The Voyeur Next Door (27 page)

Closing my drapes, I moved back into my gloomy apartment and returned to bed.

Tamara refused to speak to me when I arrived for Sunday dinner. She sat sullen and stone faced in the kitchen with her arms folded and her face stubbornly averted. I didn’t care. She could be pissed off all she wanted. I honestly would rather see her hate me, than see her dead, or worse.

Mom was tense. She kept rattling on about random things that I was sure no one was listening to. Jonas occasionally bobbed his head like whatever she was talking about made perfect sense, but Earl and I were lost in our own thoughts, which suited us both just fine.

Earl had invited a friend to dinner. He hadn’t mentioned her name, but it must have been serious, because he hadn’t brought a woman over since grandma died almost twenty years ago. I could tell he was nervous, and it also made sense why he wanted Ali over as badly as he did. Maybe he thought his friend would feel more comfortable if she wasn’t the only outsider at dinner. I wasn’t sure if Ali was coming, or not, but part of me was equally anxious to see her.

When the doorbell rang, Earl and I both jumped. No one seemed to notice, except Tamara, who arched a brow at us.

“I’ll get it!” Mom said, cracking the ladle against the side of the steaming pot and rushing off, ladle still in hand.

A moment later, we heard her excited exclamation as the newcomer was welcomed in. I couldn’t tell from the muffled voices who it was, but my palms were sweaty and I had a whole jungle going crazy in the pit of my stomach. I would have laughed at myself for acting like a guy on his first date, except nothing about my situation was funny. At least not to me.

Mom returned with a figure in tow.

It wasn’t Ali.

This woman was tall with a smile that lit up her brown eyes. She moved with the grace of a dancer, or a model, but was dressed like a woman who took on powerful men in a boardroom. Her crimson dress suit was cut to perfectly compliment her willowy silhouette. Her hair was sheered to a regal chin in a sleek bob that gleamed like a platinum helmet on top of her head. In one slender hand, she held her purse, in the other, a bottle of wine.

“Beatrice!” Earl leaped out of his seat and hurried across the kitchen to greet his guest. “You came.”

Beatrice chuckled, a deep throaty sound of someone who had spent the better part of their life smoking. “I’m sorry I’m late.”

Earl waved her apology aside with a shake of his head and took the hand holding the purse. “Come in. I want you to meet everyone.”

While Earl made the introductions, I peeked at my watch. It was already after five.

She wasn’t coming.

“Gabe, can you get the—”

The doorbell chimed.

I was out of my seat before the tinkle of bells fully faded from the air. I might have shouted something about getting it, but I couldn’t be sure as I sprinted to the front door.

Ali peered up at me from the front porch, a boxed pie in her hands.

“Hi,” she whispered.

I had never been so happy to see anyone in my life.

“Hi.”

“I brought pie,” she said, holding the dessert up for me to see. “I thought wine, but Tamara can’t drink and it wouldn’t be fair so I…” She pulled in a breath. “I’m sorry I’m late. I kept arguing with myself whether or not to come. At one point, I think I even declared war on myself, I’m not sure, but I think I won, so … here I am.”

I wanted to kiss her like my next breath depended on it.

Her unbound hair danced behind her with the breeze. The array of colors seemed to shimmer beneath the late summer sun in a way that tempted me to comb my fingers through the rich strands. She wore a soft, gray skirt over black stockings and a white blouse. Black heels adorned her feet, making her lush legs appear endless and sexy as fuck. Her purse was missing, as were her glasses, and I couldn’t say I missed either.

“Can I come in?”

Feeling like an idiot for staring, I backed away and let her into the tiny foyer. Her scent seemed to conquer the space almost immediately. It tangled with the scent of baked apples and my mother’s jungle of flowers outside.

I shut the door behind her.

“Don’t,” I said when she started to take her shoes off.

“Are you sure?”

She looked up at me with those green eyes made up in that way only women knew how and I had never been more sure of anything.

“Keep them on.”

She straightened, her shoes still strapped to her feet. With them on, she just came to my shoulders, just tall enough to make taking that mouth of hers all the easier. God, I knew it was wrong, but with her stockings, short skirt and neatly buttoned blouse, all I could think about was how badly I wanted her, how badly I wanted to tear her stockings, rip open her blouse, and hike up her skirt to get to that pussy she had spread open for me only days ago. The fact that she was watching me with those wide eyes and parted lips didn’t help matters. If anything, I could have sworn she was thinking the same thing.

“Gabriel…”

“Go!”

The growl caught us both off guard. It burst out of me before I could let the beast inside get his taste of her sweet flesh.

Ali gave a jolt and started down the corridor. Her strides were uneven, like her legs were unsteady, but she reached the end and paused. One hand settled on the wall as she turned her head over her shoulder to peer back at me. But it wasn’t uncertainty or fear in her eyes when they met mine again.

It was longing.

I spent the remainder of the evening fighting and failing not to stare at Ali’s legs. I tried not to notice how long and toned they were, or how perfectly I would fit between them. I tried not to imagine them around my shoulders while I feasted on her pussy. I tried not to imagine them tangled in my sheets the next morning. But it was a losing battle, one that steadily ate at my sanity until I was sure I would either explode in my pants, or fuck her right where she sat, screw whoever else was in the room.

