by Kitty French
Christmas decorations? Lifting the box carefully out, Sophie placed it on the coffee table and slid off the lid. Folding back layers of tissue, she found herself looking at a collection of gorgeous vintage glass tree ornaments; large, delicate, clear orbs frosted with fine glittered patterns as if a spider had spun them with silvery silk strands. Twelve in all, turquoise, jade, gold and cerise, all suspended on hand tied silk ribbons. Lifting them out one by one, Sophie held them to the light and sighed with pleasure. They were a world away from the plain silver baubles she’d settled for at home.
Setting the last one carefully down, she reached back into the box and lifted out what she now recognised immediately to be a julebukk, although this one looked much more well loved and handled than the one Lucien had placed on the mantel that morning.
Laying him aside, she reached in to lift out a garland of tiny hand painted wooden birds, their faded colours serving only to make them more appealing.
At the bottom of the box lay something midnight blue, made from soft felt that had been folded several times. Sophie reached in and extricated the fabric bundle, unwrapping it carefully until it lay flattened out on the floor.
‘Oh my goodness,’ she whispered into the quiet room. The advent calendar wall hanging, clearly hand sewn, was utterly lovely. A faithful copy of the cabin’s exterior had been layered and stitched onto the felt, creating a snowy night time scene with the Lyngen Alps behind it. Rows of little patchwork pockets had been blanket-stitched onto the front of the cabin, twenty-four in total. It was so very, very sweet and nostalgic, all the more so because of the six letters picked out in red thread over the starry night sky.
Lucien.
Sophie laid her hand flat on the warm felt and could almost feel the love for him in every meticulously formed stitch. She knew without question that this had been a labour of love for the only other woman in the world who Lucien had ever deeply cared for. His mother had made this, and her adoration for her boy shone from it as if it were woven into the felt, or tucked into the pockets for safe keeping.
And each of those pockets held treasure. A peep inside one revealed a sweet knitted hedgehog. Sophie popped him back inside and held back from delving into the rest, tempted though she was to reveal their exquisite contents. Perhaps she should have waited for Lucien to return before she’d opened the box at all. Her excitement at discovering tree decorations had clouded her judgment, because now she felt suddenly like an intruder, knowing that the contents were such very personal memories.
She’d put them away again. Put them away, and then let Lucien choose whether or not to open the box. But running her finger over the letters of his name, she hesitated. Maybe he’d say no, and then he’d never get to relive this cherished memory, to see this for himself after so many years. Her heart told her that he should have these things in his life now, that his mother would want him to touch these letters and know again how much she’d loved him.
So instead, rightly or wrongly, Sophie laid the decorations out on the coffee table and looked around the cosy cabin living room for the best place to hang the calendar.
Lucien hauled the freshly felled spruce tree out onto the slopes at the edge of the forest, axe and torch now clasped under one arm, his eyes fixed on the glow of the creamy candles Sophie had lit on the windowsills of the cabin. Hot now inside his thickly padded jacket after the exertion of tree felling, he nonetheless buried his face into his fur-edged hood to avoid the arctic bite of the snowstorm.
Seeing the cabin like this, from the forest, hit him sudden and square in the chest, early childhood memories crowding in of sledging down the hill he now stood on, always mindful to keep the safe, welcoming glow of the cabin in his line of sight for security. Back then, the cabin meant mama, and mama meant cinnamon cookies and reading together by the warm fire before bed.
He stood still and stared at the cabin, getting himself together again, reminding himself of the girl who waited there for him now, and the man he was today rather than the child he’d been. The pin sharp memory faded back into its rightful place in the back of his head, and largely to Lucien’s relief, the more immediate matter at hand reasserted itself as a priority.
Sophie wanted a tree, and he was the man who was providing it. If Sophie had asked him for the moon on a stick, Lucien would have built a ladder to climb up and fetch it down for her. Actually, he’d more likely have paid some fat cat tycoon to fly them up there in his rocket, but the principle remained the same.
