Series: Like Us Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 241
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
“I think I’m giving all I’ve got, so I’d say pretty good.” I smile at a thought. “Think all my girlfriend really wants for Christmas is for me to destroy her pussy.”
“That visual, man,” he shakes his head.
“Sexy, I know.”
He blows a bubble, then pops it in his mouth. “It’s not all she wants.”
I nod. “Yeah, I know.” My relationship with Luna isn’t all about sex. It’s a part of it, sure, but it’s not all of it. We keep our leisure stride, the cherry red lake house in view. “I don’t feel pressured by Luna. But I’m not used to holding out like this.”
“If you’re hesitating at all, you shouldn’t have sex. Just let it happen when it happens. Don’t force it or you’ll keep thinking you did it too soon.” He looks over at me. “You’ll know when it feels right.”
Yeah.
Trusting my instincts is easy when they haven’t let me down. “How much I owe for the sex advice, Dr. Hale?”
He sucks in a breath. “This one’s on the house, man, but I’ll start charging both of you if you keep talking about ruining pussies.”
I laugh hard. “Luna talked to you about wanting me to fuck her?”
His brows rise. “Yeah.”
I can’t stop laughing. I would’ve paid good money to see Farrow’s reaction. “Fuck, I love that girl.”
We’re both smiling as we step inside.
It’s loud already.
Bright chatter and laughter are a river flowing to the spacious living room, and we follow it. Luna’s pajama-clad family are just gathering. Hales, Meadows, Cobalts, Abbeys, and Stokes. Some rub at their eyes and lounge with cups of coffee. Others mill around the furniture with more energy.
With Farrow next to me, I take it all in.
Tom tosses gifts underneath the overflowing tree. Like he just wrapped them this morning. Xander is half-asleep on the loveseat, and Kinney surrounds him with his birthday presents. Beckett chats with Charlie and their father by the sprawling windows, drinking out of holiday mugs.
Eliot collects names to be put in a Santa hat. “Merci, merci, merci,” he says to the teenage girls as they drop a scrap of paper in. He goes around the room. “Merci, merci.”
I smile as most of them start arguing about nominating Charlie to be the designated Santa. Sounds like he’s never been randomly selected to pass out the gifts.
“We’ve never voted on it before,” Audrey contends. “We can’t break tradition. It’s sacrilege.”
The noise amplifies. People talk over each other.
I feel a bigger smile pull at my face.
It’s the sort of radiant noise I find myself wanting to sit inside. Like those 3 a.m. nights in a club—standing too close to the amps, or blasting “Thunderstruck” on high volume with the car windows rolled up.
Farrow lifts his almost two-year-old son up against his waist. His eyes meet mine, an understanding in them. Really, he’s the only person here who could understand what this feels like.
I’ve spent more holidays with Farrow than I have anyone else in my life. But they’ve never looked like this for me or even for him. There were some Christmases where we never left Yale. Where Oscar never left too. Where we’d all go eat a ham dinner at a local diner.
It was the happiest thing in the world to me back then.
But this…
This is what Farrow found. What I thought I’d never have.
I inhale the comforting scent of pine, coffee, and cinnamon. I listen to joyful noises.
And then the light of my fucking life slips effortlessly beside me. Luna wears a baggy sweatshirt over her nightgown, and immediately, I wrap my arms around her body and draw her back against my chest. She smiles up at me.
This is the new part. I’ve never had a girlfriend. I’ve never looked up and seen so much family. So much unconditional love.
On Christmas morning.
My eyes burn again, but with a feeling that’s easy to welcome. I want this. I want this to last. I hope, and hope, and hope.
27
LUNA HALE
“He got you a new phone?” Xander asks, cutting another slice of cinna-roll cake in the kitchen while I show him the latest Apple phone. Everyone has dispersed after the lazy morning unwrapping gifts and celebrating my brother’s 18th.
He hates being the sole center of attention. Which has led him to always combine his birthday with the first bits of Christmas morning glee. It tends to shrink the spotlight on him. And he typically requests “group” gifts so he’s opening less stuff.
The Abbeys bought him the newest VR headset. The Meadows got him a few Canyonlands tees and hoodies from their trip to Moab. Cobalts all chipped in for a vintage Lord of the Rings hardback collection. And my family gifted the wristwatch he’d been eyeing.
It’s subtly pricey—not because it’s plated in gold—but because it’s one of the most complex timepieces in existence. It adjusts for leap years, displays the calendar, depicts the night sky including the location of stars and constellations, plus so much more. All while still being an old-timey analog clock.