For those who have been eagerly awaiting the publication of my next novel, as promised, I have a little something to whet your appetite.
I hope you enjoy my cover reveal/blurb/first chapter and may
I remind you to make a note of the following dates:
10th June - available to pre-order on Amazon
17th June - published on Amazon for Kindle and in
paperback at Lulu.
THE BLURB
Take 1 single mum
Stir in:
1 hunky male housekeeper
1 new love interest
2 cute kids
Marinate with:
1 randy neighbour
2 feisty OAPs
2 recently dumped broken hearts
METHOD:
Lightly toss in a reality TV show.
Add a spoonful of salsa and a liberal
sprinkling of rumba.
Leave on a slow simmer and watch it bubble.
* * * * *
INTRO
Fancy yourself as a bit of a whizz in the kitchen?
Want to see
yourself on TV?
Contestants
needed for the popular cooking show
‘Guess Who’s
Coming to Dinner’
Five nights,
five hosts, five menus.
The guests mark
each meal out of 10 and
at the end of
the week the winner walks
away with a
thousand pounds.
Contact RealLife
TV now!
* *
* * *
Krista
‘It’s absolute
madness, Krista! You can’t even boil an egg
without setting off the smoke alarm.’
Alfie was ironing
my crisp, white work blouses and looking at me as if I was in dire need of
psychiatric help.
I slipped out of
my cripplingly high heels and sat rubbing the balls of my stockinged feet.
‘Well thanks for
that vote of confidence Alfie, but I don’t actually pay you to pass judgment on
my lack of culinary skills so I’d be grateful if you could keep your opinions
to yourself.’
‘Fine. I’ll say no more on the subject,’ Alfie shrugged
as he expertly pressed a collar and then placed the finished shirt on a hanger,
ready to take to my en suite dressing room.
‘By the way, there are some letters from the school on the breakfast bar
and Harry’s got a school trip next week followed by a football match on
Saturday. You need to sign the forms.’
I stood to flick
through the paperwork, feeling a little mean that I’d snapped at him. We worked well together and my life had never
been easier since he’d interviewed for the position of housekeeper. His thoughts on my madcap idea to take part
in a cookery programme did matter
because he wasn’t just an employee -
he’d become a good friend too.
When Joss and I divorced,
I was a mess. I’d had no idea that all
his late nights at the office had meant that he was banging his secretary - not
terribly original, huh? Ironically, the
reason I hadn’t twigged was because
I’d been too busy working actual overtime
myself. You don’t become a hot-shot
music lawyer without putting in the hours and, looking back, I couldn’t really
blame Joss for popping out for a juicy steak because the boring old hamburger
clearly wasn’t on the menu at the time.
Harry was four
when we split and had been nursed by more au pairs and nannies than I cared to
remember. I wasn’t proud of this
appalling record, or appearing to abandon him into the care of others at such a
young age, but it was just the way it had worked out. We couldn’t afford the huge house, holidays, private
education or any of the finer things in life if I didn’t graft and, with Joss living
in Hong Kong with a new family to support, this had become even more
apparent. I had to work.
But what hadn’t worked was the endless stream of
young girls who floated through my house to look after Harry. The majority of them, I chose to forget - to
blot them from my memory bank - but some would haunt me forever.
There was Olita,
a sullen Lithuanian who I found borrowed my clothes and shagged my (now fired)
gardener in my bed.
We moved on to Felina - she was great with Harry but I ended up
spending most of my time clearing up after her or cooking (Read: burning) meals for us all. It was like having two children.
Marguerite was
the one I still had nightmares about. She
broke the door off the Aga, left Harry in the park, threw up all over my prized
Persian rug after ‘over-celebrating’ her new job the night before and made an
overseas call to her mother that cost thirty quid - all on Day One.
I soon found that
I was working more and more days at home or dragging Harry into the City where
he’d cause havoc in the office, purely because the poor kid was bored witless.
My life was a
mess and I was failing in just about every aspect. I needed reliable help before my career
suffered and we lost everything.
‘You need a
housekeeper,’ Justine, my neighbour told me.
‘Someone with a bit of maturity who looks after Harry and you.
Stop going down the au pair route and all your problems will be solved.
And she was
right. When Mrs Withers moved in, my
life became … smoother. Smoother but a
little regimented. Harry would eat at six pm - not a moment later
- he would spend no longer than ten
minutes in the bath and I would call
by four if I wasn’t returning for supper.
