CHAPTER 29
Breakfast was as almost as limited as it had been in the first two places, but here there was a much better selection of jams, plus far more tasty cold meats and cheeses. Nicer still was that instead of a cheap plate with a single piece of bread and a croissant, there was a whole array of bread to be eaten at will.

I waved at the choice before us, and grinned at Ange.

“You can pick our hotels for the rest of this trip, love”

There; that word dropped into conversation just as she had served it to me. Your call, Ms Meads.

CHAPTER 12
Work had left me frazzled, as that time of year always does. There are various interpretations of legal responsibility by both accountants and clients, and by that I mean more or less blatant breaches of the rules, as I have said. As a firm, we don’t do that, or at least I haven’t seen it. I see so many entries on websites like Companies House where accounts haven’t been filed at all, or regularly late, and I can’t do that anymore than I could shoplift. Annual accounts are, in essence, an account of a year’s business plus a snapshot of where that business is at the start of April. Some clients try their hardest to either squeeze things in or hold them back, for financial advantage, but we refuse to play that game. When those windows and doors shut, they are shut.

“How did it go at Becca’s?” asked Stephanie when Faye and Paula returned to Paula’s home near High Wycombe.

“Didn’t she give you a call?” asked Faye.

Nineteen Minutes

Day 88 in chastity - 1:17pm

I was twenty years old, home from university, working three days a week at an internship that barely paid me and lying around in the garden with one hand down my shorts.

Not in a sexual way. Oh my god, obviously not! It was hot, the elastic pressed against the cage, and the cage itched. That was all.

Probably.

My laptop rested on the grass beside me with a graduate scheme application open and ignored. On my phone, the group chat was deciding which pub to start at tonight.

LUKE: spoons 7 then old red?

Part 12 Penny and the Penthouse

Andrew had given us Sam for the rest of the day. Sam was very happy to drive us around. He was still on a high after filming the last couple of scenes. I wondered if he may be a bit of a sadist himself given the chance.

Problem was that he didn’t have the body for this game; actually, he carried two bodies around of his own.

Mark Lansing never wanted to stand out. He was perfectly happy disappearing into a football huddle with the rest of the team until one play made him the talk of the town. Thrust into a spotlight he never wanted, every choice can reshape his future, and every decision could transform him in ways he never believed possible. Mark’s destiny will be determined on the field … assuming he can figure out how to dress the part.

A summer spent with the girls at a fashion and sewing camp gives a boy a chance to discover his authentic self in a supportive environment.

I was sitting on a bench in the schoolyard with my friends Jenny and Patti watching a bunch of boys aggressively kicking a soccer ball into the wall.

“School will be out in two weeks and I am not looking forward to summer.”

Jenny touched my hand and looked concerned. “What’s the problem?”

We verified that everyone’s clothes were ready, the sole exception being that Victoria’s wedding dress currently looked like Mona’s.

We confirmed with the catering staff that our Thanksgiving dinner for 119 was going to be ready at 3.

We confirmed Jeremy was ready as best man. He and Arturo were going to arrive early; the hall would already be set up then, and Arturo could just take a seat, but Jeremy needed to be ready to be part of the procession.

The bed is wrong on both sides now.

I wake at 5:31 and lie there in the gray light with the sheets and the wrong silence. Kate's side of the bed is just her side of the bed now, the impression her hip has made in the mattress over two years, the pillow she's taken, the whole absence of her breathing. She took the comforter, or I let her take it. I can't reconstruct that part of the conversation. What's left is the spare blanket from the hall closet, the one that smells like the cedar block I put in there two winters ago, and I've slept one night under it and woken up cold.

The loudspeaker in the Mess Hall. “Malachite, please report to the Colonel at 09.00.”

“No peace for the wicked, it seems.” Malachite said with a smile to a group of her sisters who were sharing breakfast together.

Dressed in a clean uniform, the Colour Sergeant was ushered into the Colonel’s office at precisely 09:00.

The Colonel, waved the senior NCO to a chair, avoiding the formalities.

“I have a little job for you.” she said.

Malachite sat up a bit straighter.