Playing Games

Dear Reader,

Something really neat happened to me recently.

I’ve been a writer for quite a while and I’ve had many readers. But outside a setting such as a writers’ conference or a book signing, I’ve never actually had a chance encounter with a reader.

One evening my husband and I were out walking two of our dogs. We’d gone about a mile when I spotted a young woman sitting alone on a bench reading. Naturally, I checked out the book—I always do. Much to my surprise, it was my book—Lilly’s Law, my first Flipside! My initial impulse was to rush over and autograph it. Which I didn’t, of course, because sensibility, my husband and two big dogs held me back.

Instead, I watched her read for a few minutes. Watched her face and saw pretty much the same expression we all have when we read. Nothing good, nothing bad. But then she laughed out loud, and when the laugh was gone her smile remained a while longer. For those few minutes, I had made a difference. I made her laugh, maybe even feel a little better, and it’s such a privilege to be able to do that for someone I’ve never met.

It is also a privilege to be back with you again, and I’d like to thank Wanda Ottewell and everybody at Harlequin for allowing me to write this book for you.

Wishing you love and laughter!

Dianne

P.S. For a different kind of read, try my new Medical Romance novel, from Harlequin Mills & Boon, coming in May 2005. You’ll find it available for order at www.eHarlequin.com.

“Do you listen to her show? Valentine McCarthy’s?”

Roxy’s heart skipped a beat at Ned’s question. She never admitted to being her alter ego. “I’ve heard she’s really good. Cute. Smart. Nice voice. Great wardrobe. Good shoes. Very successful.” She couldn’t help applauding herself.

“Clearly you don’t listen to her much, do you?”

She got caught up in Ned’s eyes, forgetting who, what, when and where for a second. He was so hot. But then his words registered. He obviously was not a fan of her show.

“I listen sometimes,” Roxy said carefully. “She’s good entertainment. And popular.”

Ned laughed. “Well, you’re right about that. She’s popular. I guess that’s the way she wants to waste her Ph.D.”

“Waste?”

“Hack advice.” His voice was dismissive.

“Entertainment.” Funny, he wasn’t looking quite so attractive right now.

“Bad entertainment.”

That’s what he thought? “So would I be wrong in assuming you’re not a big Val fan?”

“Nope. Just listen when I can’t sleep.”

Great. She had just spent all this time ogling a guy who hated half of who she was. Not the best forecast for a relationship.

Playing Games

Dianne Drake

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

What’s life without a few pets? Dianne Drake and her hubby Joel have seven—four dogs and three cats, all rescued strays. In the few spare minutes her animals grant her, Dianne goes to the Indianapolis Symphony, the Indianapolis Colts NFL team, the Indiana Pacers NBA team—can you tell she lives in Indianapolis? And occasionally, she and Joel sneak away and do something really special, like take in a hockey game.

Books by Dianne Drake

HARLEQUIN FLIPSIDE

16—LILLY’S LAW

HARLEQUIN DUETS

58—THE DOCTOR DILEMMA

106—ISN’T IT ROMANTIC?

To Janie, the real spunk behind the heroine in this book

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

1

A Little Friday-Night Waiting & Shrink-baiting

“WELCOME TO MIDNIGHT SPECIAL, sugars. Are you ready for something special? Because if you are, you’ve certainly come to the right place. Doctor Val has something extra-specially special for you tonight.”

Roxy Rose gave her sound engineer, Doyle Hopps, the nod, and the program started on cue with caller number one, a thirty-something hubby-done-her-wrong from Olympia. Make that cheating husband number fifty-six for the week. Roxy always counted them—the cheating husbands. Just in case she landed a book deal somewhere down the line she wanted to be accurate. Not that she was planning on writing a book, like that obnoxious Doctor Edward Craig seemed to do about every two minutes. But she wasn’t ruling out anything because her career was on a big-time growth curve lately, and all those hanky-pankying husbands and two-timing boyfriends came in at a whopping fifty percent share of the calls.

Love ’em, hate ’em…she definitely counted on that loose zipper legion for some nice, fat ratings. And either way, Roxy needed them. They were one of the main reasons she was eyebrow-deep in building her new dream home…a million dollars’ worth of cement, steel and glass, along with a to-die-for panorama of Puget Sound.

