Twelve Days

by Teresa Hill

  Knew the way she liked him to roll sideways and take her with him, until she was lying on top of him, and her hair was everywhere, and she pressed little kisses along his chest. It would be damp with sweat, and his heart would be pounding, and he'd want to sleep just like that, all night long. With her on top of him, utterly spent in his arms.

  He knew all of that, and she was all he remembered and more. When he couldn't wait any longer, he nudged her thighs apart and pushed his way inside of her, barely, pausing right there on the edge while he tried to get himself together so that maybe he could make this last. Just maybe.

  He felt all the heat of her, all the need. Her hands were pulling him closer, and she was whispering, "Please, Sam. Please." And then he slid home. There was no other word for it. It had been just this way, just this powerful, just this certain, the first time he'd ever done it. He felt as if he'd finally come home.

  Chapter 16

  He lost all track of time. It was that powerful, that shattering, being with her again, holding her close as she lay bonelessly on top of him. The side of her face was pressed against his chest, and it took a moment to register, but when he realized what was happening, he froze, the hand lazily stroking through her hair tightening into a fist.

  She had tears running down her cheeks, and he felt as if someone had knocked the breath out of his body in one killing blow.

  She raised herself up on one arm and took his face with her other hand. "No," she said. "It's not that. Not at all. It's just been so long, and it makes me feel so much. Sometimes I think you can rip my soul right out of my body, it's so good. And I need that, Sam. I need to feel that close to you when we're like this, because sometimes, that's the only time I do. It's the only time I feel like I can really touch you."

  "Me, too, Rachel. For me, too." He pushed her head back down to his chest and locked his arms around her. "Stay here. Stay a while longer."

  He didn't think he could give up the feel of all her silky skin, her delicate hands, her warm, eager mouth, her shy touches. He'd always been greedy for all he could get of her, had always been reluctant to let her go afterward, though in truth she'd never given any indication of wanting to leave his arms, not even in the worst days.

  Trust, he told himself. It wasn't that he had no trust in her. It was himself. He had trouble trusting that anyone would want to have him stay.

  But she always had. Always.

  * * *

  They dozed for a bit in front of the fire, and luckily woke around midnight and remembered all that they still had to do.

  Rachel went to get dressed again, but Sam stopped her. He went to the closet and dug into the back and pulled out the box wrapped in town that afternoon, and handed it to her.

  "Now?" she asked.

  He nodded.

  She slowly pulled off the paper, starting with the corners first and then the bottom, unfolding it delicately, with no haste at all, enjoying every moment. She'd always taken such pleasure in anything he'd ever given her. He'd worried that he'd never have enough to give, whether material or emotional, and watching her now, he remembered. She'd always seemed so excited by anything he had to give her.

  Finally, she pulled the top off the box and pulled out the robe. It shined in the light of the fire and slipped through her fingers like water, the midnight-blue color setting off her eyes perfectly, just as he'd known it would.

  "Emma told me you needed a new robe," he said.

  "I doubt this is what she had in mind."

  "She picked out what she thought you needed, and I picked out what I wanted you to have." And then he'd hidden it away, not sure if he'd give it to her, but he did.

  Rachel leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. He caught her by her hair, tugging gently to bring her back to him when she would have pulled away.

  "You can wear hers tomorrow," he said, pushing the afghan off her shoulders and leaving her bare once again. "And tonight, you can wear mine."

  He put it on her himself, wrapping it around her, pulling her hair out from beneath the collar, smoothing the lapels together, tying the belt at her waist, and then sat back and admired her in it. He'd been right. It was the exact color of her eyes, and he liked the way the silk felt on his skin, loved imagining the way it would feel encasing her naked body, and thought of how easy it would be to get it off of her when he wanted her again. Which he did. Already.

  He reached for her, and she smiled. God, she was beautiful when she smiled like that.

  "We have so much to do," she protested. "And I've always wanted to do this. To sit down here by the fire and the tree and listen to Christmas music and dig out all the presents we've hidden around the house and wrap them."

