Chapter Thirteen
I'd always looked at my brother at an annoyance in my life. A speck on the couch that I ignored so he could tease me and appear cool in front of his friends, even though I was always the cool one.
He wasn't the classic big brother that every girl seems to have in the movies. We never baked cookies together or laughed about our differences.
No, I had a brother that did nothing but piss me off.
Apparently when I was born he threw a fit in the hospital and our dad had to take him outside, driving him home when he wouldn't settle down. My mother had just given birth and we were left to fend for ourselves.
My earliest memory is Matt pulling on my pigtails so hard that he made my eyes water. I'd cried and smacked him as hard as a four year old could manage, and mum had shouted at us both despite it being completely his fault.
When I started year 4 he got an older boy, one of his friends, to kick a football at me across the school yard. Everyone got in trouble for that one, too; the school nurse worried I had a concussion.
I finally began making friends in secondary school so he backed off. Where he got into STEM subjects, I got into hanging out at parks and pretending to have sleepovers to drink in fields.
Once puberty hit I became an annoyance to him as well.
All the years of Matt teasing and being mean in childhood had built up in my little fists.
I started arguing back, giving our mother a headache that didn't leave until Matt left for college.
I embarrassed him in front of our family whenever I could - one Christmas I convinced a room full of people that I'd caught him kissing his study buddy and for two years they tried to gently ease him out of the closet.
I can't help but feel like this is payback.
Matt devised a plan; have Noah drop me off at Sara's early so we girls can get ready together, and speak to Skye as we do our make-up and drink cocktails. He gave me more pointers about it in the car on the way over, to my dismay.
I know that now is when I should start 'the talk'.
We're almost ready, Sara and Skye have been trying to involve me in their gossiping even though I don't know any of their other friends. We've had two cocktails each so we're loose, and Skye seems happy and smiling, but I just don't want to.
I don't want to ruin her evening, or make her hate me before we've even gotten to know each other.
Screw Matt for making me do this.
I glance at myself in a vanity mirror as they giggle about a message Sara just received behind me. My long ginger hair is in loose curls thanks to Sara's new curling wand and it looks soft, silky, shiny - nothing like the usual frizzy mess I'm used to.
A light dusting of brown eyeshadow rests on my eyelids, matching the contour Skye had helped me perfect. I think of Chelsea as I apply lip gloss.
"Are you wearing that tonight?" Sara asks from her wardrobe. I turn towards her, noticing Skye sat on the bed in shorts and her bra, straightening the last few pieces of her short blonde hair.
My jeans and t-shirt combo suddenly make me feel under-dressed with all the effort we've put into our hair and make-up. I nod, feeling weary at the smile that lights up her face.
"Because we could be really dressy..." She bites her lip. Skye groans from the bed. Suddenly hangers click together and there's a rustling that fills my stomach with dread.
Jumping up and down on the tip of her toes, she leans back out of the wardrobe and holds up three near-identical dresses; the only difference being the colour of each one.
"I really like this style," she tells us.
She holds the black one up to her body, giving us both an extended look in turn, one eyebrow raised.
It does look beautiful, with it's satin fabric and a cinch across the left-hand side of the lower half that tells me it'll cling to her body like a second skin.
Skye makes grabby hands and she looks between the remaining colours before handing her the red one. The dress I'm handed is a deep emerald green that slinks between my fingers.
"This is too much," I tell them.
"Not if you want to draw someone's attention," she winks at Skye, which is definitely my cue.
I should take it. I should begin talking about Matt immediately because that's the only opportunity that's presented itself all evening, but as she smiles softly at the dress I can't bring myself to do it.
Matt is an asshole, I think to myself. He's ruining game night for me.
Instead of ruining Skye's evening too, I lift my t-shirt over my head and slip into the satin as the other girls do. As I pull it down my body, I undo my jeans and wriggle out of them. It clings to me.
I trail my finger along the spaghetti straps over my shoulders, across the straight line of fabric that sits right at the top of my breasts, down to the dip of my waist and over the curves of my hips.
One of my thighs is exposed, milky against the green slit that starts at the end of the cinched fabric on the left-hand side.
The slit is higher on my body than it probably should be, releasing almost the entirety of my left leg to the warm air in the room.
Thank the stars that I shaved my legs in the shower before coming here tonight.
"We look hot," Skye murmurs, appearing next to me in the mirror, hands running over herself too. "Green looks so amazing on your skin."
"We can't wear these to a game night," I say to them both, frowning, because we do look incredible. "It's too much."
