Grace

    How could a mere mortal compare to that? She didn't even have the decency to walk like a person. She glided through the hallways as if her feet didn't actually need to touch the ground. It was no wonder that she had the attention of any man she desired, the job that everyone in their field coveted and everything seemed to come so easily to her.
    Even Brett loved her. Jenny couldn't compete with someone like that, no one in their right mind could, really. There were plenty of girls who loved Brett, but Felicia wasn't one of them. It didn't stop Brett loving her, however.
    Jenny was too skinny. Her arms and legs were long and lean with the rest of her following along to create a dancers build. At 5'9", she was tall for a girl, but not as tall as Brett. He was 6'3". Felicia was curvy, presently slim and 5'7". Also, she was a goddess, so there was that.
   

James and the PI

     To say he wasn't happy about the news would be an understatement. James was beyond angry. Beyond upset. Beyond anything even remotely reasonable.
    The first few pictures could probably have  been justified or even explained away. But the second set were not so easily dismissed. This was not the news that he had wanted. He'd been glad that Mr Aron had found her; he had, after all, paid enough for the man's services.
    The first set were of a vaguely familiar blonde man and Alice, walking around San Francisco. They were behaving decidedly touristy, so he chalked it up to her showing him around town. In one of the pictures, however, he had a decidedly wicked look on his face and in the next picture she was ruffling his hair in a playful manner. Just because Mr Aron hadn't caught them kissing didn't mean they weren't.
   Then there was the matter of the second guy. They had spent a very long time together and there were more than a few scandalous pictures of them... Cavorting. It made his blood boil to think of this man's hands on his angel. His Alice.
   The PI hadn't caught them doing anything less innocent than making out on a blanket. Though they had disappeared for a time in the woods. Mr Aron had assumed they would be on the last boat, so he'd boarded without seeing them. As the ferry pulled away from Angel Island, he caught sight of them walking to another boat docked near the ferry. With his telephoto lense he was able to get a grainy shot of them getting on the boat.
   It was registered to a man named John Higgins, but the man with his hands all over her was named Benedict, Ben to his friends.

Bike or car?

More than friends

Looking back at the date, he couldn't see what he'd done wrong. As far as he could tell, she had been into him all evening. If they had stayed ten more minutes they would have closed down the restaurant.
   Alice had insisted that they walk down the warf for a while so that they could talk some more. It was a warm evening and she had even held his hand while they walked back to his truck.
    But that wasn't what had his heart pounding in his chest. The kiss. He had finally worked up the courage to kiss her. Being a fisherman and kind of a big guy, he'd always been a little afraid of coming across as being aggressive or using his strength and accidentally hurting someone.
    Not wanting to hurt her, he'd cupped her cheek gently and kissed the other side of her face. Pulling away afterward was gut wrenching. When she grabbed his face with both hands, he'd panicked at first, but her touch was intoxicating.
   Within seconds, they were moving against each other. Their hands and bodies moving by instinct. He wanted her so much, and now, finally, it seemed like she wanted him back.
   With her legs around his waist, he pushed her gently as he could against the door frame as she moaned softly into his mouth. It would have been impossible, at this point, for her not to know how aroused he was. That she had moaned, told him as much. Ben fumbled for the door handle until his sex addled brain figured out that they were leaning against it.
   Reluctantly letting her go, she kissed him again and openned the door. Before he realized what was happening, she had pushed him gently outside, thanked him for dinner and apologized about having to get up early. She also had looked like she had wanted to cry.
   He actually wanted to cry too, but for probably very different reasons. His erection pressed painfully hard against the fabric of his pants. He sat behind the wheel of his truck and hit the steering wheel repeatedly as hard as he could.
    What the hell had he done wrong? It was like high school all over again. Except then he'd been a football player and hadn't learned the virtues of playing it slow. Or, of preventing blue balls.
   With a heavy hearted sigh, he drove home to deal with the situation at hand. But he wasn't really mad. He just hoped that he hadn't somehow screwed it up with Alice.

Scott's duty

  Scott sat in the bagel shop below his apartment watching a guy outside pacing and talking on his cell phone. The guy was gesturing wildly and periodically stopping to look longingly at the bagel girl behind the counter.

  He knew how the guy felt. Scott had caught part of the conversation when he'd walked into the shop. Relationship on the rocks, and it was pretty obvious, to Scott at least, why that happened to be.

