Simona Taylor - Dear Rita

And even as she was being engulfed by this ridiculously unexpected and totally unwarranted attraction, her rational mind reminded her that this was the same man who had been getting on her very last nerve just an hour before. But the warm, woodsy scent of him made those thoughts irrelevant.

Why didn’t he do something? Why didn’t he make a move, say something or lean forward and…touch her? Rita felt her body sway toward him a little. She lifted her eyes to his and found that he was not looking at her, but was staring at the ceiling, in the attitude of someone praying, or at least consulting the heavens for guidance….

“Rita,” he began.

“Yes?”

“I’d better go before…” His eyes were on her mouth again. “I’d better go now.”

Without another word, he turned abruptly and headed out her front door.

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lives on her native Caribbean island of Trinidad—a fertile place for dreaming up scorching, sun-drenched romance novels. She balances a career in public relations and a family of two small children and one very patient man while feeding her obsession for writing.

Simona lives under the spell of her muse, or, as they’d say on her island, the writing “jumbie.” At the end of the day, when her son and daughter—her little matched set of salt and pepper shakers—are safely in bed, after school bags are packed, the laundry done, the kitchen cleaned and the toys put away, she indulges in her latest writing project with a sense of anticipation usually reserved for chocolate.

A sensual setting is half the pleasure to be found in reading—and writing—a book. While Simona loves to show off the charms of Trinidad and its sister island, Tobago, she has also set her romances in the south of France, Barcelona and the fictional city of Santa Amata in the eastern United States.

When not dreaming up drool-worthy heroes, she updates her Web site, www.scribble-scribble.com, which, as thousands of visitors have found out, is a fun place to visit, read her novel excerpts and her blog and have a good laugh.

She has also published three works of women’s literary fiction under her real name, Roslyn Carrington, but it is her passion for romance that most consumes her.

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Dear Reader,

Dear Rita was one of the hardest books I’ve ever had to write. Why? Timing, timing, timing. I started it on August 16, 2005—when my daughter, Megan, was eight weeks old.

I vaguely remember starting that first chapter, sitting in a haze of exhaustion. Snatching half an hour while my baby slept.

And that’s how Dear Rita has been shaped. In dribbles and bits; in stolen half hours and precious whole hours that were too few and too far between. I wrote on my lunch hour, dividing my attention between the book and my ringing phone, my boss passing by my desk to have a word and the blip of e-mails.

At night, while Megan slept and my three-year-old, Riley, read quietly in his bed (or hollered at the top of his lungs for Mommy), I wrote a little more.

The days in which I was able to write ten, fifteen hours a week are gone. Now, 4 or 5 hours a week are a miracle. But I don’t begrudge my babies the time they’ve taken from me. They’ve added a whole new dimension to the person that I am, and I love them dearly.

I hope you enjoyed Dear Rita . In spite of the constraints, I enjoyed writing it.

I look forward to hearing from you. You can e-mail me at roslyn@scribble-scribble.com, or drop by my Web site at www.scribble-scribble.com. My snail mail address is:

Roslyn Carrington

8190 NW 21st Street

Suite T-926

Miami, FL 33122

Dedicated to Mrs. Leeba Deo La Roche

Thanks for your enthusiasm and your encouragement.

Thanks for being you. You make me laugh every time we meet. And thanks for the loving care you’ve shown toward my children, and, very importantly, for keeping them out of my hair long enough for me to write this book.

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

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

S pam.

Delete.

Spam.

Delete.

Spam…How in the world did people dream up half this stuff? And who in the world was crazy enough to buy it? Rita held down the Delete key and shook her head. She had no intention of buying cheap aphrodisiacs online, had no cellulite to speak of and was quite happy with the extra eight pounds or so she carried around on her five-foot-six-inch frame. After all, on the scale of the universe, what was an extra eight pounds?

But spammers certainly made life difficult, especially when her job involved spending hours online each day. People out there relied on her, women who were hurting and confused, who needed her help. Clearing junk mail took longer and longer every day, and when you worked freelance, time was money.

She settled into her Starbucks seat, glad that she had come early enough to bag her favorite, a comfy, funky one near the window, and slurped on her thick, aromatic White Chocolate Mocha. Rita knew her frailties, and coffee was one of them. She could start the day without food. She could start the day without air, if it came to that. But caffeine? Noooo.

She patted her mocha mustache with a napkin and got down to work. A dozen e-mails down, she found a likely prospect.

Dear Rita,

My husband and I share a computer. Last night I was surfing the Net when I began to type in the address of a Web site I wanted. Guess what? The Auto-complete feature was on, and before I could finish typing, another address popped up. It was a singles Web site specializing in girls under thirty. My husband is fifty-two, and we’ve been married twenty-nine years. Rita, I’m devastated. My husband’s registration dates back almost a year, and he’s been using another name, claiming that he’s only forty-one, and single.

What do I do?

Is it just a phase?

Hopeful

Washington D.C.

Dear Hopeful,

What do you do? Try to figure out his password (it usually isn’t all that hard), go into his account with the Web site and cancel it. Then look through his History, dig around in his cookies and Temporary Internet Files, and try to find out where else he’s been. If he has memberships in any other sites, cancel those. Then sit back and wait.

Next time he tries to access the site, he’ll know you know. The measure of the man is what he does next. Either he’ll stay quiet, in which case he’s a coward as well as a cheat, or he’ll ’fess up, in which case he’s honest—for a stinking cheat, that is.

Either way, any man who passes himself off as being ten years younger just to chase women has issues. Is it a phase? Probably. Should you sit back and accept it? No. Either thrash it out before he gets lost in cyberspace, or toss him in the Recycle Bin. Your choice. But I’ve got to tell you, honey, in your shoes, I’d cut the stinker loose and go find a Web site that specializes in men under thirty…