Sara appears in the mirror too, her own dress clinging to her body. We look as if we're ready for a high class party, with masquerade masks and all.
"You're right," Sara agrees. "Let's book a table for dinner somewhere. The six of us."
"Dinner?"
"I'll book us a table at that high-end tapas place. Can you two call the guys?"
Skye and I nod, watching as Sara types on her phone and disappears out of the room, gently closing the door behind her. Another chance - one that I'm too chicken to take. How can I warn this girl off my brother when I don't even really know her?
"I'll call Matt and Noah?" I offer.
She laughs, holds her up phone that displays Dan's number, and then disappears into the en-suite. I juggle through my bag for my phone, hovering over Matt's number. A groan leaves my lips.
He's definitely going to be expecting an update on the Skye situation. An update that I can't give because the task he's given me is impossible to complete delicately, and I'm not the type to run around butting into the lives of other women.
Without a second thought I click on Noah's contact, pressing call, holding the phone against my ear.
It rings twice, thrice, and then-
"You alright?"
His voice is heaven on the phone. Rough sounding, as if he's just woke up despite it being eight in the evening. Dripping with arousal even though he's probably doing something mundane, like sitting in his room waiting for Matt to finish combing back his quiff.
"We're going out for dinner," I explain.
"You and me?" His voice is shrouded in amusement. "I think a certain someone might disapprove."
"The six of us, you asshole." I scoff. "Sara is making the reservation at a high-end place, so wear something nice - if you own anything other than gym clothes, that is."
"Are you wearing something nice?"
I eye the dress in the mirror. Sticking to me. Clinging to every bit of skin I own.
"I'm wearing..." I eye the slit that exposes most of my leg. "Something a little more than nice."
He's shuffling around. The clink of hangers is definitive as it comes through the phone line.
"Could you let Matt know as well?"
"I'll tell him now. Stay on the line."
I strain to listen to his bedroom door open and close again, picking at my nails while I wait for him to return.
Sara enters the room, giving me as big thumbs up as she discerns the phone pressed against my ear.
She sits at the vanity and picks out a fluffy brush from a collection sat in a mason jar.
With a new wave of blush on her cheeks, she lifts her hair up into a faux ponytail and drops it back down again. Then repeats.
"What time is our reservation?" Skye asks, appearing from the bathroom whilst putting in some earrings.
"In about an hour, I've ordered a cab so tell the boys to be here in forty-five minutes or we'll leave without them."
I don't know how I hear Noah's door click open again, but I register the sound as such. There's a scuffle, and then that lovely voice greets my ears once more.
"He asked if you've spoken to Skye yet?"
"It's not an easy ask," I respond, continuing to pick at my chipped nail polish with my thumb. "Our reservation is in an hour, so be here in forty-five minutes."
"How high-end are we talking?"
"Uh..." I shrug, look between our dresses again. "Suit trousers and a shirt. Dress shoes. Tame that thing you call hair."
"I'm not your Ken doll," he laughs. "You're lucky I went to a wedding last year. I hope the trousers still fit." More shuffling. A beat of silence. "Are you wearing a dress?"
"Yeah," I look down at said dress once more. "It's dark green."
Skye hands me another cocktail, head bobbing towards my phone in question. I notice that even Sara glances back at us. I accept the drink with a warm smile, taking a small sip as I listen to Noah continue to root through his wardrobe.
"What type of food will they have?"
"Tapas," I tell him. "Hurry up and get ready, will you?"
"You want me there that badly?"
Heat appears at my cheeks, a smile I can't suppress at my lips. I feel lucky that Skye and Sara are discussing shoe options instead of focusing on me, because they'd see how much I can't control myself around Noah when he says things like that to me. Things that he definitely shouldn't say.
"Shut up," I mutter, trying not to sound as flustered as I suddenly feel. "You still haven't told me your something embarrassing."
"We'll meet you at the restaurant."
"You're an asshole," I'm telling him, but the line goes dead as I say it. I huff and drop my arm to my side again, glancing at my outfit in the mirror once more.
I look hot. I'll admit it - I don't think I've ever owned a dress this nice, that looks this good on my body. I feel recharged, like there's energy surging through me that wasn't there before.
Usually during the week I'm exhausted from work. I am the typical person living for the weekend, counting down towards it each day of the week. I've cancelled plans because I felt exhausted, but sitting on Sara's bed on a Tuesday evening, I feel as if I haven't even been to work.
