New Years Resolutions — ish

December 30, 2015Blog, Inspirationnew year post, New Years resolutionsK D Grace

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! As I started thinking about the way I now view New Years Resolutions and what resolutions are most important to me, I began to formulate a blog post for my end of the year navel gaze with that in mind. It was then that I discovered I’d already written that post for the ERWA blog a couple of years ago, and it still applies. What I’m sharing below are my every-year, every-day resolutions, starting off with the most important one — I WILL BE KIND TO MYSELF! If in doubt, always refer back to number one!

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I used to start thinking about all the changes I’d make for the New Year in the middle of November. My New Years Resolutions would be preceded by pages and pages in my journal of navel gazing and reflecting on the year past and on what I saw as my successes and failures before I finally got around to writing a list of resolutions longer than my arm and impossible to remember, let alone implement. Success was spotty at best.

I don’t do resolutions any more because it’s easier not to than it is to fail. Still, it’s impossible not to view the New Year as the ideal time for new beginnings, and the best time to make changes for the good. With that in mind, I’d like to share a very short list of resolutions that I plan to do my best to implement this year and that I would encourage other writers and creative folk to implement as well. I’m not promising success, but I think these resolutions will make my life better on a lot of different levels.

I WILL BE KIND TO MYSELF! This is first and foremost, and likely most difficult on the list. Most of the creative types I know – writers among the worst – are way harder on ourselves than we would ever be on anyone else, which means, not only do we fail at that massive list of New Years Resolutions, but we thoroughly and completely beat ourselves up about it, just like we thoroughly and completely beat ourselves up about all of the many impossible goals we set for ourselves during the course of the year. I wish I could give advice on how to implement this first and most important resolution, but I fail miserably at it multiple times every year. The best advice is just to keep on trying. I’m trying to teach myself that this is not a resolution to see through March and then forget. I constantly need to make an effort to be kind to myself, to understand that I can choose to be my own worst enemy or my own best friend. I’ll never be able to do enough to satisfy myself when it comes to my writing. It’ll always be a work in progress. That being the case, I have to make being kind to myself a daily resolution – maybe even an hourly resolution, which includes forgiving myself when I fail to meet my own expectation. Each day I’m kind to myself I will consider a huge success worth savoring!

I WILL DO SOMETHING PHYSICAL. Like all writers, I live in my head. I create whole worlds in my head, I make the characters I create in my head do amazing and sometimes terrifying things, but that means my characters get their exercise while I sit on our arse in front of a computer. This is not a resolution to spend two hours at the gym every day. It’s a walk in the sunshine when that’s all I have time for, a half hour at the gym a couple times a week. Walking instead of driving, gardening. I will breathe deep, stretch, move, sweat. I’m sure I’m not the first writer to discover that the more physical I am, the more creative I am, and the more productive I am, which helps majorly with number 1!

I WILL READ MORE! It’s another strange paradox, but at least for me, the more time I spend reading, the more I actually manage to write. It isn’t just that I write more, but it’s that time spent in the imaginations of fellow writers stimulates my own imagination, makes me think, makes me imagine. I’ve heard writers say that they’re so afraid they’ll copy someone’s ideas if they read. I find myself much more inclined to think of every book I read as a chance to learn, a chance to become a better writer from example – even in those cases when it’s a bad example. It’s also just a pleasure that feels guilty but isn’t. There are too few of those in life.

I WILL LOOK UP! Living in isolation is a huge risk for writers. I work at home. I live in worlds I
create, and most of the time, I’m very happy to be in those worlds and often very anxious to go back to them when I’m forced to walk away. But I need to be connected. I need to talk and laugh and share and look around me and observe. Everything inspires. Everything sparks the imagination. A part of what I do is to create something new from what already is. A part of what I do is to see things through different eyes and to translate what I see into ways in which it’s never been translated before.

I WILL GET IT DOWN! Once I look up, then it’s essential to record what I see, even if it’s just making a mental note. Everything is seed for a story and everything can be seen from multiple angles. The very act of taking a mental note, or even more, of scribbling something down that gets my attention, is a view from a different angle, a possible story waiting to happen.