  He took the ribbon from the chair behind him, a bright red velvet one, and wrapped it around her.

  "Sam!" she protested.

  "Don't worry. I'll unwrap you."

  And she laughed. Rachel, he told himself, laughing, wrapped up in silk and tied with a ribbon into a slightly mussed, thoroughly beautiful package. His once again, at least for the moment. He sat back and admired what he'd done to her, admired the smile and savored the laughter.

  "Now all we have to do is put you under the tree," he said.

  * * *

  On Christmas morning, Rachel woke with an arm wrapped firmly around her waist and anchoring her to the big, warm, blessedly familiar body of her husband pressed against her from head to toe. She was lying on her side, as he was, her head pillowed on one of his arms, his other arm hanging on to her.

  She was still wearing her robe—kind of. He liked having it wrapped around her, liked the fact that it was easy to push it away and get inside of it. The fabric was cool and slick, still cinched around her waist, but most of her legs were bare, as were her shoulders and her breasts.

  She knew she wore the look of a thoroughly disheveled woman and a very happy one. When she felt Sam's prickly cheek moving slightly against hers, she shivered. The things he could do with his mouth...

  "Cold?" he whispered.

  "No."

  "It's still early. We don't have to get up yet, do we?"

  "No." She slid around in his arms until she could face him, give him a slow, steamy, good-morning kiss. "I don't think I said thank you for my present."

  "You didn't?"

  "Not the robe," she whispered. "For you."

  She looked at him and saw dark, smoky eyes, sleep-glazed and lazy with satisfaction, but the heat was still there. She saw the blackness of his hair, the breadth of his shoulders, and she wanted her hands all over him again.

  Sex really was an amazing thing, a powerful thing, a healing thing, a thing to bind them together, to strip away the pretense and the images they all carried with them to get down to the elemental nature of a relationship. She felt bound to Sam, felt as if no one and nothing could come between them this morning. If they could hang on to that feeling, remember it, savor it, surely they'd be okay.

  She slid closer, feeling the little hairs on his legs tickling at hers, feeling hard muscles in his thighs and his chest and his arms, the first stirrings of arousal in his body and hers. How could she have ever given this up? Forgotten how much she needed him? Wanted him? Wanted this?

  "Merry Christmas," she whispered, rolling onto her back and pulling him along with her.

  It didn't take much that morning for either of them. They'd been in a state of semi-arousal all night, and her body was already alive with the memories of what they'd done, already soft and yielding and wanting him.

  He was hard in an instant, kissing her deeply and breathing raggedly, inside her a moment later, and she was right back there. To sheer bliss. She closed her eyes and tried to simply hang on to him and let him do with her what he would, and in her head she was thinking, Stay with me, Sam. Stay.

  * * *

  They woke abruptly the next time, woke to find Zach sitting on their bed tugging at Sam's arm. Rachel blinked twice, not quite sure she was awake and this was real. But there they were, i
n their bed, thankfully mostly covered. Sam jerked the quilt up around them both and looked at Zach, who was chattering a mile a minute, and frowned.

  "What?" he said, breaking into the stream of excited chatter.

  "It's Christmas!" Zach said, pure glee on his face. "Isn't it? Isn't it morning yet?"

  Sam frowned once again and looked at the clock. "It's six-fifteen, Zach."

  "Isn't that morning?"

  "Technically, I suppose so."

  "And Santa came?"

  Sam rubbed his hands over his face and turned to Rachel for help. "It is morning?"

  "Morning comes extra early on Christmas Day. I think it's a rule," she said. "A Christmas rule."

  "Can we go downstairs!" Zach asked. "Can we go see!"

  "In just a minute," Rachel said. "It's cold down there. Give us a minute to build up the fire and check and make sure that Santa's already gone. He doesn't like for anyone to see him, you know. If you catch him, and he gets mad... Well, we wouldn't want him to get mad at us."

  "Uh-uh," Zach said quite seriously.

  "Why don't you go see if Emma's ready to get up," she suggested.

  "Okay!" He bounced off the bed and took off at a dead run, yelling Emma's name as he went.

