Christmas Cousins: Quinn, Ellis, and Amory (Southern Scandal Book 3)

by Julia McBryant

  She wanders in. “What?”

  “Calhoun and Audie done fucked in their Santa hats.” Amory’s chest hurts from laughing.

  Baylor puts her hands on her hips. “Audie’s done so much worse in his life than fuck such a sweet man in a Santa hat, Jesus Christ, Amory. I mean, as long as it wasn’t part of a thing —” She side-eyes Calhoun. “Was it part of a thing?”

  “NO! What the hell!”

  “Then who gives a fuck? They probably got high and forgot they were wearing them.”

  “What’s going on?” Thor walks out of Isa and Baylor’s room. Well, Jesus fuck, he’s banging Baylor. Isa’s downstairs fucking Henry; Amory’s nearly caught them at it enough times to know that.

  “Uh, why was Thor in your room?” Calhoun is so fucking dense. Or innocent. Or fucking dense.

  “The usual reasons one is in a girl’s room.”

  “Oooooookay.”

  “I just saved your ass with the Santa hat deal. Don’t throw me to the wolves here, Calhoun, just because you hate my ass.”

  Amory drinks and watches them go through a whole thing. You hate me. I don’t hate you, Baylor. You totally hate me, Calhoun. It ends, hilariously enough, with Calhoun having to scream “I DO NOT HATE BAYLOR KIRKMAN” over and over out on deck. Then he screams that he loves Baylor Kirkman and Baylor is so awesome and some other shit. Amory keeps drinking and watching the show.

  By then, Quinn has stomped up the stairs. “What the fuck, Calhoun? Some of us are trying to sleep? And you should hate Baylor Kirkman because she is a bad person.”

  “She’s your cousin!” Calhoun’s cracking up.

  “Doesn’t mean she’s not a bitch!”

  “I’m proving I don’t hate her. I LOOOOOOOOVE BAYLOR!”

  “I made him go tell it on the mountain, ‘cause it’s Christmas,” Baylor informs Quinn.

  “You sang that stupid song at the top of your lungs without the Jesus part because you said you were an agnostic and Grandfather almost beat your eight-year-old ass.” Quinn gets a faraway look in his eyes. “He made you spell the word and give him a definition.”

  “I spelled it right too, didn’t I?” She grins. “I forgot that.”

  Audie appears. “Okay. Far be it from me to inquire how the fuck Baylor talked someone into doing something. But how the fuck did Baylor talk you into this, Calhoun?”

  “I’m proving I don’t hate her.”

  “Baylor.” Audie rolls his eyes.

  “What?”

  “Do not torment Calhoun. He is a sweet, innocent soul and he’s high as all monkeyfuck. Do not mess with him. Go fuck Thor, or whateverthefuck you were doing, and leave him alone.”

  She bangs back into her room, Thor in tow.

  “How’d you know she was banging Thor?” Amory drinks again. Quinn curls up on him.

  “He’s her type, and he’s not wearing a shirt. Also — nevermind.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Not nothing if you can’t say it.”

  “I don’t call people out.”

  “I’ll respect that.”

  Audie takes Calhoun downstairs before he starts snarfing cookies or something. At this point, he’s a danger to himself and others. Mostly himself.

  “Guess it’s you and me, kid.” Amory kisses Quinn.

  Until Baylor immediately wanders back out.

  “Oh, go away.” Quinn makes a face at her. “You’ve been enough of a bitch tonight.”

  She looks sad. “Be nice. I was only teasing.”

  “Your teasing sucks ass.” Quinn worms deeper under Amory’s arm.

  “I thought you’d think stuff was funny.”

  “I didn’t.”

  “I’m sorry, Quinnie.” She stretches out on the chair in her girly pjs.

  “You always say that after and you really aren’t.”

  She puts her hands on her hips. “I heard you.”

  “Heard me what?”

  Amory’s stomach flips.

  “When I stayed over at your house. I heard you talking to Ellis, and I heard what both of you call him. And I could have said it. But I didn’t and I won’t even say it to you now. I don’t kink shame. Whatever makes you happy. But I know you’d be embarrassed so I won’t tell.” She crosses her arms.

  Amory’s face feels like it may have caught flame. He chugs at his bourbon.

  Quinn steals it, chugs it, then coughs. “You know what the best thing to do would’ve been, Baylor? And here’s where you fuck up big. The best thing to do would’ve been to pretend you never heard it in the fucking first place.” He stands up and stomps down the stairs.

