Stockings and Suspenders (18 page)

Gage. My angel… with… pointy ears?
What. The. Fuck?

I jerked away from the kiss and shoved
his head to the side, shifting his hair out of the way. There! Small, even
smaller than Brady’s, but definitely points. “You knew?”

I’d never been sure how much it
actually took to push me over the edge, but his cocky smile went
way
beyond the limit. I half-jumped, half-rolled off him, ending up on my knees on
the other side of the bed.

“You’re a goddamned elf! You lied to
me.”

“I didn’t lie. I just didn’t throw it
out there.”

“Same thing!”

“No it’s not.” The smile stayed in
place, but he shook his head. “Look, I thought you knew too, Daisy. I figured
it was why you weren’t really trying to stop the connection between us.
Besides, you weren’t exactly forthcoming about it either.”

Okay, so maybe it wasn’t really lying,
but it sure as hell changed things. “I’m supposed to get your ass off the
naughty list, not have you make me jump ship and guarantee mine’ll end up there
too.” I shoved at his shoulder as he propped himself up and reached for me.
“Damn it, he sent me here to bring your ass back or something.”

My words didn’t just drive Gage to the
edge of the bed, they pushed him right out of it. He jumped to his feet and
started pacing. “I gave him and those deer almost twelve years. I couldn’t do
it anymore. So bubbly fucking happy all the time and no days off… no beaches…
no—”

My jaw dropped open after the first
sentence. It just took me the rest of his little rant to force words out again.
“You? You’re the one who left the reindeer?” I didn’t even like the animals all
that much, but he’d sent them into spirals of depression. I threw the first
thing I could find at him. When he batted the pillow away, I grabbed the clock
from the nightstand and hurled it. That one crashed into his shoulder. “They
imprinted on you! The other stable elves have spent five years trying to heal
the damage you did by walking away. Santa hasn’t found anyone that they’ll
latch onto since you left. You basically killed them, which means you’re
killing Christmas.”

No wonder he’s on the naughty list.
Oh my God. And I was falling— No. No. You will not fucking say the damn L-word.

I chose that minute to glance at Gage.
He looked like I’d ripped his heart out and crushed it. “They’re dying?”

“No. You’re killing them. It’s kind of
like the difference between lying and not telling.”

“I…I—”

I wanted to leap off the bed and beat
the shit out of him, but Santa chose that exact moment to pop into the room.
“Well, now that everything is on the table, what do you say we sit down and
talk about this like adults, Gage?”

Go me, I turned all that ire right on
the old man himself.
I’m so proud.
“Don’t even tell me you could have
popped in here anytime to talk to him.”

“Ho, ho, ho!”

I jerked backward, falling on the bed
as my elf uniform slapped onto my body. Gage was dressed too… in jeans and a
t-shirt, and I knew no matter what happened now, I wouldn’t be able to shake
this image of him. Fun, flabbergasted, and fucking hot. I was screwed… and not
in the good way.

“Yes, Daisy, I could 'pop in'
whenever, but Gage here has become rather adept at not listening and getting me
arrested before I can make him. So a different foot in the door became
necessary. Yours seemed the perfect size."

“So you used me? You encouraged me to
have sex with him just so you could have a nice little sit-down?” I was about
to jump back to Gage's side—especially since I wanted to kill Santa. Gage and I
would be famous—the elves who killed Christmas. It'd be brilliant.

The cuffs that we'd tossed in a drawer
magically reappeared, chaining me to the bed again. This time didn't seem like
it'd be nearly as much fun as the last. “Don't want you doing anything you’ll
regret. And I didn't make you do anything. I just nudged you toward what you
already wanted.”

 I strained against the cuffs.
“Already wanted?” I screamed. “I
just
met him!”

Gage didn’t yell like me, but I still
heard his voice over mine. “The reindeer are dying?”

Santa answered him first. Typical
male. “Yes, Gage. Roger bonded them to you when he retired. You left them
without re-bonding them to a new elf, so they are more than a little sad and
confused. We’ve managed to force most of them to eat, but…” He sucked in a
shuddering breath. “We’ve lost more than a few in the last five years.”

The cocky grin was completely gone,
and Gage was turning a bit green at the edges. “Can I fix it?”

“I hope so, but you’ll have to come
back and help them heal.”

“Okay. Yeah, that’s fine. But then we
can go?” He glanced at me.

“Go?” I yanked on the stupid, totally
unsexy handcuffs. “Didn’t you hear him? This was all a set up. He probably did
something to make us irresistible to each other.”

They both turned to me like I was a
raving lunatic. Okay, raving maybe, but I wasn’t crazy.

“Ho, ho, ho! Don’t you remember,
Daisy?” He waved a hand through the air forming a frosty window that looked
onto the North Pole where a party was in full swing.

Finally uncuffed and unable to help
myself, I stepped to the window and gazed through. It was one of the Night
After Christmas annual celebrations.

Brady was trying to drag me—a much
younger me—from the corner to dance. I rolled my eyes at him, and he finally
gave up, shoving a mug into my hands before he dashed onto the dance floor. I
sipped at the drink—mint hot chocolate—I could almost taste it again. Another
elf was backing away from someone, waving off whatever they were offering or
asking. He plowed right into me, and the hot cocoa spilled all over the front
of my uniform. He waved his arms, clearly apologizing, and I just scowled at
him—still an angry, bitter girl from the streets of Detroit. It must have
struck midnight somewhere then because at that moment, hundreds of sprigs of
mistletoe dropped from the ceiling. I tried to walk away, ignoring whatever he
was saying, but he leaned down and pressed his lips to mine.

Santa froze the image.