It’s simple, but it isn’t easy. But simple is always the best start on things worth striving for. Yes, this year’s resolutions are exactly the same as last years, which were exactly the same as the years before, and I’m going to go out on a limb and predict they’ll be exactly the same next year as well.

Wishing you all good things in 2016, the very best of those, I’m hoping you’ll give to yourself and I’ll try to do the same.

Out Now! Cupid by Lucy Felthouse (@cw1985 @evernightpub) #holiday #christmas #erotica #romance #shifter #paranormal #pnr

December 28, 2015Guest BloggerChristmas, cupid, erotic romance, erotica, evernight publishing, holiday, Lucy Felthouse, paranormal romance, pnr, shifterK D Grace

Blurb:

As a postman by day, and one of Santa’s reindeer on a single very special night, Cassius Cupid eats, sleeps, and breathes deliveries. He doesn’t mind, but sometimes wishes that someone would send him something more exciting than bills and junk mail.

One cold January morning, Cassius gets his wish. A young woman arrives with a parcel. Turns out it’s for his housemate – but Cassius doesn’t care. All he’s interested in is Carina – the beautiful female courier.

Has Cupid finally met his match?

Buy links: http://lucyfelthouse.co.uk/published-works/cupid/

Add to Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27255784-cupid

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Excerpt:

Cassius Cupid woke with a start, and then sat bolt upright in his bed. Shit, I’m going to be late! was his first thought.

Milliseconds later his brain switched on, and he remembered. He was on holiday. Flopping back onto the warm mattress and pillows with a contented sigh, he smiled. No work for fourteen whole days—it was going to be utter bliss. He stretched, relishing the feeling it created in his sleep-softened muscles. Ahhh…this is the life.

He knew he wouldn’t go back to sleep—hell, it was eight o’clock, which was practically the middle of the day for someone in his profession—so Cassius fell to thinking about how he was going to spend his day, not to mention the several others in front of him. God knew he deserved to relax and have some fun. He’d just emerged from the busiest part of his year, and he was more than ready to do some chilling out.

He enjoyed his job as a postman—he really did—but the Christmas period was a total killer. He idly wondered how many cards and presents he’d delivered over the past few weeks. It didn’t bear thinking about. Once you factored in the festive period itself, the weird few days between Christmas and New Year, and then the flurry of mail that got sent when everyone went back to work properly at the beginning of January, he’d racked up some serious deliveries. And that was before you even thought about his other job—which was for just one day a year, but was arguably more important than the other 364 put together.

Cassius—or Cupid, as he was known to his boss and colleagues in his second, but most important job—was not only a regular postman for the Royal Mail, but also a reindeer. For a single day of the year, Cassius had the supernatural power to transform into one of Santa’s faithful steeds and help pull that famous magical sleigh, delivering presents to excited children the world over.

Therefore, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that Cassius really did eat, sleep and breathe deliveries, but not for the next fourteen days. All he planned to do was watch some TV, read some books, maybe go out hiking, meet some friends… basically anything that wasn’t delivering something to someone. Hey, he might even receive something through the post himself—preferably not the usual crap; bills and junk mail. He didn’t hold out much hope.

He lounged in bed for another ten minutes before realising he was lying there just for the sake of it. Being on holiday didn’t have to equal staying in bed all day—and certainly not for someone as active as him. He reached over to his bedside table, grabbed his glasses and put them on. Throwing off his thick duvet, he walked to his bedroom window and peeked out through the curtains, immediately glad of the effective central heating he and his housemate had forked out to have installed the previous year.

The outside world was covered in a thick layer of snow, and Cassius was mightily glad that he wasn’t out delivering letters and parcels. The stuff was treacherous enough without having to carry a heavy bag up and down driveways, paths, and pavements — most of which either hadn’t been cleared, or had been cleared badly, leaving incredibly slippery patches of ground for an unsuspecting postie to come across. God knows he’d gone down enough times, but, much to his relief, nobody had ever seen him do it. He’d always been relatively unharmed—excerpt for his pride, of course—and had been able to scramble back to his feet and carry on.

