Chapter 2: To Love Mornings
The kitchen smelled of garlic, turmeric, and sizzling bacon. Morning light streamed through the window over the sink, illuminating dancing dust motes and the steam rising from a pot of oatmeal on the stove. Julia hummed softly to herself, her dark ginger hair tied in a messy bun, as she moved between the counter and the stove with a calm, practiced efficiency.
“Violet, be a love and get the orange juice from the fridge,” Julia said, not turning around.
“On it,” Violet chirped from the small adjacent den, where she and Emma were curled on the couch watching a morning talk show. The sound of the TV was a low murmur.
Noah sat at the large wooden table, a half-empty glass of water in front of him. He was dressed, his silver dreads pulled back, trying to anchor himself in the normalcy of the morning ritual. The memory of last night was a bruise on his mind, tender and discolored. Jane’s door had remained shut when he’d passed it an hour ago.
The back stairwell door creaked open, and Jane shuffled in. She was wearing faded yoga pants and an oversized university hoodie, her hair a magnificent disaster. She blinked against the light, went directly to the coffee maker, and poured the last of the carafe into a mug emblazoned with a faded band logo.
“Morning, sunshine,” Julia sang, glancing over her shoulder with a warm smile.
“Mmrph,” Jane grunted, bringing the mug to her face and inhaling deeply before taking a scalding sip. She padded to the table and slumped into the chair directly to Noah’s right, her knee brushing his under the table. He didn’t move his leg.
Julia placed a plate of toast in the center of the table. “You two are the late birds this morning. Girls ate already. Big test today for Emma, she was cramming at 6 AM.” She shook her head fondly, turning back to flip the bacon. “Noah, you’ll walk them to school, right? Just in case.”
“Yeah, of course,” Noah said, his voice a little rough. He cleared his throat.
“My hero,” Emma called from the den, appearing in the doorway. She smiled at him, a genuine, sunny thing. At twenty-three, she still had a youthful softness to her. She drifted over and, without ceremony, settled sideways onto his lap, tucking her head under his chin. “You’re warm.”
He instinctively put an arm around her waist to steady her, the affectionate gesture a balm after the psychological warfare of the night before. This was safe. This was family.
Jane watched over the rim of her mug, her eyes unreadable.
“Emma, let the man breathe,” Violet said, following her sister in and grabbing a piece of toast. She smirked at Noah. “He’s not your personal armchair.”
“Is too,” Emma mumbled, snuggling closer.
Julia brought over two plates, setting one in front of Noah and one in front of Jane. Scrambled eggs, bacon, a scoop of oatmeal. “Eat. Fuel for the day.” She leaned down and kissed the top of Noah’s head, her hand briefly squeezing his shoulder. “My son,” she said softly, almost to herself, before bustling back to the sink.
The word, so full of uncomplicated love, landed in his gut like a stone. He looked down at Emma’s blonde head, felt the weight of her trust. His fork felt heavy in his hand.
Under the table, Jane’s foot nudged his. Not an accident. A slow, deliberate slide of her bare foot along his calf.
He froze, a bite of eggs halfway to his mouth. He didn’t look at her.
Julia had her back to them, scrubbing a pan. Violet was leaning against the counter, scrolling on her phone. Emma was a warm, sleepy weight in his lap, tracing patterns on his forearm with her finger.
Then the foot withdrew.
A moment later, he felt her hand on his thigh.
It was a casual, flat-palmed press through the fabric of his jeans, high up, near his hip. His muscles locked. He set his fork down carefully, the clink against the plate sounding thunderous to his ears.
Jane took a slow sip of coffee, her expression one of mild interest in the window behind him.
Her hand began to move, a torturously slow slide inward. His breath shallowed. He could feel every callus, every ridge of her knuckles. She reached the inner seam of his jeans, and her fingers traced it, a feather-light path downwards.
Emma shifted in his lap, adjusting her position over to his left leg. “You’re all tense, big brother,” she murmured.
“Sorry,” he managed, his voice strangled.
Julia turned, drying her hands on a towel. “Noah, are you feeling alright? You look flushed.”
“Fine,” he said quickly, forcing a smile. “Hot kitchen.”
Under the table, Jane’s fingers found the button of his jeans. He heard the faint snick of it coming undone. His heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat of panic and illicit thrill. He dropped his hand below the table, intending to grab her wrist, to stop this madness.
He seized her arm, but she didn’t pull away. Instead, she turned her hand and laced her fingers through his, giving them a hard, possessive squeeze before dragging their joined hands back to the fly of his jeans. She guided his own fingers to the zipper. She was making him do it.