I remembered that moment with crazy
clarity. My lips twitched and raised a hand to them, a phantom kiss making them
tingle. It was the kiss I kept trying to find again—I’d spent years looking.
I’d been looking at the elf, about to ask his name, when Brady yanked me onto
the dance floor. When I finally broke free, the elf was gone.

Santa eased up next to me. “Let’s zoom
in for a minute.”

With a snap of his fingers, the elf
and I were right in front of the window, even though his long, shaggy hair
blocked everything else from view. “And a better camera angle.” The scene
rotated so my head blocked half of his face as we kissed. “And maybe a teensy
smidge of rewinding.”

He paused again just before the kiss,
and I staggered backward, the bed hitting me on the back of my knees. I didn’t
fall though. Instead, a pair of strong arms caught me. I twisted my head and
looked up into Gage’s steely blue eyes. The same ones that stared out through
the frosted window.

“It was you.”

“It was me,” he whispered, a tiny
ghost of his smile returning. “I’m kind of insulted, Daisy. I knew it was you
the moment I kissed you.”

Santa stepped up, totally invading our
space, and I was right back to wanting to hit him. “Once I found out that this
happened, I
was
setting up an encounter between the two of you for the
next party. Then Gage left, and got himself lost in the world. When I finally
found him again this time, I figured at the very least I could finally give the
two of you the chance to see each other again. Brady’s suggestion.” He winked
at me. “And I hoped one or both of us could get him to come back and help the
deer since he always did care about them. Even though, for him, life at the
North Pole chafed.”

I tore my gaze from Gage’s eyes and
glared at Santa. “So you’re saying it
was
a set-up?”

“I’m saying I don’t believe in missed
opportunities.”

Cagey jerk… who found me my kissing
elf. Damn it, I had to let him off. “Fine. You can pick us up in an hour.” I
pointed at the window.

The glance he sent Gage at that moment
simmered with both amusement and warning. “Good luck, boy. You’re going to need
it. And a little something to make it up to you, Daisy.” He winked at me and I
felt a surge of magic rush through my body. 

What the hell?
Then Santa laid a finger aside his nose just as I flipped him a
different finger. Not sure he saw my message or not with how quick he left, and
I didn’t really care. I took the ignored finger and poked Gage in the chest.

His clothes disappeared as I shoved
him on the bed.
Oh, hey. Now
this
is a nice present, Santa.
I
pointed the finger and the cuffs zipped through the air, chaining him to the
bed. Gage chuckled like he knew how all this would turn out.

Funny. I still hadn’t decided. If he
bothered to notice, my clothes were still on. “So what do you plan on doing?”

“Besides you?” He tried to hook my leg
with his ankle, but I stepped back.

“I’m serious.”

He sighed, his entire body deflating.
Well…almost his entire body. “I’m going to the North Pole. I’ll fix what I
screwed up with the animals, however long it takes. Then we leave and never
look back.”

“Not happening. I’m finishing out my
contract.”

Now that last part deflated—maybe he
was finally taking me seriously. “What? I thought you wanted to be with me.”

I shrugged. “You’re going back anyway.
It’s going to be harder for me to leave once I’m there.”

Gage banged his head against the
headboard. “How long do you have left?”

“Ten years.”

“Ten
years
?”

“Give or take.” I stood there while he
stared at the ceiling, and it hurt how long he stared. Like really hurt. Like
made me want to snap my fingers and hide myself in the depths of Santa’s
workshop until Gage pawned the deer off on someone else. I turned away, fingers
pressed together.

“For you, I’d do another twenty.”

My fingers almost slipped. “What did
you say?”

“Would you look at me?” His voice
whispered through the air like drifting snowflakes on moonbeams. Something so
beautiful couldn’t be ignored. Against my better judgment, I spun on my heel.
Even naked and chained to the bed, he controlled this moment… controlled me.
“Daisy. If the only way I could be with you is to devote the remainder of my
life to caring for Santa’s reindeer, I’d do it. Ten years for the chance at a
lifetime with you? I’m in.”

Trap. Pick a direction and run.
Stop thinking.

I wanted to, running sounded smart,
but I couldn’t tear myself away from the earnestness in his eyes.
“And
if I decide I hate you before the ten years are over?”

“Then I figure out where I screwed up
and do my damnedest to fix it, whether you take me back or not.” That’s when
the smirk poked through.

“You’re such a liar!” I snatched up a
pillow and hit him with it.

As I swung again, Gage grabbed my
wrist and pulled me down on top of him, clamping one end of the cuffs around my
wrist. “Yeah, and I also know how to pick locks. I’m willing to quit my life
here for you, but there is no way I’m going to give up on you.” He kissed the
tip of my nose, all innocent-like, as his dick reared back to life beneath me.

Damn it to frostbite and back.
“You mean that?”

He gave me the you’re-an-idiot look
again. “Well, there is that diamond on the line after all.” My expression must
have shifted to let him know I was considering it, because he laughed, the
sound dancing through my nerves just like the first time I heard it. “Besides,
do you think I’m stupid enough to give up Daisy Duke now that I’ve got her in
my life? I’ll keep you chained to me forever if I have to.”

With the way he rattled the cuffs, I
didn’t doubt it for a second. A wicked grin spread over my face as I rolled off
him and scribbled on a piece of paper. A snap of my fingers and it was gone.

“What was that all about?” He kneeled
behind me and trailed kisses down my neck, setting me on fire once more.

I pulled away from him and stood. Then
with a flick of my wrist, my uniform vanished and I pressed him back onto the
bed, straddling his stiff and ready cock. “
That
was me telling Santa to
leave us the hell alone until lunch. We need to make sure our spots on the
naughty list are completely secure before we go back.”

The End

www.selestedelaney.com

Other Books by Seleste deLaney:

'Twas a Dark and Delicious Christmas

GunShy

A VERY NAUGHTY CHRISTMAS