Wicked Christmas Nights: It Happened One Christmas

Blackout. Wonderful.

Fortunately the building was well-insulated and plenty warm. He had a couple of extra blankets for the fold-out; he’d be fine overnight, and hopefully the power would be back on in the morning.

Hunching against the wind that tried to knock him back with every step, he made his way through the wet snow to the entrance, finding the doors locked. He had a master key, and used it to get in. Emergency reflective lights cast a little illumination in the lobby, and he cautiously made his way to the security desk, knowing a few industrial-strength flashlights were stored back there. Grabbing one, he headed for the stairs, trudging back up six flights, mere hours after he’d raced down them. Going up definitely took longer.

By the time he got to his floor, he was ready for sleep. It looked like he might be snowed in for a couple of days, so he’d have plenty of time to work. Right now, he was weary—physically and emotionally—and just wanted to call it a night.

Once inside his office, in familiar territory, he turned off the flashlight. Hopefully the power would be on tomorrow, but if not, he wanted to conserve the battery. Stretching, he stripped off his wet coat and kicked off his shoes, then walked across the office to the small, private sitting area.

Ross moved cautiously; it was even darker in this corner, since there were no windows. He still managed to bump into the edge of the fold-out, and muttered a curse. Then, glad the day was over, and that it couldn’t get any crazier, he lifted the covers and climbed into the bed.

A noise split the silence. A low sigh.

What the hell?

The sound surprised him into utter wakefulness. Carefully reaching out, he patted the other side of the bed…and felt a body under the covers.

“Ross?” asked a soft, sleep-filled woman’s voice.

A familiar woman’s voice.

“Lucy?” he whispered, shocked.

Could it really be her? He knew that voice, and could now smell the sweet cinnamon-tinged scent she always wore.

She mumbled something and shifted, scooting closer as if drawn to his warmth. His eyes had adjusted a little, and he was able to make out her beautiful face. The creamy skin, the strand of dark hair lying across her cheek, the perfect mouth drawn into a tiny frown.

And she’d said his name in her sleep.

His heart pounded as he realized it was real. Lucy Fleming was asleep in his bed, in his office, in a building that was supposed to be deserted. It made absolutely no sense, was probably the last thing he’d ever have expected to happen. Considering how determined she’d been to get away without even talking to him earlier, climbing into this bed and finding the real live Santa Claus seemed more likely.

He frantically thought of the scenarios that might have landed her here. She had to have come back sometime after the building closed—when he’d left at seven-thirty, everybody had been gone except the guard. Why she’d returned, he had no idea. Maybe she’d forgotten something? Whatever the reason, Chip had to have let her in, probably recognizing her from this afternoon.

Beyond that…what? Had she offered to stay in the building when he was taken away by ambulance? That sounded incredibly far-fetched, and the officer who’d called hadn’t mentioned it.

The doors. Shit. When the locking mechanism was engaged, they couldn’t be opened, even from the inside, without a key. If Chip had gone out to help the motorist, he must have locked up behind him.

“You got locked in,” he murmured, suddenly understanding.

And she had no way to call for help. The building was notorious for its poor cell phone reception even in the best weather, and the phone system fed off the power, so regular phones wouldn’t have worked. The internet would be out, of course, plus all the computers in the building were password protected.

He could almost picture Lucy banging on the doors, trying to get someone’s attention. But with the dark night, the swirling snow and the lack of people venturing out, it must have seemed like a hopeless proposition. She’d have known she was stuck here until at least morning.

So, like Goldilocks, she’d found a bed and crawled into it.

He was glad he hadn’t followed his first instinct, leaped to his feet and bellowed, “Who’s that sleeping in my bed?”

Lucy Fleming is who’s sleeping in my bed.

A smile tugged at his mouth. What were the odds? Six years ago tonight she’d slept in his bed, too.

Remembering everything about that night—seeing the parallels—he had to laugh softly. If he were a more new age kind of guy, he might see fate having a hand in this. But being a realist, he knew the fault lay with a blizzard, a blackout and a strong security system.

