by Gem Frost
He doesn’t turn to face me, so I watch him surreptitiously as he dries off, admiring the broad shoulders, tapering down to a tightly molded rear, marveling at the sleek, strong line of his back and the long, sculpted muscles in his thighs and calves. He’s every bit as powerful as he was three years ago, or possibly even a bit more so. He’s magnificent. His body is simply gorgeous. And I intend to have more of it later. A whole lot more.
Yes, I think happily. I’ve picked out one hell of a Christmas present for myself.
Chapter 6
Syd
Nick’s bedroom is as huge as I remember, an enormous space with a big Palladian window along one wall that looks out over a heavily wooded backyard. Not that I can see it in the darkness outside, but I remember helping him clean up the leaves one weekend in the fall, back when we were dating. It was a hell of a project, because he has a mammoth lot.
His bedroom is dominated by a single piece of furniture—a massive, king-sized bed with a curving cherry headboard and footboard. Still magnificently nude, Nick pads across the thick beige carpeting and settles himself on the dark red comforter. I hesitate, realizing that all I’m wearing is my glasses, which don’t really hide much except a few freckles. I feel unexpectedly awkward about sitting down next to him with no clothes on.
“Do you have any robes?”
He shrugs a big shoulder. “There are a couple in the closet.” His eyes travel down my naked body, and a gleam of admiration lights them. “But I’m not going to wear one, and I’d rather you didn’t, either. Let’s just stay unwrapped, shall we?”
I hesitate. I know I’m not very impressive, and he’s doubtless had lovers here who were a lot more, well, decorative. And yet I can’t deny the warm pleasure that fills me at the heated admiration in his gaze. He looks at me like I’m the most gorgeous creature he’s ever seen, and even though I know that’s absurd, it’s hard to say no to an expression like that.
“Okay,” I agree at last. Because if I put on a robe, he probably will too, and I have to admit I don’t want to see him covered up, either.
I turn away from him, aware of his avid gaze studying my ass, and notice the big flatscreen TV on the wall. I have fond memories of curling up in bed with him and watching various shows, ranging from “The West Wing” to “Saturday Night Live,” and without thinking about it, I pick up the remote and click on the TV. The screen that comes on lists the shows he’s been watching, and at the top I see It’s a Wonderful Life.
There’s nothing else in the room that suggests he’s aware that’s the Christmas season. For that matter, I realize as I think about it, there was nothing in the rest of the house, either. I remember helping him decorate, three years ago, and I recall that he gleefully hung lights over all the bushes outside, icicle lights along the porch, and put up a ten-foot tree in the living room. But this year the bedroom, and the house at large, are utterly devoid of any sort of holiday decorations. There isn’t even a wreath on the front door.
What happened to you, Nick? What happened to that guy who loved Christmas?
I worry that it could be my fault, especially when I remember what his niece said to him, something she was clearly parroting back from an earlier conversation: Just because something bad happened to you one time doesn’t mean you should hate Christmas. And yet I honestly can’t believe that our breakup could have affected him that badly, or for so long. Sure, we dated for three months, but it wasn’t like he’d committed to me or anything, and besides, I’m just not the kind of guy someone like him could be into long-term. Assuming he’s capable of being into anyone long-term.
Anyway, he’s clearly been watching It’s a Wonderful Life recently. I remember how much he loved that movie. Back when we were dating, we must’ve watched it ten times in the weeks leading up to Christmas at his suggestion.
Which seems a bit odd, now that I think about it. It’s hardly the sort of movie I’d expect a playboy to like, full of sappy sentiment as it is, not to mention the glorification of family, marriage, and children. But maybe it helps fill a void somewhere deep inside him, a void even he isn’t aware of. Maybe even a guy like Nick longs for love and marriage every now and then.
Or maybe not, I think, scoffing at myself. Nick just isn’t the love and marriage type. The love-‘em-and-leave-‘em type, sure. But not the marrying sort of guy.
I realize I’ve been standing there, staring at the screen. I turn around and see him watching me with an indescribable expression on his face. Hope and nostalgia are shining from his eyes. It’s very un-Nick-like.
