The Russian's Christmas Present

by Dani Wyatt

  With one last huff, she’s out the front door and Martel turns my way.

  “I’ll call you as soon as we know he’s going to be okay. I want him to go get checked out, as a precaution. He said his pride was hurt more than anything, but still…”

  “No, of course. Get him checked over completely. And don’t worry about our ‘date’ tomorrow.” I put finger quotes around the word date, still not sure what just happened upstairs wasn’t just an offshoot of the ten grand I earned coming here tonight.

  Some crazed, breeding fantasy he has. I’m sure he would have condom’d up if I’d let things go that far…

  “If he’s okay, our date is still on.” Martel leans down and kisses the top of my head. “You paid good money for all this.” He stands tall, brushes his hands up and down the front of his torso. “I plan on giving you your money’s worth and then some.”

  I shake my head on a smirk; my body still reeling from the orgasms and the wildness of the activities upstairs. The way he talked to me. The things he said.

  His tongue.

  Oh my god, this man’s tongue.

  “Okay, just go. Take care of things.”

  “Yes, I’m sorry, Snowflake. I’ll message you as soon as I know anything and you message me when you get home, okay?”

  With another kiss, the scent of me still all over his beard, Martel disappears out the front door. I watch him walk, he goes to one of the valets, turns, pointing at me and tells him something with an intensity that has the poor kid looking like his life is being threatened.

  A second later, the valet is standing in front of me, looking scared to death.

  “Ma’am. I need your valet ticket.”

  “Sure. What’s going on?”

  “That man…he paid the valet fee and the tip, but he said if I don’t make sure you get into your car safety, he’ll come looking for me.”

  I stare up at the moon through my bedroom window, a wave of uncertainty making me shiver. It’s past midnight and Martel’s been texting me nearly every fifteen minutes since he left the hotel.

  The good news is, his grandfather is fine. Martel is still with him at his family’s home, making sure he’s getting settled in and resting comfortably.

  I’m tired but sleep doesn’t seem to be possible. Every time I close my eyes, all I see is Martel.

  All I hear is his voice.

  Alice is working so I don’t even have her as a sounding board and a distraction. My father is still up, he has three of his friends over playing poker and every once in a while I hear one of them yell curse words or let out a hoot of excitement over what I assume is a winning hand.

  How could I have let things go so far with a man I barely know?

  How come it feels like I’m half in love with him already?

  Maybe it’s inexperience. Maybe I’m just being swept up into something that really isn’t anything more than a quick fling.

  I’m thankful for the cock-block his grandfather’s fall provided, at least. I could have given him everything and for all I really know, that ten grand wasn’t much more than a very generous escort fee.

  “Fuck,” I groan between clenched teeth, kicking my feet on the bed, deciding I need to stop this before it goes any farther.

  I reach to my nightstand and grab my phone, poking at the screen and pulling up the string of messages Martel has sent since he left the hotel.

  The last few make my heart skip a beat as doubt lingers, tightening my throat as I read.

  Martel: Snowflake, I’m thinking of you every second. I want you to get some rest and make sure you eat something. We missed the dinner buffet and I’m worried you didn’t eat. When I told you I wanted to take care of you, I meant it. All of you. I’ll message again soon. Let me know how you’re doing.

  Fifteen minutes later…

  Martel: Message me anytime. Call me anytime.

  Another fifteen minutes…

  Martel: I hope you’re just asleep, Snowflake. You aren’t answering me. Are you okay?

  I start to reply, typing out words, erasing them, typing again, erasing again, before my stomach lets out a loud growl and the thought of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with a big glass of milk sounds like the bit of comfort I could use right now.

  I grab my floor-length, lavender chenille robe and wrap myself in it, tying the belt tight and slipping the phone back onto my nightstand, anxiety knitting the muscles in my back into knots.

  With a cursory glance in the mirror on the back of my bedroom door, the glamour of the evening has faded. The waves and curls my hair held at the beginning of the evening are gone. My lips have reverted to their usual pale pink, and the expertly-applied eye makeup has lost the drama.

