Page 13 of Christmas Cheer

“Dessert? We just had French toast, so I don’t know that you need dessert—”

My words die on a squeak as he suddenly lifts me up and sits me on the edge of the table. With a swipe of his tongue over my lips, he says, “Your French toast was delicious, but definitely not sweet enough.”

“Evan,” I whisper, realizing that whole Christmas movie thing was a ploy to lull me so he could shock me with this. “Shouldn’t we go back to your room?”

“No, that’s a terrible idea,” he says, unzipping my velour hoodie and revealing the bralette I’m wearing underneath. I live most of my life in sports bras and compression tops, so I still feel fully dressed, but this one is a bit prettier than usual, with lace frills and a little bow in the center.

Evan eyes it like it’s the sexiest thing he’s ever seen.

“Fuck, Hughes, why did you hold back on me?” he groans as he cups my breast through the fabric. “Why did I have to wait this long to get inside your pussy?”

“Why do you keep saying crude stuff like that?” I resisted him for a reason; the fact that I’m ignoring those reasons for now because I’m feeling a little lonely and I’m about to leave the country doesn’t mean I want him to call me out on it.

He leans down to kiss me. “I’ve wanted you for forever. I’m just frustrated on how much time I’ve lost, that’s all.” His lips brush mine, and it’s terrifying how gentle they are. I don’t want sweet and kind. I want to get him out of my system before I’m gone forever.

“You only wanted me because I resisted you,” I remind him even as I reach for his stupid designer tee shirt to take it off of him. I consider destroying it along the way. He’s gotten everything he ever wanted — including me, apparently. He did work hard, but so did I. And now I have to go to Germany just to be assured I’ll be able to get a job with my degree that will pay my bills the second I leave college.

But I want to leave claw marks on his chest before I go.

“Not true,” he says firmly as he pulls down the front of my bra so my breasts pop out over the top. His eyes and hands go straight to them, taking both and massaging them roughly enough I’m already squirming on his kitchen table. Still, he says, “I wanted you from the first moment I saw you. You were doing things I’d never seen a cheerleader do. And maybe it was because I was young and dumb and didn’t pay attention to the cheerleaders before then because I just wanted to play football, but I was absolutely obsessed with you doing those crazy somersaults.”

He pushes me back onto the table, taking one of my nipples in his mouth while he fights to get my pants down, as I point out, “So you were objectifying me? Thirteen-year-old me? That’s just perfect.”

“I was just a kid too! I–fuck, your pussy’s already wet isn’t it? And I wasn’t objectifying you! Or, I don’t know if I was. What do you mean by that?”

I sigh and pop myself back up onto my elbows, telling myself I should probably not let him pull my pants entirely off and it would make more sense if I stuffed my boobs back in where they’re supposed to be, but I want this. I want him to shut up or say the nice things I’m sure he tells all his conquests and fuck me. I don’t think I’m asking too much.

I don’t want honesty from Evan Allore. Not now of all times.

I stroke his cheek, enjoying the texture of the dark, rough stubble he still hasn’t shaved off. “You don’t want me because of who I am. You want me because I’m a gymnast, and probably that wouldn’t have mattered except in your head, cheerleaders are not gymnasts. When you saw a cheerleader who didn’t come up the ranks from pee-wee and could already do the things the older girls could, you thought she was special. I wasn’t special.”

“Fuck that,” he spits out. “You were always special.Always. You hated to talk in class but had all these big thoughts you couldn’t stop once they were forced out of you. You could have gotten everything you wanted on looks alone but you busted your ass in school to get salutatorian. You volunteered at the animal shelter, and you hated cheerleading but couldn’t keep yourself from being their leader. You took them to Nationals and won third place even while grieving for your father. You shied away from the light, but the light followed you everywhere. And no matter how much the whole cheerleading culture drives you insane — and now I know it’s because your true love was stolen from you and cheerleading was only a pale shadow of it — you let every single one of those girls cry on your shoulders when I was mean to them. You weretheirrally girl. You are amazing, Hughes.”

My sinuses prickle with emotion over how accurate he is. He shouldn’t know me that well. He shouldn’t have paid attention like that. This is not the Evan Allore who’s pestered me for almost a decade. That’s impossible.

He pushes me right back down onto my back as he grabs one of my legs and lifts it onto his shoulder, giving himself space to bury his face between my legs, and that feels more like how Evan should feel. The hand he used to push me down remains on my collarbone, his long arms making it no big stretch to creep even further up to my neck as he laps me up.

I gasp at the suction of his lips over my clit. My spine flexes on the table, my body tightening up around him. The leg that’s gone over his shoulder curls in, hooking at his side and holding him in place while my hand digs in to get a handful of his long, lush hair.

I’m sure he’s losing some strands to my grip, but the humming sound he tickles my clit with tells me he doesn’t care.

“Oh, fuck,” I whimper. “Oh, fuck.” It’s not even because I’m dangerously close to coming all over his face already, the lashing from his tongue making my whole body shiver. As much as I was just thinking about how I wish he’d give me the same sweet nothings he gives all those other girls, I’m now wondering if he’s so popular with them because what he gives them is sweeteverythings.

It’s too much. It’s way too much.

He slides two fingers into me. They stroke gently, giving me a cadence to match as I try to ground myself by focusing on the simple pendant light hanging above my head, but all it does is spots my vision. The hand on my neck presses in enough to make the world a little fuzzier as his fingers massage the soft spots behind my jaw.

The next time I say his name, it’s a weak whimper he responds to with another, more reassuring hum and a twist of his wrist to tilt my head to the side.

At that angle, when I look down, I meet his eyes.

He’s staring at me like I’m his world.

He keeps making these grand statements to me, and it turns my stomach not knowing if they’re heartfelt or if he simply has a clever mouth.

A very clever mouth, because he’s somehow got both his lips and tongue doing everything in this just-right way to make me pant and beg for more.

The Evan I know isn’t clever, though. He’s a big dumb dog that’s been trained to fetch and excels at it and expects all the treats for it, which he gets. He’s the dog who notices when one human does not give him treats and hounds them because clearly they didn’t notice how amazing he is for fetching and now has to show just how amazing he is.

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