“Eighteen years, Doctor Val. That’s how long I’ve been with him. I’ve kept myself up physically, stayed good in bed…at least I thought I was good in bed, until he started hunting down other beds. I’ve held down a full-time job, raised the kids. For eighteen long years. Then I find out he’s cheating on me. And it’s not like she’s some younger bimbo. She’s older…my age, and married, with four kids. So what’s he seeing in her? I mean, if she was twenty with a tight ass, I might be able to understand it, but she’s not!”

Astrid hit the bleep button as the a word popped out, then gave Roxy the thumbs-up to indicate she’d caught it. They were on a seven-second delay for such slippages.

Nodding, Roxy returned the thumbs-up to her friend. Best friend, actually. Astrid Billings—long auburn hair, figure of a goddess, the one who really looked like what Val sounded like—had come with the show when Roxy had inherited it from her predecessor.

“Whoa,” Roxy said, her Doctor Valentine drawl slow and Southern, even though she was Seattle-born and raised and didn’t have a drawl, slow, fast or otherwise. “Just calm down, now. Okay? Take a deep breath and pour yourself a big ol’ glass of wine. In fact, why don’t all of you go ahead and do the same.” Roxy nodded at Doyle to cue up the music, then purred into the microphone, “Be right back. Don’t you go away. Valentine’s counting on you.” Settling back into her chair, she took off her headset and gave Doyle the I need a drink in a bad way right now sign—the invisible cup tilting to her mouth, then tilting and tilting and tilting for emphasis. Unfortunately, Roxy’s invisible cup wasn’t filled with wine. Never was on air, hardly ever was in real life.

“Anything in particular?” Doyle asked from his booth.

“Anything wet. Other than that, I’m not picky.” Roxy looked at the monitor for the seconds left in this break. A one-minute break already one-quarter gone, meaning she didn’t have time to get it for herself. Or she would have.

“Told you we needed a wet bar in here, Rox,” he said, grinning through the glass at her. His booth was large, full of all kinds of gizmos and gadgets. Hers was tiny, big enough for a desk and not much else. “A pitcher of margaritas right now sounds pretty good to me.”

“Yeah, and with margaritas, you get Roxy dancing on the desk. Tap water’s okay.”

“Tap water…boring. You need to live a little, Rox. I keep telling you there’s more to life than business, and I, for one, would appreciate a good desk-dancin’ from you.”

“You got it. Tap or ballet?” Roxy laughed. Doyle was so close to hitting the nail on the head about her boring life that it wasn’t funny. Two hours on air was all anybody heard, but she managed her own Valentine publicity, hunted down sponsors, and lately, went cruising for a syndication deal. So her two hours really translated into at least fourteen. And then she slept. Oh, and did some house designing.

“I was thinking something in veils, or less. Little cymbals on your fingers.”

Astrid stuck her head into the booth and held up a can and a red plastic cup full of ice. “Hey, Rox. Before you put on your dancing shoes, or veils, is orange soda okay? They’re out of root beer and the tap water’s looking pretty brown.”

“Orange is just dandy,” Roxy said cheerfully, glancing back over at Doyle for the count. “Sorry. Guess the veils will have to wait.”

“Promises, promises.” Doyle held up three fingers on his pudgy right hand and made a zero sign with his left. “Thirty. And I ain’t lettin’ you off the hook for those cymbals.”

Short, a speck on the plump side, with long, scraggly brown hair always hanging out of a Seattle Mariner cap, in the control booth he knew his stuff like nobody else in the business. Like Astrid, he’d been with Roxy from the show’s get-go, grabbed off a sideline grunt job and given his domain on the boards. Roxy, Astrid and Doyle…the three of them together, thick and thin, yada, yada. And Roxy never forgot that. For all her quirks, she was loyal.

“I’ll put them on my to-do list right after tweaking the master bath.”

“Not the house again!” Doyle cracked, covering his face with his hands. “Please God, anything but the house.”

“Like you won’t be parking it out there when I get my entertainment room set up. Big projection TV, a sound system that’ll make you eat your heart out…”

“And you in veils…”

“We don’t talk veils until we talk about my house plans, and I got into some new ones today, in case you’re interested.” Which Roxy knew he wasn’t, but he sure liked teasing her about them.” And I’m thinking they could be the ones. Some pretty neat stuff.”

