All for Her

by Penny Best

  All For Her

  Wild Irish Lust Series

  Book One

  Copyright © 2019 Penny Best

  All rights reserved. Kindle Edition

  The right of Penny Best to be identified as the Author of the work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced or circulated without written permission from the publisher.Orla Kelly Publishing. All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  pennybestwriter.com

  Contents

  Dedication

  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

  Other Books By The Author

  Acknowledgements

  To all the brave people who create their own magic

  Chapter 1

  An elbow hurts my ribs and something hard bashes against my forehead. My scarf gets knocked off me. I squint into the sunlight on Dromore market day and rub my brow. On my gloves there’s a trace of what must be blood, but not enough to scare me. He’s young and stinks of whiskey. There are passing guffaws at our tumble.

  “Are you badly hurt?” the strong voice asks. I take a quick look into his face.

  It’s Ernest Tandy, one of the fine Tandy twins who have the best land about Dromore. One of the two men who have caught my eye in church. There’s talk that the eldest, Edward, was the only one who went to school and that both barely leave their farm.

  Smoothing down my tweed jacket, I glance around. I can feel something drip across my knee. I reach out and move the hem of my skirt. The handsome man watching me says, “Are you all right, Minnie? Jesus, you’re bleeding!” He grasps my elbow.

  Rubbing around my sore ribs, I find my usual lack of speech a torture. I have not spoken since Daddy was killed by the bull. At times like this it is a torture not to have the words.

  “I’m awful rough, aren’t I?” the deep voice asks. His grip is harsh, and he holds my elbow tightly. “You’re cut on the head as well? There’s blood in your beautiful blonde curls.” He tries to shield us both from prying eyes. Towering above me I hear an urgent whisper, “I’m sorry. Let’s get you inside someplace.”

  He steers me towards McGovern’s pub. I stall. My best shoes dig into the hardened earth, but it doesn’t stop us from moving. He has the strength of ten men as I try to wriggle free. There’s nothing to be done as I’m dragged into McGovern’s. Without ceremony we land through the door into the forbidden smokiness. I cannot bear to look around. If I don’t see anything, I won’t be at fault. If I’m honest, I do enjoy the thought of being where good women shouldn’t be.

  “I need the Doc,” Ernest says. I shake my head violently and feel it hurt even more. “I crashed into Minnie Hatton on the street,” he admits.

  “The mute?” someone asks.

  “She’s hurt.” There’s worry in the breath on my hair.

  I want to scream that the damage in me is all inside and that I usually live in comfortable silence every day.

  “Her wild mother will be after ya,” someone to the right offers. I spy a grey-haired man I know as McGovern. He called on Mammy a few times after Daddy was killed.

  “Minnie, that mother of yours will be angry! Annie Hatton is like something from the wild west,” McGovern shouts slowly as if I were simple. Mammy will be livid if she hears he said that about her.

  Ernest sounds confident. “Minnie knows herself it was an accident. Is the Doc in? It being a Saturday and the fair today?”

  I hate to think of the doctor’s state. We all know he has a weakness for whiskey. I clap my eyes tightly shut as all the men stare. I can feel their interest from here.

  Ernest brushes a warm hand from my shoulder, under my arm, along the side of my breast and snuggles it into the curve of my back. His hand stays low, massaging downwards to where he shouldn’t go. I should object, but a man like Ernest Tandy knows what he’s doing. No-one can see and I like what he’s doing. I purr and block out the world as he rubs lower still.

  “Have ya cut her bad?” McGovern shouts and there’s an intake of breath around us. Ernest heaves me closer and there’s a trickle of blood that runs past my eye. I feel the haze descend and the sweat rise on me. Then there’s a nothingness.

  Chapter 2

  Ernest holds a cloth to my forehead. Mammy will be wondering what’s happened. I’m on a low bed that smells like an old wet dog. It’s the one McGovern might use if there was a pub lock-in or when his wife has had enough. I daren’t think of what the bed clothes are like, but Ernest is sitting beside me and that’s the nicest feeling in the world.