The eerie silence outside was broken by the rumble of an engine, and Cassius turned his head to look up the street—he lived in a cul-de-sac, so he knew that’s where the vehicle would come from—and watched as a delivery van made its way slowly and carefully down the road. He hoped the driver was sensible enough to try and steer over the thickest parts of the snow—the more people went over and over the same patches, packing it down, the more the road surface resembled an ice rink. And since the cul-de-sac was on a slight hill, it was easy enough to get stuck. He’d seen it so many times—even going outside one time last winter to suggest the driver go down to the bottom of the road, turn around and try reversing up the hill—an almost foolproof plan for vans with rear-wheel drive. He’d gotten a big thumbs-up for that suggestion as the driver finally got to the junction where the road became flat, and went on his merry way.

As the van drew closer to his house, he saw that the driver was a woman. That would explain her cautious driving—he’d never admit it to one of his drinking buddies, but women were far superior when it came to driving in adverse weather conditions. He even thought he’d seen some survey containing statistics that proved it.

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Author Bio:

Lucy Felthouse is a very busy woman! She writes erotica and erotic romance in a variety of subgenres and pairings, and has over 140 publications to her name, with many more in the pipeline. These include several editions of Best Bondage Erotica, Best Women’s Erotica 2013 and Best Erotic Romance 2014. Another string to her bow is editing, and she has edited and co-edited a number of anthologies, and also edits for a small publishing house. She owns Erotica For All, is book editor for Cliterati, and is one eighth of The Brit Babes. Find out more at http://www.lucyfelthouse.co.uk. Join her on Facebook and Twitter, and subscribe to her newsletter at: http://eepurl.com/gMQb9

Writing Sex as Magic

December 27, 2015Blogsex as magic, writingK D Grace

waterhouse_apollo_and_daphne Most of you know that every Friday for the past six months I’ve been putting out a weekly episode of a novel in serial form on my blog. And of course, I’m hoping you all know that because you’re following In the Flesh weekly and enjoying each new episode. In The Flesh is a dark paranormal romance, and as is always the case when I write a paranormal story, even more so than usual, I find myself thinking about sex magic.

I’m thinking about sex magic tonight. I think about sex magic a lot, actually. I’m always struggling to get my head around why sex is magic, why human sexuality defies the nature programme /Animal Planet biological tagging that seems to work for other species that populate the planet. I don’t think I could write sex without magic, and even if I could I wouldn’t want to. I’m not talking about airy-fairy or woo-woo so much as the mystery that is sex. On a biological level we get it. We’ve gotten it for a long time. We know all about baby-making and the sharing of the genes and the next generation. It’s text book.

But it’s the ravenousness of the human animal that shocks us, surprises us, turns us on in ways that we didn’t see coming. It’s the nearly out of body experience we have when we are the deepest into our body we can possibly be. It’s the skin on skin intimacy with another human being in a world where more personal space is always in demand.

When we come together with another human being, for a brief moment, our worlds entwine in ways that defy description. We do it for the intimacy of it, the pleasure of it, the naughtiness of it, the dark animal possessiveness of it. Sex is the barely acceptable disturbance in the regimented scrubbed-up proper world of a species that has evolved to have sex for reasons other than procreation. Is that magical? It certainly seems impractical. And yet we can’t get enough.

We touch each other because it feels good. We slip inside each other because it’s an intimate act that scratches an itch nothing else in the whole universe can scratch. During sex, we are ensconced in the mindless present, by the driving force of our individual needs, needs that we could easily satisfy alone, but it wouldn’t be the same. Add love to the mix, add a little bit of romance, add a little bit of chemistry and the magic soup thickens and heats up and gets complicated. I don’t think it’s any surprise at all that sex is a prime ingredient in story. But at the same time, I don’t think it’s any surprise that it is also an ingredient much avoided in some story.

leda Cornelis_Bos_-_Leda_and_the_Swan_-_WGA2486 Sex is a power centre of the human experience. It’s not stable. It’s not safe. It’s volatile. It exposes people,
makes them vulnerable, reduces them to their lowest common denominator even as it raises them to the level of the divine. Is it any wonder the gods covet flesh? The powerful fragility of human flesh is the ability to interact with the world around us, the ability to interact with each other, the ability to penetrate and be penetrated.

