Always Mr. Wrong Read online

  Always Mr. Wrong

  by Joanne Rawson

  Published by

  Melange Books, LLC

  White Bear Lake, MN 55110

  www.melange-books.com

  Always Mr. Wrong, Copyright 2014 by Joanne Rawson

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  ISBN: 978-1-61235-818-5

  Names, characters, and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Published in the United States of America.

  Cover Design by Lynsee Lauritsen

  ALWAYS MR. WRONG

  by Joanne Rawson

  Clare Darby is feeling restless, but can’t quite put her finger on why. Her life is in order, so what is the problem? When her daughter asks what she really wants for Christmas how can Clare tell her all she wants is to get laid. All her life she has fallen for Mr. Wrong. Will she ever find Mr. Right?

  Table of Contents

  "Always Mr. Wrong"

  About the Author

  Previews

  For Yummy Mummy and her Yummy daughters

  Always Mr. Wrong

  Tonight was all about me, Clare Darby, moving on. Well, actually, it was all about my best friend Jess’s cheese and wine party. Her Ladies Circle was raising money for sick children. Or was it animals? I’m not sure which. To be honest I hadn’t taken much notice when Jess invited me. All I could think about was how, although it had been eight months since my divorce, it had been over a year since I’d got myself dressed up, gone out and engaged in adult conversation.

  For weeks now I had been feeling restless. I couldn’t quite put my finger on why. I had a good job as a midwife at St. Andrews teaching hospital. Twice a week I went to the gym with my girlfriends to Tums and Bums. Afterwards, sweaty and knackered, we would indulge in a couple of glasses of wine and gossip at the bar next door. My finances were in order; I had a wonderful home, a perfect daughter, and a caring family. So what in the world was wrong with me?

  Then two weeks ago, even though it was the middle of October, my seven-year-old daughter, Olivia, pondered over her Christmas letter to Santa. For a seven-year-old, she is very methodical, a chromosome she has inherited from her father. Unfortunately, her father’s meticulous discipline ceased when it came to fidelity. Before she wrote her letter she made two lists, presents she desperately wanted and presents she would like, but not imperative. Finally, lists cross-checked and narrowed down to one main present and a handful of smaller ones, she asked what I really wanted for Christmas. She would like to add it to her letter.

  “You never ask Santa for anything, Mummy. What would you really like most?”

  The answer shone as bright as the star of Bethlehem. I was almost positive as I contemplated my answer the Angel Gabrielle manifested in front of my dining room window, telling me to go forth, and seek, but how could I tell my seven-year-old that what Mummy really wanted was a man. More importantly...to get laid?

  It all came to a head just before Christmas last year when Phil, my then husband, a Detective Inspector for the North London Metropolitan Police, came home unusually early one Friday night. As he went straight upstairs, I should have known as I stood in the kitchen and heard him moving around in our bedroom and then appeared a while later with a suitcase in his hand, it wasn’t full of dirty laundry for the laundrette. I’d been suspicious for months that his relationship with his partner, the stunning Detective Sargent Maria Stephanopoulos, was more than professional. A typical Greek goddess, all olive skin, flowing dark hair, legs up to her armpits and tits so perky that every man, even the criminals, couldn’t take their eyes off them. To be honest, when I think back, the last seven years of our eight-year marriage had been like skating on a lake of thin ice, even before Maria. How many times had Phil assured me after each affair it was purely a fling, it would never happen again. I’d lost count of how many lonely sleepless nights I’d lain in bed wondering when the pressure of the three people in our marriage would be too much, and the lake would finally crack.

  So it came as no big surprise to find divorce top of Phil’s Christmas list that year.

