The Anti-Social Season (First Responders #2)

Chapter Twenty-Five

Twenty-Five

T he wind howled overnight, and Simon wound himself around Thea in a way that made her feel so cherished and happy that she shed a few tears before dropping off. But when she woke up in the morning, the intense brightness from the window made her lift her head in confusion. She stared at the blanket of white that mantled the garden outside her house. Sliding carefully out of the bed to avoid disturbing Simon, she could see that the forecast had been correct. It had actually snowed overnight. A lot. The normally dim predawn was bright with reflected light.

A veritable Christmas miracle.

Bedclothes rustled behind her, and she turned to find Simon squinting. “What time is it?” he asked.

She crawled back into bed and kissed him lightly. “I think it’s time for you to check and make sure your flight isn’t canceled. Because it actually did snow last night. A lot.”

“Really?” He sat up and stared out at the wintry scene. “Holy shit. I didn’t think it would be possible.” He grabbed his phone off the nightstand, his hair sticking up adorably in all directions as he looked up the information. “Wow. Yeah. My flight is canceled.” He lifted his eyes to hers, his expression wondering and almost dazed. “I don’t have to go to California.”

She flung her arms around him and crowed with glee. Those words have to had gone straight to her heart. He had been so selfless when it came to his family and they didn’t seem to appreciate what he was doing one bit.

It was about time he got to do something for himself, have something for himself.

“Are you okay spending Christmas with me?” she asked, pulling back to study his face.

His expression brightened. “Are you kidding? I’ve wanted nothing more. I was already halfway making plans for next year as a consolation for the fact that I thought I couldn’t spend it with you this year.”

Oh. This man. His vulnerability slayed her and he didn’t even know it. And he was already making plans for next year? Had her eyes literally turned into hearts? She grinned. “Well then. You know what this means.”

He chuckled. “I have no idea what this means.”

“We have to make pasta today.”

“Fine. We’ll make pasta. And do all the things.”

She threw up her hands in glee. “All the things!” Well, maybe not all of them. She was due over at her parents’ house today, but if there was still a foot of unplowed snow, that wasn’t happening. Too bad, so sad. More time spent in her cozy little home with... She didn’t quite dare to call him her boyfriend , not even in the privacy of her own mind. Not even with him making plans for next year, somehow.

Simon, a dirty gleam in his eye, reached up and threaded his fingers with hers, bringing her hands down and kissing each one. “I have some idea of what all the things might encompass,” he said, his voice low and throaty. A thrill ran up her spine.

“Yeah?” her own voice was less sexy. In fact, it veered up into a squeak.

“Yeah.” His eyelids drooped and his gaze fixed on her mouth. Panic spiraled up inside her.

“Morning breath, dude!” she said, pulling back and covering her mouth with her hand.

He just grinned a dirty, delighted smile and leaned forward, pinning her hands to the mattress and gently pushing her to lie on her back. “Okay, fine,” he said softly, his gaze roaming over her face. “If I can’t kiss you on the mouth, I’ll just have to kiss you somewhere else.”

Simon crawled backward, down Thea’s body, until he could tug at the panties she’d slept in. A hysterical giggle bubbled out of her. “Dude, I was going to suggest brushing our teeth.”

He hooked his fingers in the elastic waistband. “I like my idea better.” Her head thudded back onto the mattress, and he grinned as he dragged her underwear down and flung them away like they had offended him. Running his hands up her inner thighs, he pushed them apart as she shuddered and groaned, her pussy glistening like a flower in the rain, the scent of her arousal making his already hard cock throb. He shifted, adjusting himself on the mattress, and then lightly bit her inner thigh, appreciating the way her body jerked with surprise.

Then he started to tease her with the lightest touches of his tongue until she was tense and trembling. “God, Simon,” she groaned, and he gave her inner thigh another nip, making her yelp.

