Secret Santa

God help me, I loved him so much it made my chest hurt.



He smiled, showing off his straight white teeth, then darted his tongue between the pearly rows to moisten winter-chapped lips.



“You ready for this?” He must have thought better of the tie because he tossed it behind me onto the headrest of the couch, where it draped over Rio’s flicking tail. The kitten was elated to be offered a new toy and dug her tiny claws into the silk.



My bouncing knees captured his attention, and his smile faltered as he sat on the arm of the loveseat. It was a miniscule comfort to have him rub the meridian between my shoulders. It would have helped if he said I could bail on dinner, but no such luck.



Rio wrapped herself up in the tie and tumbled off the couch, falling to the floor with a thud. The one cat in the world who failed to land on her feet and she was all mine.



“How long until Dominick gets here?” I had a wicked idea in mind to distract myself from the fear of meeting Momma Alvarez.



Desmond checked his watch, and the simple act of seeing him read the fancy, large timepiece on his wrist sent a thrill through me. There was something erotic about a man who wore an expensive-looking watch. I think it affected the same smitten-receptors as seeing James Bond in a suit.



I grabbed his hand and pulled him off the arm of the couch and onto me. His weight was comforting, and I wriggled against him until my body was molded alongside his.



“Hi,” he said. His face was mere inches from mine and alight with amusement. His breath smelled of minty toothpaste and was warm on my lips.



A simple taste test confirmed his tongue to be hint-of-mint fresh, with his distinctive lime aftertaste.



“You taste good.” I sighed.



“You taste like cookies.”



He kissed me gently, with the easy sweetness of a familiar lover. With his body on mine he was free to cup my cheeks between his palms and lavish tender, delicate kisses over my forehead, jaw and throat with the softness of butterfly wings.



My original plan to ravish him with a Christmas Eve quickie dissolved with each pass of his mouth. Even the moisture-deprived roughness of his lips didn’t take me out of the simple, innocent indulgence of the moment.



When his road trip of kisses came home to my mouth, I held his face as he’d held mine and kissed the tip of his nose. He smiled, and with him this close I could see the lilac of his eyes.



“Love you.” I kissed each of his dark eyebrows.



“Good. Then you have to come meet my mom.”



Eyes that had been heavy-lidded with a love-drunk complacency snapped open. “Tricksy werewolf.”



“Gonna blame it on my lupine mojo?”



“Pff. Like you have any mojo.”



The hardness against my thigh and the frenzied heat building in my pants belied my insult, but I stuck to my guns. He smiled and kissed me, grazing my lower lip between his teeth. “I’m not opposed to playing dirty.”



I quirked my eyebrow at him. “Oh, no? Well if that’s how this game is being scored, I’d like a chance to spike your volley…or, you know, a cooler sports metaphor than volleyball.”



Desmond laughed but obliged me by sitting up so I could scoot out from under him. Standing in front of the couch so my hips were level with his eyes, I grabbed the hem of my shirt and lifted it up, giving him an eyeful of my brand-new leather corset.



Unfortunately that was also the moment Dominick chose to let himself into my apartment.



“I’m just saying there’s a time and a place…”



“How many times do I have to apologize?” I grumbled from the backseat of Dominick’s Prius. He’d separated Desmond and me for the short drive to Long Island, and my Alvarez brother wasn’t helping things with all his snickering in the front.



“When apologies can cleanse my mind of the image of you straddling my brother—”



“I wasn’t straddling him!”



But Dominick was on a roll and there was no stopping him. “Practically molesting him, half naked, no less.”



“I was fully clothed,” I snarled.



In the rearview mirror I caught Dominick’s grin, and ever the mature adult woman I was, I stuck my tongue out at him.



“Now, now. I don’t know where that’s been.”



Desmond laughed so hard he snorted, and only regained his composure long enough to keep me from diving into the front seat to throttle his brother.



“I can tell you a long list of places it may never go again.” I gave Desmond a pointed glare, but he was unabashed, chuckling like a twelve-year-old watching Porky’s on late-night cable.



We’d driven south through Manhattan since the Queensboro Bridge was the closest exit to Sunnyside and Casa de Alvarez. After a harrowing, white-knuckled, ten-minute drive across the bridge we were on Long Island, but considering there wasn’t much difference between Sunnyside and Hell’s Kitchen, it felt like I was still home. Queen’s Boulevard had the same seedy reputation as my neck of the woods. On some levels those reputations were deserved, but on the flip side even Park Avenue had an underbelly. At least places like Hell’s Kitchen rolled over and showed their unseemly tummy to the world, like a fat cat waiting for a good scratch.