He made good progress down the slope, dragging the heavy tree behind him until he reached the cabin. Standing the tree upright, he banged it down on the compacted snow tracks made by their off-roader, to shake the loose snow from the branches before taking it inside. As he worked, the door opened and Sophie appeared wrapped in a sheet, framed by the honey lights behind her.
‘You’re breaking the rules, Cleopatra,’ he said, pushing his hood back from his face as he stepped towards the cabin door.
Sophie glanced down at the sheet and grinned.
‘You only said I had to be naked when you were here. I figured it was okay when I was alone.’
He moved close and dropped a kiss on her mouth, her lips soft and warm beneath his cold ones.
‘Well, honey, I’m home, so your toga party for one is officially over.’
She laid a hand on his cheek. ‘You’re freezing.’
‘And you’re hot,’ he said, sliding his tongue into her mouth for the briefest of seconds before breaking their kiss.
‘Now step aside so I can bring this damn tree in before I rip that sheet off your body.’
Sophie stepped back and pulled the door wide, laughing as he ducked beneath the curtain of icicles and hauled the tree through into the hallway by its freshly lopped trunk.
‘There,’ he said, straightening up and shrugging out of his protective outdoor clothes once she had closed the door. ‘Your tree.’
‘I can smell it already,’ she said, her cheeks pink and her eyes merry. ‘You did good, iceman.’
Lucien nodded, then reached for the edge of the sheet wrapped around her body and gave it a good sharp tug.
‘The only acceptable place for a sheet is on the bed,’ he said as it fell away, leaving Sophie naked and beautiful and him happy and turned on.
‘Stand completely still,’ he said, running his hands over her shoulders and down her arms.
‘You’re so cold,’ she whispered, tingling not only at the chill of his fingers.
‘I know,’ he said, laying his cold hands over her breasts, her nipples instantly hard for him. He pulled his thermal top over his head and pressed her warm body against his, sweeping his hands down her spine to cup her ass firmly.
‘Like ice,’ she commented, opening her mouth to let him kiss her again.
‘Don’t move a muscle,’ he commanded, then turned away. Opening the front door, he surveyed the overhang of icicles for a long second and then snapped one clean off.
Enjoying the wide-eyed look on Sophie’s face as he closed the door and advanced towards her, he ran his hands over the hard, cold ice.
‘Stand very, very still,’ he whispered, circling her like a prowling lion. She jumped when he ran the tip of the icicle down her spine from the nape of her neck to the swell of her ass, and she gasped when he carried on lower and stroked it between the cheeks.
Standing close behind her, he flattened one hand over her stomach, the icicle a magic wand in his other.
‘See how sharp it is?’ he asked against her ear, holding it up in front of her face to demonstrate.
She nodded, closing her eyes when he drew the ice-cold tip slowly across her throat. It was a gesture designed to be a dark thrill rather than a threat, and one Sophie revelled in from the way she tipped her head back on his shoulder.
‘Sexy girl,’ he whispered, kissing her neck and watching the rise and fall of her body as he drew the cold ice down between her breasts, watching her heat melt away the sharp edge of the tip on impac
t, sending droplets down her torso. He teased her nipples with the ice, hard as fuck for her inside his jeans, and half of him wanted nothing more than to push her against the front door and screw himself into her hard and fast from behind.
The other half held on to control for now though, especially since he’d just moved the icicle upwards again and he was enjoying the visual stimulation of Sophie taking it inside the heat of her mouth, swirling her tongue around it until the sharp edges had worn into a smooth, phallic dome. She looked straight at him as she mouthed the ice, her cornflower blue eyes hot and wanting for him.
Would it always be this way? Would he always be overwhelmed with this dual need to fuck her senseless and protect her with his life? Christ, he hoped so.
Moving to stand before her in the hallway, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her hard, loving the press of her ice-dampened body against his, warm and soft against him. She wrapped her arms around him, close everywhere, and he picked her leg up and clasped it around his thigh.
