"What happened?" I reach up and touch one of his scars, and he leans into my palm, craving the feel of me.
"Wrong place, wrong time. Got hit by a car."
"Oh, G.o.d." Horror fills my voice, but he brushes his thumb across my cheek, soothing me.
"I"m fine. It happened years ago," he says, his voice devoid of emotion.
"Is that why you"re all the way out here in the middle of almost nowhere?" I know his company is pretty big and he has a few other people working for him. I have to deal with them from time to time.
"At first, yeah. It"s kind of grown on me now. Life"s not so busy. I like the quiet a lot more than I thought I would."
I know the feeling. I"ve always been a homebody. I just stay in the town so I can have some human contact from time to time. I know if I lived out in a beautiful cabin like this, I"d probably never see another soul until my mom came and dragged me from it kicking and screaming.
"Don"t you get lonely?"
"I was at first. Then I found you."
"Liar, you hardly talk to me." I playfully smack his arm.
"I don"t talk much because I want to hear you. If I"m talking, you"re not."
"But I like hearing you, too."
"Then I"ll talk until I can"t utter another word if it makes you happy. As long as you stay here with me."
"You want me to stay here with you? Like, for the holiday?" My heartbeat picks up as I wonder what he"ll say.
"Yeah for the holiday." He pauses for a second, and I see what looks like uncertainty creep into his eyes. "And after."
"After?" I push, wanting more. It"s hanging in front of me, so close I can almost grab it. I want his words and for him to ask me to stay.
"Forever," he finally says, and I can tell he"s worried what I might say. My chest fills with warmth, but it feels too good to be true.
"Is it too soon?" I know it"s a stupid question. h.e.l.l, we just had unprotected s.e.x. Our baby could be growing inside me as we speak, but I need him to give me more. He"s hiding so much of himself from me. I want to know we"re on the same page, that he"s just as crazy about me as I am about him.
"I"ll make you so f.u.c.king happy, Noelle. I know you"re perfect for me. I"ve listened to you talk for hours on end. You"re it for me. I know it to my core, and I"ll spend every day showing you that I"m it for you. That we belong together."
"Why aren"t you using the audios I made?" The question has been hanging in my mind, and after all the sweet things he"s said to me, this one thing is still not adding up. He liked my voice so much, and he used me for so many jobs...
He blushes at my question like he"s embarra.s.sed.
"I-I...s.h.i.t." He brushes a few strands of hair out of my face. "I didn"t like the idea of others hearing you say all the s.e.x stuff in the audios. I wanted it to just be mine."
"You kept them for yourself?" He must have a stockpile of my audios hidden away. I don"t know why, but it is adorably cute. I wonder what he does with them. I"ll have to ask him later, for sure.
"G.o.d, this makes me sound crazy, but yeah, I kept them for myself. Seems I do a lot of things I shouldn"t when it comes to you." He says it like he has a few more secrets he"s keeping, and I want them. If we"re doing this, jumping into this so quickly, then I need to know it all.
"Are there more things I should know?" It should be freaking me out, but thinking that he"s been stalkerish makes me feel warm inside. Like he"s got all these little dirty secrets about me just for himself.
His grip tightens on me like I might try to get away from him. "I ran a check on you when I first found you. Learned everything I could. I also might have hired someone to watch you for me."
"You have someone watching me?" Now that I can"t believe. Watching me would have to be the world"s most boring job. I maybe leave the house once a week, and that"s just to go to the store. I get everything pretty much just shipped right to my front door.
"I was worried someone would steal you," he says with such certainly. He says it like it"s a real possibility that someone is really going to come and take me away.
"Steal me?" I don"t even know what to do with that.
"Yeah. If I had met you, I would"ve scooped you up and never let another man near you. I got scared you"d meet someone and then..." His words trail off. He doesn"t even want to finish the sentence. I can see the uncertainly in his face. He"s scared I"m going to run from him now that I know the truth. But the grip he has on me won"t let me go anywhere, even if I wanted to.
Nope. He"ll never be rid of me now.
Chapter 10.
Alex
"I don"t want you to ever leave me, Noelle. I can"t bear the thought of not having you for even a second now that I"ve got you under me."
She smiles so big and brightly at me, it"s as if she can feel the same things I"ve always felt for her.
"This is insane," she tells me, leaning up to kiss me quickly. "I feel this pull between us, and I"ve never felt anything like this before. It"s...it"s-"
"Love," I finish for her.
"Love," she repeats, and we stare into each other"s eyes.
Thrusting into Noelle gently, I try to take her tenderly this time. Less hurried and less afraid of the moment vanishing.
I kiss her pa.s.sionately and whisper my promises of devotion and desire. And when we find our peaks together, her name on my lips and mine on hers, I cradle her in my arms and hold her while she sleeps, truly happy, inside and out, for the first time in my life.
I reach for her every hour throughout the night, making love multiple times until exhaustion carries us off to sleep. Most of the time, I wake up still inside her, one round of pa.s.sion leading into another.
Her s.e.x has to be sore, but she keeps clinging to me just as much as I"ve clung to her. Neither of us want to separate.