  Just like my mood. I know Martel said his own Christmas is the seventh, but deep down it feels like there’s no Christmas cheer for me.

  I clench my teeth as I walk into the living room, the scent of cigarette smoke and spilled beer reminding me of what Christmas usually smells like in this house. It’s the same smell as the other three hundred and sixty-four days of the year.

  As I pass through the room, I see my father is asleep or passed out on the tattered brown sofa, with the television playing a poker tournament in the background. His friends ignore me as I pass, intent on their bets and their beer, and I’m thankful for small favors. Being invisible is something I always thought of as a disadvantage but there are times it’s more my superpower.

  In the dark kitchen, I open the refrigerator and reach for the milk. As I turn to set it on the counter, a shiver traces up my back and the scent of cigarette smoke wafts around me.

  “Hi.” A male voice makes me jump as I spin around to find the tallest of the three guys. He was sitting at the table, wearing a sad, stained Santa hat when I walked by, and I thought he hadn’t noticed me. He’s been here before, but proper introductions were never made.

  “Hi,” I answer, keeping my voice flat.

  In the dim light from the refrigerator, his bulbous red nose, pock-marked with scars, looks sickly-pale. An overgrown white beard, nicotine stained yellow around his mouth, frames lips that are wet with saliva. Either that or lip gloss. Both those thoughts make my stomach sour as I take a step back, gripping the carton of milk.

  “You look cute in your robe. You changed your hair too…blondes have more fun, right?”

  His words come slow and strained, like his tongue is swelling from some anaphylactic shock, and his gray eyes are glazed. The creep factor hits the red zone when I see the left eye has an exploded blood vessel just below the cornea, but that’s not what alarms me the most.

  It’s the sick smile that exposes some much-needed dental work, and the hand that is now touching the side of my face, making me wince as I slap it away.

  “You thinking Santa needs some milk? And coochie?” He lets out a self-satisfied chuckle. “I mean cookies.”

  “I’m thinking you need to get yourself back in the other room.” I step back again, but he steps forward as I bat his grasping hand away.

  “Awe, come on. A little kiss under the mistletoe is all I want.”

  My stomach turns as he leans down, and I get ready to deliver a swift kick to his balls when his other hand darts out and grabs my wrist.

  The milk carton falls, hitting the faded green linoleum floor with a thud and spilling white liquid into a puddle around my feet.

  “Perfect,” I snap. “What you’re going to get is a kick in the balls, and then a mop to clean this up.”

  I give zero fucks right now, and if he plays his cards right, I may just beat him to death with the mop handle. After he cleans up the mess.

  His eyes narrow on a sneer. “Wow, you’re a nasty thing aren’t you? I like nasty.” His grip on my wrist tightens as I try to wrench it free, but his thick fingers are locked in place so it’s time for the kick in the balls I promised him.

  I jerk my foot back, tightening my muscles, ready to unleash the fury when the milk on the floor seeps under my balancing
foot at the same time as asshole Santa jerks my arm toward him, and before I know it I’m slipping around and gravity takes hold.

  I scream as my head hits the hard floor, kicking and swearing as he stands over me smiling, and I realize my robe is wide open exposing my red and white striped panties.

  “Got what you deserved there, didn’t you? I’ll take a lick of that candy cane…” He lets out a wet, coughing sort of laugh, but before I can land an upward kick into his sad man-sack, the backdoor crashes open, banging against the wall with the force of someone kicking it in.

  For a second, I’m sure it’s one of my father’s debt collectors. They usually knock, but who knows, he could have upped the ante and we are now getting middle of the night in-person collection calls.

  But a second later, I make out Martel’s face, his massive frame bathed in the light from the open refrigerator. He’s lost the suit he was wearing earlier and is back in jeans and a white t-shirt, covered by a tan, canvas sort of workman’s jacket, with a look on his face that tells me he’s not here to deliver gifts. And I’m not sure if this is a Russian Christmas miracle or nightmare.

