and even his ribs. Ribs. He did that once only the second I found out about it I took him to the hospital to get X-rayed. Yeah, he cracked two of them when he fell off a ladder so he needed them wrapped with something other than duct tape. *shakes head* The doctors thought it was ingenious, by the way, but back to the gushing blood and open wound on his forehead. I didn’t let him tape it – I taped it. Not with duct tape, but with proper butterfly wing strips after I disinfected area. Which was all good until he discovered that the leak he’d found (a very, very, small one) wasn’t the leak that was causing the problem. It was time to call in the leak experts – only they couldn’t come until today so we called a semi-expert. Our sprinkler guy who took one look at the meter and said, “OMFG!!!! You’re losing about a gallon a minute.”

How could this be though? Our lawn, driveway, and house wasn’t floating away. Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you it was raining the proverbial felines and canines yesterday too, so yippee ki ya you know what! In the end we went old school and turned off the water last night at the source to wait for the experts. Come morning, Honey was chomping at the bit to find the problem and within five minutes after a good night’s sleep he found it. All fixed. So there we were sitting having our coffee later than usual this morning when I said to him, “I can’t believe you don’t care about getting cut in the face.” I was sitting there imagining what it would have been like if that had been my forehead, you know?

He shrugs. “It’s not so bad. It will give me character.”

Yeah, like he needed more of that. “It’s going to leave a scar.”

“So what. Chicks dig scars.”

I almost choked on my coffee, but then he proceeds to tell me about this one time when he got hit in the eye with a toboggan. It sliced his cheek open and gave him a wicked black eye. According to him, all the girls at school were fawning all over him. Especially after he told them he’d been in a fight the night before and that’s how he got the shiner.

*Insert me steaming here* Why? Because I was one of those girls he fed that load of hogwash to. Not at school because we didn’t go to school together, but after school when we were together. Hm. *Drums fingers on table and thinks back* Why didn’t he ever mention all those fawning girls to me…me who was his girlfriend at the time?

Meh, that was so many years ago that I decided to leave it be. Yeah, right after I told him the one reason I fell in love with him in the first place was because of that fight when I thought he was a bad ass, kicking ass like that. Now that I knew he made it up and it was a stupid toboggan that gave him a black eye? Well, that changed everything didn’t it?

*Looks right at you* It certainly changed his attitude. Heh. He’s been sweating bullets ever since. Me? Not so much. I think I’ll wait until New Year’s to tell him I was only joking…Poor guy. But can you imagine the nerve? Lol!

Okay, have fun tonight. Tomorrow I’m going to post the story scene and the added item for the giveaway.

I hope all you guys have a happy and safe New Year’s!!!! See ya in 2015!!!!

Riley

The Contest Challenge Of Debunking The Stereotypical Romance With A Story Of True Love…

 

While I was enjoying a beverage last night and thinking about my next giveaway I came up with this idea. Actually Honey reminded me about something I used to do in college which inspired the idea. *Insert disclaimer here* Honey said I had to give him credit so… *le sigh* consider him being generously credited! Now onto the good stuff.

It occurred to me that I have had a run on beautiful and feisty heroines with their hunkier than hunkster heroes for far too long. So I’ve decided to do a contest where we deconstruct the romance novel with *I hope* some help from you guys. Yep, it’s true. Once a week on this blog I’m going to add a scene to my (I’m borrowing from Seinfeld here) bizarro world of romance.

Here’s the deal. Normally a perfect title would be Beloved Captive, but not in bizarro world. I’m thinking… ah, The Unloved Wanderer. Perfect. Now, *cracks knuckles* heroine’s attributes. In the real writing world my gals are usual of below-average height, curvy with nice sized breasts and features that are either adorable or stunning, or in some cases both. In this bizarro world? I’m thinking this heroine has to be six foot two with a size fourteen shoe. Well, either that or the next size up, the box. She has numerous curves. Unfortunately they’re just not in the right places. Things that curve on her?  Her spine, fingers, and even her toes that crookedly curl upward. As for her features? Easy. Rat-like beady eyes, Durante type big nose, and lips so thin, it looks as if her face is eating them. That is until she smiles when her “could eat corn-on-the-cobb through a picket fence teeth that have nothing on Bugs Bunny” make one realize those lips are to be commended for the job they’re doing hiding all the snaggle. Eek!

