2014 is coming to an end, and what a year this has been. I could spend hours writing about all that I have experienced; things that I have done. (And I admit that there are just some things that I will never tell *winks*.) However, instead of rambling on about this years mishaps, mistakes, and accomplishments; I am leaving you with my final post in 2014. I think it sums my year up quite nicely. Xx
I have hurt
Suffered
Cried
Angered
And struggled to breathe.
I have smiled
Laughed
Cherished
Fell in love
And started to feel again.
I have trusted
Hoped
Dreamt
Inspired
Only to be lied to.
I have fallen
Shattered
Begged
Withdrawn
And was completely broken.
I have fought
Struggled
Risen
Accomplished
And started creating myself.
I have experienced life.
I have lived.
Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the Redroom
Not even an insanely fucked up creature like me was stirring, or spanking, or even flogging anyone…until I heard a big BOOM!
I jumped out of my warm bed to see about the commotion, and to my sweet surprise, I find a sea of ladies filling the Redroom, moving me to some strange unknown emotion.
“What the fuck is going on here, ladies?” I ask. But to my disapproval they all ignore me, and one tosses me a bright shiny flask.
Wall to wall submissives now fill the once empty room, and I glance down to find my X-Cross on the floor, and now understand the boom.
“Who is responsible for this?” I ask in a demanding tone, but am once again ignored, but I think I heard a moan. “Lils? Why do I have the feeling that you are…
I Never Loved
Lived
Breathed
Felt
Or Cared
Until I met you
I Never Wanted
Dreamt
Yearned
Desired
Or Really Lived
Until I met you
I Never Trusted
Believed
Hoped
Aspired
Or Cherished
Until I met you
But Now,
I Never Hurt
Cried
Suffocated
Ached
Or Felt this kind of Pain
Until I met you…
I wanted to take the time to give everyone an update on where I’m at in the process of writing Raven’s Undoing. I have been asked this question a lot, especially lately. I am currently writing chapter 8. Yes, you read that right, I’m only on chapter 8. *insert frowny face here*
I did sit down and start writing Raven’s Undoing the day after Raven’s Innocence was released. And had I been on the same rigorous writing schedule as I was with my first book, then I should be writing the ending to this one by now. Yet, here I am, not even halfway through with it.
Instead of giving you a very long fluffy, yet detailed explanation as to why, I will sum it up for you here: Life Happens. These past five and half months have been by far, some of the busiest and also hardest months of my life, and as a result, my writing has been put on the back burner. And due to high stress and heartache, my muse hasn’t been talking much to me either. I am very disappointed by this, but life happens and sometimes you have to just pick and choose your battles. I wish that I was fortunate enough to spend all day every day writing, but between work and family, it just is not possible.
With that being said though, I am truly doing the best that I can to get Raven’s Undoing finished by this spring. Which means it will have taken almost a full year to put out the second book. Not exactly what I hoping for, but not everything always go as planned, right?
I do expect to start putting out some unedited excerpts though sometime in January. This book is proving to be a little more challenging to write than the first one because I have a couple of major plot twists taking place that are going to leave you on the edge of your seats. You may not know whether to scream and throw the book (but please be careful if you have a kindle, you don’t want to break such an expensive and precious item), or go down a fifth of whiskey in hopes to numb your feelings while slowly burning the confused yet disturbed emotions out of your system that you’re going to experience as Raven’s Undoing unravels you thread by delicate thread…
Either way, this book is not like the first one. Romance takes a back seat (for the most part) as emotions run high, lives are turned upside down, and some of the characters are hiding behind a delusional façade that they have created, and you have very much fallen victim to. You’re about to see that we’re all just a little unbalanced inside, in our own uniquely twisted ways…
Ever since she can remember. The longing. The desire. The ache.
A deep sexual yearning to lose control. To abandon her free will to the pleasure of another.
And in doing so find her own glorious, magical, delicious release.
Sometimes, in her private moments and when she allows herself, she has the scenarios in her head. Scripted and endlessly rehearsed, she plays them in a bold, burning, breathtaking loop. Fantasies and fetishes that leave her wasted and wet as she allows them to wash and lap over her.
Other times it is a jumble of words and images, of instruction and discipline, obedience and compliance.
Of being watched.
Of her body being used and pleasured. Stroked and caressed, kissed and pinched, slapped and whipped, licked and scratched, nibbled and teased.
And of being restrained.
And of fingers, and lips, and toy after toy. And his tongue and…
Getting divorced at twenty-five sucks.
Teaching over-confident rich kids instead of designing handbags for Mulberry sucks. In fact, every single aspect of Daisy Fitzgerald’s life is one big…
#fail
Enter Xander, a veritable Knight-in-Shining-Cricket-Pads, who knocks her off her wedge heels and into his world of It-girls, players and Michelin stars.
