Valentine Next Door
A Totally Bound Publication
Valentine Next Door
ISBN #
978-1-78430-115-6
©Copyright Willa Edwards 2014
Cover Art by Posh Gosh ©Copyright July 2014
Edited by Faith Bicknell-Brown
Totally Bound Publishing
This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Totally Bound Publishing.
Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Totally Bound Publishing. Unauthorized or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.
The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.
Published in 2014 by Totally Bound Publishing,
Newland House, The Point, Weaver Road, Lincoln, LN6 3QN
Warning:
This book contains sexually explicit content which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has a
heat rating
of
Totally Sizzling
and a
Sexometer
of
2.
VALENTINE NEXT DOOR
Willa Edwards
Jeremy’s not about to let a few numbers get between him and the woman he’s dreamed of since high school. Can Mrs Valentine do the same?
Jeremy Callahan has been in love with his next door neighbor, Miranda Valentine, since he was fifteen years old. As a teen, he used to watch her, fantasizing about how he could make her his. But he never acted on it. Miranda was older, married, and out of his league. Forced to return home ten years later after being injured on a photo shoot, all those old feelings return, and this time there’s no reason to keep them at bay. She might be a decade older than he is, but Jeremy’s not about to let a few numbers stand in his way.
Since her husband’s death, Miranda has been left with a big hole in her life. Never able to fulfill her dream of becoming a mom, she isn’t sure what to do with herself. She certainly didn’t expect to find the most gorgeous man she’s ever met next door. She can’t believe Jeremy Callahan is that sexy younger man, or that he’s had a crush on her for years. When he kisses her, all bets are off. Jeremy’s young, handsome and makes her feel more than anyone has ever before.
But she knows he can’t want the same things she does. Surely he isn’t ready to settle down and start a family, but she’s running out of time. Will her dream of being a mother keep her from the man she loves? Or can they find some middle ground where they can both get everything they desire?
Dedication
To all those brave enough to follow your dreams, whatever they may be. It takes guts to follow your dreams.
Keep pushing for those dreams. We’re behind you.
Trademarks Acknowledgement
The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:
Spiderman
: Marvel Characters, Inc.
Bundt: Northland Aluminum Products, Inc.
Tupperware
: Dart Industries, Inc.
Netflix: Netflix, Inc.
Jaguar: Tata Motors
Rollerblade: Nordica, S.P.A.
Chapter One
“You need to get out of there, buddy,” Brett declared.
Jeremy huffed into the phone. He didn’t need his best friend to tell him that. He’d been back in his childhood bedroom for three weeks now, while the damn bone in his leg healed. Being waited on by his mom, unable to even leave the house, was driving him stir-crazy. After years of moving from place to place searching out the next great photo, sitting still was taking a serious toll on his mental state.
“Are you offering to let me stay at your place?”
“Fuck no. I like you, dude, but not that much.” Brett chuckled into the phone. “I’m not giving you a sponge bath.”
They both laughed. Best friends since elementary school, they’d done a lot for each other, but they had their limits.
“I can bathe myself, dude.” It required a plastic garbage bag and a few strips of duct tape, but he could do it. “I’m not
that
handicapped. I just couldn’t get up and down the stairs to my place.” His third-floor walkup in the city had seemed cool and Bohemian before his injury. Once he healed, he’d be looking for a new apartment in a high rise with a doorman and an elevator. Maybe a condo in a neighborhood that would be good for families.
He’d been thinking a lot about the future since his injury, not that he’d admit it to his buddy. Maybe it was the staying still, or maybe it was the injury itself, but the call of the road had tamed down to a gentle breeze. The idea of coming home to someone was starting to sound appealing. If it was the right person.
“Isn’t there somewhere you can go for a little while? Just for a break.” Papers rustling echoed over the phone.
Brett must be at work. The man worked from dawn to midnight some nights. Not that Jeremy could say much. He put in a lot of hours at his job too. But at least it wasn’t in an office.
Jeremy knocked his fist against the cast on his right foot. “Can’t drive with this thing, and I won’t get far walking.” All he could do was sit and think. About everywhere he’d been and where he might be going next. He’d never been much of a thinker. He was a doer. Whenever he’d seen what he wanted, he’d gone after it. Now, all he could do was spin his mind in circles.