Now, normally at this point in the writing process I would detail what kind of skin she has, hair color, and some other super special things – mannerisms or habits — but with this I think I’ll make it a point to leave those to my hero to introduce to the reader.

Now for the hero. *takes a deep breath* I’m thinking he has to be five-foot-one on a tall day, he’ll have a size six shoe, and have soft little dove eyes. Maybe with the cutest pertly turned up nose, and ruddy cheeks. I love me some ruddy cheeks. Instead of the cut body with the six-pack stomach, he’s going to remind one of the StayPuff Marshmallow Man, only, you know, like his dwarf, troll-worthy cousin. Same white skin, same lumpy physique, but I want you to think squashed…no, squat. Ooh, nothing spells smexxy to me better than a dough boy with head-to-toe muffin tops. Rawr!

Alrighty, for the first scene next week? *pauses here to reflect upon a scenario* *Done* I’m thinking Larz (that’s the hero) spots Shermatta (his heroine who prefers to be called Sherm) at the local grocery store. It’s love at first sight for Larz when he seizes upon this hulking, yet unique creature of loveliness, pawing her way through a bushel of avocados. Unlike the rest of the patrons, he’s not repulsed, and can’t possibly turn away. He’s riveted by her linebacker moves and guttural grunts of dissatisfaction over the paltry fruit selection. This would explain why, when she snaps her head around and glares at him with those beady rat-like eyes, he’s done for because he’s always had a thing for rodents.

Unfortunately, Sherm doesn’t care much for people, men in particular. She’d rather talk to her parrot, Ezmeralda, as the bird repeats everything she says making her feel important, than share her time with the insignificant populous.

Poor Larz…

What I need each week is a laundry list of things to include in the next scene of The Unloved Wanderer. All you guys have to do is leave your brilliant suggestions in comments on one idea from the list, or on all of them, and I’ll sort through your suggestions and come up with the funny. Again, with your help.

Here’s the list for their first meeting when Larz approaches Sherm.

1. He needs an excuse. Maybe he’s found the perfect avocado for her, or maybe he’s worried she’s going to trip on her wilted stocking that has come loose from its garter and is pooled around her swollen ankle like a worm curled up dead in the grass after a pesticide treatment.

2. We need a good reason she rebuffs him. Maybe he’s too virile for her. Or too threatening. Maybe he has an accent she doesn’t trust, or his nose is too big.

3. We need something to happen that brings them together. Maybe the power goes off in the store and Larz is frightened in the dark, or maybe Sherm plucks a fruit off the stand and all of them scatter, but before Larz falls from having to skate over them Sherm catches him and he cleaves to her ample, if not miss-proportionate, bosom.

4. The last is the wild card. Give me something. Anything. A word, a thought, a physical characteristic, a problem, and if it’s something I can work in, I will.

We’ll do five weeks where I’ll post the basic scenario between Lars and Sherm and their budding relationship. Every time you leave a comment your name will be dropped in the hat and when we’re done with our Nobel Prize winning romance, I’ll be drawing from the hat. The winner will get this, *see below* with extras stuff added each week when I post the next portion of The Unloved Wanderer.

Questions? Feel free to post here or email me. Otherwise, dig deep. Can you imagine what Larz does for a living? What about Sherm? After reading her bio above, I’d probably make her a Hallmark greeting card writer, or the department head of  “Beauty Is Our Motto” customer service. Lol!

I do have a question for you guys. Would you want to read each scene every week as I wrote them, or would rather I write the whole story and then posted it at the end of the five weeks when the winner is chosen? Let me know. Either in comments or email. This is going to be fun!

So far we have two signed print copies of my books and the mystery box. I love the shmancy box, and before we’re done with The Unloved Wander you’ll get to see what’s inside it.

Riley  

The Present Deal

While I’m Waiting…Let’s Do FREE!!!!

Update!!! It has been released!

 

While I’m waiting for this to release I thought I’d mention a couple of things. First and foremost? If you received a review copy and I sent you an ePub file but you wanted a mobi, don’t be shy. Email me. Next time I do this I’ll make sure the file option is there for you guys to choose. Sorry about that.

