Chapter 2

Beth couldn't remember when she'd been more uptight, unless it was at her junior prom when her aunt had been chaperone-in- charge, and she'd dated a senior with a reputation of being the coolest, swingingest guy in school! He'd had to drive her home in his father's car with her aunt in the back seat, and the entire way Beth had breathlessly tried to restrain his hot, young hand secretly smoothing up and down her trembling inner thigh for fear Aunt Zelda would get wise and lay an egg right there! And that had been that! He'd never asked her out again! Somehow, this seemed like a repeat performance of that disastrous night!

At the moment, her doting husband, in the most unconventional garb his blatant taste could imagine, was guiding her along the walkways of Edgemont Heights shopping center. Not that there were any fashion-plates in the area, and not that she gave a damn what other people thought, but a pith-helmet, shooting jacket, and bedroom slippers... ? And worse, he was sure as the devil about to louse up her vampish little scheme! He had all intentions of accompanying her into Stan Wilson's store and trying on shoes, boots, whatever it was, dumping his big frame right in the seat beside her, and how could she do one damned thing?

Blast it! If only there was some other way of getting to know their neighbors better... at a party, perhaps... She felt certain she could manage it all nicely from there. Last Sunday, in her white, skin-tight shorts and a tiny halter, she'd purposely gone out to putter around the yard, work which she wouldn't even consider if Sara Wilson hadn't set the pace, and knowing that Jay ogled the vivacious brunette in her usual bikini as if she were an exotic dancer. At first, Beth hadn't been sure the handsome Mr. Wilson was seeing her out there doing her exaggerated stoopings and squattings, antics that bordered on the obscene, but she had finally glanced up to catch him watching her from a bedroom window. He'd smiled and waved, and for two days she'd lived on that...

"Here we are, baby," Jay gratingly crunched her thoughts, leading her into Wilson's Shoe Salon. "Have at it, hon! Just turn yourself loose. Your lover-man feels like indulging you!"

Beth moved away from him, tripping silently along the strip of carpeting in front of the empty chairs. Indulging you, she inwardly repeated, incensed. More of his jargon shit! Damn, she could throttle him for tagging along with her! She casually looked around, working to keep her rage from showing. At least, the store was empty of customers... clerks too, for that matter. and that pleased her. She'd planned to ask for Mr. Wilson anyway; that is, before her lover-man decided to escort her...

Her blood-pressure quickened when with a handsome smile, the thirtyish, tall and broad shouldered Wilson himself appeared from the back room. Little twinges of lurid excitement immediately stirred in the depths of her belly at the way he carried himself; but there was something else in her belly - an apprehensive knot forming there too. God... she could never go through with it, even if Jay wasn't with her! Imagining such lurid scenes was one thing, but when it came right down to the nitty-gritty... ?

"Well, hello neighbors! Nice to see you! Won't you have a seat and let's see if we can help you?" Stan Wilson suavely beamed, dollar-bill signs almost clicking in his eyeballs, Beth thought, but she hardly cared. Lord, he was handsome! "Who can we make happy?"

"The little wife, Stan," she heard her boisterous husband say, using their neighbor's first name as if they'd known him for years, and adding a gruff little laugh. "Poor kid needs some foot-wear... and why not, on the end of those legs, eh?"

Beth cringed with embarrassment as Stan drew up his stool, still smiling toward her husband, an obvious starchiness in the expression. Oh, why didn't that asshole keep his big, blowhard mouth shut? She crossed her legs, presenting her right foot.

"What did you have in mind, milady?" her gentlemanly neighbor softly questioned, gazing up at her with deep, dark eyes, the trace of a smile flickering about his attractive mouth, as with seemingly super-sensitive hands, he removed her shoe.

"Oh... something in a sandal, maybe. Black and with platform heel... though I'm not sure," she quickly added, reluctant to discard her original baiting temptation, and the longer she sat there trying on shoes, perhaps...

"Aahh... we have a sharp new sandal that's all the rage this season, Mrs. Durke," he said, agilely swinging up and away.

"Come on now, Stan, you guys should call us by first name, seeing we're neighbors, right?" Jay mouthed after him. "She's Beth and I'm Jay. You're Stan and your wife's name's Sara, isn't it?"

"Yes... that's right. Sara and Stan."

"So... ? Seeing we live right across the street from each other, let's get better acquainted?" the nearly exasperated young wife's middle-aged husband continued, winking at her. "First names from now on, right?"

"Why not?" Stan Wilson coolly answered, pulling boxes from tiers.

"You're a shop keeper and I'm an author," Jay said, his choice of titles mortifying Beth. "... Or maybe you didn't know that," her husband grinningly went on as their neighbor returned to seat himself on the stool. "Did you?"

