Stephenson Holt Author

The High Heel Revenge Pack.

Revenge_Review

High Heel Revenge Pack Reviews. More reviews at the bottom of the page.

BOOK BLURB (Free chapters below the blurb).


These are the members of the High Heel Revenge Pack. But which one do you relate to?

 

Donna Madison met her husband Colin in school and has been cruelly ruled by him ever since. Beaten if she complains about him staying out, abused mentally every day, she dreams of him dying and her being set free. Can she achieve that dream?

 

Greta Larson is a Scottish junior detective, bored and locked within the mistake of a marriage to husband Josh and wanting her affair with her partner Stephen to go further. Can she win or will it all go wrong?

 

Skye Morris, formerly Morreau is affluent, thanks to her second husband Peter, not that he knows about her first, arranged marriage to Trank the vampire prince, who turned her. Nor does Peter know that his wife is a witch, succubus and satis but it seems to work for them as she enjoys being human and comfortable.

 

Judith Houseman owns six engineering companies, each headed by a male. She is CEO of the parent company and each of her minions knows that she could fire them at will, if she chose to. Luckily, husband George thrives on her power mad character, him being a true submissive by nature.

 

Monique Morreau is second cousin to Skye and grew up in the same house, having the same biological father. Also witch, succubus, satis and vampire she is Empress Vampire of the realms within Europe, along with husband Emperor Tristan, Skye’s brother-in-law.

 

Kath Davenport is a bored housewife who spends the summer days behind her curtains, spying on her next-door, gardening neighbour, the muscular Larry. Her husband Michael has no idea and tries, every night, for a third child, while Kath has Larry in her head. Will Larry stay as a fantasy?

 

Pamela Busfield is a single twenty-something and has an office job but takes on extra work. Serving at Skye’s cocktail parties is lucrative because her mini-skirted legs have brought back Peter's clients for more talks about contracts, providing a cash bonus for Pamela. Subject of a date rape drug, how will she seek revenge.

 

Seven women, either strong or attempting to be stronger. Together they gain strength as The High Heel Revenge Pack.

 

Chapter One. 


Skye Morris,


England. Saturday morning, June 2nd, 1973.

 

My elongated, stretched-out neck is laid back in sweet surrender, as if eagerly awaiting a gentle kiss from human lips, or inviting the deep penetration of vampire canines. The gentle tick, is blood throbbing through a vein, sixty to the minute, mimicking time passing quickly and my dilemma of wanting to be in two places at once. I feel at my most vulnerable since ditching my first husband, the evil vampire Prince Trank. Long fingers, ending in claw-like nails move slowly across my head, exploring the contours of my skull through my scalp, keeping my neck elongated as the fingers cover the skull top, as if searching for the secrets kept within.


My old witch powers, that are confidently very much at home within my vampire head, push through and read the mind of the female behind me. I know instantly that the young girl enjoys giving me a head massage, while washing my hair as much as I’m enjoying it and she knows it will earn her a decent tip.


She keeps all my long black hair and the flowing warm water inside the salon back-wash sink and then the second dose of expensive shampoo in my hair runs like honey through her fingers and turns us both on. The whole, luxurious sensation closes my eyes, makes me relaxed to the point of feeling sleepy and makes her concentrate on keeping her false nails away from scratching my skin to wake me out of my mood.


This is what I love about this salon. The pampering of women by women. Only women are allowed this side of the entrance door, as if the world, for now, contains only us females. The salon owner does not allow men in here, not even to deliver products that she insists have to be dropped at the rear door.


Gossip, usually involving absent women and their relationships with men they shouldn’t be with, leads to a joint wish from all of us for a world where our own men could earn money to keep us adequately pampered, but do it while they sit safely in a cupboard at home, to be only brought out when we want them, maybe to pleasure us sexually when we want it - not them, maybe check tyre pressures, put up a shelf, not make their usual mess or leave socks on the floor and then to go back into their cupboard until needed again.


All the salon workers here are sponges for information gathering, choosing wisely which of their, never to be repeated, items can be allowed out to play with which valued customers. 'Don't tell anyone but…' is quite common here. Being able to read all the staff’s minds is fun for me but sometimes leaves me exhausted and struggling to keep in my head every bit of tittle-tattle that exists in my town.


My latest 'Skye's Party' will be tonight, hence the pampering, but there may be complications, maybe an evil spot down the side of my house, maybe a need for a fellow witch and fellow vampire, cousin Monique, to confirm the perceived evil and watch over it. She’s on her way and when we last thought-spoke, she told me that I’m here every week and didn't need a party as an excuse to be here. She can be bitchy on times.


Monique is in my relaxed head now, causing some non-relaxing, using thought-speak. We call each other cousins, or second-cousins but really our mothers are cousins, we are nothing to each other but grew up in the same house and feel like sisters. Complicated but then our family is. She has apparently upset a courting couple by driving through them on her far-too-large motorbike, in a forest of all places. My life choice, changing to pretend to be human, with a little car as a mode of transport, shows the divergence in our two paths. It was me that was a rebel at school, her who conformed but then something made us flip roles. The nouveau rebel speaks.


"It would be too awkward Skye, for me to turn around and apologise to that dirty pair. My worry though is what Delphis the gatekeeper would do, if the couple stray too close to the twin-elm gateway to the vampire realm I just left. I can’t warn the cheating couple off though. Too complicated. Don't think she's in the mood now though. He is and might force her."

I'm not sure why Monique is worried until she continues with her concerns.


"Luckily, we’ve already carried out conversion of this realm because, pre-conversion, Delphis would have lured that couple in, cut up the male for meat for the village and then the village king would have decided who would break that good-looking woman to the vampire way of thinking. I think he might have called her wife, not concubine or milk-cow, just as happened to me and you, all those years ago."


I hear Monique chuckle over the drone of her Harley engine and her chuckle is because she’s pretending that she was broken rather than having dived, head-first, into her relationship with the handsome Prince Tristan. Dirty cow, we all know why. Different for me though. I guess that arranged marriage works for some, not for others. She continues, ignoring my thoughts and seeing them as pure jealousy.


"Mine and Tristan’s latest transformation, behind the Scottish gateway is almost completed. Tristan is convincing the last few men that if they don’t like the new housing or the new ways, they can go back to the old village and the old way of life as it would then be called. That is, as long as they can find some women who want to live the old life. The men in the new housing area will keep cattle along the lines of the Masai tribes, milking and blood-letting the cows rather than their women. Some vampires, men and women, will hope to eventually integrate into the human world to improve it, as long as they are able to control their lust for blood, but not, I guess, their lust for sex. Just as you have done dear, so please don't look down your nose at my sexual needs from your new-money, sophisticated podium."


I explain, through thought, my head-back position and the fact that I'm not looking down my nose so she continues while I'm led to a chair for a trim, roots and pamper.


"I did receive that thought-transfer from you Skye, about an evil spot. My Emperor husband has allowed me to travel down to England to sort out your perceived problem. I just hope that Tristan can cope with our kids, on his own. At seven and six they're beginning to get strong urges not only for endorphins in their blood feast but for the sex that produces those endorphins and sugars. I can never work out why vampire lives last for so long and yet puberty arrives so early."


I’m smiling at the conversation, happy to have integrated myself back into the human world, but still lost in Monique’s voice thoughts. I know she travels too quickly and dangerously and will be with me in no time. On the open road she reaches a hundred and ten, that’s forty over the limit. Somehow, she can still concentrate on speaking to my thoughts.


"On the open road, I have time to think rather than concentrate on missing forest trees as I'm riding. That surprised couple were the only humans in a two-mile radius and yet the woman held her arm up to her mouth and nose so that she wouldn't be recognised. She might as well have held up a banner proclaiming ’affair.’ I've made a mental note to get any gatekeeper to peek through a gateway to make sure the coast is clear before any future exit, especially exit on my Harley."

