The Perils of Paulie (A Matchmaker in Wonderland) Read online

  I slid backward and grasped his penis with a firm but gentle grip and licked the underside.

  He sucked in a huge quantity of air and with both hands gripped the sheets beneath him.

  “What was that about not doing it right?” I asked.

  “I was wrong. So wrong. Very wrong. I’ve never been this wrong in my life,” he babbled, his eyes full of hope.

  I smiled again, a very womanly smile, one chock-full of the power that women held over men, and then applied myself to make him babble even more. By the time I was done fully investigating his genitals, he was almost incoherent.

  “I like how you thrash around when I do this,” I commented at one point, and gently squeezed his testicles while running my tongue the length of his penis.

  He groaned and his hips bucked.

  “Now, how about I do this—” Before I could finish my sentence and put action to (unspoken) word, he sat up and said loudly, “No! It’s my turn now.”

  “But—”

  I was on my back before I realized what was happening. He spread my legs and swung them over his shoulder, grinning wickedly at me over my pubic mound. “No buts, my fair little temptress. Now it’s your turn to thrash around and moan and groan and not be able to think straight. We shall commence thusly.”

  “I love how you talk,” I said, my eyes rolling back in my head when he stuck a finger into my depths at the same time his tongue started investigated the outer tingly bits. And that pretty much was the last thing I said that made any sense. Dixon curled another finger into me, which sent me lurching upward. I grabbed his arm and said, the words tumbling over one another, “Oh my god, that’s good! That’s really good! Stop doing that right now because if you don’t—”

  “Stay there,” he said and, to my intense sadness, rolled off and disappeared into the bathroom. He returned almost instantly with a strip of condoms, one of which he was trying to roll onto himself as he ran back to the bed.

  “Hurry!” I said, my body rife with demands for his body to return to its right and proper place.

  “I’m trying. I’m trying, but the blasted thing . . . Got it.”

  “Thank god.” I almost sobbed, and welcomed him back onto me with little cries of happiness. He sank into me with a move that seemed so right, and yet not nearly enough. I moved with him as he let his hips go wild, my mouth busy with nibbling along his collarbone, the feel and scent and taste of him wrapping me up in a haze of purest pleasure. I bit his ear when he made a little swiveling move and dug my fingers into his shoulders, wanting to yell and sing and dance and never move from the spot all at the same time.

  “I hope,” he said, panting into my ear, “I hope you’re . . . I hope . . .”

  “Oh yes,” I said, wrapping my legs around his and thrusting upward, my back arching as my orgasm spiraled out in ripples of sensation. My muscles tightened and spasmed around him, forcing him to thrust hard a couple of times, murmuring something into my neck as he shuddered his own pleasure.

  “Well, that,” I said a few minutes later, when Dixon rolled off me, “was seriously awesome.”

  He lifted his head and squinted at me. “How is it you can talk when I can barely catch my breath?”

  “I’m a woman,” I said, turning to my side so I could trace a finger down his lovely chest. “We are superior that way.”

  “I think you’re cheating somehow,” he said, closing his eyes again.

  “That’s because your poor man’s brain can’t cope with a life-changing orgasm and still be able to indulge in pillow talk.”

  “Life-changing, eh?” he asked.

  “That’s right.” I poked him in the side until he opened his eyes. “Can I say again that this was totally unexpected? I don’t want you thinking I’ve been laying a trap for you just because you’re a handsome Englishman.”

  He stared at me for a minute. “You think I’m handsome?”

  “Of course I do. You’re all yummy and you have pretty gray-blue eyes with black lashes that I can tell you make me intensely jealous.”

  “My eyes are plain hazel, not pretty gray and blue.”

  I pinched his arm. “You are supposed to accept compliments nicely, not argue.”

  “Ah. I apologize, then. Thank you for thinking that I’m handsome when everyone else tells me I’m barely passable.”