Buoyed up on cocktails & escapism Daisy agrees to play Forfeit, the ultimate game of dares, where a simple kiss sparks her relationship with Xander. But £25,000 is up for grabs and the game’s called Forfeit for good reason.
Blackmail * Betrayal * Revenge Move over Gatsby, there’s a new bunch of bored young things in town.
Perfect for fans of Jilly Cooper, David Nicholls, Fiona Walker and Jo Carnegie, #Forfeit’s an contemporary romance from a No.1 and ‘Most Read’ Wattpad author with over 3,000,000 online reads.
“#Forfeit will make you laugh, cry, question your sanity and wish for your very own Knight-In-Shining-Cricket-Pads.” – cosyingupwithbooks.blogspot.co.uk
Excerpts…
Daisy rolled the Teetotum ball, praying for a pleasant dare, and when it landed on twenty-five, she smiled. Her age, surely that was fortuitous? She took the card out of the Forfeit box and read the dare.
Lust: Kiss another player for five minutes. Don’t tell anyone what you’re doing, or why.
Oh bugger.
‘This is nuts,’ Xander said, shaking his head as he rolled the ball.
Totally nuts, Daisy mentally replied. The dare was doable, absolutely doable, but who the hell was she going to kiss? The obvious answer was Xander.
He laughed as he read his dare card. The obvious answer, but should she? He’d stuck by his no shagging promise and hadn’t been even slightly flirtatious all night, but what if he got the wrong idea? Or got pissed off because he thought she had? She couldn’t ruin their new best friend relationship, or her chance to live in the dream cottage.
‘Mine’s a piece of piss,’ James said, grinning.
Maybe she could kiss James. She could walk right over and just kiss him. As if he’d read her mind, he glanced at her, his face crumpling with disdain as he checked out her chest. What the hell? They might not be enormous, but her boobs were one of her better features. Clearly, she couldn’t kiss him. He might tell her to piss off. That would be horrific. Not James.
‘Twenty-to-one,’ James said. ‘One hour. Let’s do it. Tab, give me your bra.’
‘Not wearing one. I need a bottle of Jack and a shot glass,’ Tabitha purred to James, showing him her card.
‘Unlucky.’ He laughed, already heading for an open cabinet crammed with spirits. ‘It says whisky, spelled without an e. How about a sixteen year-old single malt?’
Tabitha’s smug smile faded. ‘But you know I can’t stand scotch fucking whisky.’
‘Aren’t you doing your dare then?’ Daisy asked sweetly. Wasn’t payback a bitch?
Tabitha snatched a bottle of Jura from James. Game on. Daisy grinned, appreciating Tabitha manning up, but she couldn’t help wishing that knocking back ten shots of top-quality whisky were her dare. It’d be a lot easier than kissing one of the other players for five minutes.
What about Marcus? He grabbed a guitar that stood propped beside the piano – because what respectable bachelor pad didn’t have a Steinway to hand? Casually, he sauntered up to a pretty girl with a dark, elfin cut. Any conversation she was having with her friends dried up as Marcus took her hand, kissing it briefly, before bursting into song. And not just any song. He’d chosen One Direction’s Little Things.
Daisy would’ve giggled at the cheesiness, but Marcus knew the words and he could play the chords. Better still, despite being off-key and horrifically flat, he delivered the song as if he were Harry Styles himself. The pixie girl never dropped eye contact with him. He’d so pulled. Daisy wouldn’t be kissing him.
Which left Xander.
He’d settled back on the sofa with his eyes closed. Was his dare to go to sleep?
‘If I die, I leave everything to my cat,’ Tabitha said, lifting the first of the ten shot glasses James had lined up on the table.
It had to be Xander, but what if it all went wrong? God, she was acting like a twelve year-old over a stupid kiss-dare. Wasn’t that the point of a dare, to do something humiliating? And she had to do it – no way would she flake out in front of Tabitha bloody Doyle. Then Daisy had a brilliant idea; how to make it a lot less messy – she’d cheat.
Buoyed up on cocktails, coke and escapism, she sat astride a somewhat stunned Xander.
‘Help me?’ she whispered, surreptitiously showing him the card.
Tabitha groaned as she sank number four. She was so going to be sick, but Daisy’s stomach churned too. What if he said no?
He didn’t.
Clearly fighting a smile, he gave a slow nod and Daisy stared at him, her nerves building. Oh God, she was about to kiss Xander. He raised his eyebrows, his eyes twinkling as he waited. She’d have to start this – it was her dare, not his. Tentatively, she brushed her lips against his, testing the water before she set the timer on her phone.
Five minutes, easy-peasy.