“Twenty. And I doubt it, Rox. Not with the way you’re killing every single architect in the greater Seattle area who comes within a mile of you and your house plans. Fifteen.”

Well, maybe she’d fired a few. Two, three? Definitely not more than five. But they couldn’t get it right. She wanted minimal with a homey feel. They couldn’t manage both in the same blueprint, and the homey part always got left out. So she was doing it on her own now, with the help of a CAD—computer assisted design—program and some old Bob Vila tapes. Plus in her spare time she stayed glued to Home and Garden TV, making up a wish list. Her house on her own beach would be nothing short of perfect.” Just cutting through the middle men. That’s all.” And sure, somewhere down the line when she roughed out exactly what she wanted, she’d go architect shopping for someone to whip it into proper form, find the general contractor, and all the rest of it. After she was finished with her own preliminaries.

“Cutting up the middle men’s more like it.” Doyle gave her the ten sign—ten chubby fingers wiggling at her.” And just when I thought you were working out your control issues. Eight, seven, six…”

“It’s not a control issue, Doyle.” Well, maybe. But she was working on it. “It’s just that I’m the only one who knows everything all the time.” Grinning, Roxy winked at Astrid, who’d returned to the producer booth, then acknowledged Doyle’s cue. “Valentine McCarthy back with you now, feeling so nice and mellow with a wonderful glass of…” She looked at her orange soda. “Chardonnay. Do you have your glass of wine, sugar?” she asked her caller.

“Bourbon,” the caller replied flatly.

Doyle tapped on the window between their booths and she glanced over. Plastered to the glass was a cardboard sign reading Control Freak with a dozen exclamation points after it.

She stuck out her tongue at Doyle, then without missing a beat went right back to her caller. “Well, whatever works best for you. Make it a double, if you have to, and while you’re doing that let me tell you what I think about your bed-hopping hubby. First, I think his cheating on you is only a fling. Usually is. Just sex. Men don’t leave their wives for older women with kids, unless there’s a whole lot of money involved. So, does she have money?”

“Not that I know of. She’s a waitress, I think.”

“Good, that means it’s just sex. He’s simply out for some exercise. And since he’s real busy exercising his male muscle in all the wrong places, you’ve got a decision to make. Unless you want to go through life getting taken advantage of by a bed-buzzing jerk, you can either kick him out or keep him. Either way, you’ve got to learn how to respect yourself so you’ll believe you don’t deserve what he’s doing to you.

“So like I said, you can dump the bum. Hold your head high, walk out that door, take everything you can get your little hands on, and don’t look back. He’s not worth it. And believe me when I tell you that, because this is an area where Valentine knows what she’s talking about.” Except when Roxy walked out that marriage door, the only thing in her little hands was the iron resolve to do better without him than she’d done with him. It was all she wanted, all she took. He got the three-legged card table, the brick and board bookshelves—no books, couldn’t afford them—and the lumpy mattress on the lumpy floor. A good deal for Roxy all the way around.

She drew in a deep breath, preparing herself to take the other approach—something she always did since most callers didn’t want advice, but rather validation for something they wanted to do or had already done. “Or here’s another plan that just might work for you. If you love him—and I think you do or you wouldn’t be calling trying to figure out how to fix this thing—and you want to keep him around, I think you should teach him a lesson. Revenge is so sweet. Good for the feminine ego, and if you do it the right way he won’t go wandering off again.” She glanced over at Astrid and smiled. “So which is it?”

“Keep him, give him another chance.”

A keeper. Not necessarily her personal choice. “And would you like to get even with him? Teach him a lesson that really counts? One he’ll remember before he drops his drawers anyplace but home?” In the next booth, Astrid was already visibly fretting about the imminent advice. Roxy feigned an innocent shrug. It was Friday night, after all. Somebody needed some Friday-night fun. “Because if you do, I’ve got just the right plan. One he won’t be forgetting for a long, long time. I promise you.”

“Yesh…”

Just great. One caller half-soused. She couldn’t blame her because that’s sure what she’d do if she had to go public with her life. Her life… If she took that public, her listeners would be getting all liquored up from boredom. “So are you ready to start teaching, ‘cause this is guaranteed to be a mighty fun lesson.”

