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Daisy’s pov

I was reading “Priest” when it began.

Poppy was on her knees in the kitchen, her nipples straining so hard to be seen through her damp t-shirt, and her pretty thighs pressed together. I knew the feeling all too well. Her heartbeat could probably shoot straight to her clit.

She was mere seconds away from throwing herself at him. I was only two chapters from finding out if she actually would.

That was when I heard it.

“Oh God!”

The loud moan echoed through the walls, meeting me where I sat on the couch in my living room. I dropped the book, letting out a soft breath. My neighbour was at it again.

I knew I should have ignored them. Maybe put in some earbuds or turn my music on, or do anything except what I did next. My body worked before my brain did, moving towards the living room window.

The blinds were already parted from when I got up to read earlier, giving me the most stunning view of the sun rising over Manhattan. Yet, my eyes lowered to the apartment directly across from mine.

I couldn’t see them, yet I knew.

“Just like that,” his voice came next, the rich baritone traveling through every inch of my apartment. Every inch of me. “Fucking hell, Mandy!”

I brought my bottom lip between my teeth as an insane level of heat washed through me, so fast that I had to grip the windowsill to steady myself. I was standing there in nothing but my sheer nightdress, the one I always slept in, yet felt too much right now.

I should have been writing. Hell, my editor called by 6 am to ask for an update on my next book. Yet, I was pressing my body against the window, a shaky breath escaping my lips, staring into his apartment like a possessed woman.

My imagination worked perfectly in moments like these, helped by the steady sway of the curtains in an unmistakable rhythm. I could see it perfectly in my head. Her wild hair fell around her face. It had to be blonde.

“Fuck!” His voice again, quieter this time, like he was reaching his climax. I squeezed my thighs together just like Poppy from the book. Because he sounded closer, like he was right in front of me instead of across the street.

I felt parched, and I tried to swallow. But I could do nothing about the sounds. God, he sounded good. Way too good.

And then—

"Harder baby, harder."

That raspy breath. He was panting now, and I knew that he probably had one hand on her waist, guiding her impossibly closer. The image was so vivid that I could feel his body heat against mine. I could hear him in my ears.

"Oh , fuck.”

He moaned out loud.

I pried myself away from the window to face my disarranged living room with littered manuscripts and empty coffee mugs. But it felt like I was still glued to them to him.

I picked up the book again. Big mistake.

The priest had Poppy, the main character, bent over the kitchen counter now, her bare ass in the air and his mouth working unholy things. His hands covered every inch of her, like he was trying to imprint himself.

The book fell from my hands a second time.

It had been two years since my ex-boyfriend walked away without an explanation. Two years since a man had touched me the way I wanted.

Two years of writing about romance and thrill that I couldn’t feel.

I couldn't take it anymore.

A bland laughter falls from my lips. This was what I’d been reduced to. And I didn’t care one bit right now. My dildo was right there under the shelf. Don’t judge me. I was the girl whose boyfriend had vanished into thin air.

I didn’t think twice, grabbing it before returning to the window. I grabbed a high stool, pulling it to the center, directly in the morning light, and then plopped down on it. My hands quivered as I parted my legs slowly.

I pulled the high stool to the center, positioned it directly in the morning light, and sat down. My hands were shaking as I spread my legs slowly, deliberately.

It wasn’t hard to listen in. I heard him again.

"You are so tight . Damn!"

Oh God.

My dainty fingers inched up my inner thighs, and I leaned back into the stool, closing my eyes. I imagined that I was the blonde-haired girl, pressed against the white wall, Spanish whispered all around me.

Clicking the dildo on, I waited for the soft purr. It shot down my spine greedily, like a tenth glass of wine on a heady night.

“Ahhh,” he moaned at the same time that I did.

My limbs quivered in slow motion. I moved my hand in and out, slow strides, but it wasn’t enough. I wanted more. So I moved slowly, my hip meeting every movement, the chair creaking underneath me.

My breathing grew more erratic. The sounds from across the street grew louder. At least they had each other. But there was I, alone by my window, chasing the same thing.

I stroke myself through my damp panties first, teasing, making myself want, wait, need. Across the street, her moans had inched higher. I could taste the passion. His low grunts were so masculine, so rude, that I could feel them vibrate through my bones.

