“No, it’s mine. Look, I’ll have it fixed in just a minute.” Hopefully before—nope, too late.
The woman screamed his name, but the roar of his motorcycle drowned out her cries and he left her standing in the cold. Alone.
“Looks like you have some unresolved issues yourself, Johnny.”
“Yeah, well, it’s not like I can wake up Christmas morning and change everything, now can I?” he said softly.
“What happened?”
“This isn’t about me. It’s about you and how you don’t have to end up like me, right? That’s the gig.” He yanked her close and waiting for the spark of magick to transport them back into the stream, but it wasn’t forthcoming.
That holly jolly bastard, Burl Ives started over again the scene rewound, playing again like a scratched record. Every time Carla screamed his name, it was another cold knife of regret and his concentration shattered like a fallen icicle.
“Not that this isn’t nice, you smell like candy canes and hot chocolate. But we both know how this holiday magick works. At least, from what I’ve seen in the movies. We’re stuck here until you say something or do something. So, if you want to help me, maybe you have to help yourself first?”
“That’s cute. Real cute.” He growled up at the heavens.
“Just tell me what happened,” Sofia prodded.
“Her name was Carla. She was my girl. And on Christmas Even in 1965, I asked her to marry me.” He was silent as he looked for the words to recount the events of that night.
“So, it didn’t go well?”
“She said no. I left. She waited for me to come back. I, uh…” he paused and took a few deep breaths before continuing. “I had this body shop on Sixth in the city. It was on a piece of property Nicholas Civella wanted. It wasn’t worth much. I’d scraped and clawed to have my own shop and he wanted me to sell it to him for half what it was worth. I told him no. He sent guys to the house to change my mind. And they killed her. If I hadn’t left, she’d still be alive. So, that’s my regret.”
Her face softened and empathy shone in her eyes. “Even if you would’ve been there, they still would have come for you,” she offered.
“Maybe. But Carla wouldn’t have paid the price.” It was the first time he’d said that out loud.
The world around them shimmered and suddenly they were back in Sofia’s apartment.
“Well, this escalated quickly,” Sofia said with a nervous half-laugh.
“Things tend to this time of year,” Johnny agreed. “Tomorrow will be better. I’m still a little new at this.”
“Tomorrow? Clarence did all his work in one night.”
“I’m not Clarence. I’m Johnny, remember?” He looked at her pointedly.
“Okay, smarty pants.” She shoved a plate of gingerbread men at him. “Well, have one for the road. I certainly won’t be eating them.”
“Why? Because of what you said about your ass being dueling cantaloupes?” He wouldn’t mind judging that for her again. If she needed a second opinion.
She scowled. “No. Because I will forever associate the taste of them with choking to death.”
“I get it. I can’t stand the taste of Jim Beam.”
“Why?”
“That’s what I was drinking when I drove my bike off the bridge.”
“I can see where that would be an unpleasant memory.”
“Not so much. The dying didn’t hurt. My neck broke on impact. It was more about what came after.”
“What did come after?” She put the plate of gingerbread men down, her attention rapt on him.
“I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.”
“Lame.” She stuffed a peanut butter ball in her mouth, her tongue swiping the last of the chocolate from her fingers. Even after what had just happened, every swipe of her tongue sent sensation straight to his cock.
“Jesus, do you have to do that?” he muttered in a strangled voice.
“Do what?” She licked more of the chocolate.
“Fellate your fingers.”
“Yes.”
“Why? There’s more. There’s a whole stack of those chocolate things.”
“Because I’m good at it.”
Chapter Three
The Nutcracker Suite
The words just leapt out of her mouth like lemmings into the sea. Just like those lemmings, there was no saving them.
Heat flooded her face and she was sure that her cheeks were the same color as the poinsettia on the end table—bright red. “I didn’t mean that.”
His eyes narrowed. “You mean that it isn’t true or you didn’t mean to say it?”
Something about the tone of his voice settled low in her belly and she licked her lips. “I didn’t mean to say it.” Sofia realized her voice sounded low and throaty.
“Meaning that you are good at it?”
“Eating chocolate? What woman isn’t?”
“That’s not what you meant.” He was smug and much too sure of himself. Unfortunately, it looked incredibly good on him.
“You have a foul mind for an angel.”
“Stop calling me an angel.”
“What am I supposed to call you? A ghost? You look pretty solid to me.” Dear God, yes! Solid, and strong, and hot, and… She fanned herself and looked away.
“How about you just call me Johnny?”
The TV flickered on and Shelley Fabares’ face came into view and Johnny Angel blared through the speakers.
He rolled his eyes at the tune. “They’re not very angelic up there, either. They know I hate this song.”
Sofia wasn’t sure what to say that. Awkward was her standard outfit, but the feeling was highlighted in red Sharpie after having spontaneously confessed that she had suction power like a Hoover.
“So…” She let the sentence hang.
“Well, it’s late. I’m sure choking to death was exhausting. We’ve got a long day tomorrow, so you should go to bed.”
“Yeah, about that. Where will you be?”
“Here. I can’t leave until you learn your lessons.”