  “Now you’re going to make me think you’re fishing for compliments.” I bit his shoulder gently.

  “On the contrary, I’m trying to be honest.” A little smile quirked up one side of his mouth. “I do think that, of the two of us, you are the more attractive. You have lovely brown eyes with perfectly suited eyelashes, so you have no need to be jealous of mine. And your hair is like liquid silk. I won’t go into how your legs leave me weak with desire, or what the sight of your breasts does to me, because I wouldn’t want you getting a fat head.”

  I laughed, and pinched him again. “Thank you for that, and thank you for also not mentioning the fact that there is an overabundance of me. Not that I think you would do any body shaming, but I appreciate that you didn’t feel the need to swing to the opposite and tell me how much you like chunky women.”

  “You’re not chunky in the least, and I do happen to like the fact that you aren’t one of those rail-thin women who are obsessed with their appearances.”

  “And that gets you a gold star for the day,” I said, glancing at the clock radio next to the bed. “Crap. The dinner is supposed to start in half an hour. I suppose I should go get my shower at last.”

  “We could stay here instead,” he offered, and for a moment I was tempted.

  “Sounds lovely, but I think it would be pretty obvious if we were both missing. I’m not a super-private person, but I really don’t like the idea of the cameras catching us together, and they’d be bound to if they noticed we were off on our own. I know how these reality shows work, you know. They love to film any fights, general drama, or couples who try to sneak off together.”

  I got up while I was speaking and slipped the petticoat over my head, followed by the camisole, collecting the other garments and my boots.

  “I understand,” Dixon said, watching me with avid eyes. “I am not looking for any attention, either. Kell is welcome to it.”

  “And I thought Louise was bad—you definitely got the worst carmate of the two.” I opened the door and peered out into the hallway. With my card key in hand for a speedy entrance, I blew Dixon a kiss and hurried across to my room.

  JOURNAL OF DIXON AINSLEY

  23 July

  5:30 a.m.

  Buffalo, New York

  The drive to Buffalo yesterday was interesting. Scenery was fairly rural. We stopped to help Paulie and her team. Kell screamed about that for an hour afterward. No time infractions. Car ran fine.

  I’m not sure I’m cut out for travel journaling. I can’t think of anything more to say about the trip out.

  JOURNAL OF DIXON AINSLEY

  23 July

  5:36 a.m.

  Buffalo, New York

  I can think of a lot of things to say about Paulie, though.

  JOURNAL OF DIXON AINSLEY

  23 July

  11:18 p.m.

  Sandusky, Ohio

  Privacy warning notice. The next couple of paragraphs are not to be included in travel journal and are just for my own reference. And insight—not that it’s done anything but make me feel horrible.

  How can I let Paulie go on believing what she believes? That’s the big question that was giving me hell after Paulie knocked on my door last night and we ended up in a lovemaking session. Except there I was, feeling horrible afterward once Paulie had left to return to her own room.

  “You ass,” I told myself as I got dressed. “She thinks you’re mourning the loss of your dead fiancée. She doesn’t know the truth. Tell her. Tell her the truth.�
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  A little voice in me disputed that suggestion, saying that things were going so nicely, it would be a shame to screw them up so soon in the relationship.

  “Not that there is a relationship,” I said to my reflection, getting out a razor and shaving cream. “It’s just physical pleasure. Nothing more. No emotional entanglements.”

  My reflection looked skeptical at that.

  “I’ll tell her,” I said later, when I was pulling on my shoes and checking to make sure I had my wallet and passport. “I’ll her the truth. Then she won’t have to feel guilty about me feeling guilty, and she can wrap those gorgeous legs around me with abandon.”

  The production company had chosen a hotel that had a banquet room, which was where our first night’s dinner was held. I scanned the room for Paulie, but didn’t see her. I intended on waiting around the door so that I could be there when she arrived, but Rupert beckoned me over. Reluctantly, and with an eye on the door, I wound my way around the tables to where he sat with the other English team.