  He was in a similar situation, actually. Nora... He just couldn't figure out what to do. They couldn't get married, they'd only known each other for eight months.

   A baby... He knew that a baby needed a father, but he just wasn't that guy. He didn't know if he was relationship material, let alone marriage worthy. Any guy could make a baby, but it took a man to be a father. Was he man enough?

   He guessed it didn't matter, really. He should get a ring and do the right thing. Scott took a big bite of bagel as the cellphone guy hung up and came back inside. He sat down at his table and resumed eating his sandwich. From time to time, he looked up over his computer screen and gazed longingly at the bagel girl when she wasn't looking.

  What cellphone guy didn't see was the bagel girl smiling over at him when he wasn't looking. On the occasion that they were both there, this tended to be the scenery.

  Everyone wants something, Scott thought bitterly. If only she hadn't gotten pregnant. Nora was amazing. Smart, fun, funny and sexy as hell. She'd be an amazing wife, a great mother. But he wasn't good enough for her, really. She just deserved so much better than he could offer.

Dream Cast

Every writer, whether they like to admit it or not, has a dream cast in their head, should their book become a movie.

Now, I do not own the rights to these pictures, but as I do not receive money from this blog, I have no qualms posting them. If anyone is curious as to their origin, please message me and I'll send along the links.

Alice, the girl in search of her place in the world:

 Sophia Myles











James, the wayward husband:

 Lucas Bryant







Candice, the problematic wife:

Emily Blunt (Isn't she just fabulous?)








Ben, the persistent fisherman:

Joe Manganiello










Grace, the fiery yogi sister:

 Christina Hendricks

 or Carey Mulligan









 
Scott, the man on a mission:

Chris Helmsworth










Nora, the psychologist with a big problem:

Kate Kelton










Who knows if anything will ever come of this wackiness... but in the meantime, this is who I picture. :D

Phone call dilemma

Alice was the only one awake. Ben had given her a ride home almost a half hour ago and she'd made yet another lame excuse not to let him in the house.

He was trying to get her guard down with every good guy card in the deck. She really wanted to want him, but something was holding her back. James...

He was always there, at the back of her mind. Like an impossible itch or something, she couldn't shake him. Maybe if she could just let Ben into her bed, she could get on with her life. But that wouldn't be fair to him, either.

The cellphone in her hands was cold and empty of contacts from her life in Denver, but she knew his number by heart. Ben had made a good point at dinner. She couldn't truly be happy until she healed. He had meant that she should forget James and be with him. She knew enough about men to know when one wanted to be "more than friends".

But Ben was sweet, and strong and made good money. He'd never be a MENSA candidate, but he wasn't an idiot either. They had fun together, even though they hadn't fooled around. She smiled at the memory of Ben walking her to the door. He'd held the side of her face like he was holding a baby bird, and then leaned down to kiss her other cheek.

His lips had been so soft, and the kiss was feather light. As he had pulled away, she put both hands on his face and kissed him full on the mouth. It deepened quickly, with hands wandering over each others bodies soon after it began. She racked her fingernails across his broad shoulders as she nipped playfully at his bottom lip. His breathing quickened and he was soon responding with a deft handfull of her ass. They stood there making out in the doorway until they were both breathless.

He wanted in, and she had wanted him to, but James' face filled her mind. The strong jaw with its morning stubble, rough against her pillow on the morning she'd finally gotten up the courage to ask him to be hers.

She'd panicked, and said something stupid about needing sleep and that she would call him later. The hurt that had flashed in his eyes broke her heart, but she hugged him and then shut the door behind her.

Now she sat at the kitchen table, flustered, horny and at a loss for what to do next. James was good at helping her sort things through, but after almost three months of nothing, would he even want to hear from her? She decided that she didn't care. She had to talk to him. She had been meaning to call since Grace's birthday almost three weeks ago now.

She picked up the phone and determinedly dialed with shaking fingers. It was only 10pm in San Francisco, so it was 11pm in Denver. Alice couldn't remember the last time Ben had been asleep before midnight, so she figured it would still be okay to call. At least it would be okay if he still wanted to talk to her. He hadn't called in three weeks, after all.

The phone went to voicemail. Alice Hung up in a rush of adrenaline fueled emotion. When the tea pot started whistling, she almost screamed aloud. She had completely forgotten putting it on.

After mixing herself a mug of hot chocolate, her phone rang. It was James. She put the steaming mug down and sat, staring at the phone vibrating on the table.