“I’ve got you,” he told her, pushing her thighs even wider, then sliding one finger into her slick heat as he lashed her clit with his tongue. A second finger pulsing inside her and a more concentrated pressure from his mouth gave him the shaking, wailing, pulsating response he wanted. He pulled his fingers out and crawled back up her body. “Ready to kiss me now?” he asked.

Thea laughed helplessly, one hand flung over her closed eyes. “You evil bastard,” she muttered as his mouth descended on hers, encouraging her to open. She groaned and parted her lips, her tongue sliding against his, her hips pulsing against his boxer-clad dick, the friction making him moan into her mouth.

“Condom. Nightstand,” she murmured against his lips, and he pulled away long enough to pull off his boxers and rip a packet off the strip. He turned, leaning against the headboard to roll on the condom, smiling as Thea straddled him.

“Now you’re getting the idea,” he said as she sank onto him, giving her hips a little swivel as she fully seated herself.

“Ngh. No talking. Just fucking,” she said, her eyes closed as she rolled her hips and squeezed him with her inner muscles. He gripped her hips and moved with her, gratified when her eyes popped open.

“Did I do a good thing?” he asked, unable to keep a grin from spreading across his face.

She leaned forward and cupped his cheeks in her hands. “Such a good thing. Do it again.”

Dear lord, but when Simon tucked his hips up when she rolled just like that ... She kind of thought the top of her head would fly right off. He was giving her that evil grin that she’d discovered she liked maybe a little too well, and she kept up her steady movements as he threaded his fingers with hers, holding her hands up and steady, giving her a source of leverage.

He grunted, his eyes slamming shut. “Oh. Yeah. That. That’s good.”

There was silence then, punctuated only by the sound of their increasingly labored, ragged breathing and the creak of Thea’s bed frame. Thea’s abs and hips began to ache. “Simon? You close?”

He cracked one eye. “Do you need me to be?”

“Not sure how much longer I can keep this position up,” she admitted. “But I want you to come at least as hard as I did.”

One corner of his mouth curled up, and he released her hands to grab her hips, holding her in place as he drove up into her, his breath stuttering and face tense as he pressed hard one final time, then eased, wrapping his arms around her back and holding her against his chest. She let herself relax there, his pulse against her cheek lulling her.

“I’m so happy your flight got canceled,” she murmured, looking at the snowy expanse outside her window. The snow had eased to light flurries that drifted and fluttered before finally falling.

He sighed. “I am too. But my sister is going to be a nightmare about it.”

She lifted her head and looked at him. “Why? How?”

He sighed and lightly slapped her hip. “Up. Condoms don’t work if I stay inside you for too long.”

She disengaged, groaning at the loss of contact and rolling onto her side to watch the flex of his ass as he strode off to the bathroom. When he returned a few minutes later, face washed and smelling suspiciously of mint, she sat up, outraged.

“You brushed your teeth.”

“Oral hygiene is very important,” he said with mock seriousness, his eyes twinkling with suppressed humor. How had she ever thought this guy was rigid and joyless?

“Damn straight, it is,” she said and marched into the bathroom to deal with her own fuzzy teeth and morning breath. When she returned, Simon was sitting up, the covers over his lap, phone pressed to his ear. He was rolling his eyes.

“I don’t know what to tell you, Ash, but I can’t magically erase a foot of snow or make airlines un-cancel their flights.” From a few feet away, Thea could hear the squawk of his sister’s voice, which only grew louder as she slid into the bed next to him. Damn. The woman had lungs and she knew how to use them. She thought Gia was bad, but her sister had nothing on this woman.

You okay? she mouthed.

He rolled his eyes again and nodded. “Ashley, I’m not going to be able to get any more vacation time, my flight is canceled, I should never have tried to make that ridiculously short trip work in the first place, and maybe we need to think about what holidays mean to all of us as a family moving forward. I’m going to go now. You need to get back to bed anyway. I can’t believe you called me so early.” His voice was incredibly gentle, and Thea marveled that he was holding it together against what sounded like a completely unreasonable onslaught. In fact, his sister was still yelling when he gently tapped the screen to end the call. Sighing, he tossed the phone to the coverlet where it bounced once and lay still, the dark screen looking weirdly ominous to Thea.

