Men-On-Pause; A Paranormal Women's Fiction Novel (Bells and Spells Book 2) Read online

  BELLS AND SPELLS

  MEN-ON-PAUSE

  BY

  M L BRIERS

  Copyright © 2021, M L Briers

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced whatsoever without written permission of the author, except for brief exerts in reviews. Any unauthorised reproduction or distribution of the material herein is illegal and may result in criminal proceedings. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded to the internet or distributed via electronic or print without prior consent.

  Note from the Author;

  All names, places, and incidents contained herein are purely fictional and have no basis in actual events or linked to actual Humans, Witches, Vampires, Werewolves, Lycans, Werebears or persons living, dead or undead.

  Copyright © 2021, Cover Design by; [email protected].

  Table of Content

  BELLS AND SPELLS

  MEN-ON-PAUSE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY NINE

  CHAPTER ONE

  ~

  “Well, I think it’s nice that the two of you are living here together,” Amber said as she ran her thumb down the inside of the peapod that had been picked fresh from the garden, and shucked the little peas into the waiting bowl. “It’s company for you.”

  Marilyn wasn’t sure how to take that remark from her daughter, but Claudia, always the best friend rushing into the fray, knew just what to say. “Well, we need something to keep us busy in our old age.” She offered Marilyn a conspiratorial grin, and Marilyn couldn’t help but smile.

  When in doubt, bring the sarcasm out.

  “I suppose you can help me out of my comfy chair when I get stuck, it’ll save me buying a crane to do the heavy lifting,” Marilyn tossed back, joining in. But really, Amber did make her feel ancient at times.

  “That’s not what I meant, and you know it,” Amber said. Marilyn lifted the glass of wine to her lips and took a sip. It felt like she was going to need it. “It’s not like you’ve shown any sign of getting a boyfriend and having another baby…”

  “B…” Marilyn choked down the wine, but it seemed to be determined not to get by her tongue which had practically curled backwards to try and choke her to death. “B-aby?” she hissed out, despite the lump and the wine both playing kiss chase with her tonsils. She looked at Claudia in disbelief.

  “Baby?” Claudia said and turned her nose up at the idea. “Did she just say – b-a-b-y?”

  “I think she’s lost her mind,” Marilyn said, finally coughing herself back to normality.

  “I think she’s forgotten how to count, and basic biology,” Claudia said. She walked to the other side of the room with the swishing material of a long skirt around her ankles giving her that Bohemian look, and a big bowl in her hands, ready for the potatoes to finish cooking so she could strain and cream them. “Or maybe it’s just all that hot sex with the wolfman has dulled her brain.”

  Marilyn rolled her eyes and groaned. “Can we – just for once – not talk about hot sex and ripped sexy men?” she begged – just as her son, Scott, walked through the arch and into the kitchen.

  Scott groaned. “This is why a grown man should not live at home with his mother,” he said. “Are all women your age sex-crazed, or is it just witches?”

  Claudia chuckled and went to give him his answer, but he held up his hand, palm towards her, and shook his head. “Please, god, forget I asked, and don’t answer that question.”

  “But, baby-boo,” Claudia said with a mocking pout and using the pet name she’d given him when he was a toddler. “Don’t you want to know what your future holds?”

  Scott looked to the ceiling for help, and his mother jumped in before he found an answer. “It’s not like middle-aged men date middle-aged women. They want perky cheerleaders with big breasts and no brains…”

  “Oh, God, I need to move out,” Scott groaned. He turned on his heels and back-traced the way he’d come before she imparted anything else that he didn’t want to hear.

  “Tell me I’m wrong,” Marilyn said, looking over her shoulder at Claudia who was battling the strainer.

  “Not wrong – men are pigs,” Claudia said, cursing at the splash of boiling water that hit her hand, and she almost dropped the potatoes in the sink in retaliation. “Damn, how do you do this every day?” she moaned.

  “Cooking is relaxing…”

  “It’s a torture chamber in here; you’ve appliances that want to cut off your fingers, burn you, set you on fire, or grate your skin off,” Claudia whined, throwing the potatoes into the bowl and the strainer in the sink as if she’d just defeated a troll in hand-to-hand combat. “Takeout is the best invention since sliced bread.”

  “Well, I think we need to have a men-on-pause,” Marilyn said and shot a look at Claudia to see what she was doing. She didn’t need her friend ruining dinner; not when it had taken her all morning to prepare the food.

  “Men-on-pause?” Amber said, and smiled. “I like it – what is it?”

  “Just what it says on the tin,” Marilyn informed her. “No thinking about them for a while – and no dating.” She shot a hard glare at Claudia.

  “Oh, I get it,” Claudia said. “You want me to stop going on about getting you a hot date…”

  “Who’s got a hot date?” Lottie asked, rushing into the room to get the juicy details.

  “Nobody,” Marilyn said.

