[00:00:00] Welcome to Dark Honey, where we share spicy short stories for adults. Escape inside a world of romance and fantasy while you close your eyes, relax, and listen to the next episode.

I always forget how small the house is until I come back. The cottage sits between two towering vacation homes like a stubborn seashell that refused to be washed away by the tide. On one side, walls of glass rise three stories above the dunes.

On the other, pale stone and steel stretch toward the sky with the confidence of money. Then there's ours. White shingles faded silver by salt air, a crooked widow's walk, the same blue front door my great-grandmother painted herself. The developers tried for decades to buy it. They offered money that could have changed [00:01:00] lives.

My great-grandparents refused every offer. Some old legal protection attached to the property kept the house safe. As long as ownership remained within the family, no one could touch it. No bulldozers, no luxury condos, no swimming pools carved into the dunes. Just this little cottage, a relic surrounded by monuments to wealth.

I loved it for exactly that reason. The moment I stepped out of my car, I breathed in the scent of salt and sun-warmed wood. The ocean was only a short walk beyond the dunes. I could hear the waves rolling onto shore, steady and familiar. For the first time in months, my shoulders loosened. No deadlines or meetings or phone calls, Just summer break and an entire week alone at the cottage. I carried my bags inside and dropped them onto the worn hardwood floor. The house creaked in greeting. "Miss me?" I asked aloud. The empty rooms offered no answer.

[00:02:00] Still, I smiled because somehow it felt like home was answering anyway. The next morning, I woke early. The sunlight pouring through my bedroom window carried that particular coastal brightness that made everything look cleaner than it really was.

I brewed coffee, grabbed the novel I'd been saving, and stepped out onto the back deck, and immediately forgot all about reading. A man was standing in the yard next door. I froze. The house beside ours had been completed sometime last year. I hadn't visited since construction ended.

Apparently, someone actually lived there now. He stood barefoot on a stone patio, tall with broad shoulders, lean in the way often swimmers were. His dark hair moved slightly in the breeze as he flowed through a yoga sequence, slow, controlled, every movement precise.

Warrior II, triangle pose, tree [00:03:00] pose. With every pose, I noticed new muscles rippling on his body. I should have looked away, but his downward dog changed my mind. Instead, I lowered myself into a chair and watched over the rim of my coffee mug, purely out of curiosity. That's what I told myself. He moved through another pose, and

the muscles in his arms shifted beneath golden skin. The morning sun highlighted the lines of his body like an artist sketching shadows. Definitely curiosity. Nothing else. Absolutely nothing else. Three days later, I knew his schedule, which was embarrassing, and perhaps a little concerning.

Every morning, he practiced yoga, and every afternoon, he swam laps in the pool that stretched behind his house. He glided through the pool like an Olympic swimmer. Every evening, he sat outside with a book, always alone.

I looked for evidence of a girlfriend [00:04:00] or boyfriend, but determined that he was single. I didn't even know his name. I only knew that he was Asian and loved to work out and was very disciplined. I didn't think I could ever achieve the level of discipline that I observed from my sexy neighbor. Yet somehow, I found myself timing my own routine around his.

I'd bring my book outside just before his yoga session, coincidentally. I'd linger on the deck during his swim entirely by accident. I was a grown woman in her thirties, not a teenager spying on a crush. Unfortunately, my behavior suggested otherwise. The worst part? He was beautiful. Not movie star, manufactured beautiful, but something more intense.

His fit body was only second to the hint of danger looming below the surface of his face. The kind of attractiveness that became stronger the longer you looked. Like discovering details in a [00:05:00] painting, one glance just wasn't enough. I found myself wondering what his voice sounded like, which felt ridiculous considering I'd never spoken to him The disaster happened on Thursday.

I was sitting on the deck watching him swim again. My book remained open on my lap, unread as usual. The man reached the far end of the pool and turned. Water streamed across his body.