The woman in question was no help at all. She sat so innocently with her legs neatly folded and her attention on the people around us. She talked and laughed with my family like she’d done it a million times. And my family loved her. I could tell. Oh, but if only they knew what a little tease she was.

At first I wondered if it was my horny imagination, the sidelong glances, the shy little smiles, the accidental nudges under the table. But when she excused herself to use the washroom and met my gaze in passing, I knew exactly what she wanted and my pants grew several inches tighter with giddy delight. The only problem was that I couldn’t, not when the bathroom was separated from the sitting area and kitchen by a mere wall and my entire family was on the other side, and I knew she knew that, which made me all the hotter to have her.

When she returned, I felt her brush along the length of my forearm in passing. She was close enough that I could count the stitching along the seam of her skirt, so close, she nudged my hand on the armrest. I watched the sway of her hips all the way to the other side of the coffee table.

Christ, what the fuck was she doing?

“So, Ali, Earl tells me you work for the garage?” Beatrice settled a fond hand on Earl’s knee. “That must be exciting.”

Taking the seat next to Tammy on the fold out chair, Ali chuckled. “You should have asked me that when I first started.”

Earl laughed and patted Beatrice’s hand. “Ali had to organize the paperwork.”

“Which hadn’t been sorted in … how many years, Earl?” Ali teased with a mock glower.

Earl grimaced sheepishly. “We’re not filers,” he told Beatrice. “It was…”

“A nightmare?” Ali supplied. “Cruel and inhumane torture?”

Beatrice laughed. “But at least you get to work with Gabriel, right? That must be a perk.”

Ali’s gaze shot to mine, her confusion mirroring my own before she turned to the woman once more.

“Why would—?”

Beatrice’s smile dimmed. Her brown eyes darted to Earl for an explanation.

“I thought you said—”

“You know what we need?” Earl rose quickly to his feet. “That wine you brought. I think we can all use a glass.”

“Me too?” Tammy jumped in excitedly.

“No!” three people said simultaneously, forcing her back in her seat with a pout.

“Why don’t you help me with that cork?”

Earl propelled Beatrice off the sofa and led her towards the kitchen.

On my left, Mom shifted forward and settled a hand on Jonas’s knee.

“Darling, did I turn the stove off?”

“I’ll check.”

Patting her hand reassuringly, Jonas rose to his feet and disappeared into the kitchen as well.

Mom sighed, shaking her head. “I always forget to turn it off.”

“She left it on for a whole night once,” Tammy said. “The house smelled like burnt chicken for a week. Oh! Speaking of burnt chicken, my play’s next month,” she said to Ali. “Are you coming?”

Ali’s eyes widened. “Me?”

“Well, yeah, you’re like my costume designer. Shouldn’t you be there to see your piece at work?”

“Oh, I didn’t think—”

“It’s the only fun thing I’m allowed to do until I’m thirty, which legally, isn’t even possible, but whatever. So you have to come.”

Ali nodded. “Okay.”

Tammy beamed. “Awesome. You don’t have to bring flowers, but if you do, black ones.”

“Tamara!” Mom gasped, outraged.

Ali laughed. “I’ll see what I can do.”

Tammy nodded. “Oh, and if you could boo when Alyssa comes on—”

“Tamara!” Mom looked like she was going to pop an eye vessel.

“What? She’s a little snitch. She’s lucky I don’t fill her locker with dog shit and set it on fire.”

“Okay, that is enough. I think it’s time for bed. Now!” Mom snapped when Tammy continued to sit there and glower.

Rolling her eyes, Tammy shot to her feet and stomped out of the room, just as Jonas returned with Earl and Beatrice. Each carried two wine glasses.

“Where did Tammy go?” Beatrice wondered, handing me a glass.

“To bed.” Mom said shortly, accepting the drink Jonas passed her. “So how did you and Earl meet, Beatrice?”

“Well…” Beatrice took her seat once more next to me and smiled at Earl when he slid in on her other side. “I was at the park, watching the ducks on the lake and he walked by. Our eyes met and he smiled.” She gave an embarrassed little chuckle, her cheeks pink. “Then, as he was walking away, he dropped his wallet. I hurried after him and we got to talking…”

“We spent the whole day feeding the ducks and wandering the park,” Earl chimed in, beaming widely. “I would have stayed there all night had this one not gotten tired.”

Beatrice swatted at him fondly. “It was already well after midnight!”

“So I asked her out for coffee the next morning,” Earl went on.

“That was six months ago,” Beatrice finished, smiling lovingly at him.

“Aw!” Ali sighed. “That’s really sweet, but I do notice a pattern here, Earl. You drop things a lot.”

Earl frowned. “I’m an old man! My hands aren’t what they used to be. Arthritis,” he said to Beatrice.

“You’re not old!” Beatrice protested.

While they argued about their ages and the downfalls of getting old, I watched Ali. I noted she never touched her drink. She held it, but it never went to her lips, just like her fork at supper hadn’t. While it moved around on her plate, she never actually ate anything. Afterwards, she had settled her napkin overtop and helped Mom clear away the table.