  * * * *

  I’d been so up for tonight. As I got myself ready, I’d lashed on another layer of mascara that, if the TV ads were correct, I would have men mesmerized as soon as I walked into the room. My two nights a week at Tums and Bums had rid me of the spare tire I had been lugging around with me for the last seven years after having Olivia. Juggling Atkins, the F Plan diet and the cabbage diet—one diet never seemed to have enough food—had proved to be worth all the pain and hunger as I slipped into my figure-hugging cocktail dress that hadn’t seen any excitement since my twenty-eighth birthday eight years ago. Come to think of it, neither had I.

  Despite all my efforts there wasn’t a chance in hell that I was going to find Mr. Right here tonight. It was hardly a wine swilling, loud music playing, hurling up at the end of the night in the bushes kind of a party. To be honest, as I sipped my wine and nibbled on cheese, I had never felt more like a leper. Apparently, to the hoity-toity married women, I was on a par with Orphan Annie as they sympathetically asked if it worried me that I would never find a decent man who would want to take on a thirty-six-year old divorced woman with a seven-year-old. Yet when they saw me innocently chatting away to their husbands, I suddenly became a threat, dragging the men away from me like I was some kind of neurotic nymphomaniac.

  To be fair Jess had asked her husband, Martin, to invite a few of his single friends. Bless his Marks and Spencer’s cotton socks, the only unmarried men Martin knew were from his fishing club. Under normal circumstances, I would never have given them a second glance. After only a couple of introductions, that was well and truly enough for me. I had to bite my tongue when Jess asked me had I found anyone I liked or me asking her where had Martin found them? Geeks R Us?

  I knew it would be rude to leave after only one hour, so I gathered a few dirty wine glasses and empty plates of canapés to make myself useful in the kitchen. Standing at the kitchen sink, up to my arms in soapsuds, I muttered away to myself. “This party sucks. I wasted a good afternoon grooming myself like a bloody gymkhana horse, polishing my nails, applying nail varnish that I know I have to take off before work on Monday. Spent hours on my chestnut mane, washing, conditioning, moussing, and scrunching to achieve the I-just-washed-and-left-it look. And for what? Geeks?”

  “Um, I’m sorry.” I felt a tap on my shoulder.

  As I swung around in surprise, accidentally taking with me half a sink-full of water, a large splodge of soapsuds landed and stuck to his chest.

  Well, ding-dong, this party perhaps didn’t suck at all. Things might be starting to look up at last. My eyes wandered across his chest, the charcoal grey lamb’s wool sweater he wore was tight enough to see the honed muscles of his shoulders and arms. Suddenly I felt the urge to touch them, run my hands over his shoulders and down his arms. Drawing in a deep steady breath of appreciation, I found myself curling my fingers into a fist, to stop any urges to touch. This man should have one of those polite notices attached to him like they have in china departments. It’s nice to look, but don’t touch.

  I shifted my gaze slowly, allowing myself to enjoy the magnificent sculpture before me. His smooth coffee-coloured skin tone could only be a genetic of being mixed race. A small goatee beard, tinged with silver, made him lo
ok distinguished. Thick, short corkscrew black hair flaunted a sprinkling of silver around his sideburns and, I have to say as the butterflies fluttered in my tummy, was still devilish attractive. Did I just say, STILL devilish attractive? I took a closer look. No, it couldn’t be? It had been almost twenty years, but Dad did tell me only just the other day Dr. Guy Foreman was to take over from him as head of Orthodontics when he retired next month.

  At the time, I hadn’t thought much about it, but now, seeing him in the flesh, caused an eruption of feelings I had not experienced since being a teenager.

  When I was sixteen, I’d refused point blank to allow my father to fit me for braces for my two very prominent front teeth, demanding to be treated by his prodigy, Dr. Foreman, an orthodontic surgeon under the wing of my father at St. Andrews Hospital.

  It all became frightfully embarrassing to find, as soon as I clapped my eyes on him, I had the most awful crush.

  I would spend my appointments in a haze of delirium, perpetually blushing every time he asked me a question. Lying back in the chair, having a mouth full of wires tightened, filling my nostrils with the CK1 aftershave he wore. I would listen as he spoke to the nurses who evidently were in as much awe as me with the dashing doctor, taking careful note of the actress, music, and books he loved, hatching my plan.