  All I hear are my own screams as I crab-crawl backwards until I’m out of the way of the fury being unleashed on sad Santa. It doesn’t take long before the two other poker players and my father are in the mix, and for a minute I’m sure Martel will be pummeled going four against one.

  But I’m wrong.

  So very wrong.

  There’s crashing and grunting and the sound of punches landing as the party spills into the living room. Bottles break, there are a couple loud thuds, then the sound of my father and some other guy pleading and begging like little girls.

  I scurry on my hands and knees around to the doorway and peek in to see the biggest guy’s face a barely recognizable, bloody swollen pulp. Another guy is face down laying perpendicular to the first while my father and a short, roundish guy with a bloody lip hold their hands up like they are in some old western bank robbery scene.

  I gasp at the sight, and Martel swings his head my way, blood splatters dotting his t-shirt and smeared over his knuckles.

  “Get your stuff. We’re leaving,” he barks my way as my father gives me a questioning look.

  “Who is he?” He nods toward Martel, who growls back, giving him a hard stare until he backs up.

  “He’s my date.” I push up off the floor and get myself standing. “I won him at an auction.”

  I step forward, emboldened by the destruction inflicted by Martel in the matter of a few minutes, and walk backwards down the hall to my room.

  My mind races. How did he know where I lived? Why would I want to leave with a man who just broke into my house in a homicidal rage?

  The answers don’t seem to matter, because a moment later I’m in my bedroom gathering up some belongings in a flurry.

  I stuff some clothes into a duffel, grab my purse and my phone from the nightstand, taking a quick look at the screen to see three more text messages from Martel and two missed calls since I went out to make myself a PB & J.

  The last message drenches my panties and makes my nipples poke out through the thin fabric of my tank top as I drop my robe onto my bed.

  Martel: I’m on my way to your house. I don’t know why you’re not answering me, but we’ll talk about that when I get there. You can’t ignore me, Snowflake. I’m not going away. I’m coming to get you. So, ready or not, here I come. In more ways than one…

  A couple minutes later, I’m down the hall, dressed, with a bag and my purse, my hair tied into a messy bun on my head and my favorite old Army jacket over my arm.

  “Ready?” Martel hasn’t moved from where he stood, but my dad and short fat guy are now sitting on the sofa and the two guys on the floor are awake, but staying put, everyone’s eyes darting from Martel to me then back.

  “Yep. Ready,” I answer, still unsure what exactly I’m ready for. But for whatever reason, right now I don’t care.

  “If any of you ever even think of touching her again, I’ll kill you.” Martel reaches for my hand and pulls me through the kitchen.

  As we’re slipping out the back door, I yell toward the living room, “Something happened to the back door. Might want to get it looked at. Bad neighborhood and all.”

  I’m giggling a little as Martel lifts me up and sets me into the seat of his pickup truck.

  “Buckle up,” he adds, then closes the door, and a minute later we are winding away from the house on our way. But to where?

  “So,” I start, twirling my little silver hoop earring with my fingers. “Where is it we are going? Back to your hotel room?”

  “Nope.” Martel reaches over and takes my hand, slipping his fingers between mine, then pulling it to his lips to kiss each knuckle before settling our hands on his thigh. “My place.”

  “Your place? So, you said your parents live a few minutes from Meadowbrook, but you were staying there in the hotel. How far is your place?”

  “Forty minutes. I want to take you there. I need to take you there.”

  Chapter 10

  Martel

  She looks so perfect here.

  She’s exactly what’s been missing in my house. A house that now, for the first time, truly feels like a home.

  She’s walking around like she did in the hotel room last night. Looking at all the Christmas decorations. Touching things. And it’s all so simple, but it has all my fantasies racing around inside my head.