Sophie moaned into his mouth when the icicle touched her between the legs from behind, cold solid ice against her hot, sweet sex. Lucien pulled his head back to look at her, watching her lips part in pleasure when he slipped the ice back and forth over her.
‘Tell me to fuck you with it,’ he said. ‘Tell me and I will.’
She was breathing in small, hard gasps, her eyes unfocused with lust. He loved her all the time; he loved her laughter, her serious side, her resourcefulness, her kind, open heart. But he loved her best of all like this, this filthy hot siren she turned into only for him, the girl who didn’t hide because he’d taken all of her insecurities and trampled them to powder beneath his snow boots.
Their sex made her powerful, turned her into a goddess with the lips of an angel and the hips of a temptress. He wanted to be tempted forever.
‘Please, Lucien,’ she said, speaking low and sexy into his mouth. ‘Push it into me. I want you to.’
Christ. It was as well that he was still wearing his jeans, because when she looked at him that way and said things like that, he wanted nothing more than to push her down and bury himself inside her.
As it was, he hitched her knee higher around his thigh, and watched her eyes as he positioned the ice cock against her, ready to slide inside. She was barely breathing, braced, and when he thrust the now-smooth cone of ice into her, her eyes opened wider and she gulped in a lungful of air, gripping his shoulders. Gratified, he did it again, jolting her against him when she gasped again.
‘You like it?’ he said, his other hand roaming over the fullness of her ass.
Sophie nodded.
‘Yes,’ she whispered, biting down on her bottom lip, her cheeks flushed. ‘Yes.’
Her fingers worked his jeans open and he helped her push them down, taking the rest of his clothes with them.
‘Kneel down, Princess,’ he said, going down with her until they were pressed against each other. When her fingers wrapped around his cock he pulled her on top of him instead, his hand behind her neck as he kissed her open mouth. He craved her, needed her, and the balance of power between them shifted in her favour when she rubbed herself on him, using his cock to pleasure herself.
Lucien watched her use him for a few seconds, enjoying her, and then, because he could wait no longer, he withdrew the melting icicle from her body and sliced into her with his cock. Fuck, she was cold and hot all at the same time, and her moans of pleasurable shock told him the sensation thrilled her too.
She was crouched over him, mouth to mouth, breast to breast, moving on his cock in a way that would give neither of them very much time because it was so fucking sensational. The ice in his hand was smaller now, but still held its form, and he pressed it against her ass, sliding it a little way in, his other hand flat on her spine holding her against him.
‘Fuck,’ she gasped, and he loved the passion of the profanity on her lips, her arms bracketed around his head on the floor, her hips smashed as low into his as they could be as he moved beneath her, driving himself so deep into her that he could barely breathe.
‘Jesus, Lucien,’ she whispered unevenly, and he could feel her body pulsing right before she tensed and banged harder against him, her eyes screwed closed, her lips parted in bliss. He watched her come, and he allowed himself at last to come with her, letting her orgasm dictate his, her glorious, fast throb, the tangle of her apple shampoo hair in his face, the bang of her heart over his. She was sen-fucking-sational.
‘That was pretty damn sexy, iceman,’ she said eventually, her voice unsteady against his neck.
He kissed the curve of her shoulder.
‘I grew up in the Arctic. I know what I’m doing when it comes to ice.’
Sophie propped herself up on one elbow. ‘Well, I knew you built with it and skated on it around here, but I never expected…’ she glanced up at the front door, her blue eyes lit with amusement. ‘That. You know, we should probably work on getting more than five steps inside the front door before we have sex.’
Lucien stood up and shrugged, nonchalant as he held out his hand and helped her to her feet. Ripping Sophie’s clothes off on sight was a pretty regular occurrence wherever they were in the world, and not something he planned on changing any time soon.
‘Speaking of growing up here…’ Sophie, said picking up her sheet and following behind him into the living room, then her voice trailed off as he came to a standstill, his eyes fixed on the advent calendar she’d hung on the wall beside the fireplace.