  The day before the unveiling of my new nashers, I spent all afternoon hogging the bathroom, dying my brown hair ash blonde. Copying make-up from Just 17 that promised to make me look older and sophisticated in the hope that when Dr. Foreman detached the mouthful of metal that for the last twelve months made me look like Jaws from James Bond, he would stand back in amazement, as Lionel Richie crooned ‘Hello,’ softly in background. The ugly duckling would have turned into a beautiful swan, and he would fall helplessly in love with me.

  The next day I glided into his surgery, hoping I resembled Sharon Stone or at least Glen Close, only to be devastated when a complete stranger stood there. The new doctor informed me Dr. Foreman had moved onto a new appointment in Birmingham.

  For the next week I locked myself in my bedroom after school, sobbing that I would never find another man I loved as much. That was until Timothy Knowles asked me to the end-of-term disco, timidly uttering he liked my new hair colour. “It makes you look like Sharon Stone.”

  I do not know how long I stood gawking at him, but he managed a smile and jokily said, “This is obviously a bad time. A party that sucks, and on behalf of all us geeks, I’d like to say sorry. But do you happen to know if there is more ice?” He scooped off the suds from his grey sweater and flicked them into the sink.

  OMG I’m sixteen again! I ran my tongue over my teeth, just to make sure I wasn’t wearing a brace. Don’t be stupid, Clare. You are twenty years older. You are well and truly over your teenage crush. You’ve been married, divorced and have a child for goodness sakes. Get a grip!

  Clutching my wet sodden hands to my throat, I finally caught my breath. I could feel the warm soapy water running down the cleavage of my dress.

  “Here, let me help.” He grabbed a towel from the side.

  Dreamily taking in the musky smell of his aftershave, the distraction had failed to alert me to what Dr. Foreman was doing until I finally looked down and realised he was not dabbing but rubbing the front of my dress. Yeah gods, the water had soaked through the chiffon that was now transparent, exposing my bare boobs, and my nipples sticking out like church organ pegs. Was this a breach of patient privacy? Even after twenty years?

  “Please, it’s fine,” I protested.

  “It’s okay. I’m a doctor.” Yeah, famous last words. The old ones are always the best, as he still kept rubbing. His nose now inches away from my bosom.

  “Doctor Foreman, please,” I stepped back, slipping on the pool of water. He reached out and grabbed me. “It’s me, Clare Darby. Well, Clare Coleman, that was.”

  He let go of me as if I was damaged goods. I wouldn’t say there was disgust on his face, more a look of skepticism when you bite into a juicy looking apple and find a great ugly green grub in there and wonder if you’ve eaten part of it. It was at that this point he noticed my pair of juicy cox pippins, shrink wrapped in chiffon, on full display.

  A rush of colour flooded his face as he began hastily pushing the towel into the neck of my dress, covering my ripe fruit. His fingers, as smooth as silk, sent a tingle though my body like an electric shock, a feeling I perhaps had at sixteen, but never really knew what it meant. But I sure as hell knew now.

  For a moment, he stood staring at me as if trying to comprehend what I’d said. Well, if past experience was anything to go by, whenever I’d spoken to Dr. Foreman I seemed to create my own language of gibberish. Or perhaps he was shocked to hear me say a full sentence without blushing or giggling.

  “Clare, you look... I mean you turned out... You always were... What I’m trying to say is, you look great.” He took my hands and stepped back, taking another long look. “I can’t get over it’s you. Look at you.”

  Okay, I have to admit the admiration and the apparent flirting before he realised he was touching up his ex-boss’s daughter had flattered me. But, really, what the hell was he doing here at a cheese and wine party in North London? Was this the Angel Gabrielle’s idea of a joke? Or was it some kind of spiritual test? Thou shall not covet thy dentist. But, hell and damnation, if I were to covet, then I’d covet away all night with Dr. Foreman.