It was like
living with my mother and, although I could go to work knowing that my son was
safe, my cupboards filled and my laundry clean, it was a little stifling.
Good old Granddad
came to the rescue and, for once, I praised his incorrigible ways. Granddad, or Ernest as he prefers me to call
him, lives at the end of the garden in the summer house - painted in shocking
pink, surrounded by gnomes and with a wooden plaque on the door telling all
visitors that they are about to enter ‘The Love Shack’.
Yes at
eighty-five, Ernest is a bit of a character.
So the third time
he pinched Mrs Withers’ bottom and chased her around the breakfast bar saw an
end to my problem of how to dispose of her.
And a return of
my old problem. As she packed her bags
with pursed lips and hefty tuts, I was left without help again.
Until Alfie
appeared.
*****
Looking back, I
can’t believe that I very nearly didn’t offer the job to him. Why would I want a strange man and his daughter living under my roof?
Yes, he came with
baggage in the shape of a shy nine year old called Nancy. Of course she’s now a chatty pre-teen and I
love her to bits. It’s great having a
bit of female company around and we often have girlie days or sit sobbing over
romcoms and munching on our guilty secret of ice cold Maltesers.
But … it so
nearly didn’t happen. Alfie’s CV and
experience were perfect, his manners impeccable, his demeanour easy - and yet I
just couldn’t envisage myself having a man work for me. He’d be washing my knickers for heavens
sake! He’d know my bra size!
‘OMG! He’s gorge!’
Justine had popped in for coffee when she’d seen him leaving on the day
of the interview. ‘Lucky old you,
eh? Cor!
I wish I had an excuse to take
on a housekeeper but I don’t think Rod would agree to one when he knows I do
sod all every day as it is.’
Yes. Alfie was
gorgeous. That was another reason
why it hadn’t sat well with me. How
could I have a hunk of a man under my roof as I flitted about in PJs or rollers
and face pack?
Fate forced my
hand though. A HUGE meeting cropped up
in town, just as Harry came down with measles and so I made a frantic call to Alfie. He was still available and had moved in to
the top floor of our town house with Nancy and their belongings by the end of
that day.
That was three
years ago and we’ve never looked back.
He does wash my knickers. He does
know my bra size. He’s even brought
me pain killers and camomile tea when he knew I had crippling period pains.
But I only ever saw
him as just … well, Alfie - the man
who ran my house, cared for my son, brought order to my life and went on to
become a confidante.
And now it’s
virtually impossible to imagine how I managed without him.
*****
‘Oh that is funny!’ Nancy was tucking in to her supper and
looking at me, shaking her lovely dark hair and laughing. ‘Krista?
Cooking? Seriously?’
I noticed Alfie
stifling a chuckle as he shot his daughter a ‘Ssshh’ look.
Harry wriggled
and fidgeted, picking at his food and desperate to join in the ribbing.
‘Mummy won’t
cook. She’ll order pizza. It’s what we lived on before you came here.’
‘Oh ha ha!’ I pouted and looked at each of them in turn. ‘You can mock all you like but I’m doing
this. I am going to cook and, furthermore I’m going to meet a man in the
process. My friend Georgie says it’s the
ideal way to get your face out there as a singleton. Nothing else has worked for me, so what have
I got to lose?’
‘A few fingers as
you chop your veg? The kitchen when it
goes up in flames? A law suit when the
other diners sue you for food poisoning?’ Alfie quipped back at me.
My withering look
was enough to silence him and he offered an apologetic smile before continuing,
‘So Georgie’s part of the production team is she?’
‘Yes’, I nodded
enthusiastically. ‘She said it’s amazing
how many of the contestants find love after appearing on the show - either with
another guest or through viewers getting in touch when it goes on air. It’s so
exciting!’
‘How come she
doesn’t go on it herself then? She’s
single, isn’t she?’ Alfie asked as he heaped more carrots onto Harry’s plate.
‘Oh no, she … you
know … she’s not into men.’ I pulled a
face at Alfie and tipped my head surreptitiously in Harry’s direction.
‘Is she a
Thesbian?’ my son piped up.
Spluttering a
mouthful of pasta across the table, I wiped my mouth and smiled. ‘No darling, she’s not an actress - and it’s thespian, by the way. No, she works on putting the show together.’
‘I know she’s not
an actress,’ Harry spoke through a
mouthful of food. ‘I meant is she a lady
who loves other ladies?’