I sink back into salon luxury and the warm feeling of being pampered and offered a later nail colour change to fingers and toes. An hour later and with all over volume to blow-dried, raven-black hair with a bounce to it and no blond roots, I’m sitting at the nail bar, trying to concentrate on Monique and trying to ignore loud gossip from other women, shouted to everyone else in the salon, above the noise of hair dryers. I try hard to ignore the shouted words. "Then, when she was broke, she went back to him, he took her back but she still sees the guy she went around the world with but it's complicated because another ex-lover has emerged from the past."


I ignore the interesting story because Monique has exceeded the speed limit on motorways being more used to riding on autobahns. She’s arrived at my house already, walking around to the rear. She closes my side-gate behind her and stands on the path between the house and the neighbour's hedge.


I concentrate on her feelings while my nails are being done. She stands still and her head is whirling, as mine did in that same spot. She feels, just as I did, the evil, appearing to be the future scene of some illegal activity. We both see that a woman doesn’t want what is happening to her there but doesn’t protest for some reason. Maybe the same woman twice, maybe two different women. Maybe something innocent, like illicit snogging at a party, snogging that maybe goes too far because of alcohol. The woman isn’t protesting in the least, not even pretending to protest. Maybe she pretends to be completely out of it on drink to save face? Maybe she's unable to protest. Whichever it is, I will be too busy to concentrate on what happens in my party and what happens outside, which is why I've asked for Monique's help.

 

 

Having spent most of the day at my salon, dishing out various monetary tips before, eventually, paying a fortune for pleasure received, I drive my Mini Cooper S into our quiet, suburban close and see, at the top of the hill, the Harley motorbike on the drive outside my detached villa-style house. The pillared frontage dominates the far end of the street. I feel a tightening of muscles around my heart. I’ve been so busy with Monique’s thoughts that I have no idea where my hubby Peter is. Why oh why did Monique have to turn up while I’ve been away from my house and, as she is nowhere to be seen, has Peter come home early, garaged his car and let her in? What, if anything, has she revealed about my past?


I force a smile, waving to neighbour Larry as I pass his house, ignoring as usual his white-vested muscled arms and chest, the vest covering the sweat of gardening. Those muscles, that I’m supposed to drool over, ignite the other bored housewives in my street who imagine him pinning their bored bodies down and then his forcing his evil way on them. I had enough of that with Trank, thank you very much, in real life, not fantasy.


In your dreams Larry, not mine. I’m not one of your many admirers and never will be. If I succubus-dreamed you it would be the end of you mentally but those days are over for me, now that I’ve reverted to being almost human. Still, you add a bit of eye candy to the street and it keeps the other wives alive with hope. Dangerously so in the case of your neighbour Kath, if I read her dirty thoughts correctly. She’s probably ogling over you right now from her bedroom window.

It’s been around five years since I last saw Monique but any woman would prefer to be present when a family member that knows that I’m vampire, witch, satis and succubus, first meets their unknowing husband. Her familiar voice sounds as soon as I enter through my front door. “In here. Living room. You left the back door spellable, idiot.” Her words let me know she is alone and she knows that I am.


We hug, shoulder to shoulder, cheek to cheek, breasts not touching, in the old vampire style we were once both used to. My fingers are outstretched, away from her clothes, just as they have been on my steering wheel and gear lever, protecting new nail polish. When we separate Monique looks me up and down and I know what’s coming.


“You’ve put on weight Skye, which suits you mind, mainly on your boobs where it was needed. Black hair? Covering grey or just a change from white blonde? Don’t tell me, it makes you look more witch-like, more like in the human children’s books. Maybe a false wart on the end of your nose would complete the picture? You left the key in the lock, inside admittedly, I just had to spell-turn it from outside.”


I throw my head back, my hair swirling to show off my recently shampooed and waved hair and to show I’m more sophisticatedly human and not un-sophistically vamp as she clearly is. “The skinny blond you once knew, the one with no boobs, that looked like a model, has gone. This black-haired beauty is none of those things. I was also vegetarian before your brother-in-law turned me, don’t forget, but I enjoy a rare steak now. I’d forgotten how much your thoughts jump around Monique. You’re the only one about here who could spell-turn a key.”


I proudly bare my teeth and talk awkwardly for the first few words. “Look at this mouth girl. Peter paid for really expensive dental treatment, cost him a fortune to get normal canines for me as a bridge. He also paid for tattoo removal to the breasts you referred to and to just above my pubes. I guess you still have your three death tattoos, Mrs. Tristan Morreau.”


She curls her upper lip and it produces a natural hiss as she shows me her canines. “I do still have them and I’m proud of my branding marks making me owned by my master. They keep me safe behind gateways with the threat of death to anyone who dares touch me. It’s a practice that would probably benefit you here, in your human world where, by the way, I feel less safe.”


Monique pulls her top up with one hand, enough to show me her tattoos of ownership and to let me know that despite my change in shape she is still more endowed in the boob department than me and still doesn’t always choose to wear a bra. She lets the top drop back down as she speaks.

"I’ve heard it leaves scarring, the tattoo removal, so Peter knows all about your past then? I can understand you don’t like saying Trank’s name because you still hate him but do you miss that concubine of yours? What was her name? My leather jacket holds them firm while I ride, to answer your unspoken question.”


I think back to salon gossip and all the executions that would happen in the town that I frequent if death-tattoos were really a thing here. I also think briefly about what Almena my concubine used to do to my head, through her nerve-sensing fingers. “Peter has not an inkling about my past dear, or about your situation and it’s going to stay like that, so stay sober-ish tonight please. I am human now, not even slightly witch."


I smell alcohol in the air, assume she has a drink so make one for myself while chatting. "You can imagine how difficult things are when we go to the cottage for Sunday lunch. Our dear mothers try their hardest not to do or say anything out of the ordinary but you know what mothers are like, they still tease me. Trank, by the way, if Peter mentions it, was the lead singer I fancied in an American rock band, not a first husband.”


Monique is unable to stay on one topic. “I need to visit Shelagh and Janice and they already sense that I’m close because of the parent and daughter bond. I already know of your party plans for tonight, before you beg me to stay. Remember I came in through the kitchen. The stuffed olives are lovely by the way. So how have you managed to keep everything from your lover boy? How is Peter the school hunk that I succubus-dreamed a long time ago and know exactly how hot he is in bed?”

There is disdain in my curled lip. “Sometimes, when he sends me to that place, I want to bite him to prolong his climax, if, that is, I want to stay where I am mentally and benefit greatly from his prolonged twitching inside me, but I have to suppress that urge. Not that I have any canines now anyway. Since the day he dragged me out of the gutter, literally out of the gutter, I haven’t cast one spell but I still thought-read him. Peter is very loyal to me, and me to him. I’d know immediately if he’d been unfaithful or even thought about it so it’s only fair that any erotic love affairs I have are purely in my head.”


I carry on filling Monique in. “Without mentioning Almena and how I miss her feminine touch. “Peter runs his father’s firm now and throws cocktail parties for prospective suppliers, clients and purchasers. I thought-read everyone, one by one, let Peter know what’s going on behind the commercial scenes and do it by explaining to him about overheard conversations with my above-average hearing and that old favourite that witches always use, female intuition. His company grows, based on the info I give him.”


Monique is impressed but I still need to warn her off my husband, the vulnerable human. “He’s much more mature in bed now, by the way. The boy you once had in your succubus dreams has now been taught by an expert, without him realising it. You had an immature schoolboy with a wish to empty himself into any available female and that was the last time you went anywhere near him, d’you hear. I would know instantly if you entered his dreams and we would be saying goodbye to each other, forever, if you did.”


My voice raised unexpectedly but instead of telling me she has no designs on my husband, she changes the subject to annoy me. “So, you don’t fancy any of tonight’s guests and none of the wives fancy your bloke.”


