Making Merry (A Firsts and Forever/Castaways Series Holiday Collection) Read online

  Making Merry

  by Alexa Land

  A Firsts & Forever Series

  and Castaways Series

  Holiday Collection

  U.S. Copyright 2018 by Alexa Land.

  All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission in whole or in part of this publication is permitted without express written consent from the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either used fictitiously or are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, business establishments or locales is purely coincidental.

  Books by Alexa Land Include:

  Feral (prequel to Tinder)

  The Tinder Chronicles (Tinder, Hunted and Destined)

  The Firsts and Forever Series:

  1 Way Off Plan

  2 All In

  3 In Pieces

  4 Gathering Storm

  5 Salvation

  6 Skye Blue

  7 Against the Wall

  8 Belonging

  9 Coming Home

  10 All I Believe

  10.5 Hitman’s Holiday (novella)

  11 The Distance

  12 Who I Used to Be

  13 Worlds Away

  13.5 Armor (novella)

  14 All I Ever Wanted

  15 Take a Chance on Me

  15.5 Once Burned (novella)

  16 The Rest of Forever

  The Castaways Series

  1 Kindred Spirits

  Dedication

  To Dena, with love

  Thank you for the story

  suggestion that started

  this collection!

  Acknowledgements

  Sincere thanks to my fantastic team:

  Jera, Melisha, Kim, Anita, Kelly, and Ron

  And thank you as always to my Firsts & Forever/Castaways Facebook group for your enthusiasm, friendship and support!

  Table of Contents

  Please note: these stories are interrelated and build on each other, so reading them in order is strongly suggested.

  Book One: Dare

  Dare: Chapter One

  Dare: Chapter Two

  Dare: Chapter Three

  Dare: Chapter Four

  Dare: Chapter Five

  Book Two: Christian

  Christian: Chapter One

  Christian: Chapter Two

  Christian: Chapter Three

  Book Three: Zan

  Zan: Chapter One

  Zan: Chapter Two

  Zan: Chapter Three

  Zan: Chapter Four

  Zan: Chapter Five

  Zan: Chapter Six

  Book Four: Cassidy

  Cassidy: Chapter One

  Cassidy: Chapter Two

  Cassidy: Chapter Three

  Cassidy: Chapter Four

  Book Five: Gianni

  Gianni: Chapter One

  Gianni: Chapter Two

  Book One: Dare

  Featuring Dare and Skye from Skye Blue

  (The Firsts and Forever Series, Book Six)

  Dare: Chapter One

  The fold-out couch creaked when I rolled over and reached for my husband, but instead of finding Skye, my fingers brushed our dog’s fur. Benny’s stumpy tail thumped against the thin mattress as I scratched his back. It was very late and more than a little cold, and I wrapped a blanket around myself before getting up and leaving the office.

  Predictably, Skye was hard at work in the main part of the warehouse. He was trying to finish two metal sculptures before Christmas, so he’d been putting in long hours over the past few weeks. That was why we’d been sleeping here more than in our apartment lately.

  His back was to me, and I leaned against the door frame and watched him for a few moments. Skye was in a pool of light beside his workbench in the otherwise dark warehouse, and he was listening to music through a chunky, retro pair of headphones. He danced in place as he crimped a metal disk with a pair of pliers.

  As usual, everything he wore was blue, to match his hair. He’d stuck his feet in a pair of unlaced hiking boots and was dressed only in a flannel-lined denim jacket and a pair of boxer briefs. He probably would have been cold if he ever stopped moving, so it was a good thing that he was perpetually in motion.

  To me, Skye was nothing short of miraculous. He was everything that was right and good and beautiful in the world, distilled down into one amazing human being.

  He was also the most talented person I’d ever met. My husband created gorgeous works of art that were larger than life, just like him. A fifteen-foot-high, kneeling couple in a tender embrace currently filled a significant portion of the warehouse. His work was usually an open framework made of recycled materials, and it never ceased to amaze me how he was able to convey so much emotion with just a few well-placed pieces of scrap metal.

  The fact that he was becoming a successful artist surprised him, but I always knew talent like his would land him in the spotlight. The pair of giant, metal men had been commissioned for the offices of an online magazine based in San Francisco. It was his third job for corporate clients. That type of work really helped us make ends meet, since the dance classes I taught and the troupe I led didn’t bring in very much. But he only accepted clients who agreed to let him build whatever he wanted, and I admired his integrity.

