Liam pulled away from me slightly, but only to whisper, “I love you. God, I love you so much.”
“I’ve missed you,” I said, stroking his hair as a sudden need to feel his mouth over mine.
“How do we talk your mother out of this separate bedroom thing?”
I snorted at this and shook my head. “It would take an act of God. Literally. She said not until there was holy matrimony involved.”
“Well, if that’s what it takes—”
“No proposals on bathroom counters,” I stopped him. “No proposals period. Just shut up and kiss me.”
If my edict had upset him, the kiss didn’t show it. At least not right away. It was as passionate as the first, but then his lips grew hard and his teeth nipped at me.
“I want you,” he murmured, his hands gripping my hips as he pulled me closer. “I want all of you.”
“You can have me.” It was a promise, and one I hoped to make good on quickly.
A knock at the door startled us apart and Liam took a step back, dropping his hands from me. Surprise flitted across his face along with something that looked a bit like anger, but I was entirely certain it was directed at the interruption.
“Yes?” he called out, not quite able to hide the annoyance in his tone.
“I have fresh towels,” Tara called through the door.
This time when my head fell back against the mirror I was surprised it didn’t shatter. I cursed under my breath. If we hadn’t spent so much time talking and fooling around, we might have reached the finish line.
“I have a towel, but thank you,” he responded, playing dumb as to the real reason she was here.
“These are warm.”
“I’m naked,” he replied.
“Tell Jillian she can use my shower.” The cheerful tone had gone out of her voice. Now it was flat and each word was measured.
I jumped down from the counter, grumbling as I pulled my panties back on. I tossed Liam his boxers and unlocked the door without checking to see if he had them on. If she wanted to embarrass us, I could play that game. I strode out with my hands on my hips and tossed her the most withering stare I could muster in my underwear.
Liam grabbed the towels, slamming the door just as his cheeks began to redden.
“This is unacceptable.” Tara turned on me.
“You said separate bedrooms.”
“You know exactly what I meant,” she said. “And what is it with you two and bathrooms. Do you have some type of fetish? Do you need a sex therapist?”
“Yeah, toilets get me hot.” And so do locks, I added silently. This was less embarrassing than when she had spotted Liam’s pants around his ankles under the stall in the women’s restroom during parents’ weekend. Actually, if I was honest, neither event truly embarrassed me. Not in the crawl into a hole and die way, at least. It really just made me want to scream and punch things, which was why my arms were firmly crossed against my chest.
“To make myself clear then. Separate bedrooms. Separate bathrooms.” Her eyes traveled down my body, her eyes narrowing at my skimpy apparel, and added, “And separate genitals.”
Challenge accepted.
CHAPTER THREE
The story unfolding via text messages indicated that Jess and Cassie were having an interesting time in Mexico. So far there had been a near arrest, an unexpected encounter, and plenty of drama. I was a little more than jealous that they were off getting into trouble on the beach while I was home for the holidays, but at least I was with Liam. Even if Tara had ensured I was with him in the most chaste way possible.
Tara had planned a variety of SoCal style holiday activities, which had all ended in near disaster. The only one of us still smiling was Liam, who clearly didn’t have the same sliver of psychosis that my family carried in their genetics. I’d taken to counting the days down like a child with an advent calendar, but my reward was coming on December 26th when we’d be driving back to Washington.
Tonight’s fun family activity was pie making. Apparently we needed to have three different pies for the four of us on Christmas Eve, and Tara wouldn’t hear talk that this was ridiculous. We had to have pecan for my dad, apple for tradition, and pumpkin because she hadn’t had any on Thanksgiving. The real issue was that none of us Nichols could stand the sight of each other, so Liam had volunteered a bit too cheerfully for pie making duty. I could care less about the pies, but getting some alone time with my boyfriend—even in the kitchen—was worth it.
Standing the kitchen as Liam pulled ingredients out of the pantry, it occurred to me that I didn’t know the first thing about making pie. Any pie. However, I could appreciate the site of Liam with a black Williams-Sonoma apron tied around his trim waist and over his jeans, which hung off his hips in such a way as to make me think about all the things I’d rather be making. With his dark blonde hair and easy smile, he looked at home in Southern California. No one would know he wasn’t American if they saw him in the kitchen making good, old-fashioned apple pie. But it was more than that, he fit here.
“Why are you staring at me?” he asked, handing me a mixing bowl. The illusion was shattered when he spoke. Liam was Scottish, not American. And even though that exoticism made him sexy as hell, it also made me sad. I could even swear I heard a timer in the background, ticking down the time left between us.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re lost in a dream.”
“You must have that effect on me.” I pushed up on my tip toes to give him a peck.
“None of that now,” he warned. “I’m trying to be on my best behavior.”
I widened my eyes in feigned innocence, but I couldn’t resist tempting him further by dropping my free hand to squeeze his ass.
“I’m warning you,” he said in a low voice, “that tile looks rather uncomfortable.”
Now I was the one to shift uncomfortably at the thought. I’d be thrilled to be naked on that tile, but that wasn’t going to happen. Liam was showing more restraint than our ill-fated attempt to stay away from each other when we first began dating.