“Don’t be stupid Monique. We are still living bodies here with warm blood in our human veins. There are two gorgeous blokes that I find fanciable and there are three women who would like to bed Peter but somehow don’t get any chance to be alone with him. He might break if he knew how much they wanted him, you know what human men’s little brains are like. Look out tonight for the powerful Judith as one of his fantasy admirers. Most men tonight will fancy her and half the women as well. She exudes a feeling of, I am powerful, can have any of you if I want to, but I just can’t be bothered.”


Monique eats another olive that was stored in her hand and I wonder just how many are left in the fridge, as she speaks while chewing. “You mentioned not using your succubus powers. Those two hunks you fancy, you’ve never been tempted to sleep-dream shagging them, getting them more interested in you, not doing anything physical but just doing it to make you feel a bit more feminine, wanted and fanciable?”


She is just as crude as she's always been. "Tempted, yes. Carried it out, no. It’s far too dangerous and like I said, I live in the human world now and my blood sucking, orgasm extending, succubus dreaming, spell making days are behind me. It’s a relief really. I’m all for a quiet life in which my husband and I climb the ladder of human success and make love in a normal, human way. Before you ask, it’s nothing like vampire sex but it is, somehow, more loving and tender. More intimate."

Monique reveals yet another stuffed olive and pops it into her mouth, making me wonder if I'll have to order more from Pamela's company.


"Sounds boring girl." She tells me with a dirty grin. "You haven't asked about me and I didn’t expect you to but I’ll fill you in anyway while you make me a drink, another whisky and ginger if you’re asking."


She hands me a glass she'd stored on my carpet by the side of her chair and I refresh it while she speaks. 


"Tristan and I have converted seventeen different vampire villages, on the other side of ten different gateways, converted them to new housing and equal-ish rights for the females of the village, that’s equal-ish compared with their old ways. As news travels, from gateway to gateway, our job gets easier because the villagers expect us and have an idea of what’s coming. Oh, and we’ve fallen even more deeply in love with each other. You'd be proud. The kids are seven and six now, going through vampire puberty and Tristan says he can handle them while I’m away but I have my doubts. More importantly though, what are you going to lend me so that I don’t stand out at a cocktail party wearing leathers? Or is it that sort of a party?”


I hand her the refreshed glass with minimal whisky and laugh at the thought of a girl in leathers at one of my parties, then grab Monique’s arm and drag her upstairs, while she is trying not to spill her drink or lose an olive. “This is your room for the night, en-suite. This, dear, is the key so that you can lock up as you leave it. Then, when you retire you won’t find a couple in your bed. There are plenty of other bedrooms for that. Now, tell me about falling deeper in love and I’ll tell you exactly why you’re here.”


She clears her throat and puts her drink down on a polished timber dressing table, so I’ll have to check for a ring mark later. “Simple story really. We, Tristan and me, both thought we were in love before the four of us went through that joint marriage ceremony. Turns out, I was in love with the fact that a vampire’s fingers have nerve readers and can do what they do while processing the results in his brain, reading my future desires. I was in love with what those fingers do, to make ready a girl for their size which, as you are so well aware, is not just rumour and I was also in love with the most incredible orgasm any woman could possibly hope for, that can be extended by him biting and keeping me at that point for what sometimes feels like forever. An easy to make error, to mistake all that for true love. As we stayed close, I realised we’d really fallen in love and I had a terrible job explaining it to myself, never mind Tristan, who was only just getting used to the fact that you could, sort of, like a woman as well as owning her body.”


Memories come flooding back and I have to remind myself that I’m happy to be married to high-flying, human Peter and that size is not that important.


Offloading the contents of Monique’s leather shoulder bag onto the bed and into her en-suite bathroom takes seconds, and while she does it, she asks the same question as last time we thought-spoke.


"So, why am I here and are all your parties the type where couples end up in bedrooms with other couple’s partners?”


I drag her down the corridor towards the master bedroom at the front of the house, overlooking the street. “No, they’re not like that and I said a couple, not a pair that are not a couple but sometimes it has been known for husbands to be away on business, wives to turn up on their own and alcohol used as the old ‘I didn’t really know what I was getting into’ ploy to make themselves feel better the following morning. This is my room, Peter and mine. That maxi-dress hanging on the wardrobe door is mine for tonight but help yourself to anything else inside that you fancy. The mini is last decade now and we all wear long, it’s the current human fashion and means a maxi, cocktail dress can be recycled to be worn around town at a later date, maybe with a cardigan or jacket. There are a few inside for you to choose from that would be revealing except for a sheer dark netting where my tattoo scars would be. I assume you’re still good with needle and cotton and could remove that bit for your usual tits-out look.”


Monique thinks for a bit. “The one on the door is halter neck, no sight of any cleavage and I guess I can understand why. It’s been years since I went to a party. I will definitely be all tits-out and tattoos showing as a talking point, as men stare at them, pretending to interpret the Tristan script. I need attention Skye. It’s been a whole day now since Tristan rammed me goodbye.”


She keeps going on about Tristan’s size and doesn’t get that Peter is gentle, loving and adequately filling. “Like I told you, scar tissue for me. He likes me covered up, calls them his private scar-boobies. Loves to kiss my top scars to get me going, while I pretend to be tired after a long day and then he moves slowly, very slowly, down to kissing the other scar to ensure I don’t have a headache and I allow him his marital rights. Of course, it’s advantageous to know his thoughts and to be able to control his climax with witch-controlled internal muscles, waiting until I’m ready to allow him. Or are they vamp internal muscles? I never know but it seems to work for us until I too get my marital rights”


Monique moves to the window, looks down the hill at the semi-detached houses that form a guard of honour for my house that looks down on them all. “I think you’re right. I’ll go easy on the alcohol tonight. All this talk about sex makes me want to be unfaithful to Tristan but in a controlled way, like, fancy me, kiss me, feel me up a bit, stop I’m married but I feel better now being still wanted by others. Takes me back to my times behind the school gym and having my young boobs roughly mauled. Not down the side of your house though. That is the reason I’m here I believe?”


I nod. “I worry mostly about Donna, she lives down there, the semi on the right joined to the one with the cherry tree in the garden. She's not a very close friend, but then none of my friends are really that close, they’re sort of the wives of Peter’s business acquaintances and a few friends from this street, and some other close streets. Donna is a victim of a horrible husband. She would never complain though but does have a whiney voice. Or maybe it's not whiney and she does complain but through a whine in her voice. Anyway, keep your eye on Donna and Kath tonight as I feel one of them is the reason we both feel as we do about the house side. I can’t concentrate on keeping everyone in line, finding out ulterior business motives and try to worry about Donna’s marriage at the same time. An evil man will reveal himself at the side of my house, maybe tonight, maybe later.”

Monique shows me her serious face. “Evil yes, a man, who knows, could be a woman. I do believe that since Trank, you’ve had a downer on all men and seem to have some sort of revengeful vendetta against the male race. Peter must be easily manipulated so that you don’t fear him so much. You mentioned someone called Kath."


Another bloody olive goes into her mouth and I think she’s doing it to annoy me. I ignore my anger and keep explaining the point I was making. “Donna’s head, is in turmoil lately. She’s depressed, more than usual, and feels on a par with a worm. Kath’s head is in turmoil as well but for happier reasons that you’ll be able to easily read because she’s very open about her sexual thoughts that blossom with alcohol. It gives me a headache trying to keep up with it all. She lives in the house opposite Donna, next door to a single guy called Larry who she might throw herself at. Peter is easily manipulated by me, you're right, but because he wants to be, for both our benefits.”

Monique’s eyebrows raise on the word ‘single guy’ and she’s just about to talk about my house being different to the rest so I fill her in before she asks.


