But he felt her stare on him. On all of him . . . naked as a jaybird.
He had no idea what she wore. If she wore anything at all. There was the chance that she was as naked as he was. The idea aroused him. There was no denying it.
He took another long pull from his beer, his gaze never leaving her window. Never leaving her shadow. He couldn’t imagine her face. But he heard her voice in his head. He saw her shape. He imagined those endless legs.
He felt her eyes on him. He knew she was watching him. She probably thought she was invisible to him up there. He smiled slightly, his free fingers resting on his abdomen, sliding down incrementally. He wanted to shock her. Maybe somewhere deep inside she was getting excited, too . . . watching him. Watching him touch himself in front of her. For her.
His cock jutted out at full mast. His hand slid lower, closing around himself. Hell, this was for himself, too.
He knew what he was doing was messed up. She could call the cops and lodge a complaint. They could be knocking on his door in under twenty minutes. That was the last thing he wanted, but he couldn’t move. Couldn’t stop. He couldn’t go inside. He couldn’t stop tormenting her. Tormenting himself.
He gripped hard. Felt his balls pull up tight, begging for his hand to move up and down, fast and rough. But even that wouldn’t be enough. It wasn’t what he wanted.
He didn’t want to simply jack off. He wanted to sink deep into a woman’s softness. He wanted long legs wrapped around his hips. He wanted the mystery of her face resolved.
Christ. He was about to lose his load like some teenage boy with his first girl. This was insane but he couldn’t stop himself. Not as long as she was watching. His fingers tightened around himself, squeezing until his dick throbbed harder.
He registered that. Processed it. She had not moved away from her window. She was still standing there. She couldn’t be too repulsed. Could she? Maybe she was touching herself, too. From this distance, with the obstruction of her blinds, it was impossible to know. But God, that thought got him more aroused.
He was close just like this with one hand squeezing his cock. The only thing more appealing to him than getting himself off was the thought of jumping her fence, yanking open her back door and marching inside her house. Finding her. Claiming her. Riding out his climax inside the woman watching him.
Christ. He didn’t even know her. Not her face. Not anything about her. He dropped his hand, that glaring truth scalding him.
He still felt her stare. It practically peeled the flesh from his bones.
It was the nightmare. That was the only explanation for this sudden dive into insanity. The nightmares always put him on edge. Made him as anxious as a long-tailed cat in a roomful of rocking chairs.
With a curse burning on his lips, he strode back inside his house, letting the back door slam shut behind him. He was done with this crazy fixation on his neighbor. She was just a woman with all the usual parts. Same as any other.
He was going to bed. Tomorrow he would get laid. Find some willing woman to slide inside and take off the edge.
One thing was for certain: after what had just happened, he doubted he would ever have to face her. She would be giving him a wide berth from now on. He snorted. Hell, she would probably be calling her Realtor to move first thing in the morning.
And that, for some reason, rubbed him in all the wrong ways.
NINE
Holy hell, what just happened?
Her neighbor had stood naked as a jaybird in his backyard. Looking right at her window. Almost like he could see directly through the blinds to her. Even though she knew that wasn’t possible.
No, he wasn’t just naked. He was naked with a full raging hard-on, which he gripped in that big fist of his. A fist not so big, mind you, that she missed how large his . . . er, member happened to be. It was as impressive as the rest of him.
And then he stopped. He walked inside his house like nothing happened. He’d turned away. Not Faith. No, she had stood there gawking, peeking through her blinds, her breathing raspy, unable to look away.
“So unfair,” she muttered as she marched downstairs and refilled her wine glass—even as she contemplated digging out Mister Perfect from her nightstand drawer.
Mister Perfect was the name she had given her vibrator. Like North Callaghan, her vibrator was impressive in size . . . but Mister Perfect was battery operated. At the moment, that did not offer much enticement. Not after staring at the flesh-and-blood form of North Callaghan.
She swigged back her glass of wine in one more gulp and then grabbed the bottle to top it off again. Her head was spinning—and it wasn’t just because of the alcohol.
He was even sexier fully naked. Naturally. She snorted in disgust. Her best look was when she wore jeans and a turtleneck. She lived in Texas. So she could pull that look off two days a year. So unfair.
Life was unfair though. She was living next door to a man who looked like that. And the man happened to be a felon. And a jerk.