“Here?” she squeaked. This man—dead man—she reminded herself, he was going to be staying in her apartment? No, no and more no. “I don’t think that’s going to work.”
“Look baby doll, neither of us have a choice. We’re both stuck. Go to bed. It’s not like I’m going to watch you sleep or anything.”
“I don’t have a guest bedroom,” she protested.
“I don’t sleep. So, no problem. You’ve got cable? I’ll watch Sports Center. A great thing, that. Back in my day, we only got three channels.” He stretched his long legs out and propped his feet on her coffee table.
This. This was why she didn’t date. Inconsiderate. Uncouth. She growled audibly. Sofia shoved his legs off the table and they hit the floor with a thud. “Look here, buddy. I know it was different in 1965, but this is my house. You’ve just invited yourself to stay here, and I accept that’s part of this deal I can’t get away from. But that coffee table that you put your giant gunship sized feet on? It’s an antique that I paid two-thousand dollars for. So unless you want to pony up the cash to buy me another one…”
“I guess a beer would be pushing it?”
“The fridge is that way.” She pointed to the kitchen and then stomped off to her bedroom and slammed the door behind her.
Of course she realized that was a totally unreasonable reaction. Sofia could have just asked him to take his feet off the table. It was disconcerting to have a stranger in her house, one who would be there for a week, and she had no control over comings and goings.
Well, she thought slyly, she could have control over his—she shook her head. She had to stop thinking about him that way. He was on the road to becoming an angel. Angels didn’t have sex. Did they?
That was upsetting as well. Realizing how much she wanted him and was ready to go “all the way” after having just met the man. She’d dated Rob for a year before she’d even considered it and it had j
ust never felt right.
Now suddenly dead guy was Mr. Right?
It would figure. She shook her head and leaned against the door. Yeah, he was supposed to show her all the reasons that her life was supposed to turn out the way it had and the possibilities that she had to look forward to, but he was going to fail because some stray maggot had burrowed into her brain and munched on the little bit of sense she had left and told her he was The One.
She didn’t even know him.
That was a good reason to be upset. That was reasonable.
Being that angry at him because he’d put his feet on the table was not.
She exhaled heavily and knew she had to apologize.
Damn it.
Sofia went back out into the living room and he looked up from his beer.
She sighed again. God, she sounded like a deflating balloon. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“I shouldn’t have yelled at you. I’m a little out of my depth here and I’m frustrated at the situation. I could have asked nicely.”
He grinned. “I had it coming. Carla would have smacked the back of my head. She wouldn’t have asked. Even in my own house. “
Sofia sat on the couch next to him. “Why did she say no when you asked her to marry you?”
The smile melted from his face. “She said she wanted to finish school first. Said she wanted to be like Lillian Gilbreth. What she meant was she wanted to go to that fancy Ivy League school and BBD me.”
“Bell Biv Devo?”
“Who?”
“BBD? Early 90’s group who sang Poison.” And not to mention Do Me. Definitely don’t mention. She snapped her mouth shut to keep from doing just that.
“No. Bigger Better Deal.” he corrected. “I thought she didn’t want to be married to me because she thought she could do better. It made me angry because I knew she was right.”
“Johnny, I saw the look on her face when you left. Heard the pain in her voice. Maybe she just wanted to get an education so she could do a job that she loved.”
“Yeah. It took twenty years in Purgatory before I even thought of that. She still could have gone to school as my wife. I was making enough with the shop she didn’t need her daddy’s money.”
“I’m sorry.” Before she realized what she was doing, Sofia reached for his hand and held it within her own, her small palm barely curling over half his hand.
“I must be the shittiest Clarence ever. This is supposed to be about you.”
“Maybe it is,” Sofia responded with a smile. “I felt useless. Now, I’ve been able to help you.”
“I’m supposed to help you. Look, maybe we should watch the movie to figure out how this is supposed to go?”
She was still holding his hand and she didn’t want to let go, but she had a man in her apartment and he wanted to watch a Christmas movie with her. None of the men she’d dated had ever offered to do that before.
Sofia imagined curling up into his side, his strong arms around her and losing herself in Christmas goodness, and then mad monkey sex in front of the fire… No, no. Wait. That was wrong.
If Johnny was a bad Clarence, then she was an even worse George Bailey. She wasn’t worried about how her life would’ve been, she just wanted to be caught up in the moment with him.
“Or you know, not.”
She blushed. “I was just marveling at the fact you wanted to watch a Christmas movie with me.”
“Logically, it seems like the best plan of attack.”
Sofia nodded. “Okay.” She still hadn’t let go of his hand and he didn’t seem inclined to make her. She reached for the TV remote and pulled up the DVR menu.
“I love TV in this time,” Johnny said happily. “But I wish they’d left cars well enough alone. These smart cars? Where’s the muscle?”
“We left it back with a time when gas was only ten cents a gallon.”
“That sucks.”
They settled in to watch the movie, hands still clutched.
His hand was warm for a dead guy. In fact, it was kind of scorching. Probably because she was imagining it on other parts of her body rather than her palm.
What was even worse was that he’d been angsting over his true love and she’d been perving on him.