The never-ending to-do list in my head has vanished, and instead I'm living in the moment, drinking too much when I shouldn't be - I definitely should slow it down. I put my cocktail on her bedside table.
"Was that Matt?" Skye asks.
My stomach churns.
Her face is neutral enough, nothing giving away their 'on again, off again' nature that Matt alluded to. She takes a tentative sip of her martini.
"Matt is an asshole," I smile, easing into it. "But that was Noah."
They both look surprised, but neither say anything. Sara waits until Skye has turned back to the mirror to give me a knowing look, raising both of her eyebrows and pulling her lips down towards her chin.
"Really. Matt's an asshole," I find myself finally able to say.
Please don't ask me about Noah.
Both she and Skye turn to me in sync, giving me a certain undecipherable looks.
I realise how it must sound then, since I'm not just speaking to a girl who fancies my brother and her friend, but two of Matt's closest friends. Talking shit about him like they're my friends and not his.
"Not like that - he's a lovely brother... for the most part," I laugh, nervous under their combined stare. "I just think he can be a bit of a dick with girls, that's all."
Both Sara and I eye Skye, but she nods, saying nothing.
She smiles as if the warning doesn't even apply to her, so I consider my job done.
Screw you, Matt. That's the best you'll get out of me - I warned her, and we're done with that whole fiasco, even if it looks like it hasn't affected her whatsoever.
"He was like that in uni, too," Sara adds. "Bit of a lad."
"I don't understand him at all," I admit. "But he does whatever."
A wave of my hand and the conversation is over. Sara talks about that girl she met at the club, their progress in talking through a messenger app I've never heard of, and then leeway's into her coming out story and how her parents had baked her a 'congratulations, you're a lesbian' cake.
We sit in her room and gossip like schoolgirls about our upbringings. I finish my third cocktail just as Dan arrives, and the cab ordered isn't far behind his entrance.
It's a short ride. Dan makes small-talk with the driver, looking nice in a button down shirt and loose trousers that suit his frame. He teases us about wearing the same dress, looking like twins born to different mothers.
Despite our schedule, we arrive a few minutes late. Sara tells me that Matt and Noah are already holding the table for us.
"I'll pay," I tell the three of them. "I carry cash."
They offer various things - drinks, food, an inappropriate foot rub - but I wave them away, rooting through my clutch as they tumble out of the cab. The cab driver wishes us a nice meal, resets his meter, and let's me know the price.
"You can keep the change," I smile, handing him a note.
I eye Sara, Skye, and Dan as they head through the open door of the restaurant and begin speaking to a host. Once I've closed the car door behind me I take in the exquisite building we're about to go in.
The building is tall, grand, full of fairy lights that litter the walls like vines. Arched windows line the length of the front, with stone canopies full of moss and hanging plants I wish I could take a cut of. The floor beneath my heels feels like marble.
It's so grand and elegant I forget I'm stood in the street for a few seconds.
"Hey," a voice calls, pulling me back into reality. Dan is stood by the entrance, a server behind him. "You coming?"
I take one last look at the building and head in, allowing him to take my arm when I cross through the entrance. I smooth my dress down and take in the romantic atmosphere of the restaurant, filled again with dim lights and expensive looking fixtures.
I don't feel overdressed anymore. Each person around me looks similarly, in cocktails dresses that look brand new, on the arms on men wearing tailored suits.
Dan leads me further into the restaurant, past people eating dishes that look divine, through smells that make my mouth water.
We turn a corner and they there are. Or there he is, because I see nobody but Noah once my eyes are on the table. He's laughing with Sara, leaning into the table with that usual smile plastered onto his face.
The white button up shirt he wears is short-sleeved. It presses against his arms, looking taut and clean against his olive skin. I can see the tattoos that sink into his sleeves through the fabric of the shirt underneath the dim lights. Black suit trousers disappear underneath the table.
It isn't even buttoned all the way up - the shirt. It's spread open casually, revealing the full piece that covers his neck. I didn't notice how long his stubble had gotten in the car, but I see it in that moment. I feel like I see all of him in that moment.
Dan gently pulls me along. He says something I don't register, but Noah does.
His conversation cutting short, he glances over at us, eyes raking up and down my body. I don't miss his chest filling with air, nor the way his lips part with the motion. I pause in my step as his eyes do another once over, slower this time, drinking in every part of me painfully slowly.
I step forward, my leg spilling out of the slit in my dress, and watch his eyes follow the movement...
A one-sided crush my ass.
He may not have said it with his mouth, but his body language does all the talking for him. Sara claps as we approach, excited to have saved me the seat next to her despite only arriving at the table a minute or so before I did.
