Sherwood Ltd.

R. Allen Anne

Description

Sherwood.The name immediately conjures up images of Richard Greene, Michael Praed and Russel Crowe. Or maybe that sly fox in the Disney version.Only, in Anne R. Allen's latest rom-com mystery the fox is a coyote and there's no Robin Hood. Or is there?In her usual inimitable fashion Allen peels back the layers, one hilarious subplot after another, until you just never know what's real and what's not. Rather like the Robin Hood legend.When the Manners Doctor, Camilla Randall, flies into Robin Hood airport with a suitcase in one hand and a book contract in the other she thinks she's leaving all her problems behind and is about to start a new life.If you look very carefully you may just spot the Sheriff of Nottingham, Maid Marian and even Little John hidden away. But as for Robin Hood himself... You'll just have to read it and find out.

Informations

• Publié par: Mark Williams international Digital Publishing
• Date de parution: 05 avril 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781908961020
• Langue: English

Extrait

SHERWOOD LIMITED



by

Anne R. Allen



© Anne R. Allen, 2011. All rights reserved.


This novel is a work of fiction. The resemblance of any characters to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.



Published by Mark Williams international Digital Publishing
.
Foreword by Saffina Desforges.

(UK bestselling author of Sugar & Spice and the Rose Red crime thrillers.)


When you see the name Sherwood you automatically think of Lincoln green, the Sheriff of Nottingham, and Robin Hood and his merry men.

If you’re a baby-boomer the theme from the old Richard Greene series will surely be floating through your mind as you read this. Younger readers may be thinking Michael Praed, Jason Connery or Russell Crowe.

But the Robin Hood legend is part of our culture, whichever side of the Atlantic you’re on. We all know it. We all love it. Which is why you will just love Anne R. Allen’s Sherwood Ltd .

Those of you who have read Anne’s previous books in the Camilla Randall Mysteries series will know the background to the Manners Doctor, as Camilla is known. But there’s no need to be familiar with Camilla’s past to enjoy this latest romantic-comedy adventure.

Anne R. Allen herself is a celebrated blogger about writers and writing, so no surprise her novels often have literary themes. We last saw Camilla Randall in the hilarious romantic comedy Ghostwriters In the Sky , fighting not entirely imaginary menaces amid a writers’ conference in California.

Sherwood Ltd takes up Camilla’s adventures from there, with the Manners Doctor turning up in England in pursuit of a publishing deal that may or may not exist, in what may or may not be Robin Hood country, and among men only some of whom are merry.

As for Robin… You decide.