“What happens now?” she asked, wanting to touch him, to give and receive comfort, but suddenly not certain if he would welcome it.

He scrubbed his hands over his face, blowing out a frustrated breath. “If I know my family, my mom will start blowing up my phone next.”

“Why?”

“I’m not sure what the reason will be, but it’s going to happen. Trust me.”

They’d gotten dressed and were outside to assess the snowfall and bring in the suitcase he’d packed for California when his prediction came true. Thea was happily humming to herself because she’d be able to do an electric snow thrower safety demonstration video that she had planned out, and Simon was basking in her energy and excitement. How had he ever been put off by her energy? She was pure delight.

“Pretty sure we got about a foot!” she crowed as his phone vibrated in his back pocket. Sighing, he let his suitcase crunch into the powdery snow and dug it out. Yup, it was his mom.

“Merry Christmas, Mom,” he said, trying to head off the emotional shitstorm he knew was coming.

“Ashley tells me you aren’t coming.” Well, crap. She was already crying. He could hear it in her voice.

“Yeah. There’s a foot of snow on the ground and my flight is canceled,” he said as calmly as he could. From the way his mother phrased her statement, he had a bad feeling about what exactly Ash had said. “I’m not sure how she thinks I’m going to get across the country under these conditions.”

There was a long pause, then his mother took a deep, shuddering breath. “Is that why you aren’t coming?”

Rage shot through him like a hot spike. “What, did you think I’d make all those plans and buy a plane ticket on my salary and then just not come on some sort of whim?” Ashley had pulled some bullshit in the past, but this was next-level.

“I didn’t know what to think,” his mother shot back, apparently retreating to a full defensive crouch.

“But you didn’t bother to check on what had to look like a really dodgy explanation before you flew off the handle.” Any desire to soften things for his mom was now gone. She was willing to take Ash’s unreliable word and assume the worst of him?

The desire to not spend Christmas with his family had never been stronger.

“Well, it’s been clear that you haven’t really wanted to come out, so what was I supposed to think?” It was terrifying, sometimes, to consider how much his mother’s and his sister’s brains worked in tandem. Shifting blame, obscuring facts, anything to make sure that neither of them were ever wrong.

Fighting to keep his voice level, he said, “Mom, my flight’s been canceled, I can’t even go anywhere local until the roads are plowed, and we’re going to have to reevaluate how we do holidays in the future because this just isn’t sustainable for me.”

There was silence. Enough to make Simon look at his phone’s screen to make sure they hadn’t been cut off. But then he heard a muffled, “Talk to your son,” and his father was on the line.

“What’s going on, Simon?” His father sounded both exhausted and exasperated. Simon guessed his mother had a big meltdown before she called him, so that tracked. He explained the situation with as much brevity as he could muster, realizing that Thea had come around the side of the house with a snow shovel in her hand. She wasn’t using it though, she just stood there, watching him as if he was doing something that required a spotter.

And maybe he was. It was the emotional equivalent of bench-pressing twice his own weight.

Thea scowled as Simon ended his call, stuffing the phone roughly into his coat pocket and picking up his suitcase.

“Everything okay?” she asked.

He trudged toward her, exhaling roughly. “It will be. I think. The person who’s really getting the worst end of the deal here is my dad. He’s going to be in the thick of Ashley’s and Mom’s tantrums, and he’s not a guy who loves drama.” Well, maybe it was his turn. Simon hadn’t realized how much he was the emotional buffer for those two until he’d had some distance. And now that he had Thea, he knew life didn’t have to be that way at the holidays or any other time.

Thea leaned the snow shovel against the wall and opened the front door for him.

“Go on in and get that suitcase settled, then come out so I can do a snow thrower safety video. Then we can have Christmas by ourselves. If we get plowed out in time, maybe we can go to my parents’ house?”

He paused at the open door, grinning. Her family might have its own drama, but at this distance it looked like nothing. “I’d love that.”