I swallowed hard, forcing thoughts of Liam and his jeans out of my mind. “So what do I do?”
“Can you make the crusts?” His tone was clipped as though he, too, was struggling to stay focused on the stupid pies.
“Sure!” Setting the bowl down, I bounded to the fridge, but after a few minutes of rifling through its contents turned up nothing.
“What are you looking for?” he asked as he peeled apples.
“The pie crusts.”
“You have to make them,” he said slowly.
“But where’s the box?”
“Box?” His eyebrow ratcheted up another degree.
“Of pie crusts.”
“You need to make them,” he repeated. “With flour and water and butter.”
“That’s going to be a problem,” I said. I hadn’t been welcomed in the kitchen when I was a kid. I was too loud, too messy, too annoying. I’d managed to avoid Tara and the kitchen since I’d left for college after I’d dropped one of her favorite porcelain bowls during an episode. She’d made it clear that I was useless at cooking, and the few pleasant memories I had associated with a stove all had Liam as a main character. But now he was staring at me like I’d grown two heads.
“You don’t know how to make a pie crust?” he guessed. To his credit, he managed not to sound condescending.
I shook my head, knowing the red on my cheeks had nothing to do with the preheating oven.
Liam smiled and set down his knife. “Let me show you.”
As he reached for the flour bag, I caught his arm. “No, I want to do it. Tell me how.”
There was something more than pride on the line. Liam liked to cook, which meant he spent a lot of time in the kitchen. That meant that if I learned how to cook, I could be with him in the kitchen. Plus, I wanted to know how to do things. I’d spent too long feeling like there was no point in learning new things. I’d spent too long believing
the lie that I was useless. He’d shown me differently and now I had a chance to put my fledgling confidence to the test.
Liam pushed the flour bag toward me and nodded toward the mixing bowl. “You’ll need those measuring cups.”
As I had asked he didn’t reach for anything else, he only gave instructions over my shoulder. By the time I’d chopped the butter into small pieces, he was hovering behind me so closely that if I shifted in the least my ass would brush against him. But I forced myself not think about that. Instead, I focused on the task at hand.
“Okay, now you need to mix it together.” He was so close to me that the instruction tickled across my ear and down my neck.
“With a mixer?” I asked.
“No, like this.” His arms circled my waist as he reached into the bowl and started working the ingredients together with his hands. Without hesitation, I followed suit, but Liam didn’t step away; instead his hands shifted until they were over my own, his fingers threaded through mine kneading the silky flour into the slippery butter. His breath was hot on my neck as we worked. I could no longer resist pushing back against him a little. He responded by moving closer to me until I was pressed into him like a mold. His lips had found their way to the spot behind my ear that he knew drove me crazy, and he whispered more instructions against my skin, his mouth brushing softly across my ear lobe as he spoke. He wasn’t kissing me. No, he was teasing me, reminding me that even fully clothed, in a kitchen, he could make my body tremble.
“You did it,” he said after I dumped a round ball of dough onto the counter. I could feel his lips twitch into a smile, but he didn’t step away from me as he reached for a nearby rolling pin. He placed it in front of me. “Ever used one of these?”
I couldn’t help myself as I picked it up. “It feels so powerful in my hands.”
“That’s what she said.”
“I know something else that feels powerful in my hands.”
Liam groaned, but he didn’t step away. “Eyes on the pies, chicken.”
I made a clumsy attempt at pushing the rolling pin across the dough, but my wrists betrayed me and I lost my grip on the handles. Without missing a beat, I picked it back up hoping Liam had written it off as novice dough making and not my tell-tale Parkinson’s symptom. But his hands closed over mine without a word and guided the rolling pin down to the dough. His strong arms pinned mine slightly as we worked, but I wasn’t complaining. His whole body encircled and enfolded me and somehow, despite the minor episode, I didn’t feel useless or broken. I felt strong and safe as he came to my aid. Liam knew exactly what I needed, even when I didn’t. I thought I was missing having sex with him, but standing here in his embrace, feeling how his body cradled my own—how it reacted instinctually to my smallest movement—was more intimate than most of our under-the-covers encounters. I needed to be close to him, but even more than that, I needed a reminder that when I stepped forward he was behind me to keep me steady. I hadn’t thought it possible to love him more, but standing here in my mother’s kitchen making Christmas pies I felt myself spiral a little further into the achingly beautiful territory of new love.
A couple of hours later, I could boast the ability to make pie. When Liam pulled the last one out of the oven, I couldn’t help but admit that it was a tad Martha Stewart of me to feel so proud. But I guess that was a good thing.
“Well, I’m for bed,” Liam said.
Checking the clock on the microwave, I was surprised to see it was past eleven. No wonder Tara hadn’t bothered us. I was fairly certain she turned into a vampire or another creature of the night after the sun set.
“I’m game for that.”
“If only, chicken.” Liam took my hand and drew me slowly to him. Brushing hair from my face, he cupped my chin in his hand and kissed me. I felt like the butter we’d used in the crust as he said his good night—slightly melty and slippery.