  "Well, if she's not up yet, she will be," Sam said.

  Rachel just grinned. It was the best Christmas ever. She gave Sam a quick kiss on his mouth and got out of bed herself, gasping as her feet hit the cold floor. She opened a drawer and pulled out a pair of her warmest pajamas and fled into the bathroom to throw them on.

  "I want to turn on the lights on the tree and in the windows and grab the camera before they get down there," she said, coming out of the bathroom.

  Sam snagged her with an arm around her waist and pulled her to the side of the bed. He still hadn't put on anything. "You need clothes," she said.

  He gave her a dazzling, disheveled Sam-in-the-morning smile. "I think you're almost as excited as they are."

  "Maybe I am," she admitted. "I want them to have a great day. I want you to have one, too."

  "I will." He studied her for a moment, not letting her go, then put his mouth next to her ear and whispered, "I still love you, Rachel."

  She let out a shaky breath and felt tears flood her eyes. "I'll always love you."

  "Hey, I got Emma!" Zach called out from the doorway. "Are you two comin'? Should we get Grace? I think I hear her, too!"

  "Go on." Sam nodded toward the stairs, his gaze steady on hers, and for a moment, he looked so much like that beautiful, bad boy from days of old, the one she'd fallen in love with in what seemed like a lifetime ago. Her heart just melted. "I'll contain them somehow and buy you a few minutes down there."

  Rachel turned and rushed to the doorway and sent Emma and Zach to get Grace, who she could hear babbling in her room. She allowed herself one quick glance at her husband, sitting there in her bed watching her with an expression on his face that warmed her entire body, before she ran downstairs to check on what kind of job Santa had done.

  The day was a blur from there on, of presents and too much food and utter chaos. The kids were beside themselves with excitement. Zach was ripping into packages and practically dancing. Even Emma seemed especially pleased with the clothes Rachel had picked out and the CDs that came at the suggestion of two of Rachel's nieces. Grace mostly played with the empty boxes, patting their sides, climbing in them, crawling under them, hiding inside, and trying to eat the wrapping paper.

  "She's like a puppy," Sam said, sitting on the floor in the corner of the room and laughing at her antics. He grabbed her every now and then to take away wrapping paper when it became necessary, putting her inside the biggest boxes himself, and getting her out when she was tired of one and ready for another.

  By midmorning, the floor was covered with boxes, paper, toys, and clothes. Sam had cleared a path in one corner where he and Zach were working on putting together Zach's new bike, and Rachel warmed up muffins she'd made the night before and put the turkey in.

  She was planning to sneak upstairs to have a shower and get dressed before the family descended upon them but Sam stopped her.

  "I still haven't given you your present," he said.

  She blushed, thinking of the robe and the way they'd spent the evening. "I thought I got my present last night."

  He actually blushed a bit himself. "I have something else."

  "I have something else for you, too. Wait just a minute."

  She went downstairs instead, to the basement. When he renovated the carriage house and moved back there, she'd taken over the space to work on her stained glass. And yesterday, despite having the children underfoot, she'd managed to finish a present for Sam.

  He'd had a logo made for the business six months ago using an image of their own house with the business name, and Rachel had decided he needed a sign to go with it. She'd been working painstakingly on recreating the logo on a sign made of stained and beveled glass. It was a foot and a half square, held within a wooden frame, and she planned to hang it from the mailbox, and when sunlight went streaming through the glass, it would be wonderful. Her favorite part was the names, McRae Construction, and underneath that in smaller script, Props. Sam and Rachel McRae.

  Zach and Emma had helped her wrap it the day before, and Grace had been persuaded to stick on a big red bow. Rachel carried it upstairs and put it at Sam's feet. The children gathered around, and he let them rip off the paper for him. They giggled as they worked and then beamed up at him when he got his first sight of it.

  Rachel worried that perhaps she'd overstepped, giving him a sign for his business that listed both their names as a couple on it and one that showed his business being located here, at this house. She was nervous about that—overstepping—but Sam seemed genuinely touched by her gift. He stood there staring at it for the longest time and had to clear his throat twice before his gaze met hers and he thanked her for it.