So as I mull through it, trying for the zillionth time to get my head around it, I conclude – at least for the moment – that the true magic of sex is that it takes place in the flesh, and it elevates the flesh to something even the gods lust after. It’s a total in-the-body, in-the-moment experience, a celebration of the carnal, the ultimate penetrative act of intimacy of the human animal. I don’t know if that gives you goose bumps, but it certainly does me.

(From the archives)

In The Flesh Ch 31: Dark Paranormal Erotica in Progress. Enjoy!

December 25, 2015Blogdark paranormal romance, free story, In The Flesh serial, work in progressK D Grace

In the Flesh 11880534_1463650103936599_545702979581425574_n Happy Holidays everyone! And here’s a little dark paranormal pressie for you. In The flesh Chapter 31 in which Susan’s plan is played out in chilling ways. But will it work?

There are only a few more episodes of In The Flesh left, so be sure to mark Fridays on your calendar, and hold on to your hats because things are about to get wild.

In the Flesh is very dark paranormal erotica. When Susan Innes comes to visit her friend, Annie Rivers, in Chapel House, the deconsecrated church that Annie is renovating into a home, she discovers her outgoing friend changed, reclusive, secretive, and completely enthralled by a mysterious lover, whose presence is always felt, but never seen, a lover whom she claims is god. As her holiday turns into a nightmare, Susan must come to grips with the fact that her friend’s lover is neither imaginary nor is he human, and even worse, he’s turned his wandering eye on Susan, and he won’t be denied his prize. If Susan is to fight an inhuman stalker intent on having her as his own, she’ll need a little inhuman help.

To read the story in its entirety up to this point, follow the links.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13, Part 14, Part 15, Part 16, Part 17, Part 18, Part 19, Part 20, Part 21, Part 22, Part 23, Part 24, Part 25 Part 26, Part 27, Part 28, Part 29.

In The Flesh Chapter 31

“What is this strange feeling?” the Guardian said from wherever He was settled inside me, a place that, when I thought about it, felt like it might be just behind my breastbone. “I feel giddy, like your flesh has suddenly gotten heavier, and I can hardly keep my eyes open.”

“I’m just tired,” I said. “Having lots of sex does that to a mortal body and, though Michael doesn’t need rest, or didn’t when he was with you, it truly is one of the best parts of sex — that slide into the warm cottony afterglow of sleep after you’re well sated.”

“Then I must experience it,” He said as I yawned mightily. “Oh Susan, I must experience it all! I had no idea just how delightful female flesh could be to inhabit. My darling you have opened up whole new vistas for me, for us. Perhaps I shall divide my time between inhabiting your flesh and my angel’s, now that I know you are strong enough to house me. I think I should love to know what his cock feels like to you. I believe his substantial size would be a delightful pleasure thrusting up inside you.”

I only nodded and yawned again. Though I would have much preferred to stay awake, I had to sleep if the plan were to work. Talia had assured me that I would find sleep no problem when the time came. I wasn’t sure what she had done to me other than kiss me on the mouth and stroke me behind the ear, but it didn’t matter as long as it worked.

“Then let us experience sleep together, my little scribe, and when we awaken, I shall summon our angel and perhaps we shall punish him together for keeping us waiting.”

And we did. We slept, or at least I thought I slept. I thought I dreamed. I thought surely it must be Talia’s doing. I drifted for a long time aware of the foreign presence inside me, aware that it was only Magda’s talisman that kept just enough of me safe and focused. Without it I would be easily taken over by that presence. It was the champagne bubble effervescence coursing over my entire body that roused me from deep sleep to the place almost of waking but not quite. The feel of a feather touch raised the fine hairs on my forearms, up my spine, on the back of my neck, goose fleshing the tops of my breasts and tightening my nipples to bullet points.