He still stares.
Dan pulls out my chair for me, waiting as I smooth the dress out again before taking a seat and meeting eyes with Noah, sat opposite me in a shirt that feels unbuttoned on purpose.
"We've already had a lot of cocktails," Skye is saying giddily, launching into a story about Sara dressing us all and deciding we just had to go to dinner.
Noah doesn't look away and neither do I.
"You look nice," I say. They're the only words I feel I can force out without begging him to bend me over the table and fuck me in this pretty dress.
His fingers twitch next to his water glass, as if he's heard my thoughts.
Skye is still talking but only when I hear my name do I zone into her words.
I break our stare, feeling those eyes on me still as I turn to look at our friends.
"I'm sorry, what?" The words don't sound like my own. It's as if my ears have filled with water and haven't popped yet.
"Look at the menu," she laughs, holding out a piece of embroidered card full of gold writing. I take it from her hand. Sara looks at it over my shoulder.
"It's tapas, so you pick any three and it'll be like you've had a full meal," she explains. "I'm dying for some of that sourdough bread."
A shoe taps against the side of my own.
My breath hitches in my throat, Sara eyeing me before looking back at the menu in my hands. Noah's eyes are lidded, mouth still softly parted. His eyes drop to the table before lifting back to my own.
I curl my leg around his outstretched one and can't help the giddy smile that splays across my face as I look back at the menu and discuss options with Sara.
We order drinks - each one alcoholic but Noah's, who drove he and Matt here in his car. Sara, Skye and I discuss our food options, finally deciding on our orders just as the waiter arrives once more to take them.
"Mum called me," Matt says as soon as the waiter walks away. He's sat next to Noah, wearing a button down shirt of his own. "Wanted to know how you were settling in."
"When?"
"When I was getting ready earlier," he responds. "I told her you haven't cussed me out yet so it's not all bad." He laughs. "She said she'll come down at some point and take us out for lunch."
"She told me the couch was a pull-out bed," I scowl.
"It's not." Duh.
Our drinks arrive, and I feel Noah's eyes on me once more as I take the first sip. What? I mouth the word, drawing my brows together when he just continues staring, a suppressed smiling playing at his mouth. I kick at his leg.
Dan is speaking to Matt about a story that happened at work, Skye and Sara listening intently, but Noah's attention is only on me.
I feel my heart start to race under his everlasting stare.
"You're being a little creepy," I speak quietly, hoping not to draw the attention of the others. I take a shy glance at them but none of them look back at me.
"You stare all the time," he returns, just as quietly. "What was it you said in that voicemail on Friday night? That I'm..." His head tilts, smile widening.
I don't remember the drunken voicemail. I didn't think he'd have the guts to bring it up either - or I thought he'd forgotten too, like I had the minute I sent it. It was only around 40 seconds long, I can't have said anything that incriminating.
Or did I?
Drunken me can be a bit of a menace when she wants to be.
I tilt my head too, holding the look passing between us.
"You don't remember, do you?" He asks lowly, leaning over the table a fraction, enough to get the quiet whisper across without drawing the unwanted attention of the others. I shake my head, twitching the leg that's twisted around his.
His eyes flicker over to Matt, then up and down the visible parts of my body when he confirms Matt isn't looking at us. He's so fucking hot. If he keeps looking at me like this I won't consider myself responsible for whatever action may follow.
"I'm heading to the bathroom before the food comes," he announces, nudging Matt's arm before standing up. My body twists to follow his when he walks past me, finger's brushing my exposed shoulder.
The four of them continuing talking.
"Me too."
My eyes widen as the words fall from my lips, but I'm brushed away without even a second glance. With trembling legs I stand and follow in Noah's general direction.
Tunnel vision.
I no longer see the restaurant or the diners around me, only Noah's retreating back in that white shirt as he rounds a corner, following signs for the bathrooms. He dips behind a thick curtain that's drawn across the bathroom entrance, and I speed up, seconds behind him.
The curtain is heavy on top of my fingers as I pull it aside to enter.
Noah is just about to head into the men's room so I step forward and grab his hand, pulling him back towards me. Back, back, back, until my heels hit the pooled curtain and Noah wraps an arm around my waist to keep me in place.
"What're you doing?" He asks, voice breathy, exasperated.
His eyes sink down my body again, squeezed into this green dress that leaves nothing to the imagination.