That didn’t, however, mean he wasn’t thankful as hell for it, as long as Chip was going to be okay. Because, trapped as she was with him in this building, it wasn’t going to be easy for Lucy to walk out of his life again.

He could hardly wait until morning to see just how much snow had fallen. How long they were going to be stuck here.

And what Lucy would have to say about it.

LUCY WAS HAVING the nicest dream. In that state between asleep and awake, she somehow knew it was a dream, but didn’t want to give it up.

She was lying on a beach, cradled by soft, sugar-white sand. The turquoise waters of the Caribbean lapped in gentle waves, caressing her bare feet, the crash of the surf steady and hypnotic. Above, the sun shone bright in a robin’s egg blue sky. Occasionally a puffy white cloud would drift across it, providing a hint of shade, but mostly she just felt warm and content.

Except her nose. That was really cold.

Actually, so were her cheeks. She lifted a hand, pressing her fingers against her face, wondering how her skin could be so cold when she was lying in such deliciously warm sunshine.

Beside her, a man groaned, as if he, too, was loving the feel of the sun, and the island breeze blowing across his skin. The sound was intriguing, and she moved closer. He was hot against her, big and powerful, with sweat-slickened muscles that she traced with her fingertips. She kept her eyes closed, not needing to see his face, somehow sensing she already knew who it was.

Or, maybe a little afraid she wouldn’t see the face she wanted to see.

“Mmm,” she moaned as she pressed her cheek against his chest. Languorous heat slid over her; she was lulled by his rhythmic exhalations, and by the sound of his steadily thudding heart.

Wait. Too scratchy. He should be bare-chested.

She waited for the dream to change, waited for the feel of slick, male skin against her face. Instead her cheeks just got colder, and the texture against her jaw scratchier. Not smooth, slick skin. Something like…wool?

Though she desperately wanted to grab the dream and sink into it again, she’d passed the tipping point into consciousness and knew it was no use. The dream was over. She was awake. Her face was cold because she was trapped in a building with no power and no heat. It was scratchy because…because… .

She opened her eyes. Waited to let them adjust to the darkness. Saw a shape. A body. A scratchy sweater on which her cheek had been resting. A neck. A face. Oh. My. God. Ross. Ross?

She froze, unable to move a muscle as she tried to understand. She’d gone to sleep alone, worried, angry, wondering what would happen tomorrow if nobody came to check the building.

And had woken up in bed with Ross Marshall.

It was him, no doubt about it. The guy who’d broken her heart, the one she’d sworn would never get close enough to hurt her again, was sleeping beside her in the fold-out bed! Not just beside her, but practically underneath her. Apparently, in her sleep, she had curled up against him, raising one leg and sliding it over his groin, her arm draped across his flat stomach, her face nestled in the crook of his neck.

She was practically humping the guy.

And he was sound asleep.

Lucy’s first instinct was to leap up and run. Her second, to grab a pillow and beat him over the head with it, demanding to know what the hell he was up to.

But then her brain took over.

Because, as far as she could tell, Ross hadn’t been up to anything except sleeping. She’d been the one getting all creepy-crawly, sucking up his warmth while she’d dreamed of exotic beaches and blazing sunshine. Probably not too surprising, considering Ross was still just about the hottest man she had ever laid eyes on. Even in the nearly pitch-black room, it was impossible to miss the sensual fullness of his mouth, the slashing cheekbones, that angular, masculine face. His lashes were sinfully long for a guy, hiding those jewel-green eyes.

All the coldness she’d been feeling, at least on those parts, which weren’t covered by Ross, dissipated. There was only warmth now. In fact, certain places of her anatomy throbbed with it.

She was suddenly very aware of the position of her arm across his waist, how it dipped low on his hip. Her leg had slipped so comfortably between his, she was almost afraid to move, lest she wake him. But staying like this was torturous.

Because it was simply impossible to have her legs wrapped around him, to feel him pressed against her, without remembering the past; all the ways he’d delighted her, pleasured her, thrilled her. The man had taught her things about her body she hadn’t even known were possible.