“I’m here now, my darling girl. Don’t be afraid. It will hurt but a little, and then you will feel nothing but pleasure.”

I felt myself being lifted, cradled like a child in strong, hard arms. Then I inhaled the cold wild scent of the high fells and below it earth, solid and warmed by moss and fallen leaves, and I could have wept with relief, even as fear shot along all my nerve endings.

“Scribe, why is the vampire here with us?” The Guardian’s voice was more curious than upset.

“We’re dreaming,” I mumbled. ” A dream brought on by our self-pleasure, no doubt.”

“How so?”

“Perhaps you don’t crave the flesh of a vampire, but I assure you, we mortals do.”

“Why?”

“Because vampires have what we don’t — eternal life.”

“But they are dead,” He said.

“We mortals don’t see them that way. To us they’re powerful, beautiful, because they symbolise lust and dark moon image_xl_6338206 virility, and we fantasise about being taken by them.”

There was a soft chuckle next my ear and cool fingers against my bare nape, pushing my hair aside.

“I did not know.” The Guardian said. “It seems very real.”

“Powerful dreams always do. Sometimes when we’re in them, it’s very difficult to tell if they’re real or not.”

“Then how do you know that this dream is not real?”

“A vampire would have no more use for you than you do for him,” I replied. “And it was he who sent me here, remember?”

“Of course.” The Guardian didn’t question my logic further for which I was grateful.

“We shall begin now, my darling girl,” came the voice next to my ear. “You have only to let me take you, and when I am finished, when I have emptied you completely and hold your life force within me, then I shall give it back to you, only changed.”

“Is this not the vampire from High View, Scribe — the one who grovels before Magda Gardener?”

I felt a vibration against my neck that might have been a growl, might have been a purr. “It is, yes.”

“And you find him attractive?”

“It’s a dream,” I said. “Go back to sleep.”

“Careful, my darling girl, you’ll hurt my feelings.”

“I suppose he’s comely enough.” The Guardian observed. “A pity his flesh is not living. I might enjoy inhabiting such a fine, strong body.”

“Good heavens, he is irritating, isn’t he?” Alonso’s voice was like velvet against my ear and with a start, I realised the Guardian couldn’t hear what Alonso said to me.

“He’s dreaming, Susan. You, however, are not. You must tell me now if you do not wish me to continue, for once I have tasted you, especially in your lust and your vulnerability, there will be no turning back, and I do not wish for you to despise me for what I have done.”

With an effort that seemed colossal, I slid my arm around his neck, amazed at how soft and how dark his hair was. As I pulled him to me, he stayed my efforts, only for a moment, and he kissed my cheek then held my gaze, only for a second longer, and his eyes were darker than midnight. Then he lowered his mouth to my nape, to the vein pulsing like a driving drum beat. His lips were deliciously warm, and it came as a surprise when he ran the flat if his tongue along the length of the vein pressing, lapping like a cat tasting milk and then pressing again with the tip as though he were probing for just the right spot.

The intake of his breath was like the sigh of a summer breeze. He kissed me once, on the spot where my pulse beat the strongest, and then again. My hand in his hair tightened to a fist. I caught my breath and held it, waiting in his embrace. It was a sharp pain, precise and doubled — just two pinpoints of pain like a surgeon’s twin incision against the side of my throat. I had barely time to notice it before blinding pain took my breath away. The world flashed white hot around me and I panicked and began to struggle, but he held me tightly, and as the skin gave beneath his bite, as I felt my blood flooding to his lips, I heard his voice inside my head.

“That is the worst of it done, my darling girl. Now you need only relax and let me take you.”

“Ouch!” Came the other voice in my head, reminding me I wasn’t alone with Alonso and surprising me how badly I suddenly wanted to be. “That was not pleasant. Susan, are dreams usually so physical?”