“Peter knew the developer. As his builder was putting up the semis, working his way up the street, Peter offered him a sum for this plot that exceeded the developer’s possible profit from the planned two pairs of semis that he’d intended to build here. I think some cash was also involved and some influence was made over planning permission. Peter paid him to instal underground telephone cables to each house that you can see from here, so each now has a modern telephone but there are no poles or wires to spoil our view, as there are in the other streets around here.


An architect designed our villa and, just like your thoughts, he saw the semis as a guard of honour with our house being the focal point of the street. Yes, the window you’re looking through looks smoky, even more so from outside, because it’s one-way vision, nobody can see in and no spells can get in and would rebound if they were attempted. I lied about not spelling, I forgot about that one. You can stand here, looking out, reading neighbours' thoughts, naked if you want, and I often do.”

Monique declines my invitation to undress in front of the window but has a dig instead. “Is that your means of excitement these days cousin? Ditch the vampire husband, become homeless, get accidentally picked up by the school hunk and become affluent and, because life is suddenly boring, you stand naked in your window, surveying your domain and the neighbours you control?”

I have to put her right about me ditching my first husband because she’s implying I did it on a whim. “You have never realised dear cousin that when Silas came to get us for our arranged marriages, I was a year older than you but you were about three years older than me in maturity levels. Because you were used to enjoying being manhandled behind the school gym, including boys making clay pots down below as you used to so eloquently put it, you took to vampire love like a duck to water with your pretty fellah. Imagine my position of not having been touched by a boy, ever, and then being thrown into the pit with an aggressive, too-large vampire owning me and insisting I do what he wanted, to please him. Unlike you, I’ve never had kids because I think Trank destroyed my innards, by cervix bruising and mashing mainly.”


Monique lets the subject drop, to stop any bad feeling between our two races and she doesn’t even mention that Tristan kindly got himself a dip-mark tattoo to know how far to go, not to hurt her. She delves through my extensive wardrobe, seriously weighing up the pros and cons of each dress but then, out of the blue, Monique's mood changes and she unexpectedly bursts out laughing.

 “Skye darling, I was looking for something dark, to be able to stand in the shadows watching over Donna and Kath and I’ve just found your old school uniform, hanging up next to Peter’s old school uniform. Is there something you want to tell me? You pompous slag you.”



 

Chapter Two. 


Greta Larson. 


Somewhere in Scotland, That Same Saturday.

 

The uphill stroll through the pine forest is not the only thing giving me an intense heart-beat. The anticipatory feeling dominating my core, transfers downwards, through my thighs, in waves, through my feet to a deep bed of pine needles that is softly giving way under-foot. The top layer of needles crackles with each step, as if each needle is dry and died on the tree last Autumn and fell to the ground to provide food for regrowth. Hopefully then, it will form a soft, dry mattress under me for my new life to come.


I decided to wear flats after only briefly contemplating heels, leaving them off mainly because of Stephen’s wee height. Heels in this forest would be a feckin nightmare. He loves me in heels but will appreciate flats more knowing they will get me to where I'm leading him.

Last night in the car, after some final innuendo trading and seemingly innocent touching, I had the guts to snog my boss, before he left to go home to wifey. My leading effort was an ‘I want sex now pal' sort of snog and that seems to have given him permission to bring me to this wooded area without prior discussion between us. I haven’t complained though, not mentioned anything and I live in excited anticipation. In his head he probably thinks he’s in charge and has picked me up, bless his wee man-brain.


See me, having worked as his partner, on various cases, for over two months now, finding him to be a decent bloke, a kind bloke and the type of man to be slowly moved away from his wife and home, a winkle plucked out of his shell with a sharp pin. He might even be a bit too decent because, when I snogged him, he deeply snogged me back but without the expected pummelling of my diddies. Maybe deep in his past, it was always left for a second date but it just left me with aching nipples, a need elsewhere and a feeling that I wasn’t the only one who would want more. Hence us wandering through the pines today.


Walking in these plantations, God may ken exactly where we are but I don't, apart from somewhere in the middle of Scotland, we could easily get lost, maybe lose the car forever. Neither of us know the Glen Tomar area that well but I ken that even on a Saturday, you could walk all day without seeing anyone. The good thing is that if we were to be questioned for being here, a quick glance at our warrant cards would send any questioner scurrying, knowing we would have to be on official business, probably looking for a body or something equally as gruesome.


I’ve taken the lead now, just as with our first snog. I walk off the wee path and into the dense pines. The renewed branches spring back in his direction with him following like a puppy, staring at my legs and, no doubt, my overactive bum cheeks, struggling on the uneven ground, moving sexily in a tight skirt. The trouser suit that I usually wear, ninety percent of the time for work, made way for my black skirt-suit this morning, purely on an educated hunch you understand. The suspenders and stockings were an afterthought and a prize for him once he reaches that base and all of that will have to go before any undressing in front of Josh.


Did my own roots last night, just in case, to ensure the short blond hair that everyone expects of me is complete and looking natural. If you’re meeting a Greta Larson, you expect her to be blond, even with my Scottish lilt. He expects me to be blond, likes me blond and I think he finds my supposed Swedish heritage exotic. I’m not saying I spent hours setting a trap for him but I did shave visible bits last night, just to keep the young, blond illusion thing going.


Did I wash the razor out? Josh will nag me again and I’ll deny using it. Why the illusion I wonder. Do I really expect him to believe I'm young enough not to have grown pubes around my fud? Maybe we women don’t admit to using their manly razors because it’s a lady thing, a private thing, like having a wee fart if you ken that you’re the only one in the house.


Where Stephen ditched our car, on the lonely track, it might have been safe enough for us but uncomfortable for me. In my fantasies with him it’s always been on a forest floor or even sometimes, in my more flowery feckin moods, a hay meadow with the sun shining through tall grasses, which is why I got out of the car, said nothing and started walking. Anyway, we might have been seen and anyone getting the slightest hint of me shagging my boss and that would be it. It would mean new partners for both of us, possible transfer for me, being the jezebel and obviously the one at fault. This forest has to be safer, more comfortable and a wee bit sexier.


I need to show him he needs me. I need to perform to my utmost. I have to be so much better than his wife and I’ll be shouting at him to tell him how good he is and how I can only just accommodate him. Do I call him ‘Sir’ while he’s on top of me, pumping? Is that too formal or will it boost his male ego? Too late to think about that now. He needs to want me again and this is my only chance to demonstrate that this is not a one-off, that I’m not a frustrated hen, looking for one good shagging to sort me out and that there’s a good chance of this going somewhere in our future together. It had better bloody go somewhere or I'm either stuck with Josh or leaving him and starting from scratch with both men and property again.


We walk for a few minutes more through the tight branches and I find a brace of odd-looking deciduous trees with a small clearing in front of them. The elms, I think they are, stand out among thousands of straight pines, and there's a bed of soft pine needles to lay on. It looks magical and the only place where the sun breaks through tall trees. I’m not really into fairy grottos, pixies, elves and witches, my job demands logic, but having said that, I do have a dream-catcher on the glass of my bedroom window, so maybe I see the elms as a sign that I’ve found the right place.


I breathe in deeply the clean, pine-odour, take in the view of the area and try for a mental snapshot to remember this place for my future with this man. I imagine us, man and wife, sat in bed on a Sunday morning with me saying, “do you remember the magical grotto you took me to for our first ever love making? Do you think there’s a chance of finding it again for some outside fun?”


It’s now or never then, the excitement in my core is at a peak that I’ve only experienced in reading novels and having daydreams. When I get home, I’ll undress in the spare room, before a shower and then vacuum any pine needles up from the floor after shaking-out and checking my clothes.

I turn and give Stephen my sexiest grin, to show him that, at last, I’ve found the spot where I will be willing to cheat on my uncaring and boring husband for the first time ever. I know that when I'm on my back the pines will be the tall grasses of my fantasy life and that if I raise my knees, he'll have a view of stocking tops.