I glance around the dimly lit corridor, his eyes following mine. Three bathrooms - men's, women's, disabled - a long dark corridor leading to another door labelled 'staff', and a small table with a flower-filled vase a few feet away from us.
We're alone.
Alone and invading each other's personal space without a second thought.
I don't remember why I followed him. I have nothing to say. No reason to be here but to have his arm wrapped around me like this.
The curtain jostles behind me.
In a moment of hazy panic I let Noah pull me into his chest and lead us down the dark corridor, towards the 'staff' door that doesn't seem overly popular. Neither of us speak as a man walks into the men's bathroom.
"What are you doing?" He repeats in a whisper, body cornering my own against the wall.
"I don't know," I counter. His head rests next to my own, each of us looking past the other. "You owe me something embarrassing."
His breath is shaky next to my ear.
I break our joined hands and let them run up his sleeveless forearms, bumping over the dip opposite his elbow before resting one hand on each bicep, hard to the touch underneath my fingers.
Another person through the curtain. His body seamlessly lines up to mine, pressing entirely against me as noise from the restaurant seeps through the open curtain before hushing again.
His hands tighten around my waist, slipping lower until they press around my hips.
He gently brings them towards his own. I gasp as I feel his cock through his trousers against me, hard, stood to attention.
Raring to go. The slit in my dress lets in a draft, reminding me that I could shove the fabric to the side and feel him there - pressed against my underwear, if I wanted to. And fuck, do I want to.
"This can't be your embarrassing thing twice," I tease, surprised at my own brashness. My body has all the reaction he needs, pulling him in further. One of his legs goes between mine and kicks them open gently. His hand appears on my naked thigh.
Breathe. Breathe.
"I have no self-control," he murmurs in my ear. "That's my embarrassing thing. You're going to have to end this, because Matt could walk past any second and I still wouldn't take my hands off you."
Fuck.
I bring one of my hands on top of his, start pushing it up my thigh.
The higher up his hand goes, the tighter the coil deep in the pit of my stomach gets. All rational thought disappears into the heat of my arousal.
His breath is shallow. It hitches when the tip of one finger touches the crease between my leg and my hip, right underneath the start of the slit on the dress. Suddenly that finger twists around the string of my thong and he groans, deep and guttural, pressing himself into me.
Kiss me, I inwardly beg. Look at me. Move your fingers. Touch me. Fuck me. Take off your clothes. My clothes. Let's go home.
"Tell me something else," I say instead.
"I'm insanely attracted to you," he admits. "I've been having trouble keeping my hands to myself." The finger curled around the string of my underwear twitches as if to prove his point.
I turn my face to his a fraction. His mouth bumps against my ear and my pussy clenches. Touch me. Touch me. Touch me. For the love of all that is fucking holy, touch me-
His lips pressing against my ear sends sparks through my body.
A cough snaps me out of the trance I'm in, head snapping over to Sara, stood in her elegant dress next to the curtain. Wide eyes unblinking as they take us in.
True to his word, Noah doesn't stop touching me. He doesn't even move, just keeps his head tucked behind my own, breathing raggedly.
Sara bites on one nail.
"Our food is arriving," she announces.
Noah doesn't even twitch, lips still pressed against my ear. Hand still half up my dress, finger still wrapped in my underwear. Sara, politely, keeps her surprised eyes firmly on my face.
The second I nod she disappears behind the curtain again.
He pulls away gently but all at once, threading a hand through his hair and looking towards the now-closed curtain.
I can't help that my eyes drop to his crotch, the outline of his reaction to me clear as day to see despite the dark corridor. I refrain from pulling him back against me and skipping dinner all together.
"This is a bad idea," he mutters. "This is not allowed." A shake of the head. "I really do respect Matt, you know?"
His hard-on says otherwise but I nod to ease his distress. I can still feel the ghost of his finger at my naked hip.
Matt. My brother, Matt. Fucking hell, what is the matter with me? Why did I initiate this?
The fog that clouded my brain lifts in one quick motion and I mirror Noah's panic because Matt is being nice to me for once, allowing me to live with him and his best friend. Yet I'm throwing myself at said best friend. Internally begging him to fuck me. Outwardly making moves on him.
"I'm sorry for doing that," I declare quietly in a shaky, diffident voice.
"I'm sorry for doing it back."
I smooth my dress back into place and try to avoid looking at him. My traitorous vagina knows he's still nearby.
"I'll head in first?"
He gives a stilted nod. I take a deep breath and walk back down the dark corridor, through the curtain and over to the table. Matt's smile as I approach makes me feel like the worst sister in the world.