  “This is Dixon,” he said, introducing me. “Dix, I told Stephen here that you’d be able to help him with a spreadsheet.”

  The man in question smirked. “Would you mind terribly? The hub here insists that we keep our plans ordered, so that we can check them off as we get to them, and I can’t get the damned thing to do anything but clump the text up as a wad.”

  I gave Rupert a telling look, which he ignored. He mumbled something about saying hello to one of the personal assistants and headed off while I took the seat next to balding Stephen. I glanced at the other two men, unsure of which was the husband. “Er . . . hello. Nice to see some fellow countrymen. I don’t think we met earlier?”

  “No, we were present for the first night’s dinner only,” one of the other two men said, “and fittings of course.” He was dark haired, with a beard and thick black glasses, looking like a stereotypical geek.

  “We had plans, you see,” said the third, a man whose origins were probably somewhere in the Caribbean, if the slight accent was anything to go by. “Hub three wanted to go to Atlantic City quite badly.”

  “Hub three?” I asked, confused as hell.

  “We’re polyamorous,” Stephen said with a bright smile. “We’re all married to each other. I’m hub three, Sanders is hub one, and Sammy is hub two.”

  “I see.” I looked at the tablet, squinting at the tiny window of spreadsheet. I made it bigger and tried to decipher the jumbled text.

  “We shock ever so many people back home when we tell them,” Sanders (dark hair and glasses) said with obvious complacency. “But here no one will turn a hair to us.”

  “Except for the fact that we’re the villains,” the last one said. By process of elimination, I figured he must have been Sammy. “People’ll have a thing or two to say about us because of that—don’t you know?”

  I managed to get the text spread out so that it was readable. The words I saw there and the ones spoken had me looking up in surprise. “You’re the villains?”

  “Yes, isn’t it exciting?” Stephen beamed at me and ruffled his fringe of light brown hair until it stood on end. “We’re ever so thrilled to have the part, and as I said, the hub—hub two—wants to keep our list straight so we don’t repeat ourselves.”

  “I think,” I said, setting the tablet down, “I’m going to need this explained to me. I wasn’t aware we were assigned specific roles. I thought we were just racing.”

  “Oh, we are,” said Stephen. “Didn’t you see that movie The Great Race? We’re the villains just like Jack Lemmon and Peter Falk were the villains. We’re here to win the race at all cost, and we will do whatever it takes to do so.”

  “But that was a movie,” I protested.

  “Yes, but this is TV,” Sammy pointed out. “It’s almost the same thing.”

  “Even if we ignore that, we’re still left with the fact that this race is based on a real one, one in which there were a handful of people traveling around the world, and I don’t recall hearing anything about any of them being self-declared villains.” I looked from one to another of them. They all stared back at me with blithe indifference.

  “It’ll make for good TV,” Sammy insisted. “Roger thinks it’s an excellent idea.”

  “Then he’s insane if he thinks I’m going to aid and abet you attempting to sabotage my team or any other team.” I held up the tablet. “These plans are downright actionable.”

  “Oh, they’re not that bad,” Stephen said, waving away my concern. “It’s not like we’re going to hurt anyone, after all. We’re not psychopaths! We just want to throw a few spanners in the works.”

  “Nice ones,” Sammy agreed, nodding. “Ones that slow people down.”

  “That’s cheating,” I said, my voice rife with disbelief and outrage.

  Sanders shrugged. “There’s nothing to stop any of you from throwing spanners in our works, you know.”

  “Only the fact that we value good sportsmanship and common decency,” I snapped, and thought seriously of handing the tablet back when a thought occurred to me.

  “Now, don’t take that attitude,” Stephen said in a voice that I assumed was meant to be soothing. “It’s all part of the reality TV game, Dixon. You need to open yourself up to the sorts of shenanigans that go on in front of the camera. You’ll see—our plans will spice things up just enough to keep you all on your toes and to provide for some truly epic footage.”