S.D.
Chapter 1-The Man in the Green Hoodie


Anybody can become an outlaw. For me, all it took was a little financial myopia, an inherited bad taste in spouses, a recession-and there I was, the great-granddaughter of newspaper baron H. P. Randall, edging around in alley-shadows, about to become a common thief.
Okay, I was only stealing trash: a clear plastic bag stuffed with enough bottles and cans to redeem for a quart of milk. I’d seen it from the window of my friend’s San Francisco apartment where I was doing a little uninvited house-sitting. All I’d found to pour on my morning flax flakes was a dusty bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream. Not the best fortification for a day of job-hunting.
I stretched an arm into the dumpster, but the bag of recyclables was just beyond my reach. Praying the gathering dusk would make me invisible to passersby, I kicked off my heels, hoisted myself to the dumpster’s rim and-with a triumphant clatter of Pellegrino bottles-extricated my treasure, safely unobserved.
Except by some dog who had materialized behind me in the alley-a skinny, bedraggled thing-investigating my discarded shoes with a hungry snout.
“You’re not to eat those.” I balanced on the edge of the dumpster, keeping my toes out of biting range. I adore dogs, but this one had odd, not-safe eyes.
A light flared from the street end of the alley.
I froze.
“Are you all right up there?” A man moved toward me-all spiky hair and bony shoulders, silhouetted against the lights from out on Castro Street. I managed to twist around to a sitting position, clutching my trash bag. I hoped I wasn’t poaching on his territory. The homeless, like everybody else, would have rules of etiquette. What irony if an etiquette expert were to be attacked for bad manners.
The man struck another match and reflected flame glinted off steel-rimmed glasses as he lit a pipe. The scent of tobacco wafted above the garbage stink. He came closer. I clutched the glass-filled bag, ready to use it as a weapon.
“The coyote,” he said: “The trickster: ‘always poor, out of luck, and friendless’-Mark Twain said that, I believe.” His accent was British. Reassuring. “I’d hoped to see a bit of the wild life of San Francisco, but that’s not the sort I had in mind.”
An ulp moment.
“That was a coyote?” I tried to breathe normally as the animal slunk away. “They don’t eat people, do they?” Thank goodness I was wearing my most conservative pants suit. I didn’t want to appear connected with “wild life” of any kind.
“I’m told they like to nibble on human feet.” The man gave a half-smile.
I wiggled my naked toes and shuddered. “Thanks for scaring it away.”
“I’m no expert on coyotes, mind you.” He puffed on his pipe. “We haven’t many in Nottinghamshire.” He was tall and good-looking, in an unkempt, What-Not-To-Wear sort of way: Oxford don meets Pirate of the Caribbean. A little older than me. Mid-forties, maybe. He wore a hooded green sweatshirt with the Golden Gate Bridge embroidered on the chest. Probably a tourist. I relaxed a bit.
“Not a lot of coyotes in Manhattan either,” I said. “I’ve just arrived in San Francisco myself.” My instinct was to offer a hand and introduce myself, but:
1) I didn’t think it wise to give my name to an alley-person-no matter how educated and/or attractive.
2) I didn’t want my dumpster-dive to make its way into the press.
3) My free hand was occupied with keeping myself from sliding, derrière-first, into the smelly trash below.
I decided it was time to make a quick exit. But a passing headlight showed the glitter of broken glass on the pavement below. Not nice for jumping on in bare feet.
“Let me help.” The man stuck his pipe in his teeth and reached up to circle my waist with big, powerful hands. He lifted me down gently. “Did you drop something valuable in the skip there?” He smelled of peach tobacco and Scotch.
“Just some recycling.” I avoided eye contact and made my way toward my shoes. I wished his touch hadn’t felt so electric.
“You risked life and limb rather than pollute? Are you sure you’re not a native?” He offered a supportive arm and friendly grin as I stepped into my pumps, but I resisted the urge to flirt. My soul-crushing divorce-plus a fizzled rebound romance-had cured me of trusting good-looking men. Even polite ones. Besides, this was the Castro; the man had to be gay.
He re-lit his pipe. “You’re here for a bit of a holiday then?” His accent wasn’t BBC English, but something edgier-more northern.
“No. Work,” I said, lying by omission. I picked up the bag. “I must run.”
“What sort of work do you do?”
My least favorite question. Since MetroFeatures dropped my column six months ago, I hadn’t done any actual work-unless you counted nursing my dying mother, staging a ridiculously lavish funeral, fighting the foreclosure on my apartment-and dealing with those condescending debt consolidation people.
“I write.” I gave him a dismissive smile and moved toward the building.
He laughed. “Indeed! I don’t suppose you have an unpublished novel lying about? Something a bit steamy?” He puffed his pipe. “Perhaps involving whips and chains?”
My head pounded. Of course. A stranger in a city alley at night-what made me think he wouldn’t be a pervert? With a quick pivot I took off toward the stairs.
I could hear him running behind me.
“Lass! I’m sorry!” I could feel his breath on my neck
I launched the trash bag in the direction of his solar plexus and ran as quickly as stiletto heels would allow. I heard my Pellegrino bottles shatter as the bag fell short.
The man wasn’t fazed a bit. “Don’t go!”
One of his big hands clamped onto my wrist. With the other, he reached into his pocket.
Oh, great. He had a gun.
Chapter 2-Poor, Out of Luck, and Friendless

The man’s grip on my wrist tightened. In the shadowy dark, I couldn’t see what kind of weapon he had taken from his pocket. If it was a gun, it was small. Maybe a knife.
I looked around for a blunt instrument. I refused to be murdered here, without even an ID: an anonymous dead garbage thief.
But with a creepy move, he stuck his hand into the pocket of my jacket. I could feel the heat of his hand through the gabardine-no gun or knife-so what did he want?
A wallet? Keys? Yes: he probably intended to burgle the apartment.
But I’d show him not to mess with a New Yorker. I faked a trip-and-fall movement, yanked off my shoe, and aimed the steel-tipped heel at his eyeball.
His turn to run.
“Get lost, creep!” I hurled the shoe at him, then slipped off the other, clutching it like a hammer. I shot up the back stairs, turned the deadbolt, and ran to the kitchen sink, not sure if I was going to be sick.
Was it the English accent that made me think the man safe? Or the mention of Nottingham? I’ve always had a thing for Robin-Hoody stuff.
I set the bronze leather Prada pump on the counter. It looked as alone and useless as I felt. I gulped some water and told myself to stop whining.
Things could be worse. I could be homeless.
But my friend Plantagenet Smith had this lovely San Francisco pied a terre he wasn’t using. At least that’s what he said in his last e-mail before my phone and Internet service got cut off. He was staying at his boyfriend’s beach house in Morro Bay until he finished his screenplay. He usually wrote slowly, so I figured I had at least a month.
I hadn’t broken in-not technically. I simply used the extra key he keeps in the hat of the garden gnome by the back door. I probably should have phoned from somewhere to tell him I’d taken him up on his offer of hospitality “if you’re ever in San Francisco again.” But it’s hard to tell somebody who met you as a teenaged heiress to zillions that:
Your mother, the Countess, died destitute.
Your celebrity ex-husband has declared bankruptcy and flown off to Thailand in quest of enlightenment, affordable health care, and/or cheap sex, not necessarily in that order.
The hot L. A. policeman you’d been hoping to stay with in California wrote last week to say he’d found his soulmate-a sweet vice detective named Lola-and they’d be sure to invite you to the wedding.
What was left of your last paycheck has gone to bribe Habib, your passive-aggressive Ma