Chapter 35
O nce he took the telephone from Trevor, Jude couldn’t keep pace with the rate his world turned. His head spun as he crouched so Louise could share the receiver, both their hands shaking as they clutched it, and Jude managed a total of one word.
“Dad?”
He sounded all of eight-years-old at that moment, his voice reedy and unbroken only to crack like a teenager’s as soon as his father responded.
“Jude.”
His dad’s voice was just as he remembered, that single word conveying what Jude felt too in that moment—relief so pure it hurt to hear it.
Him saying any more was redundant; Jude heard everything he needed, his dad still alive and breathing.
Just a few more words could make this phone call perfect, which his dad promptly delivered.
“Your mum wants a word.”
Susan quizzed him later, but it was hard to remember what his mum had said, the Anchor’s bar crammed with friends and strangers sharing a spontaneous party.
Even the guy from the car lot appeared as if their good news had crested the brow of Porthperrin’s steep hill, their joy a rising tide that showed no sign of ebbing.
Luckily, Louise didn’t seem half as fazed as Jude still did, hours after taking that life-changing phone call.
She repeated everything Jude had heard, summarising what their mum had asked of them both. “She wants us to come and get them.”
“Of course she does, pet. And don’t either of you worry about this place. We’ll all pitch in to help Rob.” Then Susan added, “And we’ll all pitch in with some cash to help you get there as well.”
That last remark was almost enough to shift Jude’s smile, one which hadn’t let up yet.
Paying for flights—two tickets out instead of one this time, and four for the return journey—would take more than a whip-round from friends and neighbours.
Jude ran through options, coming to financial dead-ends maybe as Louise had after the storm that winter, and like her, Jude’s thoughts drifted in Rob’s direction.
Perhaps he could think of a creative way to fly them both halfway around the world and back for next to nothing.
Jude scanned the bar, gaze shifting from table to table, half expecting to find Rob, smile blazing as it had since that call of what felt like seconds ago, but—Jude checked his watch—was hours now.
Instead, he finally glimpsed Rob as he headed outside with someone, the door closing between them and Jude just as they shook hands.
Trevor left then too, his hug before he went home to St Ives nearly tight enough to leave bruises.
For him, Jude at least managed two words. “Thank you.” It didn’t seem nearly enough.
Trevor didn’t agree. “It was nothing,” he insisted, his voice still a little shaky, almost drowned out by the revelry around them.
His embrace somehow lingered long after he let go, Jude’s breathing constricted by so much shared emotion that continued after Rob came back into the bar, expression pensive. It lightened as he met Jude’s gaze.
How could one look say so much, Jude wondered as Rob had his back clapped by more than one tipsy celebrator. How could that dark gaze he’d taken ages to trust now mean the whole world to him?
Rob maintained eye-contact as he skirted crowded tables, making his way across the room with purpose just as Jude decided that maybe those were questions for tomorrow, along with trying to figure out how to finance their flights.
Tonight wasn’t for worry. Tonight was living every moment to its fullest. Rob reached him just as Jude came to that conclusion.
His eyes widened as Jude followed through on his decision in the one place he never dreamed that he could.
He kissed Rob in full view of everyone in the Anchor’s main bar, and the world didn’t come to an end.
Not a soul seemed to notice, so Jude kissed him again.
They parted, Rob looking dazed and lovely.
He’d do anything to keep that expression on Rob’s face forever, although forever was a concept Jude still strained to picture.
Their future past the end of the summer was hazy as if sea mist obscured it, but Jude had one prayer granted already so he could work on another just as soon as he steered his parents home for good.
For now, he thanked everyone in the bar who added cash to a pint mug that was brimful by the time the church bell struck midnight, Marc and Louise the last to go home.
He carried it through to the office to count in the morning, thinking that Louise seemed happy enough to float up the hill rather than walk, only to find Rob closing the laptop, frowning.
“Thought I told you that it’s pointless trying to stream porn with our slow connection,” Jude teased, similar happiness to his sister’s maybe filling every vein in his body, heart pumping glee through arteries that felt full to bursting.
Rob didn’t answer, so Jude squinted. “Don’t tell me you were mooning over Guy Parsons’ byline picture again.
You know he’s as good as married.” At least that aroused a tired huff of laughter.
“You could look at me instead,” Jude offered, pulling off his T-shirt.
That caught Rob’s attention, his frown melting and his cheeks taking on more colour when Jude knelt between his knees to unfasten his jeans.
Jude paused before popping the last of Rob’s fly buttons.
“Or were you looking at hotel rooms in St Ives again? Silly when we’ve got a hotel of our own right here. ”
“Our own,” Rob said, looking pensive again, like earlier. “Until your mum and dad are back.” He added swiftly, “And thank God for that.”
Jude did pray to every deity he could recall as he tugged Rob’s jeans down, his cock firming with each kiss Jude laid on it.
Jude offered thanks for small miracles and big ones—for a shared bench at a cooking contest, for a storm that washed Rob back to him, and for another that shipwrecked his parents with all of the One for Luck’s provisions.