  "It's beautiful."

  He touched it reverently, tracing the image of the house, and she thought, Oh, Sam. Please stay.

  * * *

  Sam was touched. He loved the sign. When Sam managed to drag his attention away from it, he remembered what he'd found for her at the auction he'd taken Zach to. He brought it to her then, and she let Zach open it.

  "Careful," Sam warned.

  Zach frowned as he uncovered the dusty, even rusty piece. "It's that old thing."

  "Very old," Rachel said, getting down on her knees and inspecting it more closely.

  Zach shook his head. He hadn't seen the appeal when they'd bought it and now maybe even thought Sam was insulting his wife. "It's broken, too," he complained.

  "Chipped," Rachel said, reaching for one of those places. "Still, it's in remarkably good shape given how old it is."

  "What is it?" Emma asked.

  "A rose window." She said it almost reverently. "They used to put them in churches. In the grand cathedrals in the Middle Ages. They'd be down front, behind the altar."

  Beautiful circles of stained glass.

  "I've always wanted one," Rachel said. Turning around, she pointed to the landing where the stairs made a right-hand turn. "For there, right above the stairs. There used to be a rose window there. The oldest photos we have of this house show it, but it must have gotten broken a long time ago and someone just took it out, rather than try to get it repaired."

  "Can you fix this one?" Sam asked.

  "I don't know if I can match the glass exactly. I don't even know if anyone makes it anymore. But it'll be fun trying to find out, trying to see how close we can come to restoring it to its original shape."

  And Rachel would do that. She liked putting things together, fixing them. She was good at it. Look what she'd done with Sam so long ago.

  "I can fix it," she said, then looked up at him. "It's the one we saw in that old house in the next county, isn't it? The one that was sold before we got there?"

  "Yes."

  "How did you find it?"

/>   "The dealer who bought it had an estate sale three days ago. I took a chance he might sell it there."

  "It matches the colors on the house," Emma said. "It has the same blues and lavenders in your stained glass and the same gray that's on the outside of the house."

  "Yes, that's another reason I wanted it," she said. Then she stood up and wrapped her arms around Sam and gave him a kiss, a not-too-fast one on his mouth. "Thank you. I love it."

  "You're welcome," he said.

  "I love you, too."

  The kids giggled, probably because of the kiss. Emma looked shyly fascinated, and Zach was making faces. Grace clapped and beamed up at him. Rachel wiped a tear away and said, "We have so much to do."

  "More?" Zach asked.

  "Lots more," she said. "I have to have a shower, and we all have to get dressed, and before long, lots and lots more people are coming."

  "Who?" Zach asked.

  "My family. My entire family. My father... Remember him?" Zach nodded. "And my sisters."

  "You have sisters?" he asked.

  "Yes. You know that. You met them. Or you met two of them. But I have three and a brother. And Aunt Miriam and Aunt Jo—the one with the sleigh."

  "Will she bring it? Can we go for a ride?"

  "No, she won't bring it today. She'll come in her car. With her husband and her kids and grandchildren."

  "Oh." Zach was disappointed now.

  "But she'll probably bring more presents," Sam said. "Everybody will bring more presents." The house would be overflowing. Christmas with Rachel's family was like nothing he'd ever imagined before he married her.

  "And little boys," Rachel told Zach. "My sisters and my brother together with Miriam's and Jo's children have eighteen kids, ten of whom are boys."

  "Wow!" Zach said. "I like boys."

  "I know. We'll have so much fun. But for now, we have to get ready because everyone will be here soon."

  They managed to talk the kids upstairs. Not easily, but they did it, and rushed through the morning routine. Sam made it downstairs with Zach first, and soon Emma was back with Grace and finally Rachel.

  Sam watched her come down and the smile on her face took his breath away this morning. She'd lost that pinched look to her face, those little lines of tension in her brow, all that sadness she'd worn for so long. It was gone, and she was beautiful this morning.