  They’ve taken off my shoes and gloves and opened the top buttons of my blouse and jacket. I’m exposed a bit too much to be alone with a man, but then again, I tell myself that this hasn’t been my doing. Besides if I’m going to be a woman at all, I need to make use of occurrences and flirt as best I can with someone I’ve noticed out of the corner of my eye for many years now.

  Ernest doesn’t mention my episode or the welcome grope in the bar. “We’ll wait on the Doc,” he whispers and that manly breath tingles and tightens everywhere inside me. I’ve never been as close to any man – never mind a man like the scandalous Ernest Tandy. He’s not been at church since old Mrs Tandy died, so it’s been a while since I’ve seen him. He looks all of the ten years older than me, but I’m thankful that he’s finally noticed that I’m a woman.

  The beard he has looks like a wild growth this close, though the face beneath is as handsome as you like. He smiles. “It’s not a bad cut, but it is better to get you checked over.” His hand goes into my hair, tangling in the blonde curls and making me look for the door. If someone came in, he might stop that nice work and I’d breathe again stopping the spell rising between us. “You’re a fine lass,” he says, his voice low and raspy. “You’re almost twenty-two McGovern says. I’ve always stolen a peek at you and knew you were a beauty. That fainting is scary though. Are you going to be all right?”

  I nod and gulp. Despite the sore cut, it’s possibly the best I’ve ever been.

  “And you don’t speak at all since your father and the accident?”

  The skin is raw on my forehead, but he’s rubbing further back. The scalp there is on fire with pleasure. I sigh.

  “You like that?”

  Like a horny dog, it seems that I do like being petted. Panting, gasping for air, I never want Ernest to stop. A thumb traces over my cheek and through my lips, the tip touches my chin and he mutters something I cannot make out. Dark pupils come closer and the air of whiskey is sharp. His moustache moves into another smile and I smirk back.

  All doubts about myself disappear when he looks at me like this. He rubs my cheek and I hear, “Beautiful Minnie. I want to kiss you before someone comes in. I know I shouldn’t. I’m drawn to do it though. It’ll be nice I promise.”

  It’s an ask and a rushed one I wouldn’t ever want to refuse. He knows too that our time alone won’t last much longer. Whatever way he’s leaning he’s almost on top of me in the bed. If anyone was to find us, we’d both have explaining to do. The beard scratches my chin softly and he whispers, “Let me know that I can do it. Ask me to kiss you.”

  I’ve not spoken in years, yet every piece of me screams at him to devour me, but no words leave me. I want him to keep going so badly.

&n
bsp; “I could do everything to you, Minnie. I could lock us in or take you home or to somewhere dark and we could…” A hand molds itself around my breast. Above my clothes he rubs me. I’m losing myself, as he says, “Minnie. My Minnie.” I forget to breathe and lurch to stop him, yet I will him to continue all the same. My inner thighs tremble right down into my groin. It’s an aching with a conscience telling me, ‘You’re a bad girl, Minnie Hatton. Stop this.’

  I grasp Ernest’s forearms in a bid to listen to morals, but real eagerness tilts me into that glorious beard. The taste of whiskey is strong, the sucking is sloppy and good. He eats at me and my murmuring is muffled with Ernest’s rummaging. Pecking twice, Ernest stops with his nose against mine.

  With closed eyes he breathes heavily. “Sweet Jesus, I’ll have a horn on me like a raging bull if we don’t stop this.”

  I laugh when he pulls at his trousers a little and shuffles away from me on the bed. I keep a hold of one set of large weathered fingers. They splay and curl around mine. I’ve never been this happy before.

  “You’re some woman, Minnie Hatton. We will be alone again soon and then I won’t stop.”

  Chapter 3

  If our lodger, the Barren Widow, who I call Dottie, wasn’t in the vegetable patch I might try to write it down for her, but I need to be sensible. Much as I want to tell someone, I cannot utter a word about kissing Ernest Tandy. Dottie would be angry, and I’d never tell Mammy anything like this.

