Page 8 of 3 Stolen Kisses

The sun rises slowly into a pale blue sky, with scattered puffs of cloud pushed by the breeze. And Ali takes an age to pick her tree, strolling through a bristly green maze, but I don’t mind the wait, trailing along behind her with my hands in my pockets. Gives me a chance to keep an eye out, scanning our environment for threats. I’m armed, like always, but I don’t have backup out here, so I need to stay sharp.

Sure, this little caper means I’m working on my day off, but what else would I be doing otherwise? What else would be better? I’d probably just hit the gym, same as always, and try to sweat out the last few years’ worth of sexual frustration.

“Can we pick up decorations on the way to your place?” Ali calls back to me. She’s got her hands on her hips, eyeing up a tall spruce.

I scratch my chin. “Yeah.”

Just as well that she asked, because it’s not like I’ve got anything at home Ali can use. Truth be told, I’ve never bothered much with decorating for the holidays—not even string lights. What’s the point when I live alone, and spend most of my time at the Wainwright place anyway?

But I can get in the spirit.

I can have Ali in my space for a few hours without losing my mind.

This is fine.

* * *

Fuck, it’s hard being alone together. All our usual rules keep fading away, receding in my mind’s eye until I almost forget that Alison is a Wainwright, that she’s my boss’s daughter, and that this is a professional relationship. Supposed to be, anyway.

It just all feels soright.Being with her; the two of us alone. Undisturbed and uninterrupted for hours together, first picking out a tree at the farm, then stopping off for decorations, then finally swinging by a roadside diner to chow down an early lunch before we head to my place.

Everything is easy with Alison. I’m never much of a talker with anyone else, never have much to add, but with her, I’ve got things to say. And she laughs easily, smiles easily, is so quick to please that it gets me thinking ridiculous thoughts.

Thinking thatthisis how it would be… if Ali was mine.

Mine.As soon as that thought drifts across my brain one single time, it clangs to a halt and refuses to leave.

Mine.

Mine.

Ali should be mine. My baby girl.

Lord knows I’d take better care of her than Charles Wainwright ever has. I’d see toallof her needs, too; all the needs that he’s oblivious to. Like right now, as she fidgets in the passenger seat of the car as we drive the final mile to my place—Ali’s clearly worked up. Flushed and breathing hard, squeezing her thighs together in those skimpy black leggings, swallowing back whimpers as we rock over bumps in the road.

Makes it hard for me to think straight. And I don’t kid myself for a moment that her body’s cravings have anything to do withme, not when she’s been kept under lock and key her whole life.

The poor thing’s pent up. Needy.

But I could help her with that. Could scratch her itch. Make her moan.

“Thank you so much for this, Saxon.” Ali’s words are breathless as her little hand lands on my thigh and squeezes, and I about go cross-eyed as I put the SUV in park. We’re in the underground garage for my own building, an echo of the one we left this morning—but this one’s shared with all my neighbors, smaller and less well lit, with a jumble of different vehicles. “I owe you big time.”

Don’t think it.

Don’t think how she could pay you in kind. Don’t be a goddamn creep.

“No problem,” I rasp. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

* * *

Fifteen minutes and a trail of pine needles later, Ali stands on my living room rug, her fists propped on her hips. Brown paper bags and canvas totes filled with decorations spill around her feet, and she squints at the tree in its ceramic pot where it looms in the corner.

“Two inches to the left,” she says.

I rustle the tree over, sweating buckets under my shirt. It’s sticky work lumping holiday supplies around, especially up to the tenth floor.

“Your other left.”

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