Page 157 of In Somnis

“Ridge, please⁠—”

I suck her nipple into my mouth and groan against her. My tongue and fingertips on her soft skin at the same time are too much. I’m shaking as hard as she is, fighting not to rut against the edge of the counter for some sort of relief.

She cries out, her whole body arching into it, the hand on my wrist tightening, and I work my finger deeper while I drag my tongue across her, enjoying how she’s shaking, and that I’m the one doing this to her.

“That’s my girl.” I pull back enough to speak. “You’re so good. Look at you, taking it so well.”

“I’m going to—” Her breath stutters. “I think I’m going to⁠—”

“I know.” I pick up the pace, just slightly, just enough, watching her face go slack with it. “Let me see it. Come on, sweetheart, show me.”

“I can’t—” Her hips are working now, chasing it, all that careful restraint dissolved entirely. “I can’t, it’s too⁠—”

“You can.” I add another finger, curling upward. Her whole body jolts when my thumb brushes her clit. “There.” I press my mouth to her jaw, her cheek, the corner of her lips. “Right there, yeah?”

“Yes—”

“Then stop thinking and give it to me.” I curl my fingers again, finding the spot that makes her gasp and staying there, working it slowly in time with her clit. “I want to feel you come on my hand. Can you do that for me?”

She’s shaking.

“Yes.”

“Prove it.” I press my lips to her temple, lingering there, breathing her in. “Show me how pretty this pussy pulses when you come.”

I don’t speed up. I don’t need to, keeping that exact pressure—curl, stroke, circle—while my free hand slides up her side, thumb brushing the underside of her breast, then cupping the soft, heavy weight of it.

Lennon comes apart with my name in her mouth, clenching around my fingers, and her thighs clamping around my wrist. She’s loud, moans fracturing into whimpers while her nails rake down my arm. Her whole body pulls tight and then releases in waves. I work her through every single second of it, careful and completely unable to look away from her face.

She is…

Fuck, she’s beautiful like this.

I want to memorize every tremor and sound, because if this dream ends and she never looks at me again, at least I’ll have this.

But, of-fucking-course, the dream collapses just when I think that.

Not gradually. All at once, the way dreams do when the emotion gets too big for the architecture to hold. The kitchen dissolves, including the Shaw boy, the counter disappears from under her, and I feel the sudden wrench of being pushed out, like a hand flat against my chest, shoving me back through the membrane of sleep and into⁠—

Ceiling.

My ceiling.

I’m in my bed.

I lie there, staring up at it, my heart hammering and every nerve in my body still lit up by her. Holding up my hand, I count my fingers, even if I know with a certainty like never before that this is waking life.

Five.

Five normal, boring, non-dream fingers.

I exhale through my nose, trying to shove some of the adrenaline back down where it belongs, and listen. The wall between our apartments is not thick. I’ve heard her moving around the last few days, heard the soft sounds of her settling in, the occasional murmur of her talking to someone that I fear was probably the Shaw boy. Right now, from the other side of it, I can hear panting.

Soft, breathless, and gradually slowing as though she’s coming down from the exact same high I just got shoved out of.

My pulse kicks harder.

She’s going to knock. Any second now, she’s going to sit up, walk the few steps to my door, and knock.