We broke the news about me staying for good to Kit first, not that it surprised her. Then we told Asher and Jesse, who were equally unsurprised, before sharing it with the group at large. I still felt a little unsettled, having made the decision to bind myself to Dallas forever, but having not done the deed. Was this how humans felt? Waiting months between engagement and wedding? I suddenly understood the urge to fly to Vegas over a weekend and get married by fat Elvis in a drive-through chapel.

The week was busy, though. It was the week before Christmas, and Asher still had the other guys running around, following leads and research regarding the arsonist, but with Benjamin staying with us, we kept those discussions quiet. The man was morning the loss of both his son and his mate, and that wasn't going to heal anytime soon. 

Dallas had told me about his son being taken, and that Asher had told Benjamin everything they knew about the arsonist the morning after the fire, but outside of that, we tried to focus on the happy parts of Christmas. Evan was too young to understand what had happened to his brother and father, but he understood that his dad was sad, and that talking about them made his dad even sadder. The kid was too young to have to face that weight of responsibility, but that is what fate and Emerson Wamp had thrust upon him. I would be happy to see Wamp pay, someday.

Christmas was everything I had imagined and more. When Kurt opened his John Wayne boxset from Dallas, he looked directly at me. "Children!" I warned.

Fuck you, he mouthed, sending me into a fit of giggles. I didn't bother explaining to Dallas. His look of utter confusion was too adorable. 

I wasn't surprised that every single member of the pack had found the time to buy a present for Evan and his dad, even on such short notice. Benjamin looked ready to break apart at the slightest breeze, so we did our best to take attention off of him, but we wanted him to know he had a place here. I wanted him to feel as welcomed as I had been when I had arrived just a few weeks ago.

After our early dinner, Asher stood and clapped his hands for our attention. "We've got a surprise for the children tonight, so the alphas are going to go prep for it. We'll be back in just a bit."

Dallas squeezed my hands as he left with the other men.

I looked over at Jesse. "Surprise? What surprise?"

"Jesse leaned over to stage whisper, "I think we're getting a hay ride."

Evan perked up. "What's a hay ride."

Jesse leaned forward and bopped his nose. “It's a surprise! You'll see in just a few minutes."

I had to laugh when I saw our hay ride. They guys had lined the edges of Asher's truck bed with hay, alright, and they pulled us up into the bed with them. It was a tight fit, but that made it a little easier to handle the cold bite of the night winter air.

"Are we going somewhere special?" I asked Dallas.

"We're staying on the property," he replied. "Just a little ride for fun."

Simon started in on Christmas Carols after that. I sang just as loud as anyone, leaning into the warmth of my alpha. I couldn't help but wonder when he would finally declare he was healed enough. Would it be tonight? We hadn't exchanged Christmas gifts yet. I was saving mine for when we were alone. I wasn't sure if he had one for me or not. 

"Here we are!" Simon declared, breaking the caroling.

I looked around to see trees decorated with white Christmas lights. "Oh! This is so pretty!"

Dallas wrapped his arms around me. "Do you like it?" 

"It reminds me of the streets in Nashville during Christmas, but better. No nasty salt everywhere. No concrete. No metal."

"It's ours," Dallas said quietly.

I turned to see his face in the dim light of the Christmas lights. "Ours? What do you mean?"

"This is where I'm going to break ground after New Years to build our home. I wanted to surprise you with it to convince you to stay with me, but apparently you didn't need as much convincing as I thought."

Tears pricked at my eyes. "You dweeb. I told you, a house is just a house."

He ducked his head and gave me a kiss. "Yeah, but by that time, I already had plans to build the house, so I figured I'd go ahead and do it anyway, and then the three of us can make it a home." He pressed his hand to the general vicinity of my belly, but I was bundled up like an Eskimo, so he kind of missed, but it was cute anyway.

"Someone's getting laid tonight," Simon mumbled in a sing-song voice. He wasn't wrong.

"Might as well drop us directly off at the double-wide, Asher," Dallas yelled to our driver, making me blush. I didn't care how much he made me blush as long as he took me home and followed through on the promises his eyes were making.

We got out of the truck to a chorus of good-natured ribbing, and I was thankful everyone else decided to go back to Asher and Jesse's house for some hot cocoa. Nothing was going to stop me from claiming my man tonight at this point, but I definitely preferred knowing everyone was out of hearing range.