  How is it that when the best or worst things in the world happen, I cannot tell a living soul?

  Mammy worries about me regardless, asking for the fiftieth time, “How’s your head?”

  I shrug and give her my best smile.

  “Thugs, that’s what them Tandy’s are. Although that Edward isn’t the worst I suppose.” Mammy brushes her long brown hair and curls it into the bun she wears. She’s still a fair looking woman for her age and can hold her own against most men. Having a volatile marriage suited her, while she couldn’t control Daddy, she now tries to domineer Dottie and I instead.

  Making the dinner is my job and I start scraping the carrots.

  “You know Ernest has offered you a job cleaning? As if that’d make up for walking on you! As if I’ll let you after all they’ve done! You don’t look too disgusted? But you haven’t seen their hovel. Fine house like this it was. They say there’s dirt growing dirt on the floor. They’ve not put a hand to it since old Mrs Tandy died three or four years ago.”

  I think of how Mrs Tandy kept her twins housebound. Even when others lingered outside the church to pass gossip to and fro, she’d march the boys up the tight climb to Fern Hollow Farm. It’s nestled in a large fertile valley at the top of Dromore Hill with the finest fields stretching out for miles. Ernest is the younger twin and least liked in the village. I’m not sure why, but this makes him even more appealing to me. Talk is rife that their father left the farm to Edward, the eldest, and there’s bad blood between the brothers.

  “All for the luck of a few minutes,” McGovern said when Mammy gave in and he came calling to rent our farm. ”I wonder how they remembered who was who? Anyhow, Edward got the lot!”

  When Daddy died, Mammy and I couldn’t keep up with the seasons even when Dottie, The Barren Widow, joined us. These days we keep just a few acres around the house to give us privacy and drills for the vegetables.

  “Are you sure you’re all right?” Mammy asks me. She’s more concerned than usual after I have an episode.

  There’s no need for me to reply anyway for Mammy thinks what she wants. I touch the small bandage and nod.

  “That Ernest’s a scary animal. Did he talk to you at all before you passed out?”

  I wonder when she’ll hear about me being in the pub and it’s backroom. Taking out some paper I write Knocked into me outside McGovern’s. He took me inside. I didn’t want to go. Fainted. Home.

  “It being the fair today, the Doc was probably in there.”

  He came in there, yes.

  “I’ll have to forgive Ernest so if he looked after you properly. I’ll never thank him, just so long as he was a gentleman,” she smiles and goes to check on the oven. “Someday you’ll talk to me again, won’t you Minnie?”

  She makes me feel guilty that I won’t speak up. I want to scream at her, but instead write If I could I would.

  “You can, and you should. Skinny little Minnie needs to use her head.”

  She means no man will marry me. That stings almost as much as my forehead. At twenty-two, she knows rightly that I’m getting very old for marriage. Cruel Mammy wants it that way. She makes me dress like a child and treats me like one. Without the burden of me, she’d have no-one to control. Herself and Dottie have a strange understanding. Dottie rightly rebels now and again, however Mammy wins in the finish. With me there’s never a battle. I know my place.

  I wonder does it show somewhere when you let a man at you. Mammy or Dottie don’t notice anything different, but everything has changed. I’ve feelings stirred that won’t sit down or go away. If I lie in bed and think of Ernest, I easily pleasure myself. This must be the love in the books Dottie and I read in the evenings. Or maybe it’s just carnal lust? I care not a jot about the sin of it or the label for it. Whatever this is, Ernest Tandy is the root cause. I simply cannot take myself out or away from any of the daydreams or pulsating night pleasures.

  Dottie has been a great source of information. Her need to explain the trials and tribulations of a very unhappy and fruitless life has bestowed on me a good plethora of knowledge about men. She’s at pains to tell me how a woman is long-suffering and unfulfilled. I decide that possibly Dottie is barren because she didn’t get all these wonderful sensations from whomever she married. If she had an Ernest, she’d have constantly been happy. She’d wonder about them both naked, she’d want to rub his body at the end of a hard day and make love until the end of breathing. I can think of nothing else other than being Ernest’s wife and us lying naked all day and night. Somehow, I’m going to make this happen and usually when I put my mind to things, even with my nervous disposition. I’m like Mammy; I get what I want in the finish. I set my sights at Ernest Tandy.