“Hey, It’s a Wonderful Life,” he says. “Want to watch it?”
I hesitate. For some reason the idea of watching a sentimental movie with him on Christmas Eve seems much more intimate than sucking him off in the shower. But his strangely childlike expression is hard to say no to, and at last I nodded stiffly.
“Sure. Why not?”
I press play, put down the remote, and then turn back, walking across the acres of carpet to sit down next to him on the bed. As the movie begins, he reaches out and takes my hand, just as he had every time we watched the movie, three years before.
We don’t talk, only lounge in companionable quiet on the comfortable memory-foam mattress while the movie plays, watching George Bailey give up his glamorous dreams of globetrotting to become a small-town businessman, husband, and father. Nick stretches out his bare legs and intertwines them with mine, but he doesn’t make any sexual moves toward me, apparently riveted on the screen.
Toward the end, I glance at him and notice he’s blinking hard. “You really like this movie, don’t you?”
The characters are all singing “Auld Lang Syne,” and he looks over at me like I’ve just jolted him out of a happy dream. I see the vulnerable expression fade from his features, and that annoying sardonic smile immediately twists his mouth.
“Nah,” he answers. “I just think James Stewart’s hot. Come to think of it, Donna Reed’s not bad, either.”
Uh-huh. Apparently, Nick doesn’t want anyone to ever see the slightest glimmer of sensitivity beneath his playboy façade. He’s been acting like a jerk all night, but the memory of that soft, vulnerable look in his dark brown eyes makes me wonder if it’s mostly an act.
He seems to be working so hard to conceal his feelings that I can’t help but wonder how much of his true self I failed to notice when we were involved. Then again, maybe there really isn’t any sensitivity there to notice. Maybe I’m just imagining it.
But as the movie ends, I see him swipe surreptitiously at his eyes. An odd feeling of warmth and affection swells in my chest. I’m starting to suspect there’s a lot more softness hidden beneath his callous surface than he lets anyone guess, and I kind of wonder how I spent three solid months with him without realizing that. Our affair was incredibly intense, yet I’m beginning to wonder if I ever really knew the man beneath the mask.
Having forgotten to bring the remote control across the room with me, I stand up and retrieve it, shutting off the TV. “Good movie,” I say. “Do you believe in angels, Nick?”
He flashes his white, heart-stopping grin. I swear I didn’t fall in love with him because of his perfectly aligned teeth, but I admit they didn’t hurt. “I’m sitting here looking at one, sweetheart.”
Irritated by the way he turns everything into a facile, meaningless pickup line, I huff with annoyance. “I’m talking about guardian angels. Like in the movie. Do you believe in them?”
Some of the playboy mask over his features fades away as he looks at me thoughtfully. “I’m not sure, Syd. I’ve pretty much made my own way in the world, and I think I’ve done all right for myself, just by working hard. If there were any guardian angels around while I got my company going, I didn’t notice them.”
He has a point. My parents were well-off, and put me through college, as well as helping me with expenses while I struggled through dental school. Nick, on the other hand, once told me that his parents had kicked him out of the house a
t eighteen when they found him kissing a boy good night. I gather from Madison that once his dad died, he mended fences with his mother. But he still didn’t have any help getting through college or starting up his company.
“I guess maybe they aren’t always as obvious as they are in the movies,” I say.
“Yeah, maybe. Or it could be they aren’t there at all.”
I sigh. “I’d like to think they are.”
He goes quiet for a long moment, and I turn to find him staring at me.
“The only time I ever believed in guardian angels,” he says, quietly, “was the day I met you.”
I clearly remember the day we met, and there was nothing particularly romantic about it. Certainly nothing mystical that might suggest the involvement of supernatural beings. It was a perfectly ordinary encounter, really. We’d crashed our carts together in the produce section at the local grocery store, and after laughing over the mishap, we’d started talking. We’d bonded instantly over our mutual loathing of our weird first names, and then I’d mentioned I was an orthodontist and made an offhand remark about how great his teeth were. He’d flashed that dangerous grin and uttered a typical Nick come-on line.