Twenty-four-hour fruit stands with nothing to sell this late in the season adorned every other corner, broken up by Colombian takeout and about a hundred restaurants claiming to have the “best pizza in New York”.



Their claims were served with a grain of salt since New York proper glittered like a festive grand dame across the East River. The Empire State Building was aglow in seasonal red and green, her spindle piercing the dark sky as though it could be popped open like a confetti balloon and release our missing snow.



Dominick navigated up a narrow street lined with a crush of tall, lean houses stacked side by side. He wove through the maze of parked and idling cars, receiving a few well-placed honks and a one-finger salute from a burly cab driver.



“Puta madre,” Dominick swore, taking a turn onto another one-way, then back in the direction we’d come. It was the first time I’d heard any hint of his Spanish upbringing.



Sunnyside was a mess of cramped one-way streets, making it a frustrating task to get where you wanted to be. I might have a fancy car, but I hated driving inside the urban sprawl. Give me a back-country road and I’ll go for hours, but in the city I get grumpy and angry in the span of minutes.



The car came to a stop in front of a clean white house jammed in a row of nearly identical brown and white homes. The wrought-iron front gate had a wreath hanging on it, and through the front window I could see a dazzling Christmas tree done in hues of blue and silver.



“You guys might as well take the stuff in. I’ll need to circle the block.”



Sure enough, there was no miracle parking space out front like I always seemed blessed with at home. Desmond and I got out and loaded up with armfuls of gifts.



When we burst through the front door a flash of darkness leaped at us, and Desmond barely had time to drop his packages and catch his sister mid-flight. Penny was talking a mile a minute, and it didn’t sound like she was planning to take a break any time soon. I put my gifts down next to Desmond’s and listened to her story.



“….so I told Becky McNamara she could take her iPod and stuff it because I was going to get the best present ever, way better than a stupid iPod.” She started dragging parcels into the living room, hauling the front-entrance runner with them, leaving me standing on bare hardwood.



I shucked off my coat and boots, using it as an excuse to check out Desmond’s childhood home. The house was cramped but meticulously organized. Photos in mismatched frames spanning over two decades hung on every flat wall in the house. Everything from the Alvarez’s wedding portrait to the obligatory embarrassing school photos. Desmond and Dominick’s graduation photos were displayed side by side at the bottom of the staircase. Aside from his gel-spiked hairstyle, Desmond hadn’t changed much. Dominick was the real shocker. His portrait showed him a good twenty pounds heavier with a mane of long, blond hair.



I chuckled softly.



Next to the boys was Penny’s most recent school photo, her grinning sixth-grade pose. She was the spitting image of Desmond, dark wavy hair and big pale eyes. That smiling photo stole all the levity from the moment, because she could have been any of those missing teens.



Turning from the stairs, I drifted into the living room with its old-school eighties sofas and a small television, where Penny was checking through the bags to see which gifts were for her. She found the big one from me and Desmond and went to shake it, but her brother stopped her.



“Be patient, Pen. Soon enough.”



“Is it better than an iPod?”



Not being twelve, I didn’t know where a Wii ranked on the coolness scale, but I said, “Way better.”



For the first time since we’d arrived, Penny acknowledged my existence. She gave me a silent once-over that made me more nervous than a vampire eyeballing my jugular. Then she hopped to her feet and marched up to me, sticking out her hand. I looked to Desmond for help, but he rested his chin on his hand and watched us with a smile.



“Penelope Alvarez,” she introduced with startling formality. “You can call me Penny if you want.”



“Secret McQueen,” I replied and gave her hand a firm shake. “You can call me Secret.”



“Is that your real name?”



“Penny!” This came from the dining room doorway and was said with the tone only irritated mothers know how to use.



“I’m afraid so.” I winked at Penny as her mother came through the door drying her hands on a dishtowel.



Desmond’s mother was his exact opposite. She was a few inches taller than five feet and had the delicate build of a ballerina. She was fair-skinned and had dirty-blonde hair streaked through with gray. On her it looked like expensive highlights. Now I knew where Dominick fit in. I’d often marveled at how two such different men came from the same family without a visit from the milkman being involved.



“You’re really pretty. Your hair looks like Taylor Swift’s. And she dated that guy who was a werewolf in Twilight, and you date a werewolf too.”