  “I can’t get over you being here,” I said, still clutching the tea towel to my chest. “What are you doing here by the way? I would have thought a cheese and wine party in leafy Southgate was not your ideal Saturday night venue?”

  Well done, Clare. You sound unfazed, casual, and mature.

  “Oh, you know how it is back in town. I called an old friend, asked her if she was free. Gayle’s a member of the Ladies Circle. You’re right, not really my cup of tea. A bit like you, I snuck in here to get out of the way.”

  So he’s here with an old friend—female. Yes, it had slipped my mind that the delectable doctor had never married. What was it Mum said about him? He will still be sowing his wild oats when they bang the last nail in his coffin. Well, I’m all for ecology.

  “Well it’s lovely to see you again and congratulations, stepping into my Dad’s shoes.’ Not forgetting my manners, I stepped forward and gave him a peck on the cheek, even though the thoughts in my head were steaming like a compost heap.

  “Thank you. Look,” he turned to look towards the door. “How about we hide away in here for a while? It keeps you away from the geeks, and lets me off from being nice to people I’ll never see again. I’d rather be in here with you.”

  He didn’t have to ask twice. I grabbed two glasses and a bottle of wine from the fridge. “That would be nice, Doctor Foreman.”

  Taking my arm and with a soft squeeze, the next five words made my knees tremble as he whispered, “Clare, please call me Guy.”

  * * * *

  Conversation flowed between us like a babbling brook; the more we talked the more we relaxed until eventually we moved from trivial conversation to a more personal level.

  “I bumped into David and Victoria the other day at your parents’.” David being my older brother and his wife. “I don’t think I have ever met a couple who complement each other so well. And the twins, Mathew and Martha, how they have shot up since I last saw them.”

  Even though it had been twenty years since I’d seen Guy, he and my father had kept in close contact, meeting up three or four times a year. It was strange how much he knew about us all, and yet our paths had never crossed.

  “I love my brother and Victoria dearly, but I must confess I find all that compatibility malarkey rather nauseating.” He gave me a curious look over the top of his wine glass.

  Oh no, now he thinks I am jealous of my brother. Or, even worse, a bitter divorced woman who hates to see other people in love.

  “What I mean is...” He leaned on the table, his chin cupped in his hand. For a minute
I lost my train of thought, as his sexy come-to-bed brown eyes seemed to look deep into my soul. I had to avert my gaze so I could continue, fixating it on the label of the wine bottle. “What I’m trying to say, and badly, is that David and Victoria go through life with so much optimism. He has so much enthusiasm for his job at the university library. Victoria is so cheerful all the time, even though she works two part-time jobs and looks after the family and home. The twins are only ten, Thomas twelve, and they have already planned as far forward as to when the children leave. What they will do when they retire. I have no idea what I’m going to cook for dinner at night or where my life is going next week, let alone when Olivia leaves home.”

  Guy gave me a sympathetic smile.

  I hope it was sympathetic, and not him thinking I was a totally useless woman.

  “It’s only natural. You’re recently divorced, and you thought you were going to spend the rest of your life planning with your husband.”

  I laughed. “Phil had planned his career out down to the last detail, but when it came to our future, no way.”

  “You must have made plans at some point? Your wedding? Olivia?”

  “You’re joking. Phil was a spur of the moment man. Out of the blue at a friend’s engagement party, he said, ‘Let’s do it. Get married.’ If I’d left the planning to him, I’d still be waiting. As for Olivia, she certainly wasn't planned. That was a result from a bout of food poisoning from a very iffy taco in Mexico and a broken condom.” I could tell my last statement took him aback when he began choking on his wine. “Don’t get me wrong. I never regretted having her, but I just thought after she was born we would have more children. I so wanted her to have brothers and sisters. A real family life like the one I had. However, it was always we’ll talk about it another time with Phil.”