Halloween Next Door: An Older Man Younger Woman Romance (A Man Who Knows What He Wants Book 78) Read online

  Just like I had to take matters into my own hands by coming here.

  I’m from Oak Ridge, Louisiana and although they’re not from there it’s kind of ironic that the famous band the Oak Ridge Boys chose that name, because there are hardly any boys in Oak Ridge, the thriving metropolis of one hundred and thirty three strong.

  Yes, not even one hundred and fifty people in the world can claim to be from where I’m from.

  And sure, there are a few boys there, but certainly no men…not since Bishop left his teaching job in Monroe, Louisiana the second he got accepted for a teaching position at Tulane.

  And boy are there ever some things I’d like for him to teach me.

  I lie in my bed on my side with my small reading light on and the window open. I’ve got the main curtain opened and just the thin one “shut.” But with the light on I’m sure Bishop could see inside my room if he wanted to.

  And from the way he looked at me today I know he wants to.

  God, he is so hot. And the power I felt when I saw what I was doing to him made me feel a moistness in-between my legs in that tight spandex costume that could have been very revealing.

  But Amber and I weren’t there long. I didn’t want this to be anymore than a routine candy stop although I think she knows it was so much more.

  And I can think of the ways my infatuation with Bishop can be so much more too.

  After Amber’s mom came by and picked her up I couldn’t help but think about having a family of my own with Bishop.

  It was so fun spending the day with her today. It took us the whole afternoon to find the heavy, black, round frame glasses she needed for her costume as Edna Mode from The Incredibles. And when we finally did find the glasses they didn’t have them in a kid’s size so the huge frames engulfed her cute little chubby face. It was so adorable I swear we were taking pictures for half an hour before we left to go trick or treating.

  And apparently I wasn’t the only one who thought she looked cuter than the dickens. She made off like a bandit tonight.

  But I’m the one who’s thinking like a thief now. All I can think about is how much I want to steal Bishop’s heart and how I want to give him a treat that’s oh so sweet.

  My first time.

  Something changed inside me two years ago when I saw him at his going away party that my dad threw. I was still a kid then, only sixteen, but for the first time I felt something for a man and I knew it was more than just a crush.

  And then he up and moved away.

  And it’s been two years since I’ve seen him.

  Sometimes my dad drives down to New Orleans and they spend a day together doing fun things or even going fishing on the Bayou, but Bishop never comes back home to visit, even though he’s technically still our next door neighbor back home as well.

  He’s got the nicest house “in town,” but right now it just sits empty. It served as a constant reminder of him missing from my life and I was determined to get into Tulane and find him and let him know how I felt about him, one way or another.

  And maybe tomorrow will be my chance.

  He told me the professors are having a haunted house for charity and he asked me if I wanted to go.

  Of course I jumped at the opportunity to jump from some scares at the haunted house.

  And it gives me the perfect opportunity to jump into those big strong arms of his too.

  I’m already imagining all the devilish things I hope we do together when suddenly my mind pops back into the present.

  I stare out the window and I swear I see him walk by his own window, pausing for just a second and his head turning towards my apartment.

  Over here, I want to yell. It’s been a full hour since I knocked on his door.

  He’s probably ready to go to bed like me.

  I wonder if he sleeps naked.

  And I wonder if he’s wondering what it would be like to have me in his bed…just like I’m wondering the same.

  CHAPTER 4

  Bishop

  I laid back in my bed with my eyes closed and my hands by my side thinking about how Penelope looked tonight.

  I’d even pulled out the picture album her mom made me after I left town. I wanted to see if I’d lost my mind or if Penelope had changed that much.

  She had. In the pictures she looked nothing like how she looked tonight. She was cute, sure, but a kid.

  I put the picture album away almost immediately but what wouldn’t go away was the throbbing erection that I had for her.

  I hadn’t seen her in two years, and damn, how much she’d changed.

  When she turned to leave my front step I ran to the window like a kid watching for the ice cream truck or something, but instead I wanted to get a look at her backside as she walked away. God what a perfect ass.

  She didn’t know I was watching her. Or maybe she did. Maybe she wanted it.

  Why else would she change out of that tight costume right by her window on the side of her apartment that faces my house?

  I stood back, away from my window like some kind of pervert…watching her. Wanting her. Needing her.