I turn and scream loudly, like a wee girl. Not as expected, because Stephen is so incredibly manly on top of me, but because, before I can lay down for him, a loud motorbike appears, charges out from between the two elms and a lone female rider shouts “go girl” and carries on in the direction of our unmarked car. Too late maybe, I cover my face with my arm, not to be recognised but she’s gone, the bike parting branches as we’d done on our way to this spot.


I’m shocked to see Stephen’s instincts as a copper kick in as he approaches the bush between the elms where we both feel there is no gap large enough for that bloody motorbike to have come through.


I feel a combination of fear from being recognised, frustration from not having what I expected to have and abandonment by my boss who has just left me standing here, shaking. Natural instinct kicks in, I turn, roughly in the direction of the car and take long, quick strides to get me back to the path where I try to remember landmarks and see them through blurry eyes, coated with the first hint of tears. It’s incredible, I contemplate, how quickly the anticipation of sex can evaporate into the forest air.


The sight of the car brings a feeling of safety. We always share driving, both hold a key so my key bunch comes out of my jacket pocket and I use my car key to unlock the passenger door, sit in and feel the tears flow as my heart-rate refuses to slow and I see my tired legs are shaking when I look into the well for my handbag.


Today was a mistake, that’s obvious now and should have been pretty obvious before I snogged the bloke into believing he’d always wanted me. Even if that bike hadn’t appeared, he’d think I was on for sex for the sake of it, not realising I have designs on marriage. It was a stupid, childish thought and should have stayed in my head.


The driver’s door unlocks, I look ahead through the windscreen, not able to look him in the eye. I feel him get in, turn to me and feel him run the back of his fingers, tenderly, down my cheek, wiping away tears. It only makes me intake a choky breath, making me feel even more pathetic. I’m supposed to be a copper, supposed to be as good as, if not better than the blokes around me, not a snivelling wee girl, upset because she didn’t get laid.


Slowly, as if to calm me, his legs lift over the gear lever to get him on my side of the car. His arm comes around me, protectively and I expect soft words as he looks into my eyes that are still, stubbornly, looking straight ahead. I imagine myself in his position, pacifying a partner, saying something like, never mind love, today wasn’t to be but we have the rest of our lives. Maybe next time. Maybe a peck to my lips or cheek because he can surely see that a deep snog would be inappropriate right now. When was the last time the fecker spoke anyway?"


My body jerks backwards, surprising me. It takes another similar movement for me to realise that his arm around me was only to get his hand to the seat adjuster and I will soon be on my back as he turns the wheel to make the seat drop slowly. My power of defence leaves me more with each turn of the wheel. He lifts slightly, comes down with his legs between mine and a feeling of inevitability flows over me. I give in, bow to the inevitable and say nothing until...


“Stephen...” I manage to get out but my thoughts stay in my head as he resumes last night’s snogging session.  I want to say that I can’t relax into this. I want to say I’m dry as a chip down there now and want it to stay that way for today. I want to say that his pushing outwards on my legs is likely to damage my skirt. Everything in my head says no but I’m useless as I fight his tongue.

The good girl in me wants a conversation with him but the bitch-woman, that sometimes resides inside my head, tells me that the guy on top of me craves my body fifty times more than Josh ever did. Stephen sees me as having a body that he must have because he loves it so much and all of the efforts that I’ve made to stay slim and wear to work the bras that push me up, have been worth it. The same voice tells me that I don’t want to go home to Josh with a split skirt so I manage to get my hands free enough to hike the hem up to almost waist level by pulling it under my bum and thank providence that there are no tights in his way. If he ever needed any permission for sex, my skirt lifting just gave it to him. "It couldn't be rape, your honour, she pulled her skirt up for me."

The snog goes on, occasionally allowing me an inward breath to keep me alive and, through it all, I feel his trousers go down but I am still dressed and unable to get my hands anywhere near that area. When he grabs, roughly, my thighs and pulls me, aggressively, towards the front of the passenger seat, my back moves down the seat-back and I am totally flat and helpless. He makes me more so by clutching my wrists together above my head.


“Stephen...” I try again but it only initiates another snog from this man who seems to want to eat my face in a rough way and have me without any talking. His hands now grip the underside of my thighs, trusting my hands to stay where he’s placed them, one of his hands moves but does not gently remove my panties, uncomfortably it moves them to one side to allow him his target but allowing me to feel a bit lopsided.


When I try to moan out some words through a full mouth, his hands slide up my thighs, up my calf muscles to my ankles that are now high in the air and on full display to anyone passing and held there by his strong grip. My wrists are now pinned under my ankles which is something I couldn’t reproduce on my own. I am bent double like a tied-up chicken ready for the oven. It’s uncomfortable to say the least and I’m conscious of the roll of belly-fat that I don’t normally have. I’m half wanting things to stop, but only half.


His non-foreplay entry is hampered by dryness so he hangs around for a bit with tiny strokes in the hope of eventually stimulating his tied-up chicken enough to stuff it. Penetration slowly happens as, inch by inch, my body gives in and oils him, allows him slight progress until he groans into my mouth to let me know he is happy to be fully immersed and in complete control of the object under him.


What follows is not passionate love making. It is not even love making. This is a man with his tongue in my mouth stopping me talking while he rams into me, full pelt from the word go, with the rapidity of a piston engine, in an uncaring and aggressive manner until he allows me my mouth back, only because he has jerked his fluid into me in record time.


I pray he doesn’t feel guilty and start to search for my missing climax with his fingers but needn’t worry because, within seconds, the car door is open and he’s outside pulling up his trousers while I try to get my legs down from the dashboard and into a more ladylike position. I don’t have to dress as nothing has been removed, not even a bra strap to do up and my boobs feel a bit left out of proceedings, yet again. In my jacket pocket is a folded tissue that goes over me before panties are repositioned centrally and I too get out of the car to try and wriggle my hem down to where it should be. When my thighs touch, I realise how sore they are and wonder if redness will have to be hidden from Josh when I get home. The thought that what went up, must come down, horrifies me.

I still can’t talk to Stephen because he’s climbing into the driver’s seat. It seems it’s a man’s job to recline a seat for sex but a woman’s job to get it back to where it was. I adjust the seat up, get in, look forwards again and he pulls off, heading back towards the station and talks about some case we have to deal with tomorrow, as if nothing just happened. This is unbelievable and I may be in a state of shock. I want to say something but can’t work out appropriate words for the occasion.

Maybe, I think, I might say, do you ken you just fucked me rigid and it wasn’t, this time, just in your imagination? Or maybe I could pacify him by saying, it’s okay sir, I’ll finish myself off at home, don’t you worry yourself.


The seat feels odd, different, and it takes me a while to get the seat-back to a comfortable position and then realise that he must have slid the whole thing back so I find the lever to bring it forward again. Concentration on this seat position is not what I thought post-sex would be like with him. He’s still babbling on but I just hear a wee noise as if he’s talking underwater and I give up listening and want to be in my own car where I can have a good cry because pressure is building in my head.

Our police station car park is still full of cars. We’ve finished our shift so he pulls up next to my little car and shouts “see you tomorrow” as I get out. In his first act of decency all day, he waits for me to get into my car and drive off before then leaving the car park himself, presumably to go home to his dear Ellen.


I’m shocked to automatically reach my own home, not remembering any part of the journey from the station, I sit in the car, dazed, trying to work things out. Did me snogging him last night send to him a signal that I was an unfeeling, but willing, receptacle that would be happy to accept his aggressive need to cum inside me? Maybe he was too nervous to be himself and that wasn’t typical of him. Am I making excuses for him? Thinking back, the first time me and Josh were going to sleep together, he was still seeing someone and was so nervous he couldn’t get an erection and even I failed to make it hard. We can laugh about it now but it felt like the end of the world at the time.