While one day ago she would have sworn she was not the least bit susceptible to him anymore, the woman who’d had to get herself off in the bathtub a few hours ago would say otherwise. As would the one who now felt totally at the mercy of her girl parts.

Her nipples were tight and incredibly sensitive against his chest. The barest movement sent the fabric of her soft sweater sliding across them, and since she’d been in a hurry and hadn’t grabbed a bra, the sensation was definitely noticeable.

That wasn’t all. Her thighs were quivering, and between them, her sex was damp and swollen. The urge to thrust her hips nearly overwhelmed her, and she had to forcibly remind herself it was not polite to rub up against a sleeping man just to get a little satisfaction.

Though, to be totally honest, she suspected—no she knew—he could give her a lot of satisfaction.

She closed her eyes, took a deep steadying breath, willed her body into standby, then tried to extricate herself. Bad enough to have to wake him up and ask him what the hell he was doing here—or explain the silly story about why she was. But to do it when he knew she’d been using him as both a heating blanket and a potential sex toy was more than she could stand right now.

Holding her breath, she lifted her bent leg, drawing it back off his groin. Slowly, oh, so carefully. But when she shifted a little too low, and her jean-clad thigh brushed against the money-spot on the front of his trousers, she stopped with a gasp. Because those trousers were not flat anymore. Definitely not.

He was hard, erect, aroused.

And, she greatly feared, awake.

He confirmed it by dropping a big hand onto her arm, holding her right where she was—right against him.

“Stop.”

“Uh…how long have you been awake?”

Please don’t say long enough to know I’ve been climbing all over you in your sleep. Though, judging by the ridge in his pants—the big, mouthwatering ridge—that seemed pretty certain.

“I just woke up a few seconds ago,” he claimed.

He could have been telling the truth, the gravelly note in his voice hinted at sleep. So maybe his body had just been doing its nocturnal thing. Perhaps the fact that her thighs were spread and practically begging to be parted further didn’t factor into the big erection pressing against the seam of his pants.

Stop thinking about his pants. And what’s in them.

Yeah, fat chance of that. Every cell she had was on high alert, and her blood roared through her veins. She might have told herself a thousand times that she never wanted to see Ross again. But being here, in his arms, knowing his body was reacting to her even if his mind didn’t know it, was the most exciting thing she’d experienced in ages.

There was no sense denying it, at least to herself. She wanted him. Against all reason and all common sense.

Or maybe not. What if it was reasonable? Maybe it made perfect sense to take this unexpected moment and wring whatever she could from it.

She and Ross had been a perfect sexual match once. Lucy had spent six years learning that was a pretty rare thing. Other men had given her orgasms…nobody else had made the earth shake. Plus, she was no longer the inexperienced twenty-two year old who confused sex with love. She and Ross didn’t need to love each other to experience pure, undiluted pleasure in each other’s arms.

At least…as long as he wanted to. His body apparently did, but his mind had to be engaged in the decision-making process. Ross had walked away without a backward glance once before, so maybe this tension she was feeling didn’t mean as much to him as it did to her. If not, she needed to know that before deciding whether to slide onto him and kiss his lips off, or roll over, get out of the bed and demand that he let her out of the building. Facing a blizzard sounded more appealing than admitting she wanted him and finding out he didn’t really feel the same.

“You could have woken me up when you realized I was here. Why didn’t you?”

“Maybe because I just wanted to sleep with you one more time,” he admitted.

Nice.

Then, with a sigh, he added, “Plus I knew if I woke you up you’d put all those defenses back into place and insist on leaving in the middle of a blizzard.”

She ignored the comment, since she’d pretty much just decided to do exactly that.

“So you just crawled in and curled up next to me?”

“As I recall, you were the one doing the curling,” he said, his tone lazy and amused. Which confirmed he’d been awake a little longer than he’d let on. Hell.

“So,” he continued, “what’d you forget?”

“Excuse me?”

“I think I put everything together—you must have forgotten something this afternoon, come back to retrieve it, then gotten stuck in the building when Chip went outside and had a heart attack.”

“Oh, no! Is he okay?”

“The cop who called me said he thought he would be.”