  ‘He’ll make love to me. I’ll always want Ernest in my bed.’ I say to myself in my head over and over again. My conscience scoffs at the dirty thoughts I have, but I cannot stop them from coming.

  Chapter 4

  I’m flicking through Mammy’s recipe book at the kitchen table when there’s a tap on the window.

  Looking up, I see Ernest’s dark eyes. ”You’re still living then?” he says loudly. My heart leaps crossways in my chest and I stare. I’m not stealing a glance at the side of his nose or his beard in church or peering at the tiny figure in the distance fields. My lips curl at the ends. He winks. I pull away from gawping and go to answer the door.

  “You’re all right then?” He strides in and looks around. “Alone?” he asks, and I nod. Mammy and Dottie are in the vegetable field. I take a long look at Ernest. He’s really here, shaved and washed. He looks cleaner, more respectable and very handsome with his hair greased back roughly and his sideburns trimmed.

  “You look better anyhow,” he says. “Pretty as hell and driving me wild just looking at you.”

  I point to the wobbly stool by the table.

  “Did your Mammy say to you about the work? You could come and clean for us at Fern Hollow. I thought that might suit everyone really well. Edward wanted me to come and see if you’d thought anymore about it. He warned me that your mother probably wouldn’t agree to it, but I said you were of an age to make your own decisions and I’d help you make her see sense.” That smiles makes me jittery. He goes on. “We need someone and you’re no gossip. And I’d get to see you too.”

  Ernest’s hair glistens in the morning sunlight. I stare at the bow in his lips. It’s large and round like a girl’s. There’s something oddly pretty about that hairy chin and I can’t pull away from the darkest eyes I’ve ever seen.


  “Will I speak to your mother again? Or do you want to just say yes and come tomorrow? We’ll be alone if I can get Edward away from the house?”

  I nod a lot. Being beside Ernest makes my palms sweat and there’s a longing to make the stray curl near his ear sit down.

  “Course you’ll have to pass the field you found your father in. That’ll be alright after all this time?”

  My eyes fill with tears.

  “I’m rough with everything,” he says getting up. The stool wobbles as I pass Ernest and he grabs at my arm to steady himself. ”Don’t cry,” he says. Sniffing, I find a handkerchief in my coat draped over the back of a chair. There’s a dreadful silence as he sits again and somehow a pot of tea gets made.

  I tremble placing the tea-cosy in place. He’s watching me. I set out some cake. The sweat rises on me and those belly flutters come again. Just then a dog starts chasing the hens in our yard. The din should make Ernest do something. But no. The crumbs get pushed into a lovely mouth and he slurps around the cup and winks, “Fine cake.”

  I walk nearer and he gets up. He has almost reached me, an arm outstretched and grasping, but we both see Mammy striding past the window and hear the squeal of a kicked dog. The latch on the kitchen door gets lifted and there is Annie Hatton clattered in clay and looking like a warrior princess from the story Dottie’s reading to us in the evenings.

  “That fecking dog!” she starts and stops, seeing Ernest. She spies the cake and the tea-cosy. Holding my breath, I feel guilty about everything. Surely, she can smell the lust off us both?

  “I called to see Minnie here,” Ernest says.

  “She’s fine. Better than our hens,” Mammy points to the yard. “I kicked your bitch off home.”

  I wince at Mammy’s cursing. She never uses those words unless there’s a man about.

  “Minnie’s willing to come to work,” he says. “She’s coming tomorrow.”

  I like the way he speaks. Mammy doesn’t reply and Ernest’s confidence doesn’t give her a choice. There’s a fluttering in me again as Mammy washes her dirty hands in the sink. While she’s busy, I sense Ernest is looking at me. I become brazen from somewhere and wink. It’s a quick, knowing connection between us. A naughty secret behind Mammy’s back.