His vision blurred at the edges. The sounds of the kitchen—the clatter of dishes, Julia’s humming, the TV chatter—receded into a muffled roar. He could smell Emma’s shampoo, the bacon grease, Jane’s coffee. He felt the hard line of his own arousal, trapped and straining against his boxers.
With a tiny, imperceptible motion, he pulled the zipper down, the sound lost under Violet’s sudden laugh at something on her phone.
Jane withdrew her hand from his. He heard, rather than saw, her shift in her chair. Then he felt her hand again, this time slipping inside the open fly, past the waistband of his boxers. Her cool fingers wrapped around him.
He jerked, a full-body spasm.
“You sure you’re okay?” Violet asked, eyeing him. “You twitched like you got a shock.”
“Cramp,” he gritted out, his jaw clenched so tight it ached.
Jane began to move her hand, a slow, firm stroke from root to tip. Her thumb smeared the bead of moisture already gathered at the head. The sensation was brutally intense, a lightning bolt of pleasure spearing through his gut, made a thousand times more potent by the sheer, terrifying audacity of the act. Here, in Julia’s kitchen, with Julia three feet away. With Emma on his lap.
He was panting, shallow little breaths he tried to mask by lifting his water glass. His hand shook.
Jane’s rhythm was steady, merciless. Up and down, her grip tightening on the upstroke. He could feel her watching him from the corner of her eye, studying the break in his control. He bit the inside of his cheek until he tasted copper, focusing on the pain to keep from making a sound.
Emma sighed contentedly, nestling deeper. “This is nice.”
It was hell. It was heaven. It was the most profoundly destabilizing experience of his life. Pleasure coiled tight in his lower belly, a spring winding to its breaking point. His hips wanted to thrust, to meet her hand. He pressed them down into the chair, his thighs trembling with the effort of staying still.
Julia was talking about her plan to re-paint the hallway, her voice a pleasant drone. Violet chimed in with a color suggestion.
Jane’s pace increased. He was fully, painfully hard in her fist, the slide of her hand facilitated by his own pre-come. The obscene, wet sound was surely audible. He was going to come. He was going to come in his pants at the breakfast table with his sort-of-sister on his lap and his sort-of-mother making oatmeal.
He couldn’t.
He wouldn’t.
His hand shot under the table again, grabbing her wrist, trying to halt the motion. But his strength was gone, liquefied by sensation. His grip was weak, pleading.
She ignored it. She leaned forward, ostensibly to reach for the toast plate, and his length slipped from her hand. For a second, he felt a gulf of cold relief. Then he felt her hot, wet mouth on him.
He saw white.
She took him deep, her lips stretching around his girth, her tongue flattening against the sensitive underside. The feel of it—the overwhelming, silken heat, the suction, the absolute filth of it—unraveled him. He stuffed a fist against his own mouth, biting down on the knuckle to stifle the groan that ripped through him.
She bobbed her head, a ruthless, expert rhythm. He could feel the back of her throat, the warmth of her mouth. Her free hand fondled his balls, rolling them gently in their sac. The dual assault was absolute. His body was no longer his own.
Emma, sensing the violent tremors running through him, looked up. “Noah? You’re really shaking.”
“Dizzy,” he choked out, his eyes squeezed shut. “Need air.”
“Maybe you’re coming down with something,” Julia said, concern coloring her voice. She started to turn.
No. No, no, no.
Jane chose that moment to suck harder, hollowing her cheeks, and her tongue circled the head with vicious precision.
The orgasm exploded out of him, silent and catastrophic. His back arched off the chair, his heels digging into the floor. Pleasure detonated in wave after wave, draining the strength from his bones, leaving him hollowed out and shaking. He pulsed into her mouth, each throb a surrender, a defeat.
She took it all, swallowing steadily, her ministrations slowing to a gentle, milking pull until he was spent and hypersensitive. Only then did she release him, sliding him from her throat slowly with a final, soft kiss to the tip.
She slipped back up into her chair smoothly, as if surfacing from a dive. She picked up her coffee mug again. Her expression was one of serene innocence, save for a faint, smug gleam deep in her eyes.
Noah sat there, destroyed. His fly was still open. He was damp, sticky. The scent of sex, faint but unmistakable to him, seemed to bloom in the aromatic kitchen. He felt flayed open, completely exposed.
Julia had turned fully now, her towel in her hands. “You’re pale as a sheet. I think you should go lie down. The girls can get to school on their own.”