“I hope so. He was very nice, letting me come back in because, yes, I did forget something.” Embarrassed to admit it, since every photographer considered their camera an extension of their own body, she explained, “I left my camera bag and my specialty lens case.”

He chuckled softly, obviously reading between the lines, knowing he’d flustered her enough to make her forget her equipment. The man had always been a little too perceptive. Damn it.

This conversation wasn’t going the way it was supposed to. She’d broached the topic, hoping to hear him say he’d climbed into bed with her because he wanted her so desperately.

Now they were talking about cameras and cops. Ugh.

The wind howled, and though the temperature hadn’t fallen too much inside, she instinctively curled closer to Ross. They both fell silent, as if totally comfortable with the fact that they’d ended up in bed together by accident—which she still wanted to discuss, by the way.

But later. Not now. Not when he was so warm and strong, when his breath teased her hair, and his hard thigh fit so nicely between hers. Not when she was trying to breathe ever deeper, intoxicated by the warm, spicy scent of his skin.

Not when she needed to know if he really wanted her—Lucy Fleming—and not just the female body that happened to be beside him in the bed.

If he did, Lucy intended to let herself have him. Ross would be the ultimate Christmas present. Just this once, just for tonight.

As if he knew she had no intention of putting some distance between them, Ross lowered his hand to her wrist, lazily tracing circles on the pulse point. Like he had every right to touch her. Lucy sighed, shocked at how evocative that touch felt. Her already moist sex grew hotter, wetter, as she remembered how those strong but gentle fingers used to slide across her clit, making her come with a few deliberate strokes.

Stretching, he shifted a little, and she felt the flex of the powerful muscles in his shoulder. She’d noted earlier that his body had changed—he was bigger, broader across the chest and shoulders, though his lean hips would still be easily encircled by her thighs.

It was far too easy to visualize that. To visualize everything. In fact, she was having difficulty focusing on anything else.

Without warning, Ross moved his hand, dropping it to her hip, tugging her more tightly against his body. For warmth? For old time’s sake? Because he had nothing better to do?

Oh, God, he was driving her crazy!

He continued with that steady, even breathing, remaining silent, and didn’t reveal by word or deed whether he was just killing time or trying to start something.

Finally, unable to take it anymore, she sat straight up in the bed and glared down at him. “Well, are you going to do something about this?”

She was asking a lot more than that. Are you interested? Do you feel this? Do you want me?

He didn’t respond for a second, didn’t reply with a confused, Like what? But then, just when Lucy was about to launch herself out of the bed and call him an idiot, he moved, quickly and deliberately.

Between one breath and the next, Ross sat up, pushed her onto her back and slid over her, his powerful body pressed hard against hers. His face lowered toward her, and Lucy’s heart thudded with excitement as she saw the hunger in his expression.

Then he said two words…the only two she wanted to hear.

“Hell, yes.”

After that, no words were needed. Her heart flying, all thoughts disappearing, she rose to meet his lips with her own. Their tongues plunged together, frantic, hungry for a connection.

There was nothing slow and quiet about it. Only driving need and demand. Their hands raced to touch each other, and Lucy hissed when he moved his mouth to her neck and sucked her nape. He nipped lightly and she quivered, wanting that mouth, that tongue, those nibbling teeth, on every inch of her body.

The Ross she’d made love with all those years ago had been slow, tender and deliberate. This Ross was wild. Desperate. She felt his driving need, and answered it with her own. Emotion had been chased away by lust, and she realized, suddenly, that she’d been waiting for this since long before the moments they’d just spent in his bed.

She’d longed for years to feel like this, through other affairs and other men. She’d wanted to experience the intense, nearly animalistic passion she felt right now. Deep down, Lucy knew she’d been waiting for him. Ross. Waiting until they met again—as if knowing someday they would—to truly let go of every inhibition, every doubt, every question about her own desirability. To know she was someone’s sexual obsession, if only for one night, one moment in time.

And she was. He wanted her with every fiber of his being. His desperate touch proclaimed it and her own body was already screaming a silent Yes to every little thing he might ask of her.

