Naughty Little Secrets
by Cassandra Curtis
SMASHWORDS EDITION
* * * * *
PUBLISHED BY:
Cassandra Curtis on Smashwords
Naughty Little Secrets
Copyright © January 2012 by Cassandra Curtis
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
Smashwords Edition License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with.
If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.
* * * * *
Acknowledgements
Sincere thanks to Alicia Richardson and Grace Draven, without their advice and help this book wouldn’t have such a fabulous cover. I also want to give a special ‘shout out’ to my sister, Carol Ann for answering all my questions and sharing her insight on running a beauty shop. Thanks, Sis. And as always, hugs and gratitude to my critique partner Cora Zane. Without your sage advice and late night virtual brainstorming sessions this story would still be a work-in-progress.
* * * * *
NAUGHTY LITTLE SECRETS
Chapter One
Stacie Purcell’s pulse jumped and her mouth went dry seeing her ideal male fantasy in the flesh. Tyler Murchison hadn’t noticed her, but then she didn’t expect it. He appeared preoccupied and in a hurry, talking on his cell phone. Tyler’s short sleeve blue cotton shirt had his name and garage’s new logo on the breast pocket. A pair of dark gray pants and scuffed black shoes completed his work uniform. Despite his hands smeared with grease, she knew Tyler would clean up nice, and imagined him in dress slacks and jacket, his whiskey colored eyes smiling down at her. More than nice.
On really hot days, she’d heard he worked bare-chested in the garage. A few of her lucky customers at the beauty shop claimed his muscled chest and six-pack abs were beyond hunk worthy. The day Tyler moved back in town, every woman in Rusdale cheered.
What she wouldn’t give to see him in all his glory! Tyler inspired her muse and was the basis for her vampire hero in the erotic romance she was secretly writing. She hadn’t gotten up the courage to show her story to anyone yet, but she had hopes one day of getting published. Regardless, Tyler-watching sure kept her motivated.
The hunky mechanic opened the door to his office and walked to the front counter, never looking her way. But that didn’t stop her from checking him out. Mercy me!
Those strong and powerful thighs stretched the material of his pants in delightful ways. Tyler’s firm, chiseled body moved with smooth, masculine grace, despite having large feet. She remembered the old wives tale about large hands and large feet and stared at the snug fitting crotch of his trousers, wondering with avid curiosity if some of the rumors were true. A giggle escaped her lips before she could stop herself and she glanced up embarrassed, making sure no one heard.
The object of her scrutiny went back into the work area of the garage, ending her naughty ogling. The only other person in the customer area stood at the front register, folding paperwork before leaving the shop.
Alone at last! Now was the perfect time to pick up the narrative again on her story. Stacie opened her black leather messenger bag and pulled out her red story binder, balancing it on her lap.
She used every spare minute she could find to work on her story, and loved using the ‘down’ time when she was stuck in waiting rooms for plotting and writing. Stacie pushed the tabs on the ends of the binder’s spine, forcing the metal rings apart, and inserted the note cards she’d worked on earlier.
Flipping through the story, she reread the last page she’d written. In the scene, her heroine had just discovered the sexy, tortured hero was a vampire. Stacie chewed her lip in contemplation. Sooner or later, she’d have to decide what type to make him, vamp-glam or more traditional, but for now, he was in need of tender lovin’ care, something her heroine ached to give him.
The best part of writing romance was having her characters get the man they wanted and giving them the happily ever after she and a lot of other women desired. A close second was the sex.
She loved exploring erotic websites, reading what some people might deem soft-core porn and being able to call it research. Of course, if her sister found out she’d been hogging the computer at night in order to look up sexual positions and read erotic romances, her butt would be in serious trouble.
Pam thought she was working on her college homework, and in a way she was, since her classes were creative writing and English composition. Besides, what could be more creative than sex?
Stacie slid a printed sheet out of the binder pocket long enough to study the line drawings she’d downloaded from her sister’s computer, and tried deciding which one she should write for the first love scene. Not like she could use her own experience. Her love life was non-existent, unless she counted her purple passion vibrator.
The website she’d found had been very helpful, with descriptive diagrams and names for various sexual positions, like ‘backward facing bad dog,’ which didn’t sound very romantic or sexy. Hmm, squishy piston, face salami, oblong bend, and the love jackhammer weren’t much better. Ooh, one had possibilities—the slippery double slappy! At least it would be fun to write and she bet even more fun to try—if she had a boyfriend.
Stacie pulled out her favorite black gel pen and scribbled notes in the margins. An idea popped into her head and she wrote down part of a scene...
His rough hands slid down her hips and over her thighs, removing her panties. She felt naked and exposed, helpless under his watchful gaze. Her nipples hardened into tight points, aching for the touch of his lips, his tongue. She needed to undress him, touch him, but he’d made sure she couldn’t, not until he let her go.
“Please. I need you.” Heat spiraled down her midriff to the center of her pleasure zone, making her damp and hungry for him.
“Ms. Purcell, your car is ready.” Tyler’s voice startled her.