  Amory stands up to follow him. “You know he’s right.”

  “I was trying to —”

  “Yeah. Well. You fucking didn’t, and now I have to clean up your goddamn mess. Thanks.” Amory follows Quinn down the stairs. He wants to think she gaped after him, but he doubts it.

  Quinn’s curled in a little ball with a pillow over his head. Ah, fuck. This’ll take at least an hour.

  And it does, an hour of coaxing and cajoling and assuring him it’s okay, no one knows, no one’s judging you, you’re all right, c’mon Baby Q, c’mon out, I’m right here, lemme cuddle you. Quinn ends up plastered against him, pretending he’s not crying until he falls asleep. He’s so terrified his friends will find out he calls Ellis “daddy” and ridicule him until the end of time. Amory kind of figures, well, if they find out, he’s gonna dare them to kink shame him, offer to kick their ass if they do (unless it’s Wills or Henry), or shrug it off, like, what the fuck did you expect? Or, tell me you wouldn’t call Ellis ‘daddy’ if he asked. And everyone would laugh it off and no one would give a fuck.

  But not Quinn. He’s too scared what everyone would say, poor thing.

  Amory cuddles him close. He really, really wants to kill Baylor.

  Amory’s the first one up. He always is, he and Ellis. He pads upstairs, turns on the little light, starts the coffee, and pours a bowl of cereal. Beeholes — what the fuck? Some kind of off-brand Cheerios or something.

  Midway through the bowl, Crispin comes in almost silently. He nods at the coffee. “Thanks.” Amory shrugs. Morning calls for quiet. Crispin grabs some oatmeal cookies and milk, then sits next to him at the kitchen island. Crispin’s silent, solid presence reminds him of Ellis’s in the morning. They really only know each other from hellos and goodbyes in bars, but if this is Crispin, Amory needs to know him better.

  Amory finally speaks. “You respect the morning. That’s what Ellis would say, at least. People who respect the mornings are quiet around them.”

  Crispin smiles a little. “Guess I do. I’m the coffeemaker and general waker-upper.”

  “Ellis and I, we both wake up early. Quinn stays in bed like a goddamn prince.”

  “I can see that.” Crispin laughs a little.

  “Spoiled baby.”

  “I’d take mine coffee but he’s in there spooning Isa.”

  Oh shit. Was he fucking up which twin was which? Did Wills and Crispin — “What did y’all get up to last night? Damn. I didn’t know you two —”

  “No! God! She got sexiled when Baylor and Thor — god, I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  Best pretend he doesn’t know. “Oh, that’s okay. I won’t tell.”

  “You won’t? Not even Quinn?”

  “Nope. We all have the right to our own secrets. Why’s she in your room, though?”

  “What d’you mean?”

  “No reason. Just thought she’d be somewhere else, is all?”

  “Like where?”

  Oh shit. Shit shit shit. He shouldn’t have said that. Amory carefully makes his face blank. “Nowhere. Just surprised she’s not with me and Quinn.” He tosses his disposable bowl. “Imma go watch the sunrise.” He grabs his coat and runs. When he comes back in, Isa wants to cuddle on the couch. He gets up and makes her coffee. “What d’you want for breakfast?”

  “My ADHD meds.”
>
  “No. Breakfast.”

  “Amory. You know I hate to eat in the morning.”

  Wills looks up. “Where are y’all’s Santa hats?”

  “Uh, free pass. I don’t even have clothes that aren’t pajamas.” Isa pulls the blanket over the two of them again.

  “The rest of you, y’all should be wearing your Santa hats. I’m not kidding! Crispin, go get ours.”

  Crispin huffs and goes back to their room. Isa sighs. “Is Quinn still asleep?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Imma go back to bed with him.” She crawls off the couch and downstairs.

  Great. Quinn wants sex in the morning. He’ll be thrilled to wake up next to Isa.

  “Amory. Go get your Santa hat.” Wills puts his bowl in the trash.

  “Isa and Quinn are asleep in there.”

  “You need your hat.”

  “They’re asleep, dude.”

  “But everyone needs to wear a hat!”

  “I swear to god, when they appear, I will put on a hat.”

  Wills stops speaking, furrows his brow, and looks about as pouty as an enormous linebacker-looking dude can manage. Goddamn. Amory grabs some liquor, props his feet on the coffee table, and turns on the TV. He finds The Empire Strikes Back. Eventually, he starts drinking. People wander in. Wills summarily banishes them, demanding they only appear with their Santa hat. Baylor apparently sleeps late. Audie and Calhoun slink in. They already have their hats on. Audie immediately locates the Goldschlager, slumps next to Amory, and starts drinking.