Dallas pulled me along silently and willingly to our room. Once he had closed the door, he pulled me into his arms and joined his hands together behind my lower back. He leaned down and kissed me slowly, meltingly, warming my cold noes and fingers and toes from the inside out.

"Are you ready to make us official?" he asked when he broke the kiss. 

"Absofuckinglutely," I breathed.

Dallas released his grip behind me and I jumped when he slapped my ass, not suspecting it at all. "Language," he warned. "You're about to be a dad. You have to be an example." The twinkle in his eyes belied his stern tone, but that tone went straight to my cock. I wanted more of it. I cast my eyes down, knowing what the submissive posture would do to him. "Yes, alpha."

Dallas's hand went to the back of my neck and gripped hard, pulling me close. "Fuck, Nick. The things you do to me."

I debated on whether I should harass him for his language. If I did, he'd spank me again... and I definitely wanted that. I glanced up at him from under my eyelashes. "Now who needs to watch their language?"

The flash in his eyes was exactly what I was expecting and hoping for. 

"What did you say, Nick?"

I looked back down, shivering at his tone, but he grabbed my chin and forced me to look him in the eyes. 

"Tell me what you said."

I held back a moan. "I said, 'Now who needs to watch their language?'"

Dallas shook his head as if in disappointment, but his smile was warm and excited. "Someone is getting too big for their britches tonight. Off with them. The shirt too."

Yesss, sir! I was naked and waiting before Dallas had even finished taking off his winter jacket. He removed his clothing with painful precision, watching my eyes follow his fingers as he unbuttoned each button on his shirt, then slowly stretched out of it and dropped it on the floor. I stepped forward to help with his pants, but he pushed me back. 

"I don't think you've earned the right to help me undress. And now you've stepped out of line again, moving without permission. I don't think it's fair to let you watch me finish undressing. Lie on the bed. On your stomach, face down."

"But—" 

Dallas was by my side with a sharp slap to my ass before I could finish that thought. I fell against him, my legs going weak from the pleasure and he rubbed the sting away from my skin. "Are you going to argue some more?"

"No, alpha," I whispered.

"Good." He kissed my hair. "Now get on the bed."

I did, missing the satin of my own bedspread. I wondered if I could convince Dallas to buy one. The cool fabric would feel so good against my hot skin right now. Not that I would have noticed it the moment Dallas returned to taking off his clothes. All I could hear were the sounds of fabric and buttons and zippers. Fuck. How damn long did it take to remove one pair of pants and a pair of boxers? Was he taking them off and then putting them back on again just to torture and confuse me?

Finally, I felt his skin on mine again when he started massaging my foot. 

"Good boy," he murmured, making me flush with pleasure. "I like rewarding you when you obey me. Don't you like it when I reward you?"

"Yes... but..." The last word slipped out before I could reign it in.

Dallas's hands stilled. "But what?"

"But I want more. Please."

Dallas's hands glided up my legs and thighs to rest right under the crease of my buttocks. "What do you want more of?"

"You, alpha. I want more of you."

He leaned forward, and I could feel his breath against the skin on my ass. "But how do you want more? Be specific."

He knew exactly what he was doing with his mouth so close to my ass. I wiggled, but his hands pressed me into the mattress, suppressing my movements. "I want you to eat me out."

"Do you think you deserve such a gift?"

Fuck, did I? I knew I wanted it, but I'd been teasing him earlier, knowing he would get all growly and dominant.

His hands massaged my legs, reminding me that he was waiting for an answer.

"I don't know," I gasped.

"Good answer," Dallas rumbled. "Not cocky, and not falsely humble. That definitely deserves a present." 

He leaned forward and pressed his tongue into my seam, pressing my cheeks together to make more of a valley for him to tongue fuck without actually touching my hole. I wanted him to dive deeper so bad, I wanted his tongue in me, eating me out. I rocked back into his touch, but he was in too much control for me to alter my situation.

"Is this not enough?" he asked, as my rocking grew frantic. 

"You're always enough," I responded, playing the good boy this time. "I just want more."

Dallas rubbed his hands over my back and ass. "Someone has been a very good boy this year, I think." Suddenly, he stretched my cheeks and dove in, his tongue plunging in to me, his stubble scraping against my tender skin, driving squeaks of overwhelmed pleasure out of me.

