AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He hesitated, wondering how this could be happening in his nice little real estate office on the nice main road of this nice—well, okay, notnice—small town. If any of his poker buddies ever found out a woman had held him at gunpoint and made him strip, they’d die laughing. Of course, if the story had involved one of his moretypicalfemale friends, they’d probably be jealous as hell.
When he didn’t move fast enough, Louise let out an impatient sigh. “You know I wouldn’t kill you. But I can shoot well enough to make sure you behave from now on.” Her stare followed the direction of her pistol, and she let out a quivery sigh as she looked at his pants. “I guess I’d like to see what all the women fuss and carry on about.” Then she squared her shoulders in self-sacrifice. “But if it comes right down to it, I don’t mind having a marriage without those carryings-on between the sheets. Whatever it takes, I’ve got to save you from yourself.”
“That’s very, um, generous of you. But I promise, I really don’t mind my reputation.”
She frowned and shook her head. “I do,” she said fiercely. “You’re the nicest man in this stinky town. I’m sick of everyone thinking you’re nothing but a walking cock-a-doodle-doo.”
The cock-a-doodle-doo bit almost made him laugh, particularly because a brilliant flush had darkened Louise’s cheeks when she’d said it, as if she’d uttered an unforgivable swearword. Her vehemence was also nice—he’d always known she was a kind person. He might acknowledge that again, once she was no longer pointing a loaded gun at him.
“I’m sure you’re exaggerating.”
Her expression told him she wasn’t. “It’s because they’re jealous you don’t take up with local women. You go casting your rod into the ponds of other towns, ’steada right here at home.”
She was right. That was one of his unspoken rules, which he’d adhered to for the past several years.Never fish in a tiny lake where it’s not so easy to throw one back.
“But I know with those Hollywood floozies coming to town, the urge might be too much for you. So, I’m going to save you.”
Hollywood floozies. It took a second, but he finally figured out what she meant. Derryville was about to be invaded by a TV crew. A new reality TV show calledKilling Time in a Small Townwas set to film right here. That was the reason for this morning’s meeting. One of the producers was looking for a short-term rental, since Derryville’s only inn was going to be filled up with the cast and camera crew of the show.
“I know you’re not ready to settle down, Mick, but that’ll change once we’re married. Daddy should be here in fifteen minutes or so, after he takes my brothers to football practice. That gives us enough time to get you naked and me—” she flushed again, more brilliantly than before “—mussed.”
Fifteen minutes. Knowing Louise’s no-good old man, who was late on everything from his mortgage payments to his own weddings, that equaled more like an hour. Meaning he had that long to convince her to give up her crazy idea.
A number of possibilities quickly ran through his mind. He could sweet-talk her, reason with her, cajole her…
Or, given her brilliant blushes and the fact that she had never had so much as a date, he could do one thing that was sure to send her scurrying out of here like the scared virgin he knew her to be.
Exactly what she asked him to.
Without another word, Mick Winchester dropped his pants.
THE DERRYVILLE REALTY office was easy to spot on the main street of this small town. Caro Lamb smothered a sigh when she saw the sign, complete with engraved drawing of mom, dad, kid and dog playing happily on the lawn in front of their little house.
A sign like that in L.A. would have to show a hillside mansion and a kid being shuffled between Mom and her pool boy, and Dad and his trophy girlfriend. The dog would be replaced by low-maintenance, no-pooper-scooper fish. The lawn would become a tennis court.
Home. A word of infinite definitions. None of which had really rung her bell as yet.
She parked the rental car, which she’d picked up in Chicago after landing there late the night before. Then Caro grabbed her briefcase and stepped out into the bright Illinois morning. “No smog. I don’t think my lungs can take it,” she mumbled.
“Eh?”
She hadn’t even realized an older man pushing a broom was standing on the sidewalk near her car.
“Nothing,” she mumbled, embarrassed to be caught talking to herself. Talking to oneself was something that couldreallystart a rumor in Hollywood. Do that on Rodeo Drive and by the time you got back to your studio office, the execs were calling Betty Ford while your office mates planned your intervention.
Nothing was as “in” in L.A. as the occasional breakdown. Of course, as fun as they were, they also spelled death to a production career in TV. Stars, talk show hosts, radio deejays—they “got well” or “got clean” or “got acquitted” and the studio loved them. But lowly assistant producers hoping for a shot at a lead gig on a prime-time network show and an escape from the lowliest cable fodder featuring an ’80s one-hit-wonder sitcom refugee?
Huh-uh. Death. Absolute death.
There was, of course, one thing worse than the lowliest cable fodder featuring an 80s one-hit-wonder sitcom refugee.
“You’re here for that reality TV show, aren’t cha?”
That’d be it.
“I can tell by the rental plates. And your clothes. And the bored look on your face.”
Caro’s eyes widened. “I’m not bored. I’m just—”procrastinating“—thinking.”