  “Hair of the dog that bit ya.” Amory points to the bottle. “The fucked-up, cinnamon, gold-flake dog who bit ya.”

  “Shut the fuck up, Reed, you smoked half my pot.”

  Calhoun harasses Audie to eat. When he gets up, Amory can’t hold it in anymore. “Nice hat, Currell.”

  “Shut the fuck up. I like my hat. Wills made it for me. It was nice of him. And damn it, I’m going to wear it.”

  Wills like, absolutely glows. “Audie, you ever built a gingerbread house?”

  “Aw, fuck me, really?” Amory takes another pull from the bottle. “You really did this up, didn’t you?”

  He keeps watching Empire. Pretty much everyone eventually joins him while Crispin and Audie make omelets. Quinn and Isa stagger up. Quinn curls under the blanket with him. Isa lays down on Baylor.

  “Amory.” Quinn whines in his ear. “I woke up and you were gone. And Isa was there.”

  Amory kisses his ear. “And you had to deal with morning wood like the good Lord intended.”

  “Come downstairs.”

  “Nope. Imma have an omelet. We can later.”

  Quinn sulks. Goddammit.

  They all house omelets. Amory specially thanks Crispin, who just shrugs it off.

  Audie slips him some of his vape pen. Amory hits it. Amory hits it again. Amory and Quinn hit it a bunch. They sort of totally zone, and they’re reciting Vader and Luke’s dialogue just after Luke gets his hand chopped off along with the TV when Wills hoves into Amory’s field of vision.

  “Why didn’t you make a gingerbread house?” Wills glares. “And why won’t you put on a Santa hat?”

  Oh, fuck. They were making gingerbread houses, and he totally forgot about the fucking hat.

  “Because I hate gingerbread,” he manages. “I like vodka. You made a nice house, though.”

  Wills makes a growly sound and stomps off. Crispin throws Amory a look and follows him.

  “Quinn.”

  “What.”

  “Go get my goddamn hat.”

  “Why me?”

  “Because you look like a fuckin’ elf.”

  “Dude, uncool.”

  He leans over. “Because if you’re sweet, I’ll take care of what I didn’t this morning. Eventually.”

  Quinn practically runs. Yeah, he’s that easy. He plops the Santa hat on Amory’s head and cuddles up next to him. They keep watching Empire. It’s probably too early to be this blitzed. “We should go get our trunks on.”

  “Yeah. We should.”

  They somehow manage it with a minimum of grab-ass, return, and plop on the couch. Crispin emerges from the bedroom.

  “I forgot to put it on earlier. You wanna go out, Crispin?”

  “Hell yeah.”

  All three of them do the liquor grab, run, jump, splash out to the tub. Audie, Calhoun, Baylor, and Thor appear — they went on some kind of beach walk or something — and the drinkening really commences. Quinn’s super quiet around Baylor and Delia. Amory just cuddles him under his arm while he argues with Audie about which is better, Owen Wilson’s performance in The Royal Tenenbaums or Pineapple Express. Audie keeps offering him and Quinn the vape pen, which Quinn hits hard.

  “Dude, we don’t wanna cash it out.” Amory feels bad smoking this much of someone else’s weed. He should have thought to raid their own stash.

  “Oh, I brought plenty, have more.” Calhoun gives him this glare and Audie kisses him. Calhoun doesn’t seem to like the weed thing. What the fuck ever.

  Then Isa swims over and tries to talk to Quinn. She must have noticed how small and quiet he’s making himself; Isa always notices things like that.

  “Quinnie, how’s Ellis?” Isa asks.

  “Fine.” Quinn hits the pen again. Poor Quinn, the last thing he wants to talk about is Ellis. Amory tightens his arm around him but keeps talking to Audie.

  “Haven’t seen him in a while is all, other than Christmas.”

  “He’s working weird hours.”

  “Oh my god, Ellis is sooooooo sweet.” Baylor cuddles Isa because of course she had to sit right next to Quinn. “You are so lucky, Quinnie. Amory is super cute and you get Ellis, like hello, fantasy land. So what do you do with two of them?”

  Quinn cuddles deeper into Amory and he starts paying full attention. “Google it.”

  “More like PornHub it.” Delia giggles. Isa giggles. Baylor reaches for her phone. Aw, fuck no. Fuck fuck fuck.