Next thing? This:

 

*shrug* I just thought you had to see it.

Next thing? Honey is completely nuts. That is all. *insert that annoying piano one note/key playing from the movie Eyes Wide Shut here until I can’t stand it* Gah! Alright! He’s driving me crazy with all his help. Yes, you read that right – help.

Allow me to explain. Here’s the conversation:

Imagine me sweating over everything I have to do to nail the holidays, and imagine Honey sweating over one thing, what to buy for me.

I’m looking at the list I have – the one I don’t want to check twice because it’s too long, and then I sigh. “How am I going to get all this done before Turkey day?”

Honey answers, while lounging on the couch watching one of his stupid documentaries. “Yeah, I know. It’s tough. Every year you get harder and harder to buy for. I can tell you that.”

I look at my list of…well, there’s more than one person, that’s all I’m saying. To him I narrow my eyes and grate out, “One gift purchase must be a major bitch to figure out. How would you like to swap this year? I’ll buy for me and you can buy for everyone else.”

His eyes remained glued to the TV. Aggravating? Don’t ask. “No thanks. I have a system, and it would get all screwed up if we switched.”

There’s me thinking, “oh yeah, I bet it would” when he adds, “It’s taken me years to get this down to a science where I can be in and out of one store in less than twenty minutes.”

Me: *blink, blink* Twenty minutes? I looked down at my list and decided the only way I could pull that off was to evoke the mighty power of the gift cards. “Hm. You may have given me an idea.”

“Your welcome.”

Again, his eyes never moved. Wow, who said men can’t multitask? Here he was solving my huge problem and blissfully watching his show about– yeah, I’ll be damned if I know what he was so engrossed in– at the same time. By the look of the dirt-covered people on the screen, I’d say a primitive tribe of mud dwellers. *le sigh*

Now fast forward a couple of days when I walk through our front door and see it. *insert the snow glob moment here*

I can’t tell you what it was in case my daughter reads this (it’s one of her presents), but I can tell you it was two things. Number one. Nothing I would have EVER and I mean, NEVER  bought for her, and two, it was something I’d needed to read the instructions so I could figure out how it was used. So, yeah, where was I going with this? Oh, right. Honey attempting to help. Here’s that conversation:

“Ta-da! I bought a present for our girl.”

I tried not to scowl, but failed. “I gathered that by the note you stuck on it.”

He’d written her name on a piece of paper in block letters so there was no missing it.

“I don’t know where you keep the bows and stuff. Just stick one on there after you’ve wrapped it.”

I kicked off my shoes and remained staring at them while I let that sink in. He wanted me to wrap the monstrosity? “I’m not wrapping that.”

Honey didn’t eve blink. “You have to. I’m no good a gift wrapping.”

Like I didn’t know that. One of my first presents from him was tied with string in a garbage bag. In his defense it was a rather large stuffed animal that wouldn’t have fit into much else, and besides he was only eighteen at the time so I forgave him. But this? “Sure, I may be an expert at wrapping gifts, but I can tell you with all truthfulness, I wouldn’t know where to start with that. Sorry. We’ll have to hide it and do a present finding map for her.”

I could tell he liked the thought of that because he grinned. “Great idea. I’ll put it in the garage and make her really have to work for it. You won’t have to do anything. I’ll do the map and everything. After our talk the other day I want to help you.”

I was just doing a mental. “Aww…” over his sweetness when he heads into the kitchen and calls, “Do you know where the good paper is? Oh, and I need a better marker. What can I use as clues? Do you have red and green markers? Maybe I should make the map festive.”

*Looks right at you* This is him doing everything????

“Where do you hide the tape around this place? I couldn’t find it earlier.”

Yes, it was right at that moment I remembered why I don’t like Honey to help me with these things. Forget the crazy idea of the gift, when I walked over to better examine what he’d stuck that block lettering note  on with – all I could do was sigh. Honey may not have found the scotch tape, but apparently he’d discovered our medical supplies. Once I got close enough to see how the paper with her name on it, was fastened – I frowned as there was no mistaking the white bandage tape. He’d even gone the extra mile too and made an cartoon “ouch-looking” ‘X’ to hold in place. *Double le sigh*

A few seconds later, he leaned out of the kitchen entrance, and asked, “What about glitter? Should I use some of that?”

