Unholy Nights: A Twisted Christmas Anthology (7 page)

Then, as Stephen lowered his arms, one of his hands accidentally–I think it was accidental–brushed my shoulder. His touch was a temptation such as I had never felt before. I caught my breath, shocked. It was all I could do to stop myself from jumping on the guy. What's worse, as he looked down at me, his eyes went all narrow and predatory, turning to black as his pupils dilated. Somehow, I knew it wasn't just the mistletoe that was firm. An irresistible force like gravity or magnetism was pulling me toward him, and any second now, from the looks of him, Author Guy was going to rip off my dress.

Then someone else touched me on the back of my shoulder, where my skin was bare. I whirled to find Professor Jeff staring at me as if I were the most delicious hot fudge sundae he'd ever seen or a delightful present he wanted to unwrap or whatever silly metaphor anyone had ever invented about the look of lust. He was looking exactly the way I'd been expecting him to look at Julie, except that he hadn't.

Breathing hard, I backed out of the archway. Which wasn't easy, because both of these guys were looking damn tasty to me, too. If there had only been one to choose from, I think I'd have been lost, but I was a little confused by having two. I'd never been into
ménage a trois
fantasies, although I might have to reconsider my views on the matter.

I came up against the baby grand piano, which cut off my retreat. Meanwhile Julie, who had seen the whole interchange, made a strangled sound and ran off. And these two old friends, Stephen and Jeff, who had probably been tight for decades, were aggressively poised like a couple of alpha wolves about to tear out each other's throats.

Even though I was only about three feet away from them at this point, I had already started feeling less insane. Staring up at the mistletoe with a real bad feeling in the pit of my stomach, I spoke soothingly to my host and his friend: "Um, guys. Guys? Come out from under that arch, okay? Nothing more to see here."

I edged around the piano and retreated a few more steps. They both followed me as if I were the Pied Piper. Once they were away from the arch, Stephen shook his head. His eyes shifted slowly back to normal. I could now see that they were a soft green that reminded me of Will's. He gave me a quizzical look, then shook his head again and grinned. He quirked an eyebrow at me, and waited for a second while I thought, uh-oh! But then he moved away from me.

As for Professor Jeff, whose face hadn't made quite as startling a transformation, he glanced back at the archway as if doubting his sanity. He frowned and gave his head a toss. Then he relaxed as his expression reverted to his usual friendly cast.

Shit
. That couldn't really be enchanted mistletoe, could it? Maybe I'd better ask them to take it down before somebody got hurt.

Or maybe, I thought before I could stop myself, I should go get Will and make some excuse to stand underneath that archway with him.

I remembered Julie, who was nowhere to be seen. I felt a stab of guilt for ruining her moment with Professor Jeff. I decided I'd better find her. We'd brought the mistletoe for her sake, not mine. I didn't even believe in charms, spells, or any of that crap.

After all, I told myself as I hurried to leave the library, nothing had actually happened. Maybe I'd imagined the whole uncontrollable lust thing.

Obviously, it
had
been controllable, since neither of the two older guys had planted a Christmas kiss on me under that mistletoe.

"Way to go, Hol," I told myself, figuring that just because I'd been feeling relatively attractive for a change in my sexy stilettos and my sleek black dress, with my hair holding its wave for once and my cheeks a little flushed from all the holiday excitement, I'd been imagining that all the guys in the room, even the older and impossible ones, were hot for my bod. Absurd!

As for my own lusty feelings, it didn't take much to unleash those. I was twenty. Sex hormones were surging under the surface 24/7. Standing under normal, unenchanted mistletoe with a couple of hot guys–and old or not, there was no denying that those two were hot–would naturally make me wonder how it would feel to kiss them. Or better still, how it would be to have two forbidden guys fighting over me. Particularly since one of them hadn't seemed too interested in my even sexier roommate.

Mistletoe was mistletoe. People had probably been using the stuff since pagan times to incite a little lust on the Longest Night.