Why don’t we get together for dinner tonight, and afterward you can check out how straight my teeth are, up close and personal?
Right then I’d known he was trouble, but I let myself be persuaded by his smile, and the utterly overwhelming charisma he can wield when he wants to be charming. I went out with him that night, and our relationship rapidly picked up steam. And before long I let myself hope he might fall in love with me.
God knew I was in love with him.
“It wasn’t a guardian angel that brought us together,” I answer. “Nothing supernatural about it. Just an ordinary run to the grocery store.”
“Maybe. But I’d never seen you there before, even though we lived close to one another. And when I saw you, I knew…”
His voice trails off and he pauses for a long moment, while I wait, feeling strangely breathless. At last I say, “What did you know, Nick?”
The corner of his mouth lifts in that mocking smile. “I knew we’d be great together, Syd.”
The slow, sexy drawl of his deep voice makes it clear that he’s talking about the physical aspect of our relationship and absolutely nothing else. He might as well have said, I knew we’d be great in bed together. His tone says it clearly enough. A cold disappointment curls in my chest at the same time heat begins to gather in my lower abdomen in response to the gleam in his eyes.
Damn it. I know better than to think there’s anything between us besides sex. There never has been.
But whatever. Sex is good enough for tonight. In fact, that’s what I’m here for, isn’t it? My Christmas present to myself. I look at him sprawled out on the bed, admiring the casual grace, the strength of his sleekly muscled body, his bronze skin gleaming against the dark red of the comforter. As if drawn irresistibly by a magnet, I step toward him, then pause as I’m struck by something.
“You have a sleigh bed,” I say.
Nick frowns, evidently puzzled by the non sequitur. “Uh, yeah. I always have. So what?”
I can’t help laughing. “So, I’m spending Christmas Eve in a sleigh with a guy named Nick.”
The corners of his mouth turn up with amusement. “I gotta admit, I never thought of that.” He gives me a patently artificial leer and pat the dark red comforter. “Come fly in my sleigh, why don’t you?”
I snort. “I don’t believe you’re the real Saint Nick, somehow.”
“Damn straight. I’m no saint. But I promise to give you one hell of a Christmas ride.”
It’s a tempting offer, but something deep inside me wants more than a flight on his sleigh. A whole lot more. My emotions, which I carefully encased in ice three years earlier, are thawing, and that knowledge scares the hell out of me. I’m going to get hurt, and hurt badly, for a second time. I just know it.
I have the gut-twisting certainty that when I climb out of Nick’s sleigh in the morning, it’ll be a hell of a long fall back to earth.
But God help me, I can’t resist the gleam in his dark, knowing eyes. I step toward him and perch on the edge of the bed. Stealing a look at my phone, which I left on the nightstand, I’m surprised to see it’s just past midnight.
“Hey. It’s Christmas.”
“So it is.” He grins. “Time to make all your dreams come true, Syd.”
I reach out and take his hand, stretching out next to him on the bed.
“I’d like that,” I say softly.
Chapter 7
Nick
I’ve dreamed of this moment for years, but now that it’s arrived, I’m finding it a little difficult to believe. It’s like a fantasy come to life. Syd is here in my house, in my bed, waiting for me to make love to him.
I prop myself up on one arm and drink in the sight of him, utterly naked and stretched out on the comforter. His skin is pale ivory, dotted with freckles, against the dark red backdrop, and his reddish-blond hair, which he didn’t bother to brush after our shower, is standing up all over his head. His cock is quiescent, resting in a nicely trimmed nest of slightly darker curls.
He’s as gorgeous as ever, but with one change—his green eyes stare back at me with a self-confident, almost arrogant expression, marking him as very different from the shy and reserved guy I remember. Syd’s developed confidence with the passing years. I remember the way he’d just climbed on top of me in the truck, and it makes something inside of me tie into knots.
Carefully, almost hesitantly, I reach out a hand and stroke his wild rose-gold hair. He closes his eyes, like a cat being petted, and I feel a tight lump in my throat at his pleased expression.