When the first touch of sunlight comes through the windows, I kiss her shoulder and nuzzle her neck. "Merry Christmas, Noelle."
Smiling, she turns in my arms to face me, kissing my neck and burrowing deeper into me. "Merry Christmas, Alex."
"I have a present for you."
Noelle sits up a little and looks at me. Her hair"s a mess and she"s still half-asleep, but she perks up at the word "present."
"You got me a Christmas present? How did you even know I would come here?"
"I didn"t know. I got it for you and I thought I would send it to you, but I chickened out. Then I thought maybe I would save it for your birthday." I blush a little, feeling silly for the idea, but Noelle beams at me, leaning up and kissing my cheek.
I turn to get out of bed, not wanting to leave her warmth but wanting to keep that smile on her face, and I feel a sharp sting across my a.s.s.
"Ouch. Did you just spank me?"
Turning around, I see her sitting up in bed with the covers around her waist, her full b.r.e.a.s.t.s on display. A mischievous look is on her face, and she just nods at me.
"Oh, turnabout is fair play, baby." I dive back on the bed, and we giggle as I wrestle her over and give her three spanks on her bottom. Her squeals of surprise turn into moans as I lean down and kiss where my hand just made a faint pink mark. "Do you want more, or do you want your present?"
"Both," she says into the pillow, and I bite her a.s.s cheek, giving her what she"s asking for.
I climb on top of her as she remains face down on the bed. Spreading her legs just slightly, I press my c.o.c.k to her opening from behind, her entrance tighter than normal in this position, and I have to work my way inside her.
She raises her a.s.s, giving me access to all of her, and I slide in easily. Once I"m fully seated inside her tight channel, I lay most of my weight on top of her and start to thrust. Long deep strokes make the angle delicious for her, and she moans louder and louder.
My c.o.c.k is still hard as a rock even after all our rounds of pa.s.sion, and I"m ready to c.u.m in her again. I don"t know if I"ll ever get enough of her.
I work to rub her sweet spot inside, making sure that every stroke is giving her the most pleasure possible, and she"s soon clenching around me. I kiss her neck and nibble her shoulder, and her over-sensitized skin responds.
She clutches the sheets beneath her and screams out her o.r.g.a.s.m as I bottom out inside her. Once again I fill up her unprotected womb, letting my seed spill inside her. Noelle"s overflowing with it at this point, and there"s no doubt in my mind I"ve put my baby inside her.
Once her twitches have finally stopped, I pull from her body and turn her over. I kiss each nipple before moving down her belly and kissing her c.l.i.t. Once I"ve tenderly kissed her sweet places, I stand up and go to the living room, grabbing her present from under the tree.
I come back to find her still in the same spot with a giant smile on her face. I laugh as I sit on the bed beside her and hold out the small box.
Sitting up, she takes it from me, her eyes twinkling with excitement as she opens it up. After she"s got the paper off, she opens the long skinny box and pulls out the chain.
"What is it?" she asks, holding the gold necklace in her hand.
"It"s your voice, actually." When she looks at me questioningly, I point to the waves that run along the middle of the chain. "I listened to your recordings so many times, I think I have them memorized, so I took a couple of words and had the sound waves shaped in gold. The three small sections of lines show the words that I loved hearing from you the most."
She looks at me with unshed tears in her eyes. "What does it say?"
"I love you."
She throws herself into my arms, clinging to me. I cling to her just as fiercely, wanting her to know that what I say is true.
"I love you, too, Alex."
I hold her close, kissing her and wiping away her tears. "I have loved you from the moment I heard your voice. Thank you for coming here, and being my Christmas miracle."
Epilogue.
Noelle
Christmas Eve, five years later.
"But what if the power goes out?" Nicholas asks, a little fear in his eyes.
"Your dad is the greatest woodsman who ever lived. He won"t let anything happen to us. Besides, if the power goes out then we get to have Christmas dinner over the fire. It"s kind of fun." His eyes brighten at the idea, and I kiss his forehead, tucking him into bed. "Goodnight, my love. Get some sleep. Santa will be here soon enough."
"Goodnight, Mommy. I love you."
"I love you, too."
I close the door to his room and make my way downstairs. I find Alex in our bedroom, pulling out the train set "Santa" got Nicholas for Christmas.
"Is he asleep?"
"Not even close. Better wait a bit before we set that out. Just in case."
Alex puts the toy down, walking over to me with a seductive look in his eyes. "Hmm. I wonder what we could do while we wait. What could we possibly do with all this free time on our hands?"
I giggle and melt into him, loving the feel of him against me. We"ve been living here in our cabin for the past five years, and each day together is better than the last. I"m still head over heels madly in love with my husband, and if the way he can"t keep his hands off me is any indication, he feels the same.
We had our little boy, Nicholas, nine months exactly after our first Christmas together, and we decided to wait a while and see if we wanted any more. Alex and I are simple people and didn"t want a large family. A few years went by after having our son, and we agreed that our trio was perfect.
"I thought you were going to make me s"mores?" I moan as Alex"s tongue meets my collarbone.
"Tell you what. You let me eat your p.u.s.s.y, and then I"ll make you s"mores."