Sofia felt like the lowest of the low.
And yet, that didn’t stop her from brain from twisting and turning through all sorts of scenarios in which she offered herself as comfort.
When the movie was halfway over, Sofia realized that this wasn’t like It’s A Wonderful Life at all. They’d be better served watching Bad Santa.
Which she also had DVRed.
“You know, I don’t think this applies at all.”
“Thank God. I mean, it’s great and all, a classic. But I don’t need to show you what it’s like if you never lived. You didn’t say you wished you’d never been born.”
“I was just resigned to death.” Sofia nodded. “You know what’s life affirming?” In that moment, the whole universe shuddered to a stop. Except for her mouth. Every synapse in her brain screamed at her to close her mouth, but it kept moving, dragged out in some hideous slow-motion caricature of life. “Seeeeeexxxx.” It sounded to her own ears like a cow chewing its x-rated cud.
That couldn’t possibly have come out of her mouth.
Yet, from the startled look on his face, it definitely had.
His eyes narrowed and there was a grim set to his jaw. He looked like a caged animal who’d just been shown the exit sign.
Or the entry sign, as the case happened to be.
Dear God! What had she done?
He pounced.
Johnny crushed her down into the soft cushions of the couch, his body heavy against hers. His fingers tangled in her hair. His mouth was all fire and sin as they crashed into a kiss.
Sofia didn’t know a simple kiss could be so…everything. It devoured her only to resurrect her and do it again. She was sure she could feel eternity, wrapped in the blanket of stars that swarmed around her. All of this from a simple touching of lips.
He broke the kiss, but he didn’t stop. His mouth blazed a trail of desire down the column of her throat and she tunneled her fingers through his hair. He paused at the valley of her breasts, but she urged him onward, arched up into him and wrapped her legs around his waist.
The length of his desire was hard against her thigh and she couldn’t get close enough to him. Desire stabbed her hard and fast. She wanted more of that sensation and needed to know what it felt like to have him inside her.
Johnny pushed her t-shirt up and cupping her breast, took the stiff peak of her nipple into the hot cavern of his mouth. She cried out, tugging his hair and he sucked harder and filled his palm with her other breast.
She’d never had a man’s hands on her elicit this kind of reaction.
This was why she’d waited.
Sofia allowed herself to explore him, hands running beneath his shirt over his hard-muscled back and wide shoulders.
“You’re so beautiful.”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full. I don’t.” Sofia gasped, and pushed his mouth back to her nipple. She didn’t want him to feel like he had to say those things to her when she knew they were patently untrue. Sofia was afraid if she gave him a chance, he’d reconsider what was happening between them. Pathetic, but she couldn’t help it.
A low rumble sounded from him that could have been laughter.
A creaking sound, much like wood snapping in the fireplace echoed through the room, but through her haze of lust, Sofia dismissed it. Didn’t matter what it was, only that Johnny keep doing that with his mouth.
Except it did. Matter, that is.
While Johnny plundered her, the couch decided it had had enough of their antics and promptly surrendered.
Both front legs snapped out from under them and dumped them forward with a surprising amount of inertia. Which sent them careening into the two-thousand dollar coffee table that she’d been so adamant he
keep his feet off of.
It wasn’t meant to be load bearing.
The coffee table died a quick, but painful death as it splintered under their weight and tossed them to the floor.
This time, it wasn’t Johnny who landed on top of her, but the other way around.
And her knee was in a very bad place.
The look on his face was one of absolute horror, and to their mutual chagrin, the TV spontaneously switched channels to a showing of The Nutcracker.
Chapter Four
Johnny Not So Angel
She insisted he come to bed with her since the couch was out of commission.
Only after swearing on a stack of bibles she wouldn’t molest him in his sleep. Not that she could anyway since he had an ice pack on his balls.
Again, Heaven had to be fucking with him. Why would they have given her case to him knowing the attraction that would spark between them if they weren’t supposed to be together?
But the incident with the couch had to be divine intervention. Especially with the smart ass soundtrack.
The Nutcracker Suite? Really? That shit was not funny.
The Heavenly choirs sounded in his head. Almost as if to say: “Yeah, it sure was.”
Johnny wondered again why being dead was so uncomfortable. He didn’t actually have a body anymore, so why did he feel pain?
Or desire?
He turned to look at where Sofia was already sleeping, safely tucked away on her side of the bed.
What the hell had he been thinking? Trying to get into her knickers wouldn’t help her. It would just be a band-aid where she needed a permanent fix.
Trumpets sounded in his head loud enough to make his eyeballs jiggle.
Johnny took that to understand he was on the right track.
Okay, sorry. Next time, you don’t have to kick me in the balls. I get it. He thought to himself.
Suddenly, he found himself staring into large, doe eyes.
“That’s not creepy at all,” she murmured, “to wake up and see you staring at me.”
“Sorry.” Damn, but he was saying…err…thinking that a lot. He decided to be honest with her. “I’m going to be honest. I shouldn’t have done that.”
“If you apologize for kissing me, I’m going to knee you in the balls again.” Her self-esteem couldn’t take it if he did.
Johnny Angel Page 2
