Thursday, January 24, 2013

Last Winning Hand Teaser

Ho-kay... so...

If you haven't seen the internet video "The End of the Earth" you should really check it out. Has me in stitches every time. And "Ho-okay... so..." has made its way into every day conversation on a regular basis. It's an old video, nothing knew, I'm just saying, if you haven't seen it you should check it out.

A couple of things before I give you the teaser...

I'm finishing editing Winning Hand tonight and submitting it, which means that there's a good possibility that it will become available sometime tomorrow which means that its freebie day will be on Saturday. Those of you who wish to buy it immediately can check my twitter, this blog or amazon.com throughout the day tomorrow. Those who wish to wait for the freebie day, I'll make sure to let you know if it's going to be Saturday. 

Progress report on other works!: 

- I am about halfway through a standalone Loving Wives story (probably going to talk a bit about that for tomorrow's blog). 

- I have started writing the first chapter to Marriage Training. I would have started sooner but when I looked at the outline that I had for it I decided that I didn't like the storyline I had plotted out that much and I re-wrote the entire thing to be longer and (hopefully) more interesting. So far the writing style is different from a lot of my stuff in the past but I'm enjoying it. I have no idea what category it's going to go in, I'm still trying to figure that out. Possibly BDSM.

- I am 3/4 of the way finished with Beginning with Birching, the Victorian era domestic discipline story that I mentioned in my Now and Future Works blog post

- I am still at the beginning of Venus Transcendent but that's going to change now that I can focus on it instead of the Poker Loser Trilogy.

All in all, feeling pretty good about all that. Also I am at about 70% healthy, but considering that I've spent most of the week hovering between 20%-40%, 70% feels freaking amazing. And hopefully I'll be able to spend more time writing now that I'm not feeling so blegh. 

So! Here's the teaser for Winning Hand which (hopefully) will be available on Amazon tomorrow =):


"Looked for what?" Allison asked as she stirred the zucchini around, trying to make sure that each slice cooked at least fairly evenly.  Not exactly easy since the pieces kept flipping on top of each other; the pan was just slightly too small for them all to be laid out in a single layer of zucchini slices.  They were almost ready for the parmesan cheese. 

The kitchen smelled delicious.  Diana was stirring the 'homemade' spaghetti sauce that she'd created by taking a bottle of Prego and adding red wine and extra spices. Now she was slowly stirring it, occasionally testing the flavor. She'd insisted on wearing an apron over her casual blue shirt and dress slacks, not so much because she was worried about getting it dirty but because she liked wearing an apron when she cooked. The oven had breaded chicken stuffed with mozzarella baking in it, adding to the wonderful aromas.  Home cooking at its best as far as Allison was concerned.  Tasty, but most of all, easy.

"An engagement ring."

"What?"

Diana rolled her eyes as she tasted the spaghetti sauce, dipping her finger into some of the sauce on the spoon she'd been using to stir. "Have you looked around to see if he's bought an engagement ring? Then you'd know."

"I mean... it's just a feeling. He hasn't said anything or hinted at anything... it's just... this idea that I get in my head sometimes lately. Not really enough to go snooping around for a ring."

"You don't need more than that to just look," Diana said persuasively. Allison bumped her hip playfully against Diana's as she lowered the heat on the zucchini and began sprinkling parmesan cheese onto the slices. The cheese didn’t need much heat to melt and it would burn pretty quickly if the pan was too hot.

"Let's say I'm right... then he obviously wants it to be a surprise and I shouldn't look," Allison said. "Or if I'm wrong, then there's nothing to find anyway." She turned off the heat on the zucchini now that the parm had melted just a bit onto it. Yum. "Is that sauce ready?"

"Yeah," Diana replied, glancing at the timer sitting on the counter to her left. "We've got ten minutes left before the chicken's ready."

"That's okay, it just means the cheese on the zucchini will melt a little more."

"Good," said Diana cheerfully as she turned the heat on the sauce down to simmer. She flashed Allison a wicked little look. "That gives us time to go searching!"

"Wait!" squealed Allison, laughing and following as Diana took off, not even bothering to remove her apron.  "You don't even know where to look!"

"Always start with the bedroom."