Laying her hand on his back, she stood beside him.
‘The designers had left a box marked Christmas decorations,’ she said, quietly.
He didn’t react, just stood statue still.
‘There’s these too,’ she said, gesturing to the other pretty things on the coffee table, wanting him to know everything in one fell swoop so there were no more shocks to deliver. This wasn’t how she’d wanted to introduce the stored-away things to him.
She wished he’d speak, say something, anything. Over the past year they’d spoken freely about so many things, but hardly ever exchanged a word about his life here as a child. It hurt her that there was an area of him that was off limits to her, even after all they’d shared, but she hurt for him even more than for herself. She knew the bare bones; she knew he’d been the one to discover his mother slumped over the kitchen table with the pills in her hand when he’d been barely a teenager. She knew enough about those hard times.
‘Did I do the wrong thing?’
She spoke now because his silence filled her with trepidation. One of the only times he’d ever been truly angry with her had been when she’d pushed him to talk to her about his mother, not long after they’d met. What had she been thinking of, hanging the calendar?
She should have known better, have respected his right to keep part of himself separate if he needed to, even though they were so much closer now than they’d been back then at the beginning of their love affair.
Finally, he looked down at her, his grey-blue eyes vulnerable and raw.
‘It doesn’t go there.’
Chapter Four
Lucien reached the blue felt calendar down from the wall and led Sophie through to the bedroom.
‘I slept in here as a child,’ he said. ‘And this always hung on the wall, just here.’
He nodded towards the wall opposite the window, now adorned with a huge print. Laying the calendar down on the wide, ornately carved sleigh bed, he perched beside it and ran his fingers lightly over the stitched edge.
‘It’s beautiful,’ Sophie said, standing next to him with her hand on his shoulder. She instinctively wanted to be close, to absorb whatever he was feeling, in case he couldn’t say it aloud.
‘I didn’t realise it was still here,’ he said. ‘My mother made it.’
Sophie smoothed her hand across the back of his neck. ‘I guessed as much.’
Tentatively, Lucien reached inside the first pocket and withdrew a silver star made o
f wood. Sighing heavily, he turned the little ornament over in his palm to reveal uneven splodges of gold on the back.
‘She let me help her paint this. We were sat at the kitchen table, just through there.’
He closed his hand around the star for a moment then slipped it back inside its pocket again.
Number two held an ornate red glittered reindeer, and number three a forest green tree capped with white ceramic frosting.
‘They’re all so beautiful,’ Sophie said in wonder. She wasn’t offering platitudes. Lucien’s mother’s decorations were incredible, intricately detailed and perfect, but more than that, they were cherished.
‘She was brilliant, creative,’ he said, his voice hollow and low. ‘She was always painting, and her laughter filled any room she was in. I never missed having a sibling, because life with her was always full of colour and warmth.’ He laughed, an empty, desolate sound. ‘She shone bright, even in a place as cold and relentless as this.’
As he spoke, he pulled each of the advent gifts from their pockets, sharing them with her when she’d expected him to shut her out. Sophie controlled herself as she felt tears welling yet again at the poignancy of the unexpected moment. She didn’t want to adulterate it with any sentiment of her own.
As Lucien neared the final, largest pocket, he slowed. It was fuller, and his fingers lingered over it. A card poked out of the top offering a glimpse of a hand drawn reindeer on the front, and sønn written above it in cheery red paint. Treasured family mementos, precious beyond measure.
Lucien was still hesitating. Sophie looked up at his faraway expression, hovering somewhere between remembrance and regret. She knew how much he hated to lose control, to unravel emotionally.
‘Why don’t you leave that one until later?’ she said quietly. Then, a little more firmly, ‘I could really use your help to get that tree in place.’
She sensed his uncertainty and his reticence, and her every instinct was to step in, wrap her arms around him and shield him from pain. Lucien was such an assured, vital man that he’d never acknowledge nor understand Sophie’s instinct to protect him, but it was there nonetheless.