They separated only far enough to remove their clothes. His sweater came off, revealing the golden-skinned chest beneath, and she had to reach out and run the tips of her fingers across his impressive abs. He was built perfectly—broad chest, lean at the waist and hips. Like he’d been the model used to create the prime example of man.

When his hands touched her waist and began yanking her sweater up, Lucy arched toward him. She heard his low groan when he realized she wasn’t wearing a bra, and even in the near-darkness, could see the look of pure appreciation as he visually devoured her.

Lucy had been built a little differently six years ago. She’d been more girlish, more lean. Now she was curvier, carrying an extra ten pounds in all the right places…places he obviously liked. A lot.

“God, you’re gorgeous,” he muttered. Then he bent to her breast, no warning, no hint, his mouth landing on her nipple and sucking hard. As if he couldn’t help himself, had to quench his ravenous thirst with the taste of her.

“Oh, yes, please,” she groaned.

She sunk her fingers into his hair, pressing him even harder, needing to feel it, deep down. And with every deep pull of his mouth, she did feel it. All the way down to the throbbing center of sensation between her thighs.

He leaned over to give her other breast the same attention. Plumping it with his hand, he rolled her nipple between his fingertips before he blew lightly, then suckled her. Lucy cried out at how good it felt. Savoring his attention, she kissed his neck, his shoulder, raking her nails down his bare back, wondering how he could possibly be so strong when He appeared to now be a suit-and-tie kind of guy.

She wanted to cry when he moved his mouth away again. But she got with the program when he kissed his way down her midriff to the waistband of her jeans, which he quickly unfastened. He backed away, kneeling on the edge of the bed and straightening her legs. Lucy lifted her hips, arching up toward him, helping as he tugged the denim away.

Thank God she’d been in too much of a hurry to put on long johns or something equally as hideous before she’d left home. Her pink panties weren’t Frederick’s of Hollywood worthy, but they were cute and sexy. And Ross seemed to like them. A lot.

Or maybe not. Because without a word, he ripped them off her, tearing the fabric. She didn’t give a damn. The hunger in his every movement excited her beyond anything.

“Gotta taste you, Luce.”

She had a second to prepare, then his mouth was on her, licking at her core. She actually shrieked, shocked by the raw intimacy. He didn’t carefully sample her, he dove deep, thrusting his tongue into her opening, then up to her clit, then back again. She was whimpering, her hips bucking freely, helpless to do anything but take what he wanted to give. Her first orgasm smashed into her like an earthquake, making her whole body quiver. He didn’t stop, merely holding her hips in his big hands, continuing to lick at her as if he couldn’t get enough.

Then came the aftershocks—the tsunami—wave after wave of hot, electric delight, popping in little explosions that made her head spin. Colors, instruments, spinning lights—a whole freaking carnival seemed to be taking place all around her, all calliope music and the thrill of spinning and riding until you were breathless and just couldn’t take anymore.

She couldn’t take anymore.

“Stop,” she ordered dazedly, knowing she’d reached that point. Pleasure overload. She could barely breathe, her heart was pounding hard enough to burst out of her chest, and she was almost hyperventilating from all the gasping.

Mostly she was stunned. Shocked.

Awakened.

They hadn’t had a lot of time together six years ago, and oral sex was one intimacy they hadn’t shared. She’d been young, a virgin, and he’d been tender and incredibly patient. She suspected that if Ross had ever used his mouth on her like that, she would have stalked him to Chicago.

Now, she wanted him to feel that same unadulterated freedom. Wanted to give him what she’d never given him before. Not just to please him, but also to make him as absolutely crazy as he had made her.

More, though, she wanted that intimacy for her own sake. She’d never viewed oral sex as anything more than foreplay, a tit for tat return on a guy’s earlier tongue investment. This time, though, she wanted to take that thick ridge of male heat into her mouth and explore the flavors of his body. Wanted to taste him, explore him, suck his cock until his willpower gave out, or his legs did.

She scooted away, grabbing his hair and pushing him up. He eyed her from between her legs, his eyes glittering, his mouth moist. “You taste good,” he growled.