Chapter 14
JUDE
Nora grips my shoulders; her long red hair falling against my face. “Jude,” she whispers in my ear, sending a hot ripple of pleasure through me.
This isn’t real. I knew it the moment I felt her climb on top of me. It’s a dream.
I’d first discovered I could lucidly dream when I was a kid. I’d be on the tennis court, then something weird and out of place would happen, like the ball would be a donut or something. This time, it’s Nora riding me.
Still, it feels real as hell. I inhale the scent of her familiar shampoo.
I feel the pressure of her little hands on my shoulders, and an urgent, delicious heat in my groin.
Nora’s straddling me, rolling her hips, her soft mouth at my ear.
My dick is hard as a rock, pressed up against my pants under the pressure of her grinding pelvis.
It’s been a few months since I’ve had a dream like this about her. Must be the hormones popping up since seeing her again. I keep wanting to touch her. I did touch her, that night at the party. I got hard right next to her.
Fuck.
I never should have kissed her that day she told me she was leaving. It’s like it set something off in me.
But I wanted to.
And it felt fucking good.
“Oh Jude,” Nora whispers. Her breath is hot in my ear. My dick grows impossibly hard now.
I should make myself wake up—I can do that. Whenever I realize I’m in a dream I can just tell myself to wake up. I do that if the dream is shitty.
“I want you, Jude.”
I groan.
This dream is not shitty. It’s a dark and dirty fantasy I pretend I never have come to life. Before Nora left, I’d always leave sex dreams with her if they came up. It was too weird to dream about fucking my best friend and then seeing her and trying not to think about it.
But since she left…I’d had more than a few. Maybe it’s an act of rebellion—me being mad that she left me—but I always stay in. I tell myself it has nothing to do with her, that the only action I let myself have is in my dreams.
But even dream-me knows that’s a lie. These are the best sex dreams I’d ever had.
Right now, I feel like a thousand nerve endings are all on alert. Her soft body pressed on mine feels like a fucking orgasm already.
But shit, we’re on a train. I shift under her, knowing the boner’s probably real. But there’s a blanket.
That gleeful reminder has me relaxing a bit. Let it happen.
Nora’s tongue flicks along the edge of my ear as she angles her hips low once more, making me shudder with pleasure. I’ll just stay here a bit longer.
“Oh God, Jude,” she whispers. “I’ve been thinking about this for so long…”
“Yes, baby,” I breathe. “Me too.”
“Jude?” she whispers again.
“What is it? Anything, I’ll give you anything you fucking want, Nor.”
I mean it too. Not just sex stuff. I’ll give Nora the fucking world if she’ll just stay with me.
“Touch me.”
Oh shit. Some small, tiny part of me is still screaming that this is my best friend, that this will be weird when we wake up. She’ll see it on my face.
Right now, I don’t give a fuck. I want to feel myself inside of her like I’ve never wanted anything in my fucking life.
And I was a pro athlete.
That voice wins.
“I said touch me, Jude,” Nora says, her soft voice growing demanding.
“Yes ma’am.” My hands slide to her waist, hitching up her sweater. Ah fuck, her skin is so soft, so warm under my palms. I slide my hands up higher, reaching the lacy cups of her bra.
I’m going to jizz. I’m going to come right here in my pants on a train.
There’s a blanket! that strangled voice reminds me. Damn, it’s hard up. I’m hard up.
Nora grinds against me again and I’m momentarily distracted as her body squeezes against me. I swear I can actually feel the edge of her pussy lips through her tights, sliding against my dick.
“Oh, Jude,” Nora says, her voice hitched. “Yes. Touch me there.”
She arches her back and I draw my hands up higher, feeling the hard points of her nipples under my thumbs.
Nora bites down on my ear now, making me grunt with pleasure.
“Jude?” she asks, my lobe springing from her teeth.
“Yes, baby?”
“Jetzt Ankunft am Bahnhof Zürich,” she breathes.
I pause. I’m about to pull her bra down, to grasp those gorgeous little tits in my hands without the bra in the way—I’ve always wanted to know if they’ll fit perfectly in my palms. But I hesitate. I’m pretty sure that was German. Why’s she speaking German?
“What?” I ask.
“Arrivée en gare de Zürich.”
Now that’s French, which I can understand a little of. She’s saying something about the station…the train.
My eyes fly open. It wasn’t Nora.
It was the announcements over the speakers.
I would be bummed out I’ve been woken from my dream, except suddenly my stomach drops. I wasn’t alone in my dream. Nora was having the same one. She’s straddling me, still grinding herself against my hard dick.