  I didn’t even have to touch myself or anything, my cock was so damn hard at the sight of her, and the thought that I shouldn’t be watching my best friend’s daughter undress, that I could have come if I hadn’t intersperse my thoughts with baseball.

  Damn, surely she knew what she was doing. And damn again, because she left that thin curtain closed so I could only see her shape, but not her skin.

  The skin that I want to run my tongue along every inch of as I taste her, please her, and make her beg for more.

  I could stroke myself now to the thought of her and I’d shoot my load within seconds. I know it.

  But I can’t.

  I’m not allowing myself this shallow “victory.” I want the real thing. I don’t want to fantasize about being with her. I want her here, in my arms, underneath me, riding me.

  I want her in the kitchen, in the shower, against the wall, and in my bed. I want her everywhere.

  And if I stroked myself to the thoughts of taking her in those places right now I know I’d come so hard that I wouldn’t be able to control my moans.

  Moans so loud that even she would hear.

  But the real question is, once she heard them would I hear her moan back shortly thereafter like two wolves calling to each other in the night?

  But we’ll see tomorrow night.

  Some of the other professors have a haunted house going and I’ve got two choices. I can accompany her through it or I can work it…but just for her visit.

  Part of me says I should accompany her, but another part of me says I should work it.

  And there’s a reason why. A very selfish reason why that is as devilish as the Halloween season.

  But no matter what I decide there’s one decision that I made up the minute she stepped on my front porch.

  She’s mine.

  CHAPTER 5

  Penelope

  October 30th (the next evening)

  I step out of my apartment building with my senses heightened.

  Just thinking of Bishop makes me feel more alive, and knowing that I’ve got what might be considered a date with him tonight has every fiber of my being firing.

  A shiny, black SUV sits idling across the street. The windows are tinted but the front windshield isn’t.

  And there’s no way that’s not Bishop sitting inside. You don’t mistake a six feet five inch two hundred and fifty pound man for the guy next door, even though he very much is the man next door…by design.

  His driver’s side window quickly darts down and I see his eyes focused on me.

  I’m walk towards him, but my mind is at odds with my body. My body says to run to him and do all the things with him that I’ve dreamed of.

  And my mind screams “predator,” and “run” in the opposite direction.

  But matters of the heart aren’t settled in the mind, they’re settled by the unsettled r
umblings in my core and the need that’s literally coming out from underneath my underwear.

  As I get closer he steps out of the SUV as he towers over me, causing that flight or fight response to inch even higher up the survival scale.

  I can feel the pulse in my neck throb as I watch his eyes dilate as he keeps his focus trained on me as he walks around to the passenger side, and I follow along right in step…in sync…in rhythm as our bodies should always be.

  He opens the door without saying a word and offers me his hand to help me up and in.

  I look at his massive digits and can’t help but wonder what they say about the size of a man’s fingers and the length and thickness of his cock. If it’s true my pussy is going to have its work cut out for it if I’m going to be able to accept everything he has to give.

  I reach for his hand as I go to step up and into my seat, but the minute my hand finds his my body freezes up and my leg just kind of wobbles as it misses the floor mat and I feel the side of the seat moving quickly towards my face, or more accurately the other way around, as I fall forward.

  And just like in the movies, Superman swoops in and scoops me up in his arms, lifting me up and literally sitting me in my seat and then pivoting my body around so I’m facing forward.

  “I’m so clumsy sometimes,” I say.

  “You’re not. It’s a big step up. When I had it modified I wasn’t really thinking of other passengers,” he says.

  He was never known to get around back home, but then again he commuted to work everyday so who knows what went on there.

  But I never saw a woman over at his house or remember my parents talking about him going on dates or anything.

  All I remember in that regard was my mom trying to hook him up a few times to which he always politely declined without so much as even taking a look at the pictures of my mom’s friends.

  He always said he was focused on getting a job at a university so he could get tenure and then do what he really loved, writing research papers while he was teaching. He was just so focused on his career.

  And focused on keeping that body of his rock hard.

  I know he had a gym in his garage. I remember the few ladies in town talking about how it was time to go for a quick walk every time his garage door was open.

  I remember as a kid riding my bike by his house and seeing this hulking man covered in sweat as he groaned while he lifted weights that would make Paul Bunyan look like a sissy.

  And now I realize what I’d missed all those years.

  But I just made up for it with the way he lifted me like I was a five-pound dumbbell, after my dumb loss of balance. I really need to quit blaming myself for things sometimes.