8. Chemistry and the Moon

I was looking for Julie, but she wasn't the first person I found. As I was hurrying back up the hallway I ran into Will, tripped on my stilettos, and would have gone down if he hadn't grabbed me around the waist. That hot feeling that had boiled up under the mistletoe came surging back. For the first time since our night together, Will was touching me.

"Holly?" He sounded surprised. "You're here."

"That's right." I was suddenly and unpredictably annoyed. "So what?" Which wasn't at all what I imagined I'd say if this moment ever arrived.

"So...uh...I guess you didn't go to Singapore to be with your family for Christmas?"

"You saw me on campus the other night." Despite the chemistry, which was just as strong as ever, I felt combative. I was tired of yearning after this guy. There were other men in the world, some of whom might actually find me attractive. Even if they were way older than me. "Have you seen Julie? I'm looking for her."

"No, not recently." He sounded jumbled and maybe a little nervous. But he had remembered that my dad lives and works in Singapore. Give him points for that. I managed to steady myself and look up. I saw a lot of yummy chest and shoulders, swathed in the pure white of his shirt, and above that his muscular throat, his quizzical half-smile. As I met his gaze, his expression grew warmer and his green eyes gleamed.

I remembered that gleam. Screw it! I pulled away, taking a couple of steps back. I could hardly believe my own actions, which weren't in any of my mental scripts. "I have to find my roommate."

He stopped me. One of his hands gripped my wrist, giving another jolt to my already-swimming head. I felt as though I'd been drinking all evening, when all I'd consumed had been half a cup of eggnog. "Holly, wait." His voice was urgent. "I need to talk to you."

"Why now? It's not as if you haven't had plenty of chance to talk to me before this."

I could see the flush rise on his cheeks—a slight coloring showing beneath the darker shadow where his whiskers would come in. He was clean-shaven, but his beard would be thick if he ever let it grow, and I knew how rough and raspy it could get during the night. How it felt against my bare skin.

"I'm sorry about that." His eyes met mine. "I guess I should have called you."

No shit, Sherlock. I shrugged, confused now, and trying to feign indifference. "Whatever."

His green gaze pierced me, slicing right into my bones. His hand was still gripping my wrist, and he resisted the tug I made as I half-heartedly tried to break free. He nodded toward the back of the house. "Come with me. I know a quieter place." And he began walking back the way I had come, pulling me along with him.

I thought about jerking my wrist from his grip and stomping off. But I was curious. Was he going to offer some sort of explanation? If so, why? He could have easily ignored me. He could have given me the cut direct.

We passed the library and went through a back hall. A narrow staircase on one side climbed to the second floor. It had probably been the servant staircase back in Victorian times. Opposite this stairway was a large country kitchen. People were milling around in there; people were everywhere. But Will opened a door and led me out onto what must at one time have been the back porch. It had been enclosed and was now a family room, with huge windows on three sides. A wood-burning stove kept the room warm and cozy.

We were alone there except for two scruffy-looking dogs who were lying on the rugs in front of the stove, and a cat perched imperiously on a cushion, where it had a good view out the windows. The dogs greeted us, tails wagging joyously, and Will and I both patted them. We sat down on a small sofa. When he addressed one of the dogs by name, I said, "You know these dogs?"

"Yup. This is Rex and that's Eleanor."

"I guess you've been here before."

"I have, yeah. I've known Jeff since freshman year. Did you know he fell off his roof and broke his leg a while ago? He cracked his ribs, too, and had a concussion."

"I heard about it, yes."

"It was lucky he wasn't killed. His roof is higher than most roofs on modern houses."

That must be true, given the high ceilings.

"After the accident, I helped him out with some chores around the house. He was on crutches for a few weeks."

"I know. He still has a limp." I'd heard about his accident from Julie, whose maternal instincts had been excited by the sight of her beloved advisor on crutches. She had helped him out with some chores, too. "So you're friendly with him?"

"He's an affable guy. He volunteers at the local animal shelter here in town, and I do, too, so I kept running into him outside school."

Will volunteered at an animal shelter? I remember the dead cat we'd bonded over sophomore year. My hostility was fading. How could I be mad at someone who volunteered at an animal shelter?