“Oh!” Her sexy muse was standing right next to her! Stacie jumped up, papers flying in every direction. She grabbed and stuffed them in her binder, shoving it into her messenger bag on the floor, conscious of him waiting while she dug through her purse for her wallet. Her cell phone rang the precise moment she found it.
Stacie answered, half-listening to her sister on the other end of the call, while she slipped her credit card from the faux leather sleeve. What sense she had left unscrambled when he turned and walked toward the cash register with her paperwork. Mercy! She’d heard of buns of steel, but his tight curved assets made her girly bits ache with pure lust.
“I didn’t think it would be done so fast. No, not you, Pam. I’m talking to Tyler Murchison, and yes it’s ready. Look, can I call you back? Okay. Bye.” Stacie flung her purse straps over her shoulder, credit card in hand and met him at the front register.
“I replaced the brake pads and shoes, and checked the brake oil pressure. It was low.” Tyler explained.
“Thank you,” she mumbled and ducked her head, heat crawling up her neck and into her face. Even his voice was sexy, deep and soft in a way that made tingles run down her arms and settle between her thighs in a sweet ache.
Stacie tried sliding her credit card through the card reader, but it wasn’t working.
“No, it goes the other way. Here, let me help you.” Their hands touched for a brief moment and a giddy rush of bubbles zipped through her. If she were smart, she’d leave before she did or said something stupid and made a fool of herself.
“It’s okay, you just had it turned backward.” He smiled down at her, and their eyes met. It hit like a sucker punch, how much she wanted this man.
“You’ve got beautiful green eyes.” His voice lowered to a husky whisper.
“I do?” He thought her eyes were beautiful?
An odd flicker of emotion crossed his face. “Sorry, that was too forward, huh?” Tyler rubbed his brow, smearing grease on his forehead.
“No! I mean, no it was fine. I just don’t get many compliments.” Heat spread across her cheeks. Oh good one, Stace! Let him see exactly how clumsy and unsophisticated you really are! She was sure the big ole ‘L’ for loser was probably flashing on her forehead right about now.
“I find that hard to believe. I’m sure you hear how pretty you are all the time from your husband or boyfriend.”
“I, umm...I don’t have a boyfriend. Or a husband.” Was he serious? This couldn’t be real!
“That’s good to know.” Tyler’s smile curved at the corners of his lips. He handed her the keys to her car.
“Thank you.” Rooted to the spot, and unsure what to do next, Stacie wondered if Tyler was actually flirting with her. Don’t get too excited, or overeager. He’ll smell your desperation.
When he stepped back and told her he hoped he’d see her around, she practically floated out of the garage and across the parking lot.
Her hands trembled turning the ignition. Even a simple thing like their fingers touching made her weak in the knees. Tyler thought her eyes were beautiful.
Stacie pulled into the driveway of the house she and her sister shared, and looked into the driver’s side mirror on the visor. Except for the color in her cheeks and the sparkle in her eyes, she appeared as she always did. The giddiness from his comment remained. Big chemistry. Now what to do about it?
Pam told her the last time she mentioned Tyler, she should ask him out, like it was easy or nothing to worry over. Sure, maybe for Pam. But her sister was a natural born extrovert. Pam was the responsible and practical one, Stacie thought, remembering how Pam had gone to court, making sure she was named Stacie’s guardian after their parents died.
Her sister always went after what she wanted. It was a trait Stacie admired. Could it be that easy? Was she being immature to fear rejection? And if she thought acting on her attraction to Tyler was complicated and scary, then how in the world was she going to face the risk of publishers and editors declining her book and giving her the big, fat R?
Well, she may be inexperienced and unsophisticated, but she knew what she wanted, and that included a career where she didn’t have to wash hair. She also wanted hot passionate sex with the man she’d crushed on since she was a teenager—Tyler.
Stacie set her purse on the coffee table and then plopped down onto the sofa, hugging a pillow to her chest. In the stories she created, her heroines could do anything...even have the courage to seduce the man they wanted. She knew she wasn’t one of her heroines. The idea of going up to Tyler and asking him out made her knees knock and her lungs squeeze.
She’d rather tackle the next chapter in her book than show what an idiot she was in front of Tyler. Stacie reached beside her, prepared to grab her story binder and finish that scene she’d started earlier, but her hand reached empty space.
Standing up, she ran her fingers under the sofa cushions and pillows, just in case it fell behind there. Weird. Wait a minute. Where was her messenger bag?
Noooo! Frantic, she ran out to her car and looked in the passenger seat, then in the backseat, and in the trunk. After an hour of frenzied hunting, turning her car and her house inside out, Stacie came to the disturbing realization of where she must have left her messenger bag. Heart thumping like crazy, she fought the swirling panic in her chest. Please let it still be there and please don’t let anyone read what’s inside, she thought as she prayed under her breath.
Chapter Two
Tyler rolled his shoulders, stretching his stiff muscles before finishing the last adjustments on the blue Datsun 720. With any luck, the old pick up truck would last Mr. Gambel a few more years. He removed the adjustable floodlight and closed the hood, ready to call it a day.