Maybe Stephen and Ellen are like he just was with me all the time, childhood sweethearts who know no different. Maybe I will have to be subtle but, at the same time, teach Stephen the fact that a woman can enjoy these things as well and I didn’t. I imagine saying to him that when he was only one inch in and it flopped out, I really liked it when it brushed over my erect nub. Take it from there and let him think he’s in charge of pleasuring me. Am I assuming there will be a next time and assuming the ability to talk through a next time as well?


On a more practical level, and there always is a practical level in my life, Josh’s car is there, he’s home as usual on a Saturday but he hasn’t taken the bin in from yesterday. I take it, one handed, from the pavement to the back of the house, look around, reach below and retrieve the soggy tissue and bin it. Going in through our back door to the kitchen I pick up the latest carrier bag of rubbish and place it on top of the tissue in the bin, losing the incriminating evidence forever and good riddance.


In the hall I can hear Josh has the telly on, I shout “back in a minute love, desperate for the lavvy,” and dive upstairs. In the bathroom all clothes come off, no pine needles and I shower myself clean on the outside and use the hand-held shower extension on the inside. In the bedroom I ditch the towel that was wrapped around me and then a belt and pad from my bedside cupboard goes on with non-sexy pants over, not only to catch any further signs of Stephen but to deter Josh from any thoughts he might have. I’ve had enough of men, all the wee feckers for this year.


The bloody skirt label says ‘dry clean only’ and being black has managed somehow to get stained, even through the lining. Sponging the material and the lining, I’m happy I can get more wear out of it before it goes to the cleaners and so it goes back on a hanger with the jacket.

Nightdress, dressing gown, slippers, I’m ready to announce myself to my dear husband that I’m home and I look like my granny. Only curlers would make me less edible.

“Sorry love, had to run up, first day of my period, bit of a mess.” If that doesn’t make him leave me alone, nothing will.


“New Doctor Who. Episode three.” He answers without looking at me, nodding towards the telly, with all the sympathy of a bloke that’s just been told that yet again, I’m not pregnant and might be upset at not being a mother or even of having missed episodes one and two.

As if he too may be upset that I haven’t caught since my last period that he hasn’t worked out was less than two weeks before this one, he adds “What are we eating?” Apparently, the fecker waited for my return to cook him something and because my period has started, I’m not really worth looking at as he demands to be fed.


I huff, knowing how incapable he is. “I don’t feel like much. Might do some chips. D’you fancy a butty?”


So, this is our excitingly adventurous evening together. Me frying chips and buttering bread, him watching his kids programme, him, much later turning the telly off to announce that the master of the house has decided it’s bedtime and then the two of us are in the same bed but far enough apart that we are seemingly on different planets that will only collide if and when he wants sex again and it’s possible for him to have it.


I have a lot on my mind as we drift off to sleep. I don’t want to be Josh’s cook and I don’t want to be Stephen’s toss pot. I’m not looking for glamour but surely, life is supposed to be better than this.

 


I wake refreshed, feel the pad and realise I can't ditch it and pretend it was a one-day period. Strangely, the part of that night’s dream that I remember this morning is the bit about a girl, a faceless girl, maybe the one on the bike. She makes love to me gently and ensures my climax way before thinking about her own. My amateur psychology tells me it’s a mixed-up yearning for the excitement of Stephen, allied with the boredom but safety of Josh and a need for something in between. I smile to think I haven’t had a girlie dream since high school, after seeing Rebecca Higgins walking out of the school showers like a naked goddess that couldn’t find her towel.

Who can ken what the future holds for me? This boring marriage continuing? Stephen whisking me away? Stephen wanting me as his bit on the side while he stays in a comfortable marriage, telling me periodically that it’s not quite the right time to tell Ellen he’s leaving her? I will have to take control and weave my wee magic to make sure I get the outcome I seek, once I’ve worked out what exactly that outcome is.


 

Chapter Three.


 Kath (the Taff) Davenport.


Saturday.

 

From my bedroom window, I can look down the street and I see Skye, driving too quickly for a woman with no deadlines in her life. She probably gave Larry a little wave because he waves back to the car, maybe too late for her to notice though. Keep off Skye love, he’s in my head today girl. I bet she gave him one of those smiles she does. The one that says I could have you if I wanted but you’ll have to try harder to impress me. It’s the type of woman she is and rightly can be, always has been as long as I’ve known her. Just look at that house of hers. I’m sure she could have Larry if she wanted but she has too much to lose. On the plus side, Skye has never called me Kath the Taff as the others do and seems to sense I don't like it.


It's never been any good explaining to them all I'm from West Wales and only ever saw the Taff on international days. It's all rugby league up here, horrible game. Back home on international day, everyone wore red, even to go down the local pub. Here, you wouldn't know a match was on.

Skye has no idea and not even Larry realises, that him and me have rules of etiquette, for when I watch him gardening from behind the little gap between my curtains and the wall. His etiquette rule is that in his back garden he strips to the waist, love him, to catch the sun and to show me his incredible body, not that he’s aware that I watch him. But, when he goes to the front of the house, he slips on that vest that somehow makes him look even sexier.


My rule of etiquette involves being allowed to watch him in his front garden but when hubby Michael is working, or like today playing his stupid golf game, if Larry strays to the back and the vest comes off then he is allowed to overpower me as my fingers help him to love me on his patch of lawn. Dirty boy he is and I love it, especially after a vodka or two.


Who would think that a man on his knees, weeding, could be such a thrill? He has no idea that while he looks for weeds, I’m under him, my legs forcibly spread by his knees, usually saying something like ‘Larry, don’t be silly bach. What if the neighbours see us?’ To my shame, and never to be admitted to even my closest friend, I sometimes fantasise those big arms surrounding me, not allowing me to escape as he has his evil way against my will, but I don't fight because I've been drinking. Embarrassing I know but it keeps a girl going.


I’m lucky today that Michael’s parents have the girls, because they usually only take them on school days. It’s because we’ve been invited to make up the numbers at Skye’s bash tonight. It’s a glorified business meeting really, with neighbours playing the part of extras to make up numbers but it gets me out of the house and it allows me to buy long cocktail dresses, much to Michael’s petty annoyance. The kids will come back tomorrow at a respectable time, once hangovers have been cured.


The red dress, the scarlet-woman dress hanging up over there, is for tonight. He goes on about wearing the same one twice but has to admit to himself that golf must cost more than women’s clothes, or so he believes anyway. I keep telling him maxi dresses are in and can be worn about town but that red number is a bit too good for shopping in. Of course, new shoes were needed and how could a woman wear a new dress without the luxury of new underwear that only she knows about, brushing delicately against her skin. If he knew the underwear and shoes cost more than the dress, he’d have a fit.


I should start getting ready, showering myself sober anyway but there’s still the chance that Larry will move to the back. No. A shower it is then, with Larry soaping me down because Michael will drift in from golf, shower and change in two minutes and nag me for being slow, then complain about another new wardrobe, as he politely phrases it.

I don’t hear Michael come into the house but when he finds me and shouts, my washing technique becomes a lot quicker.


“How long will you be darling? I’ll need a shower before changing.” His greeting to the wife he hasn't seen all day. He wants a third child, I don’t. I enjoy exercise, well, jogging to keep me looking good but the thought of giving up jogging to be pregnant and starting at square one again months later, makes me shudder. Michael’s looking tired lately as if it’s becoming more of an effort to groan on top of me every night. No need for testing us with two kids already but the advice from the doctor was to groan every night without fail. Maybe golf is a way of getting away from me. Maybe golf has tired him out and after the party he’ll fall asleep and leave me alone to actually climax for once.

“Two minutes.” I tell him but my mind says Larry is just about to finish me off on a lonely Welsh hill and then snog my head into the ground instead of rolling off and snoring. I stare through the wet shower glass, ensure the bolt is on the bathroom door and then Larry’s huge arms pin me from behind while his hand nearly finishes me and then he turns me to snog me as he hammers into me until I burst.