Forget the double le sigh. This called for a double dirty martini! If you’ve read A Perfect Holiday you’ll know why I cringe whenever Honey mentions the use of glitter. That scene in the park at the Santa Claus parade was taken right out of a page of our lives. Lol!

“I’ll need some Elmer’s glue too.”

So there you have it. Instead of banging out my lengthy gift purchases and getting my shopping done. With all of Honey’s “help” – I wasted a whole afternoon trying to keep him from gluing the red and green throat lozenges he’d spied in the medical supplies onto the gift map. I knew I was in serious trouble when he dumped the glitter on the page and then squirted the glue on top of that. *shakes head* He’s been a really, REALLY, big help I can tell you that!

On another note…

I seriously think Amazon forgot about me. The Present Deal should have been published yesterday morning. I’m kind of bummed about that. So to make up for it, I’m offering A Perfect Holiday on for free for today and tomorrow. Grab it if you haven’t read it. Free is always nice, right? Just click the cover or the teaser and it will take you to the FREE buy link.

 

Last thing! I promise. In a few days I’ll be posting about a new contest! This one will be a New Year’s one and they’ll be a little bit of mystery. You see the picture below?

So far I’ve decided the giveaway will include two signed paperbacks and what’s in the box. I love the box there’s a jewel in the center and I love what’s in the box, but that’s the mystery. I haven’t decided what else I’m going to include, but when I do I’ll post the details.

Hope you guys have a great weekend. Between waiting for Amazon and babysitting Honey around my craft supplies, I think it’s going to be a long one for me.

Riley

Quick Update about the winners with a teaser!

Okay, I have notified the two winners and will post about that once I hear back from them. Congrats!

Also, I had a look at the responses I received on ARC requests. You guys are awesome btw! Looking at the list, I’ve decided to do more than the original ten I’d thought to do. Instead I’ll be sending out 30 as soon as I have the book back from the formatters. I’m sorry I can’t send to everyone who put in requests, but when I do this again, the guys who didn’t get an ARC this time, will get one next time, I promise. I’ve saved the list.

I really, REALLY appreciate you taking the time!

Now for a little slice of Riley’s life with Honey…

Tonight while I was cooking the potatoes, making the salad, and chopping the vegetables – because you know Honey was exhausted cooking the one meat item on the BBQ, I was looking around for an oven mitt.

“Do you really need three oven mitts? Are you hiding an hand I’m not aware of?”

He pops his brows. “Not a hand.”

Okay, yeah. Nothing spells sexy to me than my guy standing over a smoking BBQ.

I shook my head, rolled my eyes, and then left because…well, I’m not a big fan of flirting over smelly meat. *shrug* could be me. Bah! I just read that line back! Hilarious. Smelly meat. I’m talking about chicken not, you know. Gee, you guys are bad! Anyway men have no problem about cook smells. If you don’t believe me read this. But back to the oven mitts.

There I was cooking up a storm, when Honey comes in and has the stupidest look on his face. I’m like, “What now?”

He says, “Guess what I found?”

Did I mention I don’t like to play guessing games when I have three different foods cooking at three different temperatures on the stove? “Can’t guess. Just tell me.”

Truthfully, I was expecting him to carry on with the direction of our earlier conversation and say something about his third hand needing attention. Instead he held up two matching oven mitts. Admittedly, one was darker with wear and age, while the other was pristine and beautiful.

“I found the missing link,” he announced. “There always was two of them. You owe your sister an apology.”

I didn’t really, because all the bitching I did – about her giving me a basket full of kitchen stuff all those years ago with only one oven mitt in it, I did behind her back. “Where the hell did it come from?” I’m thinking it was stuck in one of the drawers out in the BBQ area, but that didn’t explain why I’d never – and I mean never – seen the matching Eiffel Tower mitt in my life.

“It was stuck inside the other one.” He demonstrated and then said, “It’s a Christmas miracle.”

There I was thinking, the only miracle surrounding those mitts was the fact that I’d kept what I thought was only one for so long. If you guys knew how many times I picked that lone sucker up out of the drawer, wondering what my sister was thinking giving me one effing oven mitt, you’d die. The kids practically canonized it.