Might as well, since he couldn’t get the cute blonde with the green eyes out of his mind for more than a few minutes at a time. Since he’d come back to Rusdale, he’d had plenty of female attention, but none of them interested him until now. Despite his reputation, he wasn’t a tomcat.
Buying the garage and building his business were the first steps in what he liked to call his ‘ten year plan’ and soon, he’d have the next phase completed, enough money to purchase a decent sized plot of land by the lake and build his dream home. With that done, it left one last thing on his list...starting a family to call his own. No way he’d abandon his kid like his own parents had, dumping him off at his grandparent’s house like unwanted, dirty laundry.
“I finished the muffler job on the old Mustang.” His business partner Tim leaned against the garage’s open door, his hand outstretched.
Tyler glanced over at Tim and took the repair form. “Sounds good. Thanks, I’ll call the owner.”
“You know, more new people are moving to Rusdale ‘cause of that auto parts plant getting built outside of town. Might want to hire another worker.”
“I’ll see if we can swing it after I crunch some numbers,” Tyler promised. With business growing every day, he needed more help. The reason Tim first approached him about buying into the garage was because Tim wanted to take more time away from the shop, semi-retire and travel.
Problem was most of the mechanics around Rusdale would rather work out of their home and pocketed any money under the table. It made things difficult since he couldn’t offer a shade tree mechanic as much in wages as the guy would make staying home and pocketing all his income.
Plus, he’d bought specialized diagnostic equipment for the imports and that took training to operate. He knew from experience some guys already thought they knew everything and didn’t think they needed fancy computer equipment to diagnose or fine-tune a car.
“I’m gonna head out, Ty. I won’t be in tomorrow, got an appointment to get my hair cut,” Tim said, following Tyler into his office.
“You’re the only guy I know who gets his hair cut all the time and it never looks shorter.” He watched the older man’s face take on a definite pink hue.
“Pam Purcell is the best hair cutter around.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Tyler said, not trying to hide his grin. Not a day passed that he didn’t hear the name Pam on Tim’s lips.
“You should go with me. Your hair could stand a cut. Besides it’s good business. Her little sister came to us for her brake job,” Tim reminded him.
“When I saw the last name on the repair form I figured they must be related somehow. So she’s Pamela Purcell’s little sister?”
“Yeah. Stacie,” Tim remarked, adding, “Sweet girl. Kinda shy though, compared to Pam. Taking classes over at the community college extension and working at Pam’s beauty salon part-time.”
“Hmm.” He vaguely remembered her from the past as a knock-kneed teenager, all bones and buckteeth, with her hair hanging so it covered half her face. In the intervening years, it appeared she’d grown into a true beauty like her big sister.
Stacie had acted flustered when he’d touched her hand to take the credit card from her and slide it through the reader.
“Anyway, see ya Monday.”
Tyler nodded, “Okay, Tim. Have a good weekend.” Once his partner left, Tyler finished the paperwork on the Datsun and left a message for the owner, letting him know his vehicle was ready, but warned the customer that the shop closed in half an hour if he wanted to pick it up tonight.
He might as well straighten the area around the front counter and waiting room until the guy dropped by to get his truck. Tyler unwrapped another stick of his favorite spicy chewing gum, popping the clove and cinnamon gum into his mouth. When he bent to toss the wrapper in a wastebasket, he spotted something on the floor under the coffee table and picked it up, ready to crumple and toss it into the trashcan. He did a double take.
Suggestive drawings of people having sex were on the piece of paper and below the drawings were some of the silliest names for sexual positions he’d ever heard. He grinned seeing one of his own personal favorites, but he’d never known it as the ‘double slippery slappy!’
How the hell had the drawings found their way into his shop? He checked, making sure there weren’t any more of the printouts lying around, when he noticed a black leather messenger bag on the floor between the magazine rack and the sofa.
He’d seen Stacie with one earlier. Ty picked it up and opened it, looking for her name just to be sure, and pulled out a red vinyl binder. Pages were shoved haphazard into the side pocket. Tyler thumbed through them, looking for her name, his skin suddenly warm.
Make hero come alive. Use Tyler’s mannerisms. Crosses arms in front of chest when he’s finished talking and has made his mind up. No persuading once arms cross. Taps forefinger on desk or counter when he gets impatient.
“I don’t do that, do I?” Ty asked out loud. While he’d been fixing her brakes, she’d been in his waiting room cataloging all his faults. He flipped to the next page of scribbled notes.
His rough hands slid down her hips and over her thighs, removing her panties. She felt naked and exposed and helpless under his watchful gaze. Her nipples hardened into tight points, aching for the touch of his lips, his tongue. She needed to undress him, touch him, but he’d made sure she couldn’t, not until he let her go.
“Please. I need you.” Heat spiraled down her midriff to the center of her pleasure zone, making her damp and hungry for him.
Pleasure zone? Damn, if this is what they’re teaching in college, maybe he should enroll. Oh yeah, he’d bet all he owned the page he’d found on the floor had fallen out of her binder. Miss Stacie had been doing her homework, he thought, grinning to himself as he wondered how many of those positions she’d tried. He read on, growing intrigued in more ways than one.