“Tara is in bed,” I pointed out.
“I’m pretty sure she has sonic hearing.”
It would prove my point about her being a vampire—crazy hearing, evil, and blood-sucking. Yeah, this holiday was going about as well as I imagined it would.
“We’ll be home soon,” he said, letting his hand slip down to my throat, “and then we have two weeks before school starts.”
“I hope you don’t have plans.” I couldn’t quite keep a pout out of my voice.
“My plans involve making you scream my name every hour.”
“Only every hour?”
“Behave.” But his eyes twinkled as he said it. “Good night.”
My gaze followed him—or rather his butt—as he left the kitchen. As soon as he was gone, my eyes landed on one last measuring cup. I placed it in the dishwasher and took one last look at my accomplishment before I turned to find Tara standing in the doorway.
“You finished them.”
My arms folded over my chest involuntarily as though I could ward off the coming attack. “Liam taught me how to make them.”
“He cooks then?”
“I can tell what you think about that.”
“No, it’s good,” she said with a wave off her perfectly-manicured hand. “He can take care of you.”
Coming from anyone else this might have been reassuring, but I braced myself for the worst.
“It’s not like you’ll be able to in a few years,” she added.
“There it is,” I muttered.
“There is what?”
“The afterbite.”
“Jillian, I only want you to think about the longterm consequences—”
“I’m twenty-one.”
“You won’t be twenty-one forever,” she said.
“Let it go, Mom. We’re dating. We’re in love. I’ve heard that’s normal for girls my age.” My hands were starting to tremble. I needed to get out of here before she set off another attack. I’d discussed what to do with Dr. Fales if this happened, and our best plan was to remove me from the situation.
“But you aren’t a normal girl. You never will be.”
I darted for the doorway, but she caught my arm and held me in the hallway.
“I don’t want to see you get hurt,” she said.
“Then stop hurting her.”
Liam stood up from the sofa in the living room. My father watched the scene unfold and Liam glanced briefly to him before Dad nodded. They’d obviously been discussing something until Tara and I had interrupted. Liam didn’t say anything else, he simply strode over and took my hand, removing me from Tara’s grasp.
“Good night,” he said to my mother, leading me toward the guest room. Nobody spoke again. My mother didn’t try to stop us. But when I found myself in his bed, he took me in his arms and let me cry, whispering promises until I fell asleep.
CHAPTER FOUR
The turkey was laid in the middle of the table, its bare skin roasted golden brand, a gleaming knife at its side. I knew just how it felt. My mother having had enough of awkward silence had taken to producing a constant stream of chatter ranging from questionable facts about celebrities to country club gossip. I wanted to tell her that if she didn’t shut up she was going to be what the neighborhood was talking about in the morning. I could almost see the headlines: Mother smothered with roast turkey on Christmas Eve.
Liam sat across from me in a gray button down that made his usually bright eyes look stormy. His blonde hair was tousled artfully, which only served to remind me of how he looked right out of bed. But although he smiled, I could see it was strained. He was cracking under the stress, and it was getting worse with each passing second.
I had just raised my glass of wine when Tara said, “Maybe we should say a prayer?”
At the moment, I discovered someone could actually choke on a drink and spray it all over the table.
“Wh-what?” I gasped. “Oh God, don’t tell me you’ve been saved.”
Tara glared across the table, and I realized the carving knife was closer to her than it was to me.
"I thought it would be nice to take a moment to remember what we're thankful for this year." But instead of bowing her head, Tara reached for the turkey platter.
"Oh, that's easy enough," I said, watching as she sharpened the knife against the steel. "I'm thankful for kilts and pancakes for breakfast and going to college two states away."
"How lovely, Jillian," Tara snapped. "I'm thankful for ungrateful daughters who act like porn stars on the bathroom counter." She'd begun to gesticulate wildly with the carving knife.
My father rose to his feet and took it from her. "Sit down, Tara."
"I don't need you to do this for me."
"You've made that clear," he said in a firm voice. "But I'd prefer not to spend the holidays in the emergency room."
Tara sunk into her chair, shoulders back, head held high, and peered at each of us as though daring any of us to challenge her authority. She'd placed herself as the head of the table, like a proper matriarch, which meant her gaze could reach each of us no matter how we sat in our chairs. There was no point to sulking, so I sat up straighter, matching her posture, and met her glare with a smile.
Liam cleared his throat beside me. "I'll say grace."
My eyes flashed to him. We'd discussed the subject of religion before and neither of us were into it. Of course, one could hope he was about to recite Rub-a-dub-dub, thanks for the grub in front of my mother. Dad looked to Liam gratefully and laid down the knife—out of reach of my mother.
Liam folded his hands and bowed his head. I stared at him until my father gestured that I should follow suit. We'd never really prayed at the table before. Like most well-to-do people in our community, my parents went to a few services a year to keep up appearances. I'd never heard them use either a-word, but I also hadn't really been brought up to consider myself Christian. Everything about this felt weird and out of place, and I hated Tara for managing to make things even more awkward for everyone.