“Talia, can you not silence him?” Alonso spoke inside my head again and, for the first time, I noticed the succubus sat at my feet, gently stroking my ankle. She said nothing, but the Guardian gave a soft moan of contentment, or rather I did, but I knew it was his. And for the first time since He had deceived His way into my life, I was relieved that He was silent, that He couldn’t touch me, even though I felt the fullness of him pressing gently against the inside of my chest. I needed Him to sleep and to leave me alone for a little while longer, and it was with that thought I realised I was clinging to Alonso’s strong, well muscled frame and I wanted him like I had never wanted before. Christ! I wanted him to devour me, to take me completely into himself. I had never imagined it would be like this. Somehow I’d thought it would be more macabre, more solomn.

I would have writhed if I could have. I would have pulled him closer, if I could have, but I was lost, drowning in the swift flowing river of my blood that he pulled into his mouth in deep, thirsty gulps. That l couldn’t move, that my body was completely held in thrall to the flow of my own blood into his mouth mattered less that the fact that he fed from me, an act so powerful, so incredibly intimate, that I felt shy, awkward.

“It’s all right that you feel this way my darling Susan, for so we all feel at our making.” He spoke as rose images though he’d read my thoughts, though in truth what I experienced was far too primal to actually be thoughts. “There is no act more intimate, no connection deeper than the taking and giving of blood. What I take now is meant to give me life, to give me your life, but only so I may give you back my own. In this act, we shall both find pleasure, and you will be more than my familiar. You will be the child of my own heart’s blood.”

There was a sudden thrashing behind my breastbone. Though I knew it wasn’t physical, it was no less real. “Susan, you have deceived me. I shall punish you very severely for this duplicity. Do you really think a dead creature can keep me from what is mine?” The Guardian’s voice was not raised, but in it was the edge of disquiet I’d not heard before.

“For your impertinence, vampire, I shall take your succubus and use her long and hard, even if she does
reek of your death.”

“You can try.” The voice that responded was different, and in my groggy, giddy state, a blurred apparition of Magda Gardener pushed aside the makeshift curtain that separated the mattress from the rest of the area. Even with her glasses still in place, her hair seemed to writhe and danced around her face as though it lived and breathed anger and fury. “I won’t hesitate to turn the scribe and the vampire if that’s what it takes, and well you know this.”

I felt as though my whole body jerked and struggled around the still point at which Alonso’s mouth pressed against my vein, but in truth I had not physically moved. I was incapable of movement, completely enthralled by the ebb and flow of my blood and the kiss and bite of the vampire at my throat.

“That won’t be necessary, Magda,” Talia spoke, her hand still caressing my ankle and my calf. “We’ve got this.”

“You shall all suffer for this deception!” The words came from Talia’s throat, but the Guardian spoke them from inside my body.

“Oh I doubt it,” the succubus managed in the next breath, her grip secure on my leg. And then He spoke inside my head, only to me, and I knew that no one else could hear Him.

“Susan, my darling little scribe, you can still set me free, just as you’ve done before. I can give you so much more than this vampire can. I can give you the mind of God, only release me and I promise you there will be no punishment, no recriminations, but I shall embrace you as my own. What I have promised, I shall perform. I shall give you the mind of God.”

“But you’re not God. I know this now. As I released you, so I now return you to your captivity. Only this time, I hold the key in a place where you can never reach it.” It was a thought, nothing more, but He heard me, and so did Alonso.

“Then I shall enthrall another to stake you and set me free,” the Guardian said.

“I’m already dead.” I replied. “If I become ash, I take you with me. All doors are closed to you. And now, you have your wish, a home in the flesh.”

“Susan, no. Susan please don’t do this. There is so much I have to offer you, so much to tell you, to show you. Please don’t do this.” I heard his voice from a long way off, and for a moment I feared he was escaping, but the weight pressing on my chest became more desperate as the voice drifted farther and farther away, and I must have moaned out loud. Perhaps I even thrashed. But then Alonso’s calming voice filled my whole body.

“There is nothing to worry about, my darling girl. All is exactly as it should be. His efforts of desperation In The Flesh 2 12006311_1476805985954344_6570546160088833292_n will end soon, for you are nearing your death, and then we will remake you. I promise you the Guardian cannot leave. As for you there is now no turning back, so is it for him.”