  I glanced down at the spreadsheet, automatically formatting it so the text was arranged properly. Banana in tailpipe, read the first item, followed by: loosen bolts on steering wheel, slip laxative to team, lock team into room on third floor or higher, dispose of spare tires, replace radiator water with vodka, get team members fighting amongst selves, accuse a team of theft (NB: must plant something on them first), encourage members of rival teams to sleep together in order to foster jealousy and ill feelings, tell press members are felons, write slurs on cars when teams aren’t looking. “This is a hell of a list,” I said slowly. I looked up to see three pairs of eyes on me, speculation in all of them.

  “No,” I said quickly.

  “No what?” Stephen asked.

  “No to whatever it was you were going to say. I don’t want to have any part of this. I don’t hold with cheating of any sort, and no matter what you say, that’s what this is.”

  “Oh well,” Sammy said, and held out his hand for the tablet. Reluctantly, I handed it over. “We had to try, you know.”

  “I’m going to have to report this,” I said with a nod at the tablet. I don’t know what I expected them to do at that statement, but it certainly wasn’t smile at me.

  “You go right ahead and tell Roger about it all,” Stephen said, the others nodding with him.

  I rose and was about to leave when something occurred to me. “What’s to stop me from warning the other teams what you have in mind? You just let me see your plans, after all, and if I tell them that you intend on attempting to eliminate their chances at winning, they will simply watch out for you.”

  “That’s what makes it all so delicious, don’t you think?” Sanders asked, his eyes holding a look that I remembered well in a bully from my school years. “You’ll all be on guard, but you won’t have an idea when or where or how we’ll strike.”

  “Thanks for the help with the spreadsheet,” Sammy added, tapping on the tablet. “It’s much more readable this way. I wonder if we should get a printout?”

  I shook my head and left them, going straight to Roger, who was busily talking to two other members of the production company.

  “A word in your ear if I might,” I told him, and gave him no option to refuse. Quickly, I explained what had happened with the Essex Esses team. “I don’t like to be the one to tell tales about another team, but the blatant statement of intent to cheat surely excuses it.”

  “I
t would—it would indeed, if that’s what will really happen,” Roger said calmly, giving me a patient smile. “The boys came to me with their idea, naturally, and I couldn’t help but give it the green light. Oh, not any actual sabotages—that would be quite against the rules of the race—but their intent to play the villains before the cameras will be pure gold. Everyone loves to hate the villain of a piece, and here we have three!”

  “But their plans,” I protested. “Their list of what they plan on doing—have you seen it?”

  “All just part of their personas, I assure you. Why else would they show it to you?” He shook his head. “Think, man—if they truly wished to damage anyone’s chances, they’d hardly tell you, then express no concern when you said you’d tell the rest of the racers.”

  “I didn’t say I would tell everyone; I just asked them what was to stop me from doing so.” I had to admit, he had a point. If I was planning some sabotage, the last thing I’d do was tell people about it. “If they weren’t serious about it, why go to all the trouble of creating a spreadsheet?”

  Roger shrugged, and pulled out his phone when it burbled. “Padding their parts so they will get more camera time? Which they will, of course, because, as I said, everyone loves to hate the villain. Ah, Barry. Yes, I’m here. Buffalo, actually. First day of shooting was a bit rocky, but overall good . . .”

  He moved away to take his call, leaving me to stand with a vaguely dissatisfied emotion. I glanced around the room and saw Paulie, but her table was full. Disappointed, I lifted my hand in a wave, but she was laughing at something her tablemates—two of the Italians and her teammates—had said.

  I felt alone and somewhat peevish, and sat with the Ducal team for dinner. Roger recapped the events of the day for everyone, made a few announcements about what was coming up for the following few days, and talked a bit about the local news stations that would be catching us up. I didn’t pay much attention; I was too busy wondering why Paulie didn’t even look over at me.