Page 21 of A Manny for Christmas

Without me.

Ofcourse,without me. Seriously, Molly.

Oh my God. Oh my God.

Will he do it in bed?

No. Too messy. He’ll do it in the shower.

I find myself squeezing my eyes shut in a pointless attempt at blocking out the crystal-clear, positively pornographic visual that my unhelpfully creative brain is now serving up.

Max in the shower. Naked. (Obviously. Duh.)

Water running over him, making those spectacular muscles slick and soaked. (They’re still spectacular, by the way. He took off his jumper when he was drying up and there was some serious bicep-flexing going on).

He throws his head back, fisting his rock-hard cock at the root and giving it a few pumps as he lubes it up with shower gel.

I can hear the noises he’ll make. Involuntary sounds of pleasure at the back of his throat. The same noises he used to make when we contorted ourselves for each other in bed.

His hand will pick up pace.

Those abs will contract.

He’ll plant a palm flat on the tiles to steady himself as he squeezes his eyes shut in pleasure.

Fuck. I can feel the ridges of his glorious dick just as clearly as if it was me in the shower with him, bringing him to orgasm with my hand. Can feel the satiny wetness of his crown as water and soap sluice over it.

And, as the Max of my mind’s eye presses his forehead against the cool tiles of the shower, his hand moving desperately over his length, his release hot and fast and hard under the torrent of water, I conclude that he will not be the only one touching themselves over the next few weeks.

I groan and roll over onto my stomach.

8

MAX

It’s showtime.

Seven-fifteen, and I already feel like a god. I’m showered and dressed—I even had time to bang one out under the spray. If my morning wood is anything to go by each day, I am ageingwell.

I could have done without my reptile brain serving up a fantasy of me pressing myself up behind Molly at the kitchen sink last night as we washed up. Of her moans. The feel of her arse against my hard-on. Of slipping her leggings and knickers down just enough to—

You get the picture. It did the trick, anyway. And then some. I came so hard I saw stars. But now I’m about to go wake up her kids, so I should shelve the sex thoughts.

And I should shelve any sex thought where Molly is concerned. Full stop. It’s obvious she has too much on her plate. She doesn’t need her pervy ex wanking off over her, even if it’s natural that I should have some, uh,physicalthoughts about her after seeing her for the first time in so long. There was many a washing-up session in the three years we lived together that went that way, let me tell you.

I didn’t even hear her leave this morning. Last night, before we went our separate ways, we set out breakfast stuff. She wrote out copious instructions and left them on the kitchen table after talking me through them. The most crucial, apparently, is: DO NOT LET THEM COME DOWNSTAIRS UNTIL THEY’RE FULLY DRESSED. The last two words are underlined twice for good measure.

Right. I mount the stairs, feeling not unlike how a SWAT officer must feel when preparing to storm the hiding place of a known terrorist. My heart is beating faster than a short flight of stairs warrants. I’ll do the easy one first, I think. I poke my head around Toby’s door, which features his name spelt out in colourful wooden letters.

The room is still dark, the small figure in the bed unmoving. I make a beeline for the curtains, even though it’s barely dawn outside. As I pad across the carpet in my socked feet, I bear down on something hard and sharp. It digs into the soft arch of my foot, lancing my skin, and I let out an agonised roar.

‘Fuuuuck!’It’s fuckingexcruciating.

There’s a piteous cry from the bed, and I can make out the shape of Toby, sitting up, rubbing his eyes. ‘Mummy?Mummy?’

I bend and feel around for the offending item while biting down on the fleshy part of my hand to absorb some of the pain.

‘Sorry, mate,’ I grit out in a rough whisper. ‘It’s me. Max. I stood on something sore.Ouch.’

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