  He shut my door and moved back around to his side and got in.

  His expression neutral and his body language calm and in control as he took the stick shift and off we went.

  “I like your SUV,” I say, trying to break the ice.

  “Thanks,” he says.

  “I don’t know many guys who drive a stick shift anymore…especially an SUV.”

  “I never considered myself most guys.”

  “No. I definitely wasn’t implying that,” I say and as I realize my mistake I instinctively reach out for him, my hand finding the top of his hand which is resting on top of the stick shift.

  And then I feel him shift into a higher gear and the SUV picks up speed without jerking or anything.

  But the speed of the SUV isn’t what gets me. It’s having my hand on top of his as I feel the power in his hand as he so effortlessly controls this multiple ton piece of machinery with complete mastery.

  He looks down at my hand, glaring at it and I feel my cheeks redden.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to distract you from your driving.”

  He smirks. “You’ve been distracting me since the moment you rang my doorbell.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say feeling like something’s wrong. “If your busy we can call this off.”

  “You’re the kind of distraction I need, Penelope,” he says and I feel a lump in my throat as he looks at me with need in his eyes.

  “I’ve been so focused on my career and my research all these years I think I kind of lost sight of what’s important in life.”

  “You did?”

  “Yes, and I needed a little distraction to get me back on track.”

  “I’m glad I could help,” I say. “I think that’s what you’re saying at least.”

  “That’s partly what I’m saying,” he says. He pauses for one second and then looks back at the road as we pull up to a stoplight.

  Then his eyes turn back to me as his body turns just slightly so his shoulders are more open to me.

  “But what I’m really saying is that you’re not a distraction…you’re the priority.”

  CHAPTER 6

  Bishop

  The whole ride over I could see how nervous she was.

  Good.

  Seeing her off balance, on edge, turned me on.

  And little did she know she had me on edge too.

  I was doing my best to keep myself together, but inside all I could think about was pulling this SUV over on some dark street and grabbing her and kissing her hard before we were even fully in park.

  What in the hell was she thinking wearing those short jean cut-off shorts and that white button Henley?

  And more than half of the buttons weren’t buttoned, which from my position next to her, and because I tower over her, gave me a straight shot down her top at her ample cleavage.

  Cleavage which was making it damn hard to shift gears because as my foot would move on and off the clutch, the inside of my leg would rub against my throbbing cock.

  And I needed my cock out of these jeans and inside of her.

  And that’s exactly what was going to happen soon enough because I wanted her more than anything in this world and when I see something I want I stop at nothing to get it.

  CHAPTER 7

  Penelope

  I wait in line to enter the haunted house.

  “I’m going to wet my pants,” the girl about my age in-front of me says just before some monster comes out of nowhere with what I hope is a fake chainsaw causing the entire line to scream in terror.

  Including me. I’m still practically panicking from that ride over here. The way he looked at me. The things he said.

  If I wet my pants inside I won’t even know it, because my panties are already drenched.

  Bishop said he would work the haunted house when I went through that it would be more fun that way.

  When I asked him how I’d know which monster he was he just flashed me one of those smirks of his, the ones that got my panties in this predicament in the first place.

  “You’ll know,” he said. “With absolute certainty.”

  What does he have planned?

  Before I know what’s happening it’s my turn to step up and go.

  I love scary movies but this is a lot different. At home I can just hit pause on the remote if things get too intense. Not tonight.

  And I’ve got the intensity of this fright night plus the intensity which Bishop is showing.

  I hear the girl and her boyfriend in front of me scream just up around the corner so I know there must be something scary up there.

  I really wish Bishop had joined me in this haunted house. I would have had ample excuses to jump into his arms and my hands to find his big, beefy body for security…a very sexy kind as I could have let my hands linger just a little too long across that broad chest of his and then drag my fingertips across every ridge in those abs…the abs I know he has and want so badly to see for myself.

  But now I have to focus on looking out for this scary creature.

  As I turn the corner I inch forward with my back along the wall knowing it must be in the hole up ahead on the right.

  Suddenly something come out from behind me and it’s arms wrap around me, but it doesn’t really touch me.

  I jump
away and right toward the hole, where another creepy creature pops out and goes to grab me but stops just short and quickly disappears back in its hole.

  My hands are making fists and I bring them up to my face pounding them together as I’m totally terrified right now.