"I... ah... never gave it much thought, to tell you the truth," the wavy haired, handsome man almost icily replied, taking the shoe from its box.

"I understand. You got your daily grind... not much time to think about what other people do. I know what it is. I was in the old selling game myself for awhile... grueling contest. But those days are gone, now... just the creative art when the spirit moves me. Beth, here, does all my final work for me, when I'm not chasing her around the desk... if you get what I mean, Stan..."

She wanted to kill him right there! Dumping a shovelful of white-hot coals into his lying mouth would have served the purpose, Beth thought, utter rage shamefully scathing her insides. Goddamn him, she tremblingly seethed, intentionally uncrossing her nylon-sheathed legs to let their neighbor fit her foot into the shoe!

"H-How... How's that feel?" the dark-eyed shoe salesman stammered, letting her know that he'd caught his first glimpse of what she'd originally come prepared to show him.

"Hmmmmm..." She gained her feet, taking several observing steps on the carpet. They were absolutely ugly! But that had nothing to do with it. He'd looked right up between her legs for a brief moment, and she well knew what he could see through the snug fit of those sheer, nylon panties! Her pubic curls... the very crevice of her pink-fleshed pussy, itself... ! "No... no, I don't think so. These aren't what I had in mind..."

"We have many more sandals, Mrs. - Beth," he lumpishly got out, his beautiful Adam's apple bobbing in his throat. "S-Shall we try on a few?"

"Sure, give 'em all the once over, baby," Jay butted in. "Hell, might better throw our business to old Stan here, than take it to L. A., right?" He leaned back, lighting a cigar. "Fella's got to sweat today to make it, eh Stan?"

Ignoring her coarse husband, Wilson said in a tone that trembled enough for her to feel its sensuous vibrations: "Let's try this one, Beth... ?"

The alluringly dressed young wife tossed her long blonde hair in a characteristic gesture, then swept it back over her shoulders. The act, she was well aware, had made her braless, ripely full breasts ripple in provocative freedom. She was hardly conscious of her husband's presence, and could barely contain the smile she felt tugging at her wetly parted lips at her handsome neighbor's visible uneasiness. It registered that he must enjoy many sensual panoramas from his strategic position, and she was suddenly determined that none would be more equal to the bird's- eye view than that she would shortly offer him!

At the moment, while his perceptive hands were skillfully removing and replacing the shoe, her eyes were drawn to the short, black masculine hair lightly enshadowing their backs, a sensory shiver dancing up her spine. She leaned forward then, supposedly observing the sandal, coyly spreading her thighs, but not without a certain gracefulness.

"Mmmmm... I think I like this better... but the heel isn't exactly what I wanted," she said, pretending to study it, but from the corner of her eye she saw the lusty gleam leap into his deep, dark ones as they flitted back and forth, overly lingering each time they focused up between her legs.

"That's a damn good looking shoe on you, baby," Jay commented, hanging a stenchy cloud of thick smoke over them with his puffings. "Not every doll could show it off like you, right Stan?"

"T-True," their handsome neighbor stammered, dragging his eyes from her to briefly glance at her stretched out husband. She almost heard his eyeballs snapping back, then he lowered his head as if studying the fit, his gentle fingers feeling around her instep, but Beth wasn't fooled. While his broad brow hid the recess of his eyes, she knew he was straining them damned near out of their sockets to feast on the luring, nylon-misted revelation of her most intimate secret. "W-Would you like to try on the other... Beth?"

"Oooohh... yes, I think so."

He fumbled, dropped, retrieved and managed. Almost pathetically, he looked up then to catch her suggestive little smile of understanding. She stood, moving around him to pace the carpet.

"They look great, hon," Jay said. "You like 'em?"

"Yes... I think so, but this one you just put on seems to have something sticking up into my foot," the voluptuous blonde wife lied, re-seating herself. One more little fleeting peek for him, and the next move was his.

"Ooohh... ? Well, let's have a look at that," Stan eagerly replied, dropping to his knees to remove it, but with head definitely bowed, almost as if he couldn't weather another dose of her voluptuously presented charms.

Beth was delighted! She'd reached him, all right! In fact, she'd wager that the slight bulge in the front of his trousers he was uncomfortably trying to conceal wasn't perpetual. She watched him smooth his hand over the insole, slowly rising from his kneeling position and saying something about 'when they came off the last... '

"Easily taken care of, Mrs. - Beth... if you like them," he unsteadily faltered, his avid dark eyes devouring her.

Damn, she sure had reached him, and in grand style! "Yes... I think I'll take them, if you can do something about that... whatever it is?"

"Of course... yes... well, it won't take a minute," he went on, his handsome face and eyes caught up in an expression of complete confusion. "I-I just have to put it on the workbench I have in back and give it a few taps... Y-You can watch if you like..."