Oop, now that I think about it, I better tell the kids. They used to enjoy making up stories about it. How there was a whole line of kitchen products designed for a one armed chef who had a French fetish. Bummer. I bet they’re going to be disappointed to learn that the Eiffel Tower glove has a twin. Exciting, right?

Yeah, I didn’t think so either, but Honey did. There I was getting my hair steamed over the boiling potatoes while he made lobster claw moves with the glove through the window at me. That’s my life people! One solved mystery after another.

Thanks for stopping by!

Riley

 

 

 

 

The Contest And A Peek At The Cover Of My Next Release!!!!!

Hi guys! I told you this one was going to be easy. I will be drawing one winner from comments and one from my subscribers list on December 14th 2014. One lucky winner will win a 25.00 Amazon gift card and another will win one of Sidney’s (my heroine from A Perfect Holiday) quirky angels with decorative box and Godiva chocolate gems (click here) for pictures and details!

Yay! *Insert drum roll here* This is the cover for my short holiday story The Present Deal that will be released on the 18th. This time I’m doing something a little different. I’m offering a limited number of advanced reader copies (on a first come basis) for those who are interested. You’ll find the details below. Oh, and if you don’t know what to comment, but you want two chances to win, just leave a comment letting me know what you think of my new cover…or the excerpt. This book’s a steamy one!

Sign-ups for advance copy reviews

THE PRESENT DEAL

 In order for both to win, one of them must lose, and it’s not going to be him….

EXCERPT

 “Tell me, Ms. Crawford. Is there a point to this visit, or did you insist on meeting with me today in order to save my soul?”

“Tough to do that when you don’t have one.”

The silence that followed that statement got adrenaline coursing through me. I recognized very clearly why my heart rate was picking up speed. She’d verbally slapped me in the face and I wanted to slap her right back. I narrowed my eyes and spoke slowly. Softly. Carefully. “If you believed that then you shouldn’t have said it. A man with no soul is capable of doing the unthinkable. Is that what you want, Ms. Crawford? Me to do the unthinkable to you?”

“Maybe…for a price.”

(end)

 

Okay, I am handing out 10 advance eBook copies for review. If you’re interested, all you have to do is fill out this super-duper easy-peasy form and click submit.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Riley

 

Request an advance copy of The Present Deal

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Congrats To The Winners!!!

Thanks so much for playing!!!

Rebecca who won the stuff in the picture above – the pen/magnets/books and various other goodies

Lauren who won the 50.00 gift card

Aleana, Sandy, and Jill, who won books and/or available audio copies of their choice!!!

Woo-Hoo! For those that didn’t win…yet. I’m posting a new contest on Thursday for commenters and subscribers. One lucky winner from each place. Which means if you leave a comment and you’re a subscriber your name gets entered twice for the draw!!! This will be a fast one. I’ll be drawing on Sunday Dec. 14th. That’s my anniversary! Well, mine and Honey’s. Twenty-nine years together, and I still crush on him. Love that! They’ll be a 25.00 Amazon gift card, and if you’ve read A Perfect Holiday, one of my heroine’s (Sidney’s) “quirky” angels will be up for grabs!!! This is her in her red and yellow poke-a-dot bikini. She comes with a decorative box (I tried to get a good shot of it) and some Godiva chocolate caramel gems! Yum!

 

This is how she looks on the tree…and below is the decorative box (it’s hard so great for storage)

Now for a little Honey story.

To set this up, Honey and I went away for Thanksgiving. This time, my mom stayed home, so we decided to drive. The ride up to Georgia was pretty uneventful. We got to shoot the breeze and catch up with stuff so it was nice. But then…

It was time for the drive home. *shakes head*

Why is it when you go away you’re totally cool with the trip there until you have to return? I mean, it’s the same distance – the same amount of time spent together- so why not shoot the breeze and have fun heading home too? *looks up while I wait for the universe to throw me the answer* Nope, I got nothing. Apparently the universe had the same attitude Honey had when we drove home last week. Silent. *le sigh*

So picture this. Me in the passenger seat pointing out stupid landmarks and asking even stupider questions. You know, those ones you already have the answers to, but you’re just trying to fill time and hear something else besides your own thoughts? Now picture this, Honey grunting, nodding, or giving me answers that are short and sweet – I hate those. Can you spell “followed by awkward silence”? Anyway, it’s at this point I start to get bored. :)

“You’re going over the speed limit. You may want to slow down.”