I hurry to dress. We are late now and it's obviously my fault, well Larry's really. By the time Michael starts really nagging I’m putting in the second dangly earring. A last squirt of perfume to lay a trail for the hounds, neck, neck, cleavage, bottle into a new red handbag and we walk up the road, free of transport, free of the kids and free of all worries. Red heels, dress and clutch display my mood. Times like this I'm glad I emigrated across the border.


I’m introduced to Monique, a distant relative of some sort to Skye and she seems nice if a bit unusual. She's had her husband’s name tattooed onto each off her breasts. It’s a sort of ‘look at me’ coupled with I’m taken so don’t think about it. Probably men see Monique as a challenge, or she hopes they do. We chat for a bit. She does something or other in Europe but then she's introduced to the next arrival. I chat to the other wives, all of us with forced smiles as we speak in posher voices than normal, my accent becoming more English as the night goes on.


I get so engrossed in a conversation that I don’t notice Larry come in. I try to not show that I’ve noticed him or started drooling as I lift my glass to my mouth and look over it. He has no idea, of course, that he had me in the shower earlier but if he did then it would be our little secret.

Other wives find Larry a bit of a mystery, maybe dangerous but I see his paper delivery each morning, see the financial papers along with many others, hear his raised voice on the telephone around midday and know that he works out his trades and financial deals while he gardens. We have a bond, me and Larry but he rarely talks to me other than pleasantries over the back fence. In my head our bond is purely physical, if maybe a bit obsessive on my part.


It’s the usual server, the leggy girl that Skye always employs. Not allowed to look anything like the guests so her gorgeous, long legs have to finish in a black mini and the tight black top shows a white bra underneath it. If I know Skye then she has asked Miss Server to dress like that to entice businessmen back to the next party. If server bends to pick up an empty glass or plate from a low coffee table then men’s eyes move towards her. She could, of course, bend her knees, but doesn’t, the dirty cow. Sometimes, later in the evening, she leans to get a glass, one leg raised off the floor. It thrills me so I guess it does the same to men, Michael included. The downside to that is that in my husband's head, he’ll want to groan into the twenty-something tonight using me as a substitute but I can’t really grumble after what Larry did to me in the shower. Fair's fair in love and war, girl.

After a couple of hours and too many gins and tonics, I decide it might be best to drink tonic on its own and let people think there’s gin in the glass. I sometimes wonder why I drink vodka in the house but gin and tonic in Skye's house. Maybe it sounds more sophisticated. Long legs is busy so I go to the kitchen to fix myself a fresh drink, and as I pass her, I realise the gin has loosened my brain so much that I have a silly urge to run my hand up her silky legs.


An unexpected voice comes from behind me in the kitchen and I try hard not to jump and spill tonic. “I guess I need to apologise about the noise of my new electric guitar.”


Larry, talking to me for once, and in the sexy drawl he uses when he wants to join one of my fantasies. Has he come to fix his drink or to seek me out and carry me off to his secret lair for seconds?  Say something girl. "I sometimes hear noises from your house Larry, through our party wall, but a guitar is a new one on me. Sometimes a vacuum cleaner, you sound like you keep the place extremely clean for a single man.” God, I sounded posh-English then.


He smiles, not a mocking smile but, to my mind, an ‘I want your body’ smile. I casually push one hip out to make myself curvier so he can judge while thinking of a reply.


“Just off outside for a cigarette. Join me and I’ll explain.”


I can’t tell him I’d follow him to the ends of the earth, so follow, speechless, like an infatuated teenager in love with a pop star. Instead of standing outside the kitchen door for his cigarette, he nips around the corner and down the side of the house. I can either stand there, in the garden, like a lemon, or go back inside. Perhaps a bit rude that, so I follow him. I breathe in deeply, my head spins and the corner that I walk around will provide ample fantasy fodder for me for weeks to come, I’m sure.


“I guess you’re otherwise occupied,” He informs me when I get to his standing position. “When I practice my scales, I mean. It’s just that the metronome effect that Michael emits from your bedroom is perfect for my practice. It used to be a note per beat but my playing has progressed now to two notes and my guitar playing is hopefully improving."


I take a moment to digest what he says but know we are on the same wavelength and I have to appear shocked at his brashness and speak seriously. “I take it Larry, that you refer to my headboard that will be moved away from the wall first thing in the morning. I apologise. I feel I don’t need to give you an explanation but in defence of my dear husband, we are trying for number three and it does become a bit of a chore after a while, a tiring chore for him, day after day, week after week.”


Why am I explaining my love life to this man as if he's one of the girls? Why am I here in the dark with him as if we really are long time lovers? Why am I moving closer to him, too close? I have no idea what to do with my hands that are flapping about with no drink. Surely, he’ll go now, embarrassed, but no, he keeps the conversation going and for some reason I don’t want it to end, ever. I don’t want him to walk away from me upset. I want him to know I’m bored with my metronome. I want him to make love to me all night, not allowing me sleep, forcing multiple orgasms on me. I need to remember to breathe, I need that glass of tonic that I left on the table. The night air is hot. I let him speak because I’m unable.


“For him yes, I can imagine it could be a chore, but for an observer, such as myself, it’s hard to imagine making love to such a beautifully shaped woman ever being a chore.”


Obviously, I should walk away from his drunken chat-up lines but the alcohol in my own head tells me I’m flattered and waiting for more, needing more and if I walk away now it will be my life's one regret. I push out the other hip. When was the last time a hunk flattered me? Probably never. Not that it could possibly lead anywhere in real life you understand but a woman does like to be innocently flattered which is why my smile looks so dirty. I do believe I just smoothed a hand over my waist to my hip as if to confirm to myself that he is right and I do have a good figure without working on it every single day of my pigging life. Keep talking Larry and I’ll act affronted while staring into your dreamy eyes, imagining this long dress being peeled upwards over my skin, so very slowly.

“That dress is a perfect example of what I’m talking about. The stiff material, whatever it is, is like a hard shell, protecting a delicate body. The top, strapless bit obviously has built in cups that were designer-made specially to form your perfect breasts to show to their best advantage, you knowing them to be a great asset and eagerly wanted by every man here tonight.”


He’s slowly getting closer to my hound trail, or I’m still moving, and if his lips hit mine, I may have to run to my husband or I may have to snog Larry onto the floor and rip his shirt off. Can't decide. He keeps talking, the voice getting sexier, my insides wondering which way up I am. Is it me he’s talking about? Do I really look that inviting to other men? Am I falling headlong into his bullshit believing every word because I want to? Concentrate on what he's saying girl.


“The curved waistline shows your perfect waist to hip ratio that has always driven me mad with desire and shows no hint of the wearer being the mother of two. If anyone came out while we innocently talk, we’d hear the kitchen door open. The dress though lets you down in one respect.”

He runs his hand down the same portion of dress that my hands covered and I develop a need to take that hand and move it nearer the front of my dress where there is a feeling of… “Oh.” My eyebrows raise questioningly, giving him permission to carry on flattering me all night and into the next day while touching my naked body all over. “Why would we be listening for the door to open?”

He ignores my question as if the answer is obvious to both of us, which it is. “You don’t think highly enough about your legs.” He informs me. “But then, few women do. Those legs that look so perfect in those tiny denim shorts you wear each summer should be exposed at a party like this. The dress should not be almost down to the ground but cut off say an inch or so below your panties and then every man here would dream of you tonight, not just me. We would all, every male here, follow you with our eyes. You'd easily outshine any immature serving wench. A woman of your shape must surely pray for the mini skirt to come back into fashion."


I try to think of something witty to say but my throat gulps three or four times, I clench hard between my legs and I try to get words out, but fail miserably. My head remembers transitioning from mini to maxi, my mini skirt under a maxi coat that had a long slit up the back. Sitting on Michael's lap on a park bench in Llanelli he could have me in broad daylight. We were young and life was exciting then and finally he whisked me off to England by promising all sorts of things.

