Theo stopped in the circular driveway just to gaze in wonder at the great house. He had seen it from afar when he met with the estate owner, Calvin Brooke, to sign the lease to rent the caretaker's cottage for the summer. It had looked immense from that vantage point, but it was hugely more impressive as he approached the colonnaded porch.
He was a professor of literature at the state university and hoped that a summer in the cottage would provide the time and place for him to finally finish the novel he'd been pecking away at for four years. His first book had been a critical, but not a commercial, success, and he thought this next story might be more appealing to a wide audience.
He shook his head, climbed the stairs and rang the bell. He took a step back when the giant door swung open and revealed a young woman with a ribbon in her hair and wearing a short black skirt and sneakers. And nothing else.
"Are you Theodore?" she asked. Her smile was warm and full a bright white teeth. Her blue eyes captured his full attention, once he lifted his gaze from her bare chest.
"Yes, I'm Theo. Theodore Chandler. I'm here to see Mr. Brooke."
"We've been expecting you," she said, stepping forward. "I'm Stephanie, one of the maids." She threw her arms around Theo's neck, pressed her breasts against him and gave him a loud smack on the cheek. "Welcome to Brooke Manor."
"Theo! You're here. Good." Calvin Brooke strode across the vast entryway to greet his tenant. He was a robust 59-year-old who looked 20 years younger in the swimsuit and sandals he wore. Stephanie stepped aside and let the men shake hands.
"Thanks, Stephanie, for welcoming Theo to our home. Please let Rose know he's here."
"Sure thing, boss," the maid said as she slipped by him into the house. He patted her ass as she passed. She turned in mock horror. "Mr. Brooke! Why I've a mind to report you to the missus." She smiled at Theo. "The missus would just wonder why he didn't grab a titty too." She laughed. "You're a dirty old man, sir," she said, addressing Brooke again.
"I am not too old, young lady, to give you a lesson you'll never forget. Now, swing that sweet ass into the sitting room and tell Rose our company is here."
She murmured, "Promises, promises," and wiggled her ass delightedly as she hustled into the house.
"C'mon in, Theo," Brooke said, wrapping his arm around Theo's shoulders and ushering him into the mansion as if he were his oldest pal. "That little filly drives me nuts, and she knows it. But will she let me between her legs? Not a chance in hell. Maybe you'll have better luck this summer."
Theo saw Stephanie and another bare-breasted maid, later identified as Keri, scurrying across foyer. When they were about to enter one of the hallways off it, Stephanie spun around and lifted her short skirt to reveal her bare ass. Keri raised the front of her skirt to display her full, dark bush. They giggled and then actually skipped away, holding hands.
"Uh, your maids' uniforms are quite alluring," Theo said.
"For the record, they may wear as much or as little clothing as they like," Brooke said. "Those two tarts, bless their souls, pull stunts like that just to tease me. All I really care about is that they do their jobs. And they do, with ease and efficiency. This way, I'll introduce you to my wife and sister."
They turned in the opposite direction than the two maids had taken and soon entered a rather cozy sitting room. Two women there stood and smiled at them. Theo recognized that, given their relationships to Brooke, that they must be in their 50s. But they looked much younger. And they, too, were bare breasted.
They were a little chunkier than they probably would have liked. But their faces were unlined, their eyes gleamed, their breasts sagged only slightly and they hips appeared firm, their legs slim.
"Rose, Clara, please say hello to professor Theodore Crandall, our new friend who will be staying in the cottage this summer," Brooke said. "Theo, this is my wife, Rose, and my sister, Clara."
The women bypassed Theo's outstretched hand and hugged him, just as Stephanie had done. This is certainly a very friendly household, he thought. The women didn't seem to feel at all self-conscious about pressing their bare breasts against a total stranger.
"We're pleased you're here, Theo," Rose said. "I've asked Stephanie and Keri to get us some refreshments before lunch. Please have a seat."
Brooke interjected, "I thought, dear, that I might give Theo a quick look around first. That is, if you don't mind."
"Okay, dear. By all means, make sure the professor feels quite at home here. We'll be waiting for you here," Rose said.
They passed several rooms that appeared to have no particular purpose other than affording the family more space to spread out.
"Since you're a writer and literature teacher, I want to show you our library first," Brooke said. "I'm very proud of it. We have more than 8,000 volumes -- fiction, history, science, philosophy, biographies and autobiographies. We have the complete works of William Shakespeare and John Le Carre, for instance. We have Jane Austen and Margaret Atwood. We have children's books, young adult novels. Here we are."
The library was impressive, indeed. It was 30 feet wide and 40 feet long. It had floor to ceiling shelves on its inner walls and three-foot high shelves under banks of windows on the outside wall.
But what drew Theo's eye was the couple sitting on opposite sides of small table, hunched over a chess board. They were naked.
"Theo, this is my eldest son, Mac, short for Malcolm. And Becky, short for Rebecca. Mac, Becky, this is Theo Chandler, noted author and professor. He's with us for the summer in the cottage."
The pair rose from their match and met Theo and Brooke in the middle of the library. Mac shook Theo's hand, but Becky -- this no longer surprised him -- gave him a bear hug of a welcome.
"It's so nice of you to join us," Becky said. She kissed him lightly on the cheek. "Sometimes we get starved for intellectual conversation around here, so having you with us should stimulate some interesting debates."
"I hope I can contribute," Theo said. "And if you're looking for an easy mark at chess, I'm you're man."
They all laughed.
"I'm sure that's not true, but I'll take you up on the challenge of a game sometime soon," she said.
"I'll look forward to that."