“God, you’re beautiful,” I whisper. My voice is so dark and husky I hardly recognize it as my own.
Syd opens his eyes and looks at me, and I see the challenge in his gaze. “You’ve said that before, Nick, but we both know it’s not true. I’m just an ordinary guy.”
The lump in my throat gets bigger. For all the new self-confidence in his eyes, Syd still thinks he’s ordinary. But he’s the farthest thing from that. Not only is he a gorgeous guy, he’s smart and strong and totally amazing. I fell for him the very first day we met—not that I ever told him that. I don’t tend to talk about my feelings a whole lot.
“You’re not ordinary,” I tell him. “You’re sexy as hell.”
“Uh-huh.” He doesn’t sound like he believes me. “So, is that all you see when you look at me? A pretty face?”
Fuck, no. I see a whole hell of a lot more than that. The first moment our carts had crashed together, and he’d laughed about it instead of getting annoyed, I’d known there was someone behind those green eyes I wanted to know better. Over the three months when our lives had become so deeply intertwined, I came to admire his quiet intelligence, his dry sense of humor. And now that his quiet reserve has been replaced by a spunky, mouthy cockiness, I find I like him even more.
I open my mouth to say so, to tell him how much I think of him. To tell him how much he’d meant to me, three years ago. How much he still means to me. Unfortunately, what comes out is totally wrong.
“It’s not just your pretty face,” I say. “You have a hot body, too.”
The moment the words leave my mouth I want to kick myself in the ass, hard. Jesus Christ, what the fuck is wrong with me? Why can’t I ever tell Syd what I really feel, without making a total asshat of myself every time I say something?
I’ve never been good at saying what I feel, but around Syd, it’s worse. Truth is, I know perfectly well why—because around him, I’m vulnerable, fragile, weak. It’s a feeling I don’t like in the least. But I still wish I could learn to keep my goddamned mouth shut.
Dismayed, I watch as various emotions chase across his expressive face—hurt, disbelief, and anger. But at last he gets his visible annoyance under control, and the corners of his mouth quirk up in an insolent grin that mirrors mine
.
“I admire a man with good taste,” he says lightly.
Relieved that he isn’t going to stalk out into the dark winter night, even though I probably deserve it, I reached out and stroked his cock gently, hearing his sharp intake of breath. It twitches beneath my fingers, then begins to stiffen, and I can’t help stroking it again.
“Anyone in their right mind would think this is beautiful, Syd.”
He snorts, and I see the quick flare of disbelief in his eyes. I sigh, and say gently, “Yeah, I know you think it’s too small. Trust me, it’s not. It’s perfect. You’re perfect.”
“Well, compared to yours, it’s definitely small.”
“To be fair,” I say, throwing out my chest, “that’s true for most guys, really.”
He bursts out laughing. “You have an ego the size of Texas, you know that?”
“More the size of Alaska, I think.” I grin back at him, so relieved to see his smile that I can’t hold back my own. That’s one of the things I always loved about him. He’s always been able to make me smile.
My hand continues to toy with his cock, and I can’t stop watching as it swells. His eyes flutter shut, and he draws a long, shuddering breath. Blood surges into my groin, bringing my cock to full mast almost instantly.
Syd’s so incredibly responsive, so receptive to my every touch, that it astounds me. His honest, open responses make my body ache with desire, drive me crazy with the desperate longing to make him mine entirely.
God knows the things we did earlier were amazing. Our bodies, moving together; my hand on him; his mouth sucking me eagerly, taking me so deep I can’t believe it didn’t choke him…
But I want something more. I want to be inside him. To be part of him.
I lean closer, smelling the fragrance of my own soap on his skin. On him it smells like Christmas trees, a sweetly nostalgic scent that sends a peculiar pang of longing through me. It makes me remember gathering around a decorated tree with my parents and Madison on Christmas morning, back when I was a little kid, and ripping packages open. It makes me remember the tree Syd and I bought three years ago, the one we decorated together. It…