“Yesh…because I don’t want to be pushed around by him anymore. And if I confront him, tell him what I know, he’ll just say he’s sorry, beg me to forgive him, then we’ll be fine until he starts sneaking out again.”

On that count, the caller was right. And Roxy was getting herself worked up for some good, on-air two-timer throttling. “You’re right. There sure will be a next time. If he gets away with it this time, he’ll figure he can go out and do it all over again. Once he’s had seconds, he’ll want thirds and fourths and it’ll never stop.”

“So tell me what to do, Doctor Val. I want to get even with the jerk, and I definitely want to teach him a lesson.”

Roxy took a drink of her orange soda, then laughed into the microphone. It was a throaty, deep, practiced laugh. A pseudo laugh, one that fit her pseudonym—Doctor Valentine McCarthy. Valentine was her real middle name, McCarthy her married name, although she’d dropped it right after the divorce and hung out her license to practice as Doctor Roxanna Rose, Ph.D. But she liked hiding behind her pseudonym, liked hiding behind her husky pseudo voice, too. And it fit the raven-haired, brown-eyed radio shrink who came out at midnight, talked sex for two hours, then went away to be just plain Roxy again. Make that Roxy with the bright, sunny laugh—cropped-cut, blond-haired, blue-eyed girl next door that she was. Not a thing like her pseudo self, thank heavens.

All things considered though, it worked out pretty well. For both of them.

“Well, my advice is simple. Do unto hubby as hubby would do, and apparently has done, unto you. Have yourself a little fling, too. Then let him know about it. Does his honey have a hunky hubby? Maybe he’d like to get in on some good extracurricular activity, since his little woman is already getting it on her own. Or does your hubby have a lonely hubba-hubba back at his office, down at the lodge, maybe his best friend? If he does, I say go for a young one if you have a choice—they’re so eager and willing to please when it comes to a more experienced woman.

“And that’s what you are. More experienced, not older. Also, finding yourself a younger man will definitely let your hubby know that you’re not over the hill or otherwise checked at the door, that there’s still some mighty good grazing left, even if he isn’t the grazer. Oh, and leave the clues, so he’ll find them. Be obvious. He deserves it.”

“And if I do all of this, Doctor Val, do you think he’ll leave me?”

“Honestly, he could. I’ve gotta be truthful about that. But if he leaves because you’re doing unto him, then he wasn’t going to stay around, anyway. And if he does leave, you’ve got options, ‘cause you can do a whole lot better. But if he doesn’t, I’ll bet he’ll think twice before he wanders off again, knowing you might be wandering off right behind him. Bottom line, dish the dirt, but have a little fun while you’re dishing it. Two more can play at hubby’s game besides hubby and his mistress. And call me back, will you? Let me know if it was good for you.”

Roxy cued Doyle to bring up the program music. “That answer got me all hot and bothered, thinking about all the exciting possibilities that are waiting for us out there if we care enough to go out and hunt them down. So let me go cool off for a minute, then I’ll be right back.” She went to break. Two minutes this time.

“Her husband?” Astrid screamed over the microphone into the booth. “You told her to go out and have an affair with her husband’s mistress’s husband? Come on, Rox. What’s wrong with you? That’s crazy, even for you!”

“You come on, Astrid. When you were dating that guy, Buford, last year, and found out he was sleeping with three other women besides you, didn’t you want some revenge? I mean, who was it that stalked him at night and poured syrup and feathers all over his car?”

“Burton, and yes, I wanted revenge. I’ll admit it. But that was different. And my revenge could be fixed at a car wash.”

“Yeah, you left him the ten-dollar bill under the wind-shield wiper, you wimp. But what I’m saying here is that the emotion’s the same. We get wronged, we want to fight back, whether it’s with the guy’s girlfriend’s hubby or a bottle of syrup. Same thing. And I just gave her an interesting way to fight back. Which she’s not going to do, Astrid. Human nature. She wants to fix her marriage, not make it worse. But I’m betting she’ll let him know, one way or another, that she knows what he’s doing. And if her marriage can be worked out, that’s the start of it.”

“And what if she takes your advice?”