“I’m… I’m okay,” he whispered, the lie ash in his mouth. He couldn’t look at her. He couldn’t look at Emma, who was now climbing off his lap, her brow furrowed with worry.
“You’re not,” Julia insisted gently. “Go on. Rest.”
As he shuffled past Jane, her hand shot out and caught his wrist. Her touch was electric. He stopped, forced to look down at her.
She gazed up at him, and with Julia and the girls watching with concern, she gave him a sweet, sisterly smile. Her voice was clear and loud enough for everyone to hear.
“Feel better, Noah,” she said. Then her eyes dropped to his crotch for a fraction of a second, and her voice dropped to a whisper only he could catch, laced with dark satisfaction. “You’re welcome.”
He walked away from the table, the ghost of her mouth still on him, the taste of eggs and shame thick in his throat. The stairs to the second floor seemed to lengthen with each step, the polished wood groaning under his weight like a living thing. He could still hear the muffled kitchen sounds below, the mundane echo of a world that had just been violently split open.
His room was a sanctuary turned crime scene. The morning light through his blinds felt accusatory. He shut the door behind him and leaned against it, eyes closed, breathing through the nausea. His hands were trembling. He could smell her on his skin, a mix of coffee and something darker, saltier. His cock, spent and sensitive, still throbbed faintly in his open jeans—a brutal reminder.
He fumbled with his fly, his fingers clumsy. He got the zipper up but left the button undone, sagging onto the edge of his bed. He dropped his head into his hands, trying to erase the image of Julia’s worried face, Emma’s trusting weight, the cheerful yellow of the kitchen walls. The violation was total. He’d been dismantled in the heart of his own home.
The doorknob turned.
The door opened and Jane stepped through, closing it softly behind her. She leaned against it, mirroring his posture from moments before, and watched him. The hoodie was gone, tossed aside somewhere between floors, leaving her in just the thin tank top and yoga pants. Her expression was no longer smug or playful. It was focused, predatory.
“You ran away,” she observed. Her voice was quiet, devoid of its usual teasing lilt.
Noah didn’t look up. “Get out.”
“No.”
He lifted his head then. Anger, hot and clean, cut through the shame. “What the fuck was that? Downstairs? With them right there?”
She pushed off the door and took two steps into the room. “That was you,” she said simply. “All of that was you. Your heartbeat. Your shaking. That fucking delicious, helpless noise you tried to swallow.” She tilted her head. “I just conducted the orchestra.”
“You’re sick.” The words felt weak, juvenile.
“Probably.” She agreed without rancor, her gaze dropping to his lap. A slow smile touched her lips. “But you’re not done, are you?”
He followed her look. Against all reason, against the tide of his self-loathing, he was hardening again. The fabric of his jeans tented, the undone button a precarious gate. His body was betraying him with a vicious enthusiasm, responding to her presence alone.
She saw it. Of course she did. “See?” she murmured, moving closer. She stopped just before her knees touched his. “Your brain is writing checks your body can’t cash. Or won’t.” She reached out and brushed the back of her knuckles over the bulge. He flinched, but didn’t pull away. “Still so hard. For me. After all that.”
“It doesn’t mean anything,” he hissed, even as his hips lifted involuntarily into her touch.
“It means everything.” Her hand flattened, pressing down, massaging him through the denim. The pressure was exquisite. A low groan escaped him. “It means all that thinking, all that goodness, it’s just a shell. And I cracked it.” Her fingers found the button, flicked it open with practiced ease. The zipper hissed down.
She sank to her knees on the floor between his legs.
“Jane, don’t—” The protest died in his throat as she yanked his jeans and boxers down to his mid-thighs in one rough pull. His cock sprang free, fully erect, slick still from her mouth and his own release. It hit her in the face. She flinched a bit but didn’t back down.
“Don’t what?” she asked, looking up at him. Her eyes were black with intent. She didn’t wait for an answer. She leaned in and licked a broad, wet stripe from his balls all the way up the throbbing vein to the tip. He cursed, his hands fisting in his comforter.
“Fuck…”
“That’s the idea.” Then she took him into her mouth, not with the teasing slowness from under the table, but with a deep, hungry urgency. She swallowed him down to the root, her nose pressing into his pubic bone, her throat working around him. It was raw, messy, and profoundly obscene.
He couldn’t fight it. The last shred of resistance vaporized in that wet, consuming heat. He looked down, watching her head bob, seeing his own flesh disappear between her lips. Her hand worked the base of his shaft in tandem with her mouth, a tight, twisting motion. Saliva dripped down onto his balls.