Pleasure shoots from my crotch even as panic takes over. “Nora!” I whisper, yanking my hands down out of her sweater.
Oh fuck.
I glance over her shoulder, which is tough given Nora’s hair is blocking most of my view.
“Yes, Jude,” she asks, cupping my face, which makes turning even harder.
I part her hair, and see a woman staring at us, her face pinched in disdain. Beyond her, a couple of teenage boys are shoving each other to see around her. There are more behind us, too, I can hear them whispering.
“Nora, wake up!” I say.
She doesn’t wake up. She grinds against my erection once more. Even though lights are flashing through the windows now—we’re arriving in the station—I bite back a groan. My dick is so confused.
“Excuse me, sir,” a sharp female voice says.
My stomach turns. I can see slices of a gray-haired attendant’s uniform through Nora’s hair.
“I’m afraid we’re getting some complaints.”
“Yes,” I grunt. “I’m sorry, I—”
I grip Nora’s hips, preparing to lift her off of me and onto her seat, but Nora chooses that moment to bring her face down then, presumably to kiss me, and I just barely manage to duck aside. Her forehead knocks painfully against my skull.
It’s enough for her to wince and pull backward.
“What—” Nora looks down, then at me, her eyes wide. Huge behind her glasses, which she’s managed to keep on while dream-making out with me.
“I’m sorry, I tried to wake you,” I say, remembering her words from right before she fell asleep. Guilt rips through me.
Stupid, Jude.
I do lift her up then, setting her down on the seat next to me.
“Thank you so much for understanding,” I say to the attendant, who must moonlight as a nun the way her whole face is pursed.
“I did not say that I did,” she snaps. But mercifully, she steps aside, beckoning the people who apparently hadn’t wanted to walk by a couple dry humping on the evening train to come through the aisle.
“You okay?” I ask Nora, shifting to try to rearrange my junk.
Now that we’re decent, a whole stream of people start walking by toward the doors as the train slows. Several of them sneak glances, while others stare outright.
Nora’s eyes are growing wider by the second, her face crimson.
She shakes her head, her rumpled hair shaking. “I can’t—I didn’t—”
“Hey,” I say gently, “it’s fine. You’re never going to see these people again.”
She reaches into the seat pocket in front of her and grabs her water, guzzling it down like she’s just come out of the desert.
When there’s a gap in people, I pull her coat out from the rack above our head—it’s an oversized beige parka. She pulls it over her head like a blanket. “What happened?” she whispers, her voice muffled.
There’s no easy way to say this. “You tried to kiss me,” I say into the coat. I decided not to add you also rode my dick and told me to touch you. Instead, I waited for the crowd beside us to thin. “There was a little more, but that’s most of it.”
She pokes her head out of her coat. “More?”
I clear my throat. The train’s coming to a stop now. “I’ll get our stuff.”
I’m not avoiding her so much as giving her a moment to digest this information.
I realize, as I grab our luggage, that the guilt I feel isn’t just about not keeping my promise to her.
It’s also for breaking my promise to myself.
Because if I’m being honest, that non-dream felt incredible because it was her.
My corduroy and tights best friend Nora.
The same Nora I swear I heard moaning in the shower at her place before I snuck out the door.
And some not-so-little part of me hoped it was real.
Even though all I can think about right now is my best friend—in the most carnal way—I turn it off as we step off the train with only a little effort.
Nerves jangle in my stomach as the unwarranted fear that something happened with Cap and Farrah.
I texted when Nora was in the bathroom though, and Farrah had assured me that they were getting off the train momentarily.
“Dad!”
Just like that, everything loosens up again as I kneel down to catch the kid flying at me faster than the train we just got off.
“Hey, buddy,” I laugh, nearly toppling backward.
“I missed you, Dad,” Cap says into my shoulder.
“We were only apart for an hour,” I laugh. “But you know what, I missed you too. So much.”
I throw a glance to Nora, but she’s hiding behind her camera, filming our mini reunion.
“Nora!” Cap yells, jumping on her next. She laughs, lowering the camera.
“Cap is so very excited,” Farrah says from where she’s standing a few feet away, hands twisted in front of her, while Cap chatters to Nora all about the train ride.
I stand up, straightening. “How did it go?” I ask, my voice harder than I mean it to be.
“It was good, Jude. Fine.”
“Did he eat his dinner? Like, his vegetables? And did you remember all his books from the seat pocket? He always forgets them, or his crayons.”