It all started harmlessly – even a little mechanical, but after the first minute, Xander’s hands moved up her back, his thumbs caressing her skin through the thin silk and shivers surged over her. He’d done the same on the one night stand, just before he’d undone her bra.
And I want him to do it again.
What the hell was that drumming noise inside her head? Was that her heartbeat? She wanted to pull away, desperate to breathe, to take control of her head, but her hands still held his face and his Bulgari aftershave still sent hersenses reeling.
Slow, sweet, teasing, this was no teenage kiss-dare. Xander’s hands had moved up her bare shoulders, his fingers doing wicked things to her neck. How long had they been kissing for, three minutes, maybe four? Why wasn’t it thirty seconds? Then she’d have four and half minutes still to go.
Tequila body shots. Oh to lick salt off his abs again.
‘Supposed to be just friends,’ Tabitha slurred behind her. ‘That doesn’t look like friends.’
Daisy’s phone beeped. The five minutes were up, but no way was she stopping.
I want more.
‘I bet it’s her dare,’ James replied.
A dare.
She dragged her lips from Xander’s, looking down, watching his chest rising and falling. It was just a stupid dare. How had she got so carried away? How had theygot so carried away? Oh God, what if he wasn’t carried away? What if he thought she were some desperate cow, throwing herself at him? Mortified, she closed her eyes, her head dropping. How could she laugh it off, put on her bravest of brave faces when she’d made such a fool of herself?
Xander dropped a kiss on her neck.
Itching with a masochistic desire to read the HeatWorld article, Daisy unlocked her phone, but the first notification waiting for her was Forfeit invited you to like the pageForfeit – the Ultimate Game of Dares. Her finger shook as she clicked the link. Eighty-one Likes. What the hell? Liked by who? Who knew about it?
On Saturday 24th June, five hedonistic twenty-somethings each tossed fifty pounds into a pot, gambling on their ability to do a dare. Follow their progress as they get ready to play the final round.
Who the hell would be interested? Eighty-two people, one of them a friend of hers. Clara had liked this nonsense?
In Round One, birthday boy James Dowson-Jones collected bras…
The names were hyperlinks. Daisy clicked hers. Daisy Fitzgerald – Forfeit Player. It wasn’t her own Facebook page, but another set up by someone else. It had a shot from James’ party as the profile picture. Vague details about her. And comments. People had posted comments on her wall.
Do the dare!
Hope you play!
Do the dare #forfeit
It had a hashtag? Oh God. It did. This wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real. But over on Twitter, @ForfeitHost had almost a hundred followers, the hashtag dozens of tweets.
@polilrichgal: Daisy’s a Fugly Ho. #forfeit
@1_D_fangirl_1990: hate her too, but so want to play #forfeit
@skizzerd_love: bet they don’t turn up on NYE #forfeit
@wineinachippedmug: she’s alright, I reckon. Daisy to win.
At least someone was on her side.
Daisy scoured the tweets, the comments, the messages. Ninety percent of it was people discussing dares they’d done or forfeits they paid, but the other ten percent? Bitchy comments, mostly decrying her as totally unfit to kiss the feet of Xander or Finn.
By the time she’d chain-smoked her way through half the bottle of wine, the Facebook page had almost three hundred Likes and @ForfeitHost over five hundred followers. This crap was going viral before her eyes, not hurt by the Daisy/Finn/Brittany story.
Pay the stake, Roll the dice, Do the dare.
The tweet had come from @jellyfishmommie at 10:45. By 11:30 that quickly became a mantra tweeted and retweeted with horrific regularity. Daisy hoped the jellyfish mommy had her jellyfish babies taken away from her. Pay the stake…
‘I don’t have five thousand pounds, you stupid cow.’
The Book Trailer:
About Caroline Batten
Born in the United Kingdom, Caroline lives in the Lake District with her husband, small child and two Kune Kune pigs.
She daydreams of one day owning a pair of Louboutin’s and having somewhere fabulous to wear them. Until then, she’ll be found plodding up a mountain in her trusty hiking boots.
#forfeit is Caroline’s debut novel. Her second novel, Distraction, is due for publication in February 2015.
Walking through a dense fog
Created by my own demons
I shudder as they stare
Can they see what is inside?
I try to keep it hidden
Protected from the world
Not allowing anyone in
Yet now it is completely controlling me.
A pretty smile on my face
A twinkle in my eye
This facade for the world to see
Do they know I’m dying inside?
Is the pain starting to bleed through
Seeping out from within
Poisoning the words that escapes my lips
Dulling the luster in my hazel eyes.
It slowly consumes me
The high that comes from the pain
The pain that comes from the venom
That races through my veins
Living to kill me.
Don’t get too close
It’s safer that way
Better for you to not be tainted
By the poison that is encompassing my soul.
You can’t save me
No one can
Not anymore
Not from this…
N.D. White 