I should have looked away. Instead, I stared lost in the trance of my sexy neighbor's strong arms and shoulders, and that was the exact moment he lifted his head. Our eyes met. My entire body locked, and as much as I tried to peel my eyes away, I couldn't. The distance between our properties suddenly felt much shorter.

His expression didn't change. He simply looked at me for one impossible second, two, then three. Heat rushed onto my [00:06:00] face. Then finally, I dropped my gaze toward my book, as though pretending to read could somehow erase the last week. When I finally dared another glance, he was still looking, then something unexpected happened.

He nodded, a small, gentle acknowledgment. Then he resumed swimming. Meanwhile, I considered throwing myself directly into the ocean. The knock came later that afternoon. I wasn't expecting visitors. Nobody ever visited the cottage, and I couldn't think of anything I ordered.

I opened the door and nearly forgot how breathing worked. It was him. He was dressed in emerald slacks with a linen button-down shirt. He looked effortlessly handsome as he stepped straight out of GQ. His skin looked impossibly smooth. Black wire-rimmed glasses framed dark, intelligent eyes, and his mouth, God,

his lips were soft and full enough to [00:07:00] belong in a sculpture. For a second, I simply stared, then I remembered basic social behavior. "Hi." Truly masterful conversation. His smile appeared, small, warm. "My apologies for interrupting." His voice was deep and smooth, like dark tea poured slowly into a cup. "I live next door," as though I hadn't spent a week cataloging every detail about him.

He lifted a large wicker basket, artisan breads, cheeses, a bottle of wine nestled between linen napkins. "A welcome gift." "Oh." I blinked. I was so flabbergasted that I didn't wanna tell him that I'd been coming here for years. "That's incredibly kind." He extended the basket towards me with both hands, and I reached for it.

Our fingers brushed just barely, a tiny accidental touch, yet something strange moved through me, like a spark [00:08:00] finding dry tinder. His eyes flickered toward mine. My lips parted slightly. For one suspended moment, neither of us moved. Then he stepped back almost abruptly.

"As I said," he murmured, "welcome." I tightened my grip on the basket. "Thank you." His smile returned, brief, controlled. Then he nodded once. "I should go." And just like that, he turned and walked away, leaving me standing in the doorway, completely bewildered. The basket sat on my kitchen table, not because I needed bread or wine or cheese, but because looking at it reminded me of him, which was ridiculous.

I knew almost nothing about my neighbor, except that his presence seemed to occupy more and more space inside my thoughts. I finally learned his name, Min-Joon. He left it on the card with the basket. Min-Joon. The name suited [00:09:00] him, elegant, strong, mysterious.

Monday afternoon arrived warm and bright. I spent most of the day trying and failing to focus on my book. Eventually, I snapped it shut. Enough. This has become absurd. I was obsessing over a man I'd spoken to for less than three minutes. A handsome man, a perfectly dressed man, a fascinating man, a man with muscles that didn't quit, But still, just a man. I stood and looked toward the neighboring house, then toward the path leading between our properties. Before I could change my mind, I started walking. I had no plan, but I felt like a magnet being led by a pull that I couldn't explain. The closer I got, the larger the house seemed.

Glass reflected the sunlight. Palm grasses shifted in the breeze. My heart beat harder with every step. Why was I nervous? I was simply introducing [00:10:00] myself like a normal person. Normal people did this all the time. They certainly didn't spend an entire week watching someone do yoga. I reached the front door, took a breath, and knocked.

Nothing. Then the door slowly drifted inward, unlocked, already opened. I hesitated. "Hello?" No answer. The ocean murmured somewhere beyond the house. A faint splash echoed from deeper inside. Curiosity pulled me forward. I pushed the door wider and stepped inside. The house was cool, quiet, beautiful.

Then I looked up and let out a soft gasp.

Thanks for listening to Dark Honey. To listen to full episodes, become a Dark Honey member at darkhoney.supercast.com. And don't forget, new episodes are published [00:11:00] every week