“You like that?” she pulled off to gasp, her lips swollen and glistening. “Watching me choke on it?”
“Yes.” The admission was torn from him.
“Say it.”
“I like it.” His voice was a ragged thing.
“Tell me what you like.” She took him again, deep, then pulled back to swirl her tongue around the head.
“I like your mouth.” The words felt filthy. “I like your fucking mouth on me.”
She moaned around him, the vibration shooting sparks up his spine. “What else? Tell me what you want.”
He was lost, adrift in a sea of sensation and permission. “I want to come. Again. In your mouth.”
She shook her head, releasing him with a pop. “No.” She stood up swiftly, pushing him backwards onto the bed. He didn’t resist. She climbed over him, straddling his hips, her yoga pants already pushed down. She was bare underneath, wetness gleaming on her inner thighs. The scent of her, musky and primal, flooded his senses.
She reached between them, guiding him. The head of his cock pressed against her entrance. She was searingly hot. She looked down at him, holding his gaze, her own breath coming in short pants. There was no teasing now. Just a stark, hungry need.
“I want you to fuck me,” she said, her voice rough. “I want you to forget you’re a good boy. I want you to forget your name.”
She sank down onto him in one slow, devastating slide.
He cried out, arching off the bed. She was impossibly tight, a silken vise gripping his entire length. She gasped, her head falling back, a cord standing out in her neck. For a moment, neither of them moved, just connected, pulsing, drowning in the feeling.
Then she began to move.
She rose up until only the tip remained inside him, then slammed back down, taking him deep. The sound was wet, flesh meeting flesh. She set a brutal, grinding rhythm, using his body for her pleasure. Each downward stroke forced a grunt from his lungs. Her tits bounced in the confines of her tank top.
“Is this what you wanted?” she panted, riding him hard. “When you pinned me to the wall? This?”
He could only nod, his hands finding her hips, his fingers digging into her flesh. He thrust upward to meet her, their bodies colliding. The bedframe knocked against the wall with a steady, rhythmic thump.
“Tell me,” she demanded, leaning forward, her hands on his chest for leverage. Her pace never faltered. “Tell me to fuck you harder.”
“Harder,” he groaned, the command breaking from him. “Jane, fuck me harder.”
A wild grin spread across her face. She obeyed, driving down onto him with renewed force, her cries growing louder, less controlled. The room filled with the sounds of them: skin slapping, the creak of the bed, their mingled, ragged breathing. He could feel her clenching around him, getting tighter, closer.
“I’m gonna come,” she gasped, her rhythm becoming erratic. “You feel that? You’re gonna make me come all over that fucking perfect cock.”
Her words tipped him over the edge. The coil in his gut snapped. With a shout he didn’t recognize as his own, he came, surging up into her, pulsing deep inside her clenched heat. The orgasm ripped through him, longer and more violent than the one in the kitchen, stealing his sight, his breath, everything.
Her own climax followed, triggered by his. She cried out, a raw, shattered sound, her body convulsing around him, milking him through the last waves of his release. She collapsed forward onto his chest, her sweat-slick skin sticking to his. They lay there, a tangled, breathing mess, the only sound their hammering hearts gradually slowing.
The reality of what they’d done descended slowly, like ash after a fire. He was still inside her. His come was leaking out of her, onto his stomach. The thump of the bedframe seemed to echo in the sudden quiet.
Downstairs, a phone rang. Julia’s voice, faint and musical, called up the stairs. “Noah? Jane? Everything okay up there?”
Jane lifted her head. She looked down at him, her eyes clear now, and utterly unreadable. She shifted, lifting herself off him with a soft, wet sound. She didn’t look away as she pulled her yoga pants back up, as she wiped a hand across her mouth.
“Collect yourself,” she said softly, echoing Julia’s earlier instruction. But the words meant something else entirely now. They were an indictment.
Then she turned and left the room, closing the door gently behind her, leaving him alone in the wreckage.
Down the hall, Violet sat there on the ground. All the sounds that were made in that room came loud and clear to her. She hadn’t even realized but she was masturbating to the sounds. Imagining herself. She wasn’t in control. She pulled her hand back up. She saw how sticky her hand had gotten.
She snapped out of it. Panicking, she rushed to wash her hands before running downstairs. “Let’s go Emma!” she shouted running out the door. “Coming!” Emma shouted back hopping up from the couch.