‘Where on earth
have you heard …’
Thankfully any
further discussion was thwarted by the arrival of Ernest as he came through the
back door, closing it behind him and wiping his feet on the mat.
‘Evening troops!’
he bellowed as he twiddled his handlebar moustache. If you imagine the Major in Fawlty Towers,
you’ve more or less got my paternal grandfather!
‘What fine
looking tucker have you conjured up tonight, my good man?’ he asked Alfie as he
slapped him heartily on the back.
‘There’s plenty
of pasta bake and veg, Ernie. Grab yourself
a plate and join us,’ Alfie offered as he pulled out the chair next to him.
‘No no. Can’t stop.
Just pour me a quick snifter and I’ll be off. Got a date with a little dame. Wouldn’t do to keep her waiting, eh?’
I loved my
grandfather dearly but sometimes I just wished he’d slow down a little. He was always out with a different woman,
went to the gym with Justine and basically had a more eventful social life than
I did. With my parents also living in
Hong Kong and seeing more of my ex-husband and his kids than they saw of me and
Harry, I felt responsible for him and worried that he overdid it sometimes.
‘Hey! Listen to this, Ernie.’ Alfie poured him a glass of red wine and
continued, ‘Krista’s going on that cookery programme. You know the one we watch at five on weekdays. Can you believe it?’
Ernest’s laugh
boomed out as he wheezed and wiped at his rheumy eyes with a silk hankie
retrieved from the top pocket of his blazer.
‘Heavens to Mergatroyd! That is the funniest thing I’ve heard in
a while. She cooked me a shepherd’s pie once.
On the karzie for days, I was!
Now if you’d told me she was going on that dancing programme, I might
have understood. But cooking?
Krista?’
‘Well I’m
delighted that you all find the whole thing so amusing,’ I told them as I sat
back and crossed my arms defensively.
‘Yes. It would be better if I’d been invited on that ballroom show but as
I’m not a celebrity that’s never going to happen. I’m doing this show, no matter what you may think. And by the end of it, I’ll have a man. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have my dance
class to go to - I’ll leave you all to have a jolly good gossip about my
inadequacies while I’m out, shall I?’
As I left the
kitchen, I heard Harry say, ‘Alfie? If
Mummy gets a new husband, what will happen to you?’
I didn’t stick
around to hear the response because it had been a question that had been
hovering unanswered in my head for a while.
****
Originally the
dance classes had been Justine’s idea as a way for me to meet single men and
for her to flirt with them while Rod was away.
What we didn’t know was that the class was filled with women with the
same idea - and gay men.
We might not have
continued had we not grown to love Paulo, our teacher, and I found that I had a
real flair for dance. After a stressful
day in the office, I loved to simply let my hair down, put on a swishy skirt
and some sexy shoes and just let rip on the dance floor.
Justine struggled
a little, though. Her curves and blatant
sexiness were more suited to pole-dancing or burlesque but she persevered,
partly from boredom at being stuck in a huge house alone and partly because we
found we really enjoyed it.
‘Oooh! Krista!
Loving the cleavage tonight, girlfriend.
Look at those tatas!’ Our friend Felix commented as he saw me practising
my rumba with his boyfriend Neil.
‘She’s just been
telling me she’s gonna be a TV star,’ Neil said, turning to his partner. ‘Our Krista’s gonna nab herself a bloke on
that dining programme.’
‘Sheesh! Really?
The last time she tried to cook for us we were laid up in bed for a
week! Remember, Honey?’
As I strutted and
sashayed, I found myself questioning my sanity.
Just what was I thinking of? My friends and family were right - I couldn’t
cook if my life depended on it. Tea and
toast were my speciality and once, when Alfie had been struck by a bad case of
the flu, I’d even stuffed that
up. The toast was burnt on one side, still
bread on the other and I’d even forgotten to put the teabag in the cup.
If the way to a
man’s heart was through his stomach, I was destined to be single for the rest
of my life.
But … as Felix
swung me in to a sexy dip, the blood must have rushed to my brain and given me
a light bulb moment.
There was still a
week until the show started filming - and an extra four days after that until I
was scheduled to host my own dinner party.
Alfie was a master in the kitchen - he was a trained chef, for heaven’s
sake. He could teach me everything he
knew - well maybe not everything, that
was a bit ambitious, but he could teach me enough to get me through the ordeal.
My housekeeper
was going to help me cook my way to a man.
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