Still, now that I was finally with him, after all these weeks of longing for it, I was feeling weird. I'd been disappointed so many times that I hadn't expected him to be friendly or encouraging tonight. My throat was doing that frozen-up thing that made it difficult to speak. I mumbled something about how I wished I were friends with more professors.

"I guess if I were smart," said Will, "I'd try to get to know some in the chemistry department. It was kind of an accident, getting to know Jeff." He seemed to have relaxed. He was speaking in that friendly manner I remembered from our night together. "When are you leaving for the other side of the world?"

"I'm not. I have an aunt on Nantucket, so I'm going there for Christmas dinner, and then I'll be coming back to campus. I'm taking an intersession course with Professor Slayton. I can't get used to calling him Jeff, the way you and Julie do."

"You will. He insists on it, and you're a history major."

So he remembered that, too. I wondered if he remembered everything we'd said that night. Did he remember everything we'd done?

"I'll be here for intersession, too," he said. "Going home on Christmas Eve, but I'll be back after a few days." He smiled. "It'll be nice to see a friendly face. All of my others friends will be off skiing."

So, we would both be on campus during break. I had grown so accustomed to feeling pushed away by him, that my first reaction to this was dismay. What if, knowing he was there in his dorm, I got the urge to run by it every day? Fuck! I didn't want to feel the feelings that I was already feeling again!

I couldn't fathom what was going on between us, here on the windowed porch. The moon had risen high over the trees now, and its silver light made the snow sparkle. It was huge in the black sky, driving ahead of it a few wispy clouds that didn't dare obscure its light on this, the Longest Night. It made me feel a little moonstruck.

Will-struck.

I wanted to touch him. As soon as he'd stepped into my circle of awareness, my body had recognized that here was another body that made it feel good. Molecules started exploding in all my cells, fizzing into my blood, and being circulated from heart to lungs to brain to belly and all the way out to the tips of my fingers and toes. Even my hair felt electric. When Will leaned over to pat the cat, who had deigned to come check us out, coolly pushing the two dogs out of her way so she could head-butt Will's legs, unruly chestnut strands of my long hair clung to the warm flesh of his forearm.

"So what did you want to talk to me about?" I asked, surprising myself again. I wasn't about to be ensnared by chemistry and the moon. I wanted an explanation for why he hadn't contacted me for two months. But I wasn't sure how to ask for one. We probably both had friends who fell into bed with casual lovers. Weekend hookups, no big deal.

Will looked as if he felt cornered by my question. "I wondered how you'd been doing. How things were going, and all. You know."

Right. Had there ever been a guy who wanted to talk about the relationship? Particularly when there was no relationship to discuss?

What had probably happened was that Will, more solitary than usual because his friends had left for the holidays, had been reminded of my existence when I'd jogged past his dorm. But he hadn't cared, not then. Not enough to run after me. Not enough to call, send a text, or make any move at all.

Tonight, though, here I was, still on campus, dressed up and looking fine in my little black dress and killer heels. I mean, I surely looked a lot better now than I had in my running sweats and old jacket, no make-up, no perfume, my hair bundled up and hidden under a woolen cap.

What's more, I would be here for intersession while Will's other friends were skiing, and I was demonstrably an easy lay.

I jumped up from the sofa. It seemed that Pissed Off, Rejected Holly was in the ascendance tonight. Maybe "D'arcania" had sold us the revenge charm, after all. "I really need to find Julie." I pushed past the dogs and headed toward the door. "Enjoy your Longest Night."

But not with me, asshole.

And that should have been the end of it. I was going to find Julie and leave. I wasn't a party person, and I figured I'd had about as much of the festivities as I could stand.

But Will stopped me again. This time he did it with his voice.

"I fucked up," he said. "Holly. Please don't go."

I paused. Curiosity is a bitch. I stood there, fists on hips like a challenge in the moonlight. "I'm listening."

"You're mad at me because I didn't call you?"

There were many things I could have said to that, but for once it was good that I couldn't squeeze any words out. I just stood there, like an avenging goddess, waiting for the guilty mortal to lay his case before my divine court of justice.