She snatched it up on the third ring.

"Hello?" She hated the way her voice was wavering, but couldn't seem to stop shaking.

James, meet floor

The phone was ringing. James cracked open his sleep crusted eyes and surveyed his surroundings. Problem one was his being on the floor. More specifically, on the floor in the livingroom, mouth open, drooling into the brown carpet. Problem two was that the phone hanging on the wall of the kitchen was ringing. Problem three was that it was one in the morning and his mouth tasted like scotch puke and carpet.

Candace was comatose in the hospital, Alice wasn't in Denver anymore and had never called the house when she was still here. The thought made him want another drink. Maybe not scotch this time, though. His stomach lurched again as the phone rang again and he dragged himself up to answer it.

"Who the fuck is calling me at this time of night?" Was what he wanted to say, but his professional nature kicked in instead. "Williams residence..." He slurred into the phone. He rubbed the crust out of his eyes while the person on the other end paused. He blinked himself a little more awake. There was someone on the other end he could hear them breathing softly. "Hello? ...Alice?" He hated the desperation in his voice, but he just couldn't take it anymore.

  "Hi." A man's voice. Not Alice. "Sorry to call so late, but is there a James there?"

"This is James... May I ask who you are?" His tone was harsh, but he really didn't care. It was late, he was drunk, and the phone number was long distance.

"I'm a friend of Alice's. My name's Ben. Now, I know you and her had some history, but I gotta make sure you're going to leave her alone now." He sounded reasonable enough, but James really wasn't feeling too reasonable at the moment. "And before you ask, she doesn't know I'm calling you." James was livid. He couldn't seem to make a sound.

"This is James Williams the architect, right?" Ben seemed a little less sure of himself, which finally deflated James' furious silence.

"Yeah. This is James. Alice's James, actually. What I'd like to know is, and I mean this with the utmost respect, but who the fuck are you? Why are you calling and where is Alice? She won't return my phone calls and no one knows where she is. I miss her... Will you tell her that? Whoever the fuck you are to her, can you tell her that much?"

Ben was silent on the other line for almost a minute. James openned his mouth to ask if he was still there. Ben beat him to it. "She doesn't know I called you... I'm sorry." Before James could yell at him, the line went dead.

A little mystery...

Wind was howling through the man-made canyons of downtown San Francisco. It was rare enough for it to be windy, but even more so for the amount of wind. 60-70 miles per hour was the high wind warning for the day. Scott pulled his coat a little tighter around himself and soldiered on to his hotel. It was a boutique hotel off of Bush Street called The White Swan Inn. His contact for this particular trip had booked the room and made all of the arrangements for his stay.
    It was a quaint spot with a decent view, free baked goods, coffee and tea throughout the day and a central location to the businesses he had the need to visit. That it was within walking distance of Union square and a short cab ride most everywhere else also helped. Generally speaking, he would have liked to be closer to the Haight and Ashbury part of town, but the hotel had not been his choice.
    Breakfast was a quick endeavor in the small dining area in the basement. While reading his notes, he partook of the breakfast of the day: scrambled eggs and a couple of sausage links paired with some toast and excellent coffee. By 8am he was walking to his first stop, a commercial upscale building being renovated for a larger business. Naturally, since the person who was meeting him there had a vested interest in the completion of the smaller project, it was deemed necessary to have their business handled there.
    If the wind had been less intense, or his business far enough away to warrant a cab, he would have missed her. Cowering in a small corner, waiting for a bus, was a long necked blond woman with her hair up in a messy bun. She wasn't glowing like the night he'd seen her carousing with a married man, but there was no mistaking the woman from the restaurant. She had on a long tan London Fog trench coat which was belted tightly on her pleasantly curvy figure. He looked longingly across the street, wanting to go over to her. To ask what the hell she was doing out here, and to find out where she was going. The traffic wasn't slowing down and there was no hope of getting across without a light. By the time he got to the light and was across, her bus had already picked her up.
    A girl he had once known, a million miles away in a small mountain valley town, had told him that the difference between stalking and being pursued was if the girl thought you were cute. He'd have to handle this delicately. He couldn't risk freaking her out. But this just wasn't something that happened to people. There was a reason he'd seen her. He quickly wrote down the number of the bus to look up after his meeting and continued on his way.
   