Farrah holds up the bag we packed with all Cap’s road trip activities. “They’re all here. And yes, he ate the carrots, though he said they were…what is the word? Mushy.”
I let out a breath. I’d been worried about them.
Twenty minutes later, we’ve got all our bags, a quick snack from the shop in the station for Cap, and are piling into the sleek stretch SUV that will take us the rest of the way to the resort.
It’s an awkward hour of driving, but when the town finally comes into view, we all stare out the windows like a bunch of kids hitting Disneyland for the first time.
The town is nestled in the bottom of a valley surrounded on all sides by snow-blanketed mountains. The main street is all done up for Christmas, with the lamps festooned in fat ribbons and giant novelty bells. High up on the mountain in the distance, Diamant sparkles like a glistening jewel.
It’s another half hour from the town to the resort, and by the time we arrive, I’m itching to stretch my legs, but by now it’s well past Cap’s bedtime, and I need to get us sorted into our room.
“So,” Farrah says as we step out of the vehicle. “Our room is close to yours, no?”
I frown as the bellboys take our luggage, welcoming us to the resort. “What do you mean, our room?”
“Me and Cap.” She frowns back.
“Yeah, Dad,” Cap says. “I can’t stay alone.”
Typical seven-year-old logic.
“You’re not staying alone. You’re staying with me. Nora’s on the other side and Farrah’s…close by.
I’d had my travel agent book Farrah a room on a separate wing, but I hadn’t mentioned that.
“I thought you and Nora would be in one room and me and Farrah in the other one?” Cap says, his voice breaking.
My head nearly spins at that. “You thought…what?”
“Sweetie, your dad and I have separate rooms,” Nora smiles at Cap. “My friend got mine right next to yours though…or, your dad’s, I guess…” She looks awkwardly at Farrah.
But Farrah’s standing stiffly next to Cap. “Jude, we talk about this, it is our chance to be together. The room is important to us.”
“Yeah, Dad, we talked about it at the sleepover!”
I grit my teeth, running my hand over my head.
“Sir, would you like to check in?” the bellhop with our cart of luggage says.
“Not really,” He looks confused.
“Listen,” Nora says next to me, piping up for the first time. “How about I take Farrah’s room, and you guys do the adjoining roo—”
“No.”
Everyone looks taken aback, even Cap.
“I…” I don’t want to not have my son in my room. But if he does stay with her, I don’t want to be that close to Farrah.
There’s nothing I can do here that doesn’t make me look like a total dick.
“Dad,” Cap says, his tone plaintive. He takes my hand. “Let’s go inside.”
Once again, my son is being the better person.
We head into the foyer, which is huge and open and lined with a red carpet that stretches all the way to a giant Christmas tree in the center of the space. To the left is the check-in desk.
“Why can’t you share a room with Nora?” Cap asks. “Then me and Farrah can be next door? It’s one of those rooms like at your work, right? With a door we can open so it’s like we’re all in the same room?”
I grimace. “Yeah, it’s going to be like that. It’s complicated, Cap, but Nora needs her own space. I think it’s because…”
“Because you snore, isn’t it?”
My lips tug up. “Yeah. Something like that.”
“Dad, Farrah and I are gonna be fine, okay? We’ll see you like, all the time. We can have breakfast and lunch and dinner together.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose as I reach the desk. When I turn back, I see Nora and Farrah have given us a good amount of space. I also see they’re chatting amiably, like friends.
I don’t know whether I like that. And because I don’t know, I feel like a dick about it. I feel like a dick about all this stuff.
“Okay,” I say softly, kneeling down beside Cap. “I’ll do the rooms like your mom wants, okay?”
Cap grins, then looks back before leaning in again. “I call her Farrah, too, Dad. I told you she’s not my mom.”
“Right.”
“Nora’s going to be my mom.”
For a moment I’m not sure I heard him right. “I’m sorry, what?” I croak.
“Nora and you are going to get married. She’s going to be my mom.”
Holy shit. “Cap, dude—”
“Next, please!” the person at the counter says, smiling warmly like my son hasn’t just lobbed a grenade at my feet.
I look back to see Nora coming up behind me, and God help me I get the sudden image of her riding me just like she did in the train. I squeeze my eyes shut. “Jesus Christ,” I whisper under my breath.
“Dad, are you okay?” Cap asks.
“Sir? Are you ready to check in?”
“No.”
“Oh?” the woman at the desk says.
“I mean, yes. No, I’m not. Goddammit.”
“Here,” Nora says, stepping up. “Hi!” she says, smiling sweetly. “We have several reservations.”