Roxy wrinkled her nose. “Then she might just have some fun. And guess what, I’ll bet no one’s turning me off at the break right now and going over to that all-night sports talk show. When they’re talking home run, they mean home run, but when Valentine talks home run, her callers know exactly what she means.”

“I love it when you two fight.” Doyle chuckled. “I think people would pay big bucks to see you do it in person…in syrup and feathers.”

“Somebody gag him,” Roxy yelled, glancing up at the computer screen, checking for the name of the illustrious Doctor Edward Craig. Not there yet. Kind of a surprise because the spicier calls always brought him out.

“Gag you, next time you pull something like that,” Astrid muttered. “And next time you want something to drink, get it yourself.”

“She’s baiting him,” Doyle quipped. “That doctor dude. That’s just her way of asking him to come out and play.”

“And he’s ringing the bell right now,” Astrid announced over her microphone. Part of her job was to screen the calls—letting in the good, keeping out the bad. And her order was to always move the self-important Doctor Edward Craig right to the top of the call-in queue. Not because Roxy particularly liked him, because she didn’t. But the ratings! He brought ’em, she loved ’em. A match made in broadcaster’s heaven.

“So maybe I bait him a little….”

“A little?” Doyle sputtered. “Honey, you throw out the chum and he eats it up like a hungry shark. And you enjoy it, even if you won’t admit it.”

“Oh, yeah. I enjoy it all right. Just like brussels sprouts. My mom fixes me brussels sprouts when I go home and I eat them because I have to, but they give me gas.” Roxy thought about Doyle’s notion that she liked the great Eddie Craig’s calls, then dismissed it as ludicrous. He was a sprout, that’s all. Necessary, not gratifying. And he did cause a fair amount of gastric upset from time to time, even though somehow she always managed to walk away satisfied. In a professional sense, of course.

“Come on, Eddie, let’s see what you’ve got cooking for me tonight,” she said, checking his name on the monitor. Yep, he was there, first name on the top of the list, and ready to go. “Whatever it is, it’s going to be way better than brussels sprouts.”

“Good evening, Valentine. You’re in rare form tonight.”

At the sound of his voice, Roxy wrinkled her nose at Astrid. The man did come on so darn strident sometimes. Like sending her copies of the fifteen billion books he’d written—the ones still in the carton in the trunk of her car. Unopened. “Good evening, Doctor Craig. And let me just correct one thing you said before we go any further. I’m always in rare form. Not just tonight.” Something about his voice, that little Boston/British accent thing he had going on, made her voice go even sexier than her normal Valentine sexy. If dark chocolate could talk, it would sound like Edward Craig.

Roxy glanced down at the dark-chocolate truffle on her desk. Every night, right about this time, she got the craving.

“Rare form, maybe. But rare doesn’t necessarily mean good. Not when you do such a disservice to your listeners with your advice.”

“My advice, Doctor Craig?”

“Keep it nice,” Astrid warned over the headphones. “We’ve got a couple of potential new sponsors listening in.”

Roxy slapped a sweet smile on her face just for Astrid’s benefit. “My advice, Doctor Craig, is what my listeners want. Or they wouldn’t call me, would they.” She felt a chill, awaiting his voice. Strange effect, but it happened a lot. She chalked it up to the adrenalin rush of a battle. “So what would you have me do?”

“I’d have you give the previous caller sound advice instead—”

“Yeah, yeah, Eddie,” Roxy interrupted. “We know your broken record. Get counseling, get counseling. But what good’s counseling going to do a cheating husband? It’s not a problem in his head. It’s in his pants. Actually, let me rephrase that. There wouldn’t be a problem if it was in his pants. You know a counselor’s going to charge her a couple hundred bucks an hour, and you know as well as I do that cheating hubbys don’t go to counseling. So she goes there by herself, plunks down all that money, and for what?”

“To fix her marriage.”

“Might be better spent if she could fix her hubby. But that’s not going to happen, so what I’m suggesting is an inexpensive alternative—revenge sex, Doctor.”

“And you really believe a knee-jerk reaction like revenge sex, Doctor, is sound advice for working through an indiscretion? By the way, do you really think revenge sex is a good label to put on what you’re advocating? That oversimplifies a serious problem.”