When he'd had his fill, and left me almost a rag doll underneath him, Dallas pulled me close and flipped me over, hovering over me so he could look into my eyes. "You haven't given me my present yet."

I was dazed already, and confused at the sudden non-sequitur. "What?"

"My present. I don't think it's really fair for me to keep giving if you're not giving anything in return." His smile was wicked. Had he found my present already, somehow? He couldn't have. I had it wrapped up before I left the store.

"In my sock drawer," I said. 

Dallas quirked his eyebrow, and I wondered if he was going to make me go get it, which would be problematic, given the state he'd put me in, but he stepped away to grab it himself, then placed it on my stomach and began to unwrap it. He started by carefully slicing every piece of tape, leaving the paper as intact as possible. Every time he turned the present to reach a new piece of tape, the pull of the paper on my stomach made my cock twitch. Once the tape was managed, he carefully unfolded it, but let the paper fall away to the floor and kept the cardboard box on my stomach as he opened it. He pulled out two clips attached by a silver chain.

"What is this?" He twisted the chains this way and that. "Fancy chip clips?"

"You could use it for that, but I'd much rather you use them on my nipples."

Understanding brightened in his eyes. "Really? We've never talked about these. Have you used them before? Do you like them?" 

I blushed. "I haven't tried them, but I figured that I love it so much when you bite my nipples..."

Dallas leaned forward to nuzzle my neck, inhaling the scent concentrated in the gland there. "I like the way you think. Are you okay with using them tonight?"

"I wouldn't have gotten them for Christmas if I wasn't intending to use them," I quipped. 

Dallas's eyebrows twitched. "Careful, Nick. You don't want to get too snippy."

My head dropped back as all the blood rushed to my dick. Maybe I did want to get too snippy... Maybe I wanted to—oooh!

I let out a moan that surprised even me when Dallas clipped the first clamp around my nipple. "Hmm… so far so good," he murmured, placing the other one more slowly, building the anticipation now that I was expecting it. He twirled the metal around my nipple before placing it. If anything, my moan was louder this time. 

Dallas tugged on the chains, playing me like a musical instrument. "These are definitely a winner," he said. "You chose well, my pet. This definitely deserves a reward." His hand trailed between my legs, his fingers spread, pushing my legs farther apart. I relaxed, anticipating his magical fingers, but instead, Dallas surprised me, taking his huge cock and shoving it into me in one go, half way in, and then held still

Fuuuuuck. It hurt so good. I loved it when Dallas took just a little more than my body thought it could bear, showing me I could always handle more than I thought it could. Normally, he would massage my chest and legs while we waited for my body to adjust, maybe rock a tiny bit, but tonight the only thing he did was tug on the chains to the nipple clamps in a steady rhythm. The two sensations warred in my mind. I kept splitting my attention between the burn in my ass and the pinch on my nipples. After a moment or two, he did start thrusting, slow and steady, somehow keeping his perfect rhythm on the chains while stroking slowly inside me. I loved feeling like I was his toy, both to use and to please. I loved giving control over to him in the bedroom, to only him, submitting to him in a way I'd never done to anyone before. I told him how he felt inside me, how distracting the nipple clamps were, how good they hurt. He slowly sped up, silently, his only encouragement to keep talking the quicker movement inside me, urging me to keep on, a silent promise that I would find ecstasy in him if I would just keep talking.

I lost track of where my mouth was going. I could hear myself speaking as if from a distance, but my whole world was wrapped up in the sensations Dallas was giving me. I was so close, the tension coiling in me, pulling all of my energy into the tightening of my balls, drawing up into my core. I recognized my voice telling Dallas I was going to come, and then there was a new pain, a glorious pain, as his teeth tore into my skin, marking me, claiming me. My teeth elongated instinctually, and I bit him back. As my teeth sunk in, the sensations, the emotions intensified. The claiming wrapped around us, binding our senses together as one, and, in the moment, I couldn't tell where my pleasure ended and his began as I felt him fill me with his seed and his knot, felt it both as the receiver and the giver, felt the glory of being one soul in two bodies.

That feeling didn't fade when our bodies collapsed, his knot pressed deep inside of me, binding us together physically for a little while longer.

Dallas... I didn't have words to share the love I felt for him right now, but I didn't need to. He felt it.

He simply answered with my name, Nick, and wrapped me tightly in his arms, shifting a little to pull the blankets up around us. Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas indeed.