Amused, Allison followed Diana up to the bedroom, watching as her friend quickly went through Todd's drawers. She didn't do anything more than feel around for a jewelry box, so it wasn't quite as invasive as it could be. Then Diana moved on to the closet, but unless Todd was hiding it in his shoes there wasn't anything there to find. Somehow Allison wouldn’t have thought it’d be in the bedroom anyway, she went through Todd’s drawers too often herself. She had a penchant for wearing his t-shirts around the house. And his sweatpants. Somehow they were just more comfortable than her own. And she liked the possessively pleased look that he got in his eye when he saw her wearing his clothes.

"Have you done this before?" Allison asked as she watched Diana peek into the drawers around Todd's computer in the study.  "You seem to have a bit of a system."

"Oh, my parents used to hide Christmas and birthday gifts from me in all sorts of places," Diana said as she closed the last of the drawers and tapped her fingers thoughtfully on the computer desk.  "I definitely haven't searched Roger's place like this if that's what you're asking. We're not at that point yet."

"Do you think things might go there?" Allison was now genuinely curious.  So far she and Diana hadn't talked too much about Diana and Roger's relationship.  Sometimes she wondered if Diana felt that it would be too awkward, but she seemed completely casual about dropping that nugget of information.

"Maybe.  He's the first guy I've ever dated that I could see myself considering taking that step with."  Standing in the middle of the study with her hands on her hips, Diana examined the room as if a hidden compartment with a ring box might suddenly jump out at her. Allison put her hand over her mouth to cover her smile, it seemed rather funny that Diana was more interested in this search than she was, but truthfully she was happy with what she had at the moment. Maybe eventually she'd want to get married... but it wasn't at the top of her list of priorities right now. Not when she was concentrating on graduating in a couple of months.

"Is there anywhere else in this house that's just 'Todd's'?" 

"Ummm..." The toy room that he was creating sprang to mind.  Allison had honored her promise not to enter it, so if Todd was going to hide something somewhere in the house that would probably be the best place to do it.  She had no idea what was in there, he sometimes received large packages in the mail or brought things home that were wrapped up so that she didn't know what was going in there. Curiosity had almost gotten the better of her a few times, but she liked surprises.

Plus, he'd probably blister her bottom for ruining this particular surprise.  

"Where?" asked Diana immediately.

"Well... he's setting up a room for us to ah... play in," Allison said a little hesitantly. She knew that Diana wouldn't judge her for whatever Todd had in there, that wasn't the problem. The problem was that she was tempted to send Diana in there, even though that would definitely be pushing the boundaries of following Todd's orders.  Still, it would technically be obeying him, since she'd only said that she would stay out of there.  Nothing had been said about other people or friends.  "I'm not supposed to go in there until he's completed it."

Diana's face lit up. "Ooo, that sounds promising! Where is it?"

"The room across the hall from this one."

Immediately Diana scooted out of the office with Allison following close behind. As Diana turned the doorknob, Allison positioned herself next to the door frame, facing the opposite side of the hall so that she wouldn't even be able to see inside. 

"What are you doing?" asked Diana, giving her a strange look.  "Don't you want to see what's in here?"

She rolled her eyes. "Of course I do, but Todd told me not to look. I'm pushing it by letting you go in there."

"You're such a goody-goody sometimes," Diana teased as she practically pranced into the room. "Oh holy crap!"

The unfeigned awe in her voice nearly broke Allison's resolve not to look.  "What?"

"I'm not going to tell you." Diana giggled. "After all, this is supposed to be a surprise.  Damn. Now this is a sex room.  Hmm... here's some drawers... Maybe there's a ring in here...." The sound of wood sliding. "Oh my..."

Now Allison was pretty sure that Diana was saying things just to get a reaction from her. Although there was also honest delight and surprise in her voice, so maybe there were some really good goodies in there.  Shifting back and forth from foot to foot, Allison reminded herself that she would eventually get to see everything in there. More than see, she'd be using everything in there. 

Insistent beeping downstairs sounded faintly down the hall, just as she heard the front door open. 

"Diana! Todd's home! Get out of there!" she hissed before rushing down the stairs, heading for the kitchen. Todd home and the chicken ready. Well at least her timing when it came to cooking was getting better, she thought ruefully. Behind her she could hear Diana following her down the stairs.

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