I couldn’t wait anymore, so I pushed my pants aside slowly, the action making me clench. My back arched off the chair, and I trapped my bottom lip between my teeth to keep myself from crying out loud.

I eased it inside slowly, and my back arched off the chair instantly. I bit down on my lip to keep from crying out as heat spread through me, as my body clenched around it, as every nerve ending screamed for more.

I heard my pulse straight down in my clit, and my body screamed for more.

"Ahh," he moaned at the exact same moment I did.

My limbs started shaking. I moved my hand slowly at first—in, out, in—but it wasn't enough. I needed more. I started rocking with the rhythm, the chair creaking underneath me, my breathing ragged and uneven.

My breathing grew more erratic. The sounds from across the street grew louder. At least they had each other. But there was I, alone by my window, chasing the same thing.

“Fuck!” I threw my head back as the first wave hit. My core clenched so hard that I felt it in every inch of my body. My pink lips were parted, and my fingers were scratching into the wood of the stool. It felt like the gates of paradise were opened to me.

When I finally came back to myself, the dildo was still inside me, and my body pulsed in the aftermath of one of the greatest orgasms I’d ever had. But there was something else.

I couldn’t hear them anymore, and the silence was just too loud.

I lifted my head slowly when I first felt it. That feeling like someone was watching me. And there he was.

The neighbor I had actually never met, but whose voice had made me whip out a dildo.

He was standing at his window, so tall that I could tell he towered over more than half the people he knew. Dark curls fell into his eyes, and blank ink swirled around his arms. I couldn’t make out the drawings, but then again, I was too stunned to.

He was completely shirtless, holding a steaming mug of coffee in one hand.

And his eyes were directly on me.

Oh Jesus!

Nothing about his expression changed. He didn’t even look shocked or embarrassed. He just stared at me. That knowing look, like he’d been standing there the entire time.

Humiliation washed through me so intensely that I thought I might be sick. I should have moved, maybe pulled away, and closed the blinds.

Pretended that this never happened.

But I was just stuck there. Perhaps it was something in the way he looked at me. Completely shameless and magnetic. Behind him, a blonde woman sauntered into view. I was right. Very blonde.

Her naked curves filled my view as she wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed herself against his back. His eyes never left mine.

And then, slowly, his lips quivered into a smirk.

Fuck!

I pulled myself away from the window and pushed the blinds so hard that they rattled the frame. The dildo fell from my shaky hands to the ground in a clatter. My hands were shaking so hard that I couldn’t breathe.

What the hell just happened?

I stood there by the side of the stool for a full minute, trying to calm my raging breath, to process what I’d just done. What my neighbour had seen.

The shrill of my phone on the coffee table made me jump. My head darted around until I found it.

Crossing the space, I hit the message icon just to get myself to do something other than think about my current situation.

“Daisy, I need that first chapter by Friday, or we’re postponing the release. Don’t make me beg.”

My eyes strayed from the message to my laptop sitting open on the couch, and then, back to the blinds hiding the man who’d just witnessed the most humiliating moment of my life.

At least, now I have inspiration.

Grabbing my laptop, I plopped down onto the couch and started working, the words coming easier than they had in months. Maybe even years.

“She heard him before she saw him. The sound of unfiltered pleasure snaking in through the walls like a silent invitation she couldn’t say no to.”

My hands never left the keyboard for the next three hours. I wrote until there were ten pages of the filthiest yet most honest erotica I’d ever put out. The main character, who was a writer, had a neighbour who fucked like he was auditioning for a lead role in an X-rated movie.

She couldn’t stop listening to him, nor could she stop imagining those large hands….

By noon, I had twenty pages already and a small problem.

I had written the whole manuscript with my neighbour as the male lead, and I had no idea what I was going to do about it. No one would catch on, right? I mean, that was literally impossible.

My phone vibrated again. I angled my head when I saw that the text was from an unknown number.

“Enjoy the show?”

I froze.

It couldn’t be. There was no way. I mean, he didn’t even have my number. We had never spoken before.

Another message slid in.

“Your blinds are closed. Shame. I was enjoying the view.”

Oh God!

I took in a deep breath, conscious of the fact that it did nothing to calm me down, and then typed back.

“Who is this?”

The reply came in a second.

“Your neighbour. The one you were thinking about five hours ago. And probably right now.”

I dropped the phone like it was a grenade.

He knew.

And he was fucking texting me about it.