Has Larry looked at me through his curtains because I wouldn’t dare wear those shorts outside my back garden? The serving girl is much younger than me, probably single and childless, has incredible legs and a man has just said that he would prefer my legs that are now shaking, luckily unseen underneath this long dress. Something is happening to my insides and I have to remember that I’ve been drinking. I park the realisation that me daring to wear those tiny shorts, hoping he’d see me and it actually working, for later, in bed when, in my head, he’ll be peeling them off extremely slowly. That’s in my head. Repeat, in my head, not in reality. God he's popping the stud fly with his teeth, in my head. Stop it Kath.


He flicks nearly a whole cigarette into the hedge as if he has no further need of it and our mouths meet in a fury without me seeing the approach, slamming against each other as if gums are thrusting hips. I make no effort to stop him moulding my breast outside my dress and want his other hand to show me exactly where he thinks my dress length should end. Eventually, he breaks the kiss, unhitches my hands that have somehow become locked around his neck and he turns and walks back inside as if we’ve just had a chat about the state of the economy.

I stand there, shocked, my head trying to confirm that it all actually happened and wasn’t in my drunken head, my dire need to have his thigh between my legs, so nearly accomplished, is but a dream. The arrogance of the man. Is that his way of gaining women? To light their fire and walk away, hoping they’ll chase him? He can get lost. Maybe. I need the toilet. I need a wee, I need to check my lipstick quickly.


I go in, add more gin than is respectable to my glass and take it to the bog to cool off, then I join a group of women being catty about someone who hasn't turned up. Occasionally I look over to my next-door neighbour, wondering if he still looks hungry for me. It makes me feel like I'm here with Larry and I can hear that Michael is talking to someone I don’t know about joining a different golf club, or visiting their club or something. Who bloody cares? Maybe I should wander over to golfer’s corner to announce that I still have the taste of smoky tongue in my mouth and my nipples are erect and pointing accusingly at Larry, who I’m about to rape in the middle of the living room. They’d probably smile and say something about a nine iron.


I need another gin and know I’ve already had too much but get one from the youngster who has great legs but not as good as mine, apparently. I drink too much and what feels like an hour later but is probably only minutes, fuelled with Dutch courage, I walk up to Larry who is standing alone in one corner of the living room, and I try not to overdo my hip movements as I approach and offer him a dish of salted peanuts, acting as if we are chatting about the weather and I’m not slurring in the least.


Do people stare into each other’s eyes while talking about the weather?


Breathing in deeply, I expel fantasy words that are word-perfect for my fantasy world but are now, drunkenly, expelled into real life to see if they should be here or not. "Tomorrow is Sunday Larry and a family day. No guitar practice for you because the kids always join us in our marital bed. On Monday, Michael leaves for work at eight and shortly after, his parents pick the kids up for the school-run. At nine-thirty I’ll arrive at yours. Nothing whatsoever happens in my house, especially not in my shower. Do you understand? Under my coat will be my denim shorts, a tight top and no bra. It will be a one off. You do not get stupid and fall in love with me and I do not fall in love with you. It’s once and once only and sex for the sake of it. You do not beg me to come back. If I beg you, and I'm likely to, you ignore me. If you mention anything to anyone it will get back to me and I will kill you, literally kill you dead. Do you understand me Larry? I have a lovely marriage, don’t want it ruined and will kill to keep it that way.”


Those words sounded sensible when they were in my head, looking at him from the other side of the room but now that they’re out in the open, I pray he doesn’t say ‘sorry there has been a misunderstanding’ but he just smiles back like a hungry wolf that has his pray cornered. For some reason he scares me by agreeing with me, making my insides churn and telling me there’s no way back now, so he might as well take me this minute.


His eyes penetrate mine as if we are not talking about the weather and I study, too carefully, his lips as he speaks. “I’m already looking forward to peeling off those little shorts with my teeth but insist you wear your push-up bra under any tight top, just like you wear it in the garden for me. I want to undo it and release them into my hands. Just a little fantasy I have while I’m gardening.”

My God, he’s studied my underwear and I thought it was only me did the spying through the curtains. Has he seen my bras on the drying line or has he studied my chest when dressed? Don’t snog him now Kath, it would spoil everything. God those soft lips need to be between my legs. I'm dampening again and there's only so much one pair of panties can take.


“Michael is taking me home soon,” I tell Larry and then tip my glass to my mouth as if it’s his… “And I’ve just remembered that the children are with his parents for the night, so now would be a good time to get your guitar in tune. I will be thinking about you and wondering just how different you could be and what your offspring might look like. Yes, you are allowed bareback if you wish, I would hate for anything to come between us and me getting pregnant would stop the groaning metronome. It will be early on Monday but I’ll need to steady my nerves so get gin and tonic in and make sure the seal is on all bottles, no funny stuff. Think you can wait big boy?”


“Yes, it was a lovely party, I’ll find Skye and tell her so before I go.” He tells me and my befuddled head slowly works out that Michael is approaching from behind me, coming to drag me away to groaning land, where I too will groan with eyes closed tight.


I turn. “Hold me up Michael. I’ve had a bit love.” He holds my arm and I stagger purposely on my heels, my backside sticking out and doing a rumba as I walk away from Larry, knowing that what happens on Monday will fuel fantasies for me for months to come.


As we walk down the street, luckily downhill, I take my heels off to walk barefoot on the tarmac and Michael, I think, tells me off for drinking too much and being unable to balance on stupid footwear that probably cost too much anyway. As always, he tells me off for giggling for fuck's sake, like he doesn't like me to be happy.


When we get inside, I throw my shoes in a corner as if they were cheap and ask him to unzip me as I find it impossible. Michael informs me he’s frisky in his own little way.

"Undressing already dear? Can’t wait for me to get you into bed? Might have to devour you in the hallway, up against the wall if you keep taking things off.”


I giggle in agreement, knowing it won’t happen. It might have done ten years ago but he’s aged twenty years in that decade. We both stagger upstairs and my dress falls off me in a heap on the bedroom floor. He stares at my new underwear as if he's only just realised there was a woman under the dress. My alcohol fuelled grin is because I remember Larry's kiss and it makes me remove the underwear slowly, one piece at a time while Larry lays in bed, watching. I guess there's a stripper in every woman, waiting to come out, helped out with alcohol.


Slipping into bed naked, his hand does the customary titty-first thing for thirty seconds to give him decent clearance to wander lower.


He lowers his voice to sound sexy. "If I'd known you were that eager for me, I would have brought you home earlier." He talks to my smiling face as he feels the wetness that Larry gave me, actually believing a thirty second nipple twiddle from a husband could do it.


No snogging from Michael, he mounts me and I utter a moan as if I haven't had him for weeks and I actually enjoy my boobs being mauled aggressively.


When he's close, I'm not so it will have to be fake number four hundred and sixty-five.

"Talk to me dirty, in Welsh." He begs and I know it usually finishes him.


I try to imagine he's Larry but it's truly difficult.


"Sais twpsyn." I breathe out sexily, over and over, having previously told him, when we first met that it means 'fuck me harder' and he cums high inside me, rolls off and starts snoring after a few minutes. I lay there realising that it’s far too late now to come clean and explain that my exotic Welsh words mean ‘thick Englishman.’


My brain might be dulled but my body is wide awake and craving Larry’s tongue and soft lips, or my finger for now. Not the shower in my head this time but the side of Skye’s house and as he rips the zip on the back of my dress to expose my boobs, I care not a jot how I might explain it to anyone or even get home with no dress, half naked. God he’s good. That nipple might come off if he sucks any harder. Go for it boy.


I have an affair, or a one-off with Larry to look forward to and all I have to worry about in life is that Michael never has an affair with another Welsh speaker to find out what my dirty banter really means. That would ruin an already mediocre sex life with him.


 

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