Silence. Followed by more silence for several minutes. So, you know I had to go on…

“Speed limit is 70.” I annoyingly pointed out.

“Who’s driving?”

“You, but not very well. Is that a cop?”

Honey doesn’t even take his eyes off the road. “Nice try. Why don’t you read something? Better yet, why don’t you read something to me?”

His tone was so pleasant it grated on my nerves. He may as well as well have said, “Just sit there and look beautiful” It really pissed me off. “Why? So you can ignore that too?”

No answer. *insert me thinking  #@!#@!$! here* But then I see a real cop with a nice big radar detector pointed at us. “Speed trap!” I yell.

He pats my knee. *insert me blackly scowling here because I hate that gesture too* and when he says, “Take it easy. Unless the guy’s car can levitate, I highly doubt he’ll be chasing us down. There was not only a guardrail, but chain-link fencing in between him and the highway.”

Okay, truth be told, I did see the rail, but not the chain-link. It didn’t stop me from grumbling, “He could call ahead to one of his buddies. He could relay the color and make of our car. The guy could be right over the next rise.” Of which there wasn’t one, but I wasn’t about to give this up being knee-deep in it already.

Honey snorts. “Call ahead? Oh yeah, I can hear him now.” He continues in a very official sounding voice that made me smile. “Adam 12? You there? Nab the car behind the hummer. Forget that the hummer is clipping along at 10 more miles an hour than the car. What do you mean you don’t see it? It’s not hard to miss. It’s the vehicle where the guy is expertly driving while his wife is wagging her finger at him and  bitching up a storm. Do the poor bastard a favor and pull him over so he can get fresh air and some distance from the harpy. He’s probably got one helluva a headache listening to that in such close quarters.”

By the time he got done with his sarcastic rant, I was drumming my fingers on the door handle, trying to contain my frustration. He thought he was so funny. That’s when I thought about frustration and made my decision. He’d said he wanted me to read him something, so I sure would. I pulled out my next story, The Present Deal, and began to read. Did I mention that it’s very, VERY, erotic for the first 4 chapters? No? Well, it is. *beams* Frustrated? Yup, he was. He also wasn’t laughing by the time I got to the end of the 4th chapter -that ends on a rather breathless cliffhanger, because I refused to read any more to him. This certainly fixed the problem with him being silent. For the rest of the way home he kept trying to guess what came next. Wrong EVERY time! Of course, I didn’t tell him the rest of the story, and I won’t. For the first time ever, I told him he’d have to buy the book to find out. Heheheh. His answer to that?

“From now on, we’re flying.”

*Looks right at you and scratches my head* Is that a bad thing? I didn’t think so. But then, if you read my blog you should know I never let him get the last word in. So I refocused in on him, and said, “Great. Providing you’re not the pilot flying the plane, I’m in.”

He didn’t say anything to that which kind of has me worried. Honey has a habit of turning my putdown quips into a personal challenge. *insert me thinking for a millisecond here and then the light bulb clicking on!* Eek! I better alert the children now that I think about it. Honey’s very devious about these kinds of things. Usually he enlists the kids help via having them gift him with things – in this case? Flying lessons so I won’t be able to say no! Actually, it would be more like me saying, “Over my dead body” but you get the point. If the kids get involved I’ll be screwed…Got run. Oh, but don’t forget to check back on Thursday for the next contest.

Riley

 

 

 

And The Winner Is….

Yay! Jennifer B you won Myrtie!

A big congrats to all the winners so far!

Jessica who won an eBook copy of Stare Her Down

Tamara who won a 25.00 Amazon gift card

Kristina who won a copy of Reclaimed Surrender

Alina who won an eBook copy of Stare Her Down

Michelle who won a signed copy of Reputable Surrender

Sandy who won a 25.00 amazon gift card

Monique who won a signed copy of Stare Her Down

We still have this up for grabs:

This drawing will take place at the end of the month – I got my proofs of Stare Her Down so there will be a copy of that book included. All my subscribers and everyone who comment on that original post are included in the draw. If you want to subscribe to play along with all my giveaways, great. If not, but you still want to play, just go here and leave a comment.