    The meeting could have gone better. He'd kept the account, but only after promising some provisos that would not make his boss happy. He arrived back at the small room on the top floor of the quaint 'French' hotel and quickly opened his laptop. After almost a half hour of searching, he was unable to locate the route that the wayward young lady had taken. The number 2 line ended near the Golden Gate park, but from there, he didn't have any idea where she might have gone.
    Really, the only hope he had was to go back there the next morning around the same time and see if he could find her again. It was a depressing thought, and before he could get too far into it, he was on the phone with the client for the next day. The client was calling to reschedule for later the next afternoon, as something had come up at his daughter's school. Being that Scott had already decided that he was going to go to Haight and Ashbury for dinner and a couple cocktails, it was welcome news.
    The afternoon was spent with a light lunch from the corner bodega and writing out both the new terms of the client from that morning and a prospectus for the next client. By six o'clock, he was in a cab, headed for Martin Mack's Gastropub on Upper Haight. Scott knew all about San Francisco cab drivers and gave him specific directions so that he wouldn't give him the run around "tourist route" that took twice as long and cost twice as much. After tipping the man and walking along part of Haight to see what had changed since his last trip, he headed inside.
    It wasn't his normal fare. Most days he would have opted for an upscale restaurant that served overpriced tapas that required several courses to even approach something close to being filling. But today, he just wanted a fucking cheeseburger and a beer. Okay, maybe two or three beers... and a shot.
    He had ditched the suit for something a little more low key: Jeans and a button down t-shirt. All still solidly designer items; apparently he didn't own anything that wasn't designer anymore. Not that he knew when that had even happened for sure. But none of the tags were visable and he really didn't care at the moment. He just needed to get his mind in gear and figure out what he was going to do next.
    There was a menu at the end of the bar, so he sat down and started looking for the cheeseburger section. Maybe he'd even get a side of jalapenos to put on top. If he was very lucky, they would even be pickled.
    "Hello, what can I get you?" Scott put down his menu, gasped and proceeded to choke on his own spit. The bartender had big azure eyes and soft, but slightly wild, blonde hair that had been swept up into a loose bun high on the back of her head. She pivoted gracefully and grabbed him a glass of water and patted him on the back while leaning over the top of the bar. She smelled like vanilla, figs and something else wild and entirely her own. After a moment, he had stopped coughing and took a sip of the water. She was back on her side of the bar and had a genuinely concerned look on her face.
    "Are you okay?" He realized that he was blinking rapidly and didn't actually have any kind of plan on what he would say to her when he met her. Usually he had all of his interactions completely planned out. It was sort of his buffer against losing control of the situation. "Do you want something else to drink?" She was smiling tentatively now, almost like she was trying to put him at ease.
    "Yep, yes, actually... yeah. A beer. Whats on tap?" He was seriously screwing this up. She pointed down the bar about three feet away with a thumb as he raked his hand through his hair. Turning back to him, she giggled softly to herself.
    "Tell you what, I'm just going to make you something you'll like." He made a gesture to wave it off and actually managed to open his mouth to protest when she cut him off. "Don't worry, its on me." And she winked at him. Winked! What the fuck?!
    She returned to his place at the bar with a mysterious and large glass of what looked like a margarita.
    "Don't over think it, just give it a try. You'll like this, I can tell." Her eyes were glowing and she had on a mischievous little half-grin. He sniffed at it doubtfully before taking a sip. It was a margarita, but there were a few extra ingredients that made his taste buds stand up at attention.
    "See? I told you you'd like it." She grinned wider, before turning pseudo-serious on him. "You're gonna want to eat something with that, though. What'll it be?" She already had out her notepad and a pen from her apron and was waiting patiently.
    "Cheeseburger with pickled jalapenos on the side. French fries and a small side of ranch." She nodded her approval, grinned again and walked over to put in his order and help some other customers who had just come in.
    He was still trying to figure out what to say to her when she came over with an ice water and asking if he'd like a refill. She'd have to charge him for the next one, though. He nodded yes and managed to smile back. Not the debonaire smile that he used to pick up women, but his own, slightly goofy one.   
    He was still mentally beating himself up when he noticed the three people come in and take turns hugging his mystery woman. In all of the excitement, he still hadn't caught her name. The bartender and the woman of the threesome looked very alike, except for their hair. One of the men was obviously with the curly haired redhead.  The other one was leaning in towards his bartender in a very casual, but more than a little possessive, masculine way.
    She didn't seem to notice, or if she did, didn't seem to care. Either way, it didn't bode well for her apparent (or at least hoped for) single status.