“Not long now,” Talia said, and suddenly my vision was filled with Michael, who stepped around Magda and pushed his way forward. My heart was filled with Michael no matter where the Guardian resided inside me, and I think I tried to smile. But even that was such an effort.

He settled on the mattress next to me and took my limp hand in his pressing a kiss to my palm and closing my fingers around it.

“Not long now,” Talia said again.

This time with my last effort, with my last coherent thought, I shouted in my mind, the only part of me that still worked, “I love you, Michael. Tell him I love him … Tell him … Please tell him …

His fingers jerked against mine. A single tear slid down his cheek. He bent and pressed a kiss to my lips. It was the last thing I felt as I drew the breath of the living for the final time.

Out Now! – Properly, Or Not At All by Lucy Felthouse (@cw1985 @totally_bound) #newrelease #spanking #erotica #romance #bdsm

December 24, 2015Guest BloggerBDSM, erotic romance, erotica, Lucy Felthouse, new release, properly or not at all, spanking, totally bound publishingK D Grace

Blurb:

Tristan and Jayme are not only devoted husband and wife, they are also Dominant and submissive, with a particular penchant for spanking. They’ve been playing delicious kinky games for the fifteen years they’ve been together and couldn’t be happier. However, when Tristan develops a health issue that means he can’t redden his wife’s backside for a while, it puts both of them under a lot of strain. It’s a big part of their sex life, and one they’ll miss badly.

They try to find a way around their unfortunate predicament, but it’s not easy. In the end, Tristan declares that he will either spank Jayme’s bottom properly, or not at all.

The prospect of no spanking at all dismays Jayme, but she has no other choice. Or does she? Continuing to put her mind towards the issue, she indulges in some solo experimentation, with mixed results.

But how will Tristan feel when he finds out his wife has gone behind his back?

Buy links: http://lucyfelthouse.co.uk/published-works/properly-or-not-at-all/

Add to Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27319937-properly-or-not-at-all

Excerpt:

“You know what this fucking means, don’t you?” Tristan said loudly, slamming his car keys onto the hall’s side table and storming into the kitchen.

Jayme followed him quickly, her heart racing. Tristan rarely got angry—sure, he often pretended she’d done something wrong and faked being pissed off about it when they played D/s scenes, but real anger–it was something that just didn’t happen. She wasn’t quite sure what had sparked it, either. The news had been unfortunate, yes. Inconvenient, yes, but it wasn’t the end of the world. Tristan’s only choice was to take the doctor’s advice.

“Um, I take it you mean aside from the obvious?” she ventured quietly, not wanting to piss him off even more.

“Yes,” he said on a heavy sigh, making it clear his anger and frustration weren’t aimed at her. “Come here, you.” He held out his arms, and when she went into them he hugged her tightly and kissed the top of her head. “Fucking hell, Jayme, I’m really going to miss spanking that beautiful arse of yours.”

“And I’m going to miss you doing it,” she murmured into his chest. Then, pulling back so she could make eye contact, continued, “But we’ll cope. There’s loads of other stuff we can do—we can still have fun. As much as I love it, it’s not worth making the problem worse, or screwing up your recovery once you’ve had the op. Your health is more important, babe.”

“Mmm…” came the reply, along with a very displeased expression.

“Hey,” Jayme said sharply, raising her eyebrows, “you might be in charge in the bedroom, mister, but I’m putting my foot down here. Hopefully you’ll get a date through for the operation really soon. And the sooner you have the op, the sooner you’ll be recovered and we can get back to normal. In the meantime”—she grinned widely—“we’ll just have to get creative, won’t we?”

Much to Jayme’s relief, Tristan finally smiled. “You’re right, as always, wife of mine. Clearly I’m not happy about this—fucking carpal tunnel bollocks, spoiling all our fun—but it could be a lot worse, I suppose. At least they’re not operating on my dick!”

“True.” She giggled. “That would take some creativity of epic proportions!”

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