  “Well, that’s not good,” Lottie said as she slid onto the stool beside Amber, and nudged her with her elbow, offering her a conspiratorial smile. “What’s a life without hot men around, we have eyes for a reason.”

  Marilyn whipped the bowl out from Amber and took it to the stove where she tipped the freshly shucked peas into the boiling water and doing a double-take as Claudia tried to pound the potatoes out the bottom of the bowl.

  “Exactly!” Claudia said with an enthusiastic nod that made Marilyn jump to attention, she’d been too engrossed at watching Claudia’s lack of mashing skills, and her mind had a senior moment. Either that or she was considering elbowing Claudia out of the way and doing the work herself.

  Lottie wasn’t about to give up. “I live vicariously through you ladies, and I want details, big hunky juicy details,” she gushed.

  Claudia turned a victory smile on Marilyn, and her friend waited for the punch line. “And we can’t let Lott
ie down.” She pouted.

  “Lottie can get her own date, or you go and date someone and tell her all the gory details. I’m on a break,” Marilyn said.

  “A ten-year hiatus from life, more like,” Louann said, strolling into the kitchen and hooking a thumb back over her shoulder. “Why is Scott standing in the hallway thumping his forehead against a wall?”

  Marilyn’s head shot up as she absently poked at the peas. “He is?” she shrieked.

  “He might as well be,” Louann said, and Marilyn stood down from her motherly panic with a sigh.

  “Claudia did it,” she said, throwing her friend under the Louann-bus.

  “I did not,” Claudia hissed back. “Your daughter was talking about hot sex with dirty hunks again … ouch!” She snapped to attention when Marilyn’s magic slapped her backside like a wet towel.

  Marilyn offered a bright and breezy, sweet and innocent smile to her mother, who was frowning back at her. “I did no such thing,” she assured her. “Claudia’s been on the wine again.”

  “As long as she isn’t running a black-ops bookie out of the garden shed, we’ll be fine,” Louann offered back, and Claudia did a double-take at the elder. There was mischief in Louann’s eyes and a sparkle of amusement, so she let that one slide.

  “How do you feel about the black market gun trade?” Claudia teased.

  Louann shrugged. “Can I get an Uzi?”

  “No!” Marilyn snapped. “The day you go postal from the upstairs window, I want it to be magic only.”

  “Mum wants a men-on-pause,” Amber informed her Gran.

  “The menopause?” Louann screwed up her face. “At her age, she should already be in it – hot flashes, drying up like an old prune, saggy skin; it’s all downhill from there.”

  “Thanks, mom,” Marilyn said. The last thing she needed pointing out to her was a list of her body’s latest achievements. “And it’s men – on – pause,” she corrected.

  “What the hell is that when it’s at home?” Louann shot back.

  “Abstinence,” Marilyn replied.

  “But, I thought you were rejoining the world, not digging your grave and crawling in before your time,” Louann tossed back.

  “See,” Claudia said, nudging her. “Even your mother thinks you should date.”

  “Good Goddess, no!” Louann barked. “Another Jake? I never liked that man.”

  “You liked him well enough when he was at your beck and call,” Marilyn said.

  “No, I didn’t. I just used the tool available for what I needed at the time,” Louann said.

  “That’s exactly my point. Marilyn needs to lighten up,” Claudia said.

  “Amen to that, and I’m far from religious,” Louann said, and Marilyn rolled her eyes with a groan.

  “She needs some fun in her life,” Claudia added.

  “Buy her a dog, or maybe she could walk Amber’s wolf,” Louann said, and Amber’s jaw slacked. “Josh wouldn’t mind?”

  “Umm,” Amber looked lost.

  “She doesn’t need to walk the wolf, she needs a hot sexy man and mindless sex,” Claudia said.

  Lottie chuckled. “Then she needs a man half her age or risk a trip to the emergency room…”

  “Or,” Claudia said. “A supernatural.”

  Marilyn groaned again. “Can you not…?”

  “Claudia Michaels,” Louann said. “If you are trying to hook my daughter up with that damn vampire…” She left it there, but it was evident what she thought, and she didn’t need to spell it out.

  “Perish the thought,” Claudia lied. Then she looked at Amber. “How old is Josh’s father?”

  Amber opened and closed her mouth; the conversation had gotten away from her. She shrugged. “No idea.”

  “I’ll bet he’s hot though, right?” Lottie said, giving her a little nudge and wiggling her eyebrows with mischief.

  “He’s an older version of Josh,” Amber said.

  What more could she say? She hadn’t seen him since he’d left to tell Roland that her brother was dead – which of course, he wasn’t, but he might be if Roland decided to come calling and check it out for himself.

  “And let’s not forget he works for Roland,” Louann said.

  “Worked, he doesn’t anymore,” Amber informed her.

  “Have you all finished talking about sex?” Scott called.

  “Yes!” Louann said. “It’s not a subject for the dinner table.”