“There’s got to be something you can do,” his friend declared.
But the words didn’t register with Jeremy. All he heard was the slam of a door. He stilled. His heart sped up and his cock perked to attention. It was a sound he knew well. A sound he’d waited for so often as a teenager and had now begun to anticipate each night since returning home. It was one of the few joys he’d had since he’d been stuck back in his childhood bedroom.
Next door, Mrs Valentine, the school librarian and the star of his every adolescent fantasy and most of his adult ones, had shut her front door. He held his breath, waiting for her to walk through the house to her bedroom that stood across the small twenty-foot lawn from his own.
“Mrs Valentine’s home,” he whispered, even though, logically, he knew she couldn’t hear him through the walls of two houses.
“Are you fucking kidding me, dude? Mrs Valentine?”
Brett groaned, and Jeremy understood his pain. Just the thought of Mrs Valentine had Jeremy’s balls tightening and his dick hard.
“You were always the luckiest shit in school to live next to her.” Brett’s voice rumbled in his ear.
The sound distracted Jeremy—momentarily—from the beautiful sight before him. Jeremy wasn’t the only one who’d had a crush on the school librarian.
He waited with bated breath as she walked into her room then shut the door behind her. Mrs Valentine always changed as soon as she got home from the library, switching from her pumps, tight pencil skirts and curve-hugging button-down blouses, into more relaxed sweats or jeans.
And he got a front-row seat for the action. As a teen, it had been one of his favorite times of day. As an adult, it was starting to become the same. Thank God the woman had never discovered blinds.
She stepped into the middle of the room, her tiny bare feet curled into the plush carpet. Standing in front of the dresser mirror, she dropped her hands to her chest, her nimble fingers unbuttoning her shirt. The pale color was perfect against her exotic caramel complexion. Each released button showed off a new inch of flesh. Even from his vantage point across the yard, her skin looked soft and kissable.
Nothing about Mrs Valentine had changed in the ten years he’d been away. Not her habits, her figure or her ability to strike him deaf, dumb and blind with her beauty.
She tossed the white shirt to the floor. She slid her hands behind her to unbutton her skirt, thrusting her chest forward, her ample breasts threatening to overflow from her white-laced bra. The very edge of one nipple almost escaped the frilly trim, tempting him to insanity. She twisted the skirt around her waist, released the zipper then pushed the fabric down her full hips—hips that would be just the right size to hold onto as he pounded into her from behind. From this angle, he couldn’t see her ass but he knew it was plump and round. The kind of ass he’d always loved. He’d do almost anything for the opportunity to explore those hills and valleys.
The skirt dropped to her feet and she stepped out of it. Her matching white-laced bikini panties were cut high, showing off even more of her shapely legs. Mrs Valentine was five three, barely reaching his shoulder, but he’d always liked that about her. Her small, curvy frame was perfect for him to hold, to protect, to love.
His cock thickened further in his sweat pants. He fought back a groan, not wanting to share the noise with his best friend. He’d forgotten how hard it was to watch from afar and not be able to touch her. In the years he’d been gone, being allowed to touch a woman hadn’t been a problem. There were very few women he’d met who he couldn’t charm, either with his handsome but still boyish good looks or with his exciting and prestigious profession. Though he’d never found the right woman.
In his life, there must have been other women he’d been unable to seduce. There certainly must have been a few others in high school. He hadn’t started working out until college. And he hadn’t discovered how appealing women found being photographed until a few years into his profession. But the only one he remembered was Mrs Valentine.
“How’s the view?”
He held the phone tight to his mouth as he rose then limped around the corner. He hid behind the faded Spiderman curtains his mom planned to take down but hadn’t gotten around to yet. At least they offered some protection from Mrs Valentine’s view. He’d hate for her to find him watching her.
Jeremy smiled, straightening his stance for an even better view. “Just as good as ever.”
It may have been ten years, but Mrs Valentine looked as amazing as she always had.
As a teenager, he hadn’t realized the invasion of privacy it was to spy on her, to see her in her states of semi undress, even if she allowed it by never closing her curtains. Now he was old enough to know better. But he couldn’t make himself look away. He made a career of capturing the most beautiful visions on Earth, and he couldn’t avert his eyes from the most gorgeous creation he’d ever seen, no matter how wrong it might be.