  I need this girl here, not just for the night but forever. No fucking way am I ever allowing her to return to that house with her father. Fucking waste of life. I wanted to kill him most of all, for allowing her to live that way. For not protecting her.

  But none of that matters now, because I’m in her life and that’s my job, and I take my work pretty fucking seriously.

  It’s closing in on 2 AM but I’m wired and pulled tight. I don’t know if I’ll ever sleep again. Both because I never want to let her out of my sight, but also because I’ve missed so much of her life and I can’t imagine not being alive and awake with her every second of every day, from this moment forward.

  “You sure do go all out for Christmas.” She spins around the big pine that stands in the living room decorated with some of the little welded ornaments I make for myself and also sell in some of the shops in the nearby tourist town.

  She’s wearing red leggings and a white silk tank top, which I want to tear into a million pieces so I can get at those nipples that keep tormenting me through the thin fabric.

  Her arousal still lingers on my beard, but I need a fix. I want her to know that what happened in the hotel room was it for me. But, I also don’t want to scare the shit out of her either. I’m keeping her either way, it’s just a matter of how quickly she can acclimate to the idea that she belongs to me now.

  She belongs here and I’m never letting her go.

  “What do you want for Christmas?” I ask as she pins her eyes to mine and my dick hardens.

  She shrugs. “I quit wanting things for Christmas a long time ago. Besides, Christmas is over.”

  “Not in my world. Remember.”

  “Sure. Yes, sorry I forgot.”

  I want to kill anyone that took away her joy, but right now what I want to do more is to bring it back.

  “I know what I want.” I clear my throat and walk across the wood floor, and cup her soft cheeks in my rough palms.

  “Let me guess…” She twists her lips back and forth like she’s thinking hard. “A pony? No! I’ve got it, Red Rider BB gun? No! A PS5?”

  “I want you, Bria. I can’t explain it, but I need you.”

  She shifts on her feet and from what I could see through her tight red stretch leggings, she’s not wearing any panties.

  “Martel,” she starts, her voice hinting at doubt. “This is all crazy though. Isn’t it? I feel like some Alice in Wonderland tale and a late Hallmark Christmas movie had a love child and here we are. I don’t even know how old you are.
If you like coffee or not. Because, seriously, I don’t know if I could be with someone that doesn’t like coffee. And waffles! What if you don’t even like waffles?” She shakes her head and she’s playing, but she’s serious as well.

  “I’m thirty-nine. I drink coffee from the time I wake up until I go to bed. I have a waffle maker in the cabinet, it was my grandmother’s, but I’ve not had the stones to put it to use. She made me waffles almost every morning, right here in that kitchen, whenever I would visit. What else do you need to know? I’ll answer any question you have. Just realize, I already can’t imagine life without you. And once you give all of yourself to me? There’s no undoing this.”

  Her dark eyes search my face, and there’s a flicker within them, a sparkle of understanding. “I feel like I’ve woken up from a coma. Like, since I walked into work yesterday and you were standing there, everything before that moment doesn’t feel real. You know?”

  “Yes, Snowflake, I feel the same.”

  “And, I mean, I have things I want to do. I want to go to design school. I want to create and own my own shop someday. I have dreams that you don’t even know about. Maybe my dreams don’t work with your dreams.”

  “Your dreams are my dreams. I’m all in. I’m going to take that sweet cherry you’ve saved for me, Bria, and you’ll be mine forever. Then, I’m going to spend the rest of my life making all your dreams come true.”

  “This is insane.” She flutters her sexy lashes but what I don’t hear is her saying no, that she doesn’t want what I want and it’s time to seal this deal. For a second I hold my breath when she steps back from me, and I wonder if she’s about to try to walk out, but as I watch her work her way toward the hallway, she reaches down and pulls the hem of her tank top up and over her head, looking at me over her shoulder. “But, maybe a little crazy is just what I need in my life.”

  I bolt in her direction, scooping her teasing ass up and carrying her, caveman style, over my shoulder and only put her down when we are in my bedroom.