  “No, hot sex is better discussed over rum and coke in front of the fire on a cold lonely night,” Claudia said right over Marilyn’s shoulder. “Hmm, that’s also a good place for hot sex…”

  “Would you all stop? I’m not having hot sex with anyone!” Marilyn declared and winced as Scott thrust his hands into the pockets of his jeans and grimaced.

  “Can I eat in my room, I don’t feel good,” he whined, and everyone burst out laughing.

  “Ah, poor baby-boo,” Claudia mocked him.

  “I hate it when you call me that,” Scott grumbled.

  There was a flash of wicked mischief in Claudia’s eyes before she winked at Scott, and it was still there afterwards. “I know. Boo-hoo.”

  “Am I late?” Sandy asked, racing into the room and panting like she’d been running for a bus.

  “Right on time,” Scott said, smiling.

  “Hmm, look who just perked up,” Claudia said on a whisper to her friend.

  Marilyn paid him a little more attention. “You think?”

  “I do,” Claudia said. “But does Sandy?”

  “We could sit them together at dinner and find out,” Marilyn said with a smirk.

  “I like how you think,” Claudia replied. “If only you’d be that devious with your own love life.”

  “I do not want…”

  “A man, I knooow,” Claudia groaned. Then she hit her eureka moment. “How about a woman?”

  “You’re not my type,” Marilyn said and grabbed the potato masher from the pan and thrusting it at her. “Be mean, beat their brains out until they’re mush.” Marilyn didn’t care anymore.

  “No lump spared, I’m on it,” Claudia said, and she was. She’d mash those potatoes to perfection – she hoped – but she was also on Marilyn’s lack of a love life.

  Now that was going to take a whole lot more work, but anything worth doing was worth doing well – and being devious was always a way to start. She needed a plan or maybe, like those potatoes, she could just wing and a prayer it.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ~

  “Ha! I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist,” Claudia said, poking her head around Marilyn’s bedroom door and catching her in the act of going through the bags of clothes that Claudia had brought to replace what she’d stolen in an attempt to update all aspects of Marilyn’s life.

  Marilyn jumped in place and turned a sheepish look on her friend. “There is only so long I can wear sweats,” she said and scowled. “Give me my clothes back.”

  Claudia walked into the room and eyed the purchases hanging in the wardrobe still in the protective wrapping. “Not happening, and your little hermit trick isn’t going to last either,” she said, referring to the fact that Marilyn had refused to go out in the last few days.

  “I’m not leaving the house again until I have my clothes,” Marilyn said and folded her arms to show she meant business.

  “You have clothes,” Claudia said with a sweeping hand over the bags at Marilyn’s feet.

  “Not my clothes,” Marilyn replied.

  “Not my problem,” Claudia tossed back with a shrug. Then she headed for the bedroom door.

  “Going to get my clothes?” Marilyn asked.

  “Maybe I already took them to goodwill – you haven’t been out, you wouldn’t know,” Claudia said, and without giving her friend a chance to answer; she snapped her fingers, added a dab of magic, and slammed the door behind her.

  “This isn’t funny anymore,” Marilyn yelled. Then she sighed and turned her attention back to the bag
s. “Oh, fiddle-poops.” She stomped her foot and rolled her head on her neck. “It wouldn’t hurt to look.”

  The frustration of not venturing out into the great wide world – or little town to be more precise – was getting to her. How was she supposed to know what was going on if she wasn’t around to hear the gossip?

  Life was happening all around her, and she was stuck indoors. Something had to change, and one little outfit wasn’t going to mean she’d back down about her clothes, she reasoned. “Just the one,” she said and dived in like a kid on Christmas morning.

  ~

  Claudia chuckled to herself as she strolled into her bedroom and headed straight for the bathroom. She felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise and a strange pang that felt like hunger hit her stomach. She certainly wasn’t hungry, Marilyn had cooked, and when Marilyn cooks, you eat your fill and fill your boots. But there was something not quite right.

  She stopped just short of the bathroom door and turned a slow look towards the window. “Holy hell’s bells and crap!” she said, whirling to face him. “You’re dead!”

  Marsh Weathers, the golfing guy that had drawn a gun on her, and Neal, in his infinite wisdom, had killed was standing right there. Admittedly, he looked a little grey and was a bit fuzzy around the edges, but it was him.

  “So was the thing that killed me,” Marsh said. His body phased out of sync with the real world for a moment, and Claudia was hopeful that he’d be pulled back into whatever afterlife would have him, but his aura grew stronger again, and her hopes were dashed.

  “Technically, and that wasn’t my doing, so go and haunt him,” Claudia said.

  Marsh offered her one of those smarmy little smirks that suited his personality so well, and he always delivered when he thought he had the upper hand. “I thought it would be more fun to haunt you.”

  “Go towards the light, there’s a party on the other side,” Claudia replied, waving him away with a sweeping hand that complimented the look of boredom on her face.

  Marsh wagged his finger at her. “Fool me once, shame on you…”