Also, if you haven’t entered this drawing yet – there’s $$ and prizes too. Click on the Night Owl link here to enter the rafflecopter:

 

What’s next? Well, I’ll tell you….

 

Myrtie and Fred are both mysteriously missing at my house. Me thinks Honey has sent them away to parts unknown again. So, I’m going to make you a deal. When they do reappear, I’ll do another giveaway for one of Myrtie’s cousins. This will be for all my subscribers and anyone who leaves a comment on that particular post, so check back.

Then?

I am also going to do a giveaway when A Perfect Holiday releases in Audio format (should be around Dec.1st or so, for one of Sidney (my heroine’s) quirky angels. There’s a story about this particular book, and the “quirky angel”, but I’ll tell you all about it in my next blog.

Here’s a teaser

Next up is my newest holiday story. It’s a hot and steamy one!!!

Here’s a teaser for that one

This was should be all nice and shiny by Dec. 1st.

Thanks so much for stopping by! And good luck with the next wave of giveaways!

Riley

Did I Do That???

I don’t even have to think. *raises hand and does that annoying ooh-ooh in the classroom until the teacher points to me and I emphatically shout* “Yes!”

If you’ve been following the case of the ice “you-know-whats” great, if not here’s the rundown. A few months ago I realized that I had a haunted oven. True story, you can read about it here. Anyways, I bugged Honey and he got me a new stove. Yay! But then something really odd happened. My icemaker started acting up. Coincidence? I don’t think so. I write erotic romance, so check these out and tell me if my little haunted ghostie guy didn’t jump the proverbial burner right into the ice. *leans in to whisper* I think the little devil was trying to schmooze me with these delectable suckers, but I digress.

This is how these little beauties played out between Honey and me. When the male members start multiplying I start snapping shots of them. Then I started to show Honey the pictures. The first time he doesn’t even blink, when he says, “Interesting.

The second time he frowns and points out a node. “This mold is defective. It looks like the guy has syphilis.”

 

But that’s when I tell him that they weren’t coming out of kinky molds. The ice maker was making them (I added the “for me” part just to bug him, and it did). This is when he announced he was going to order a new machine.

Great. Only the new one that arrived was damaged, so we had to send it back. Then the second one that came wasn’t the right model so Honey sent that back too. Then? Then the customer service representative did something to make Honey mad so he cancelled the order altogether. *shakes head* Did I mention Honey doesn’t handle incompetent well? *looks right at you* Seriously, he’s bad when he gets mad because he goes quiet and before you know it people are apologizing, but he never changes his mind in the end. That’s the bad part.

Long story to this very short problem? I still, through no fault of my own, have the haunted ice maker, so when I complained about it the other day, Honey said something he shouldn’t have. He said, and I quote:

“I’ll make you a deal. The day that effing thing produces a real man size one, I’ll change the machine. Otherwise, we’ll just wait until the New Year as planned, and buy a whole new refrigerator.”

Yeah, there were two things wrong with that the way I saw it. One? There was nothing the matter with our current fridge besides the peen-producer and two? I didn’t want to wait until the New Year to get perfect ice. Hello? I’ve got the holidays coming up and people like non-erotic ice. Can you imagine me sticking this into my neighbor’s gin and tonic? They already have enough chit-chat going on about Honey and I they don’t need any more. Trust me.

So there I am thinking. *tapping index nail on front tooth whilst I burn the midnight oil trying to come up with something to fix this so I get what I want and…Bam* I decide I’m going to order what Honey accused me of doing in the first place, using manual ice molds that maketh the dicketh. I was so excited about the prospect until it came to me. With my *cough, cough* robust computer skills and paint shop, why I could photoshop my way into a new machine! *beams* Brilliant right? *Stands at attention and gives you a very formal salute while I announce* Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Richard The Mega-Dong, but we’re going to call him Dick. Can’t wait to show Honey tonight. Heheheh.

 

Thanks for stopping by.

Riley