  “Oh Baylor, don’t.” Trust Calhoun to try saving Quinn, thank god for Calhoun. “You’ll give your phone a million viruses and no one wants to see that. Audie, do you see what I was talking about?”

  Amory’s pretty sure Calhoun means, Baylor is a bad person. Right now, he’s Team Calhoun.

  Audie huffs. “Calhoun. Are you the only person here who’s never been on PornHub? Show of hands, people? Never have I ever been on PornHub? Everyone take a shot but Calhoun.”

  “Ooooooh, Never Have I Ever!” Baylor swipes at her phone. Amory hopes the fucking thing falls in the hot tub. “Oh. Oh. Like that. Okay then.” She passes it to Isa and Delia. They gape at it.

  “You guys.” Quinn burrows deeper into Amory, who wears his come-at-me-motherfucker look.

  “Okay, I’m done. My eyes are permanently seared from my brain. That was like, the biggest dick I’ve ever seen.” Baylor tosses her phone over the side. “So Calhoun gets to start, because he was the only one who didn’t drink last round.”

  “Start what?” Calhoun’s cocked his head and furrowed his brow.

  “Never Have I Ever. Let’s go.” Baylor has a grin a mile wide.

  Calhoun’s eyes widen. “Uh-uh.”

  “Aw, c’mon, it’s fun.”

  “No. Way.”

  “Leave him alone, Baylor.” Audie cuddles his boyfriend. “I told you not to pick on the sweetest man alive. You picked at Quinn. Don’t pick at Calhoun. Go pick at Thor.”

  “No. I don’t pick at Thor.”

  “Why? You’re fucking him.” Audie shifts and drinks some liquor.

  Baylor smirks.

  “Oh, god. I did not need to know that in this life or the next. Thor, make her stop harassing Calhoun.” Thor whispers something to Baylor, who scoots over into his lap and glares at Audie. Somehow, he shuts her the fuck up. Go Audie. Maybe he’s not as Team Baylor as Amory thought.

  Quinn’s still terrified and quiet. But Audie actually notices. Quinn looks from Audie to Baylor.

  “The f
uck did you do?”

  “Nothing you need to know about.” Audie grins like a maniac. “Here, hit this.”

  Quinn perks up a little. “Amory, you wanna shotgun?”

  “I always wanna shotgun, Baby Q.”

  Quinn blows the smoke into Amory’s mouth like they’re making out. Then they actually do make out. Calhoun smacks him. Quinn smacks him back without stopping. Quinn sits in Amory’s lap, wiggling on him, mouth moving over his. Amory’s tongue explores the familiar taste and feel of his mouth and he hardens. Quinn gets stiff on him and my god they’ve got to get downstairs. They eventually stop before it gets overly lewd, but Amory keeps Quinn floating in his lap, his hard dick brushing against his boyfriend’s back. Ellis would freak out at the PDA. Fuck Ellis.

  Henry makes them all order subs, a good decision that goes totally fucktangular, with everyone changing orders and the pad falling in the tub and like, six other things going wrong. Wills and Crispin eventually wander back out. Wills announces they were fucking, Christ in a motherfucking manger, like anyone needed that visual. Audie passes the pot. “Look, if that bastard over there is gonna be Martha Stewart, Imma be Snoop Dogg.”

  Amory nearly dies laughing.

  They go in to eat subs and do stockings. Quinn and Amory wander downstairs to change. “I fucking hate Baylor and Delia just eggs her on.” Quinn tosses his suit on the ground as if it’s the suit’s fault.

  “Baby.” Amory begins drying him off. Quinn looks up at him with those big blue eyes. His cock stiffens immediately. Amory can’t help it. It won’t take them long. His knees hit the ground and Quinn hits the back of his throat. Quinn groans and plays with his short hair. Amory massages him with his lips. He misses that good smell of cock; they’ve been in the hot tub and he smells like chlorine. But he slides back tight lipped, sucks Quinn’s head hard while he jacks him and licks that spot he likes. About a minute and Quinn’s arching, thrusting. He groans and slick come slides down the back of Amory’s throat, so goddamn hot. He sucks it all out in the same rhythm of Quinn’s climax.

  “Oh my god.” Quinn flumps on the bed. “You didn’t have to.”

  “You wanted it. Now put on your sweater or they’ll get suspicious.”

  They attack the subs and try to pay Henry, but he waves them off. Wills brought candy canes, and the girls hang them on the tree. “You want one, Quinnie?” Delia smirks.