He licked away a jewelled bead of pre-come while counting more treasures, Rob top of a list that made him feel wealthy even if Jude’s bank account was empty.
What did money matter when he had all this?
Jude mapped a body he loved with every cell of his own, pressing that emotion in with his fingers, he hoped, as he took Rob into his mouth.
He’d go into debt for the rest of his life as long as he got to give this man pleasure.
“F-fuck,” Rob said not too long later. “Fuck, I’m close.”
Jude looked up to see Rob almost as undone as he felt, teeth digging into his lower lip and hips canting helplessly upwards, strain evident in his grip on the desk seat.
Jude blinked and Rob’s expression transformed in that split second, bliss lighting him from the inside, coming as Jude swallowed.
He sagged back, boneless, watching as Jude undid his own jeans to stroke himself off, only to take over, Rob mapping him just as Jude had—touching, stroking, exploring territory that was his for the taking.
He could have it all, Jude knew in a way that went soul-deep.
Rob might have signed an agreement with Louise, but he owned Jude’s heart, lock, stock, and barrel.
Jude woke the next morning to the sound of Louise screeching far louder than the seagulls roosting on the boatshed roof.
She flung open the door and shouted, “Pack!” She then noticed that her brother was virtually naked, along with Rob who yanked up a sheet of rainbow batik.
She clapped a hand over her eyes, then peeked through her fingers once they both were covered. “Okay, okay dress first! Then pack!”
Jude caught the duffle she threw at him. “Lou. What—?”
“Plane tickets!” She said like that was a full explanation, expanding when Jude didn’t immediately hurry. “They were in our email inbox this morning. Two each. The first from Newquay to Heathrow, then onwards. God, if Trevor was here right now, I’d kiss him.”
“Trevor?” Jude scrubbed at his face like rubbing sleep dust away might help make sense of his sister.
“Seriously, Jude. Will you hurry? Marc’s waiting to drive us.” She was gone before he could ask more questions.
“Well,” Rob said as he sat up. “You heard the woman.” His kiss on Jude’s shoulder was followed by a gentle shove.
“Better not keep her waiting.” The flurry of activity that followed was frantic, Jude too busy to do more than take the passport Rob passed through the open window of Marc’s car once he, Louise, and their hastily packed bags were in it.
“You’re not coming to see us off?” Jude motioned to the empty backseat beside him. “Marc’s car isn’t like Betsy, you know? It can fit four people.”
Rob winced as though Jude had said something painful instead of joking, but before Jude could ask why Rob leaned forward and brushed a quick kiss to his lips. “Someone’s got to run this place.” He blew a last kiss as they pulled away from the Anchor.
Jude replayed that final moment as they passed cottages that were starting to fill with tourists for the summer, wishing he could have swapped the last kiss Rob blew him for a real one as Marc’s four-wheel-drive made taking the steep incline easy.
Much easier than in Betsy, Jude mused. And as if summoned, there she was at the top of the hill, crimson paint gleaming as the guy from the car lot peered under her bonnet.
“I didn’t know there was something wrong with Rob’s car,” Louise said from the front seat, having noticed the same thing.
“Me either.” Although, maybe that did explain why he’d looked worried.
Jude turned to keep her in view until Marc pulled out to join the traffic.
Then he sat back as Marc accelerated and didn’t think about Betsy again until he was thirty-five thousand feet in the air, on the final leg of their journey.
High above landlocked mountains that resembled pond ripples rather than high peaks, Jude’s thoughts drifted.
It was hard to believe they’d already covered as much distance as it would take the Aphrodite days and days to travel.
Powerful jets instead of billowing sails transformed a return journey that Jude had dreaded making alone into a joy-filled sprint with his sister.
And it was joy that filled this cabin, he decided, joy turning each glance he exchanged with Lou jubilant, each breath into an exaltation; he’d never felt so buoyant.
Maybe Lou hadn’t either, if her constant smile was a metric, lifted like Jude from sorrow so deep it should have drowned them both already.
Smile still in place, Louise fingered the soft leather of her seat.
“I’ve never flown business class before.
” She stretched, relaxing into a seat Jude could never have afforded, and said, “I don’t know how we’ll ever pay Trevor back for the tickets, but I’m so glad he bought them.
Let’s face it, we had nothing left to sell to raise the money in a hurry. ”
Jude almost laughed at the thought of being able to do what Trevor must have, stealing away to purchase tickets online while the rest of them were still in shock and celebrating.
Then, for the first time in what felt like forever, Jude frowned.
“I’m not sure he could afford it either, to be honest.” Hadn’t Trevor mentioned that he still worked part-time to make ends meet?
“We’ll have to think of a way to repay him when we get back. Put Rob on the case,” Louise said, her eyelids drooping. “He’s good at solving problems.”
Something about what she said niggled. Jude mulled it over, tugging at mental loose ends as Louise slept.
Trevor mentioning that he didn’t have much of a pension….
Rob shaking hands with someone as though they’d come to an agreement….
None of them had anything left of any value to sell, apart from…
Jude suddenly sat upright. “Oh, no.”
Apart from Betsy.