  Skye’s ingenuity was also impressive. He was basically on a lifelong scavenger hunt, forever collecting odd and interesting things which told him stories no one else could hear. I’d seen him work with such unlikely items as the guts of a washing machine, a thousand mismatched pieces of cutlery, and a rusted out shell that had at one time been a Volkswagen Beetle.

  He had an uncanny ability to see worth and possibility in things most people would write off, which was a rare gift. It was also exactly why he’d ended up with me, even though he denied it whenever I tried to point it out to him.

  When we first met, I’d been such an asshole. And okay, maybe I had reasons for that. The only other relationship I’d ever had ended when my ex-boyfriend pushed me down a flight of stairs, which injured my knee and almost cost me my career as a dancer. I’d been broken, literally and figuratively, and I’d felt worthless.

  But Skye saw something in me which I didn’t even see in myself at that point in my life. He was able to look past the hurt, anger, and bitterness, and he decided I was something special. Even now, years later, I tried every day to be the man he believed me to be.

  Given where my thoughts were going, it occurred to me I’d woken in a bit of a funk. But when my husband put down his tools, threw his arms over his head, and began gyrating to whatever song was currently being piped through his headphones, I couldn’t help but grin. He really got into it, in a way that told me he was probably listening to Lady Gaga, who he absolutely adored.

  When he started shaking his cute little ass, my cock stirred. The cement floor was cold beneath my bare feet as I crossed the warehouse. Skye noticed me a moment before I reached him and smiled, and I dropped the blanket, leaving me in just a pair of underwear. His gaze flickered to the bulge in my briefs, and he tossed aside his jacket before standing so close to me that I could feel the warmth radiating from his body.

  He draped the headphones around his neck and kept moving to the music, which we could both hear faintly. We were the same height, and when we stood face-to-face, I noticed a playful glint in his blue eyes. Skye leaned against me and slid down my body, which drove me wild. When he straightened up again, I ran my hand around the back of his neck and claimed his mouth. The kiss
I got in return left no question about what he wanted.

  I stripped quickly, and his gaze lingered on my cock while he pulled his boxer briefs off over his hiking boots and set aside the headphones. He sounded excited when he told me, “I built us something.” Skye leaned over the workbench and flipped a switch, which turned on a few lights around the perimeter of the warehouse. Then he grabbed my hand and led me around the huge sculpture as he said, “I’d been trying to think of something to do with that netting I found at a junk shop last week, and this occurred to me a couple of hours ago.”

  I smiled when I saw what he’d set up in the corner. What Skye referred to as netting was a grid made of yellow straps, similar to seat belts. He’d suspended it with four chains from a metal frame, which in turn hung from the high rafters by a single, thick chain. “So, this can either be super tame or totally sexual, depending on our mood.” The rigging swayed as he hopped up onto it and explained, “Right now, it’s a hammock.” He slid forward so his ass was hanging off the edge of it, spread his legs wide, and planted his boots on the chains. “And now, it’s something else entirely.”

  I stepped between his thighs and ran my hand down his body as I said, “I can’t believe we didn’t build one of these sooner.”

  “I know! Did you see the accessories?” He pulled up a rope, which spanned one side of the sling. Clipped to it were a pump bottle of lube, a hand towel, a couple of dildos, a bottle of water, and a candy bar. That last thing made me chuckle.

  “You thought of everything.” I leaned over and dispensed some lube into my palm, then grasped my cock and his in one hand and began jerking us off.

  Skye relaxed against the sling and murmured, “Tried to,” as his cock swelled. I reached for more lube and began fingering his tight opening as I stroked us harder and faster.

  After more than four years together, I knew his body as well as I knew my own, and I concentrated on making him feel fantastic. I could tell right when he switched over from thinking about a dozen things at once to just letting himself enjoy the moment.

  A faint blush rose beneath Skye’s pale skin, and his body writhed as his lips parted. His eyes were half-lidded, but he held my gaze as I massaged his cock and his prostate at the same time, and he rasped, “Fuck me, Dare.”

  Those words never failed to send a wave of desire through me. I slicked my throbbing cock and wiped my hand on the towel he’d thoughtfully provided before pressing my tip against his opening.

  I grasped my husband’s waist as I eased into his body, stopping when my hips were pressed against him. As I started to slide in and out of him, the sling came into play. Skye rocked back and forth as my body collided with his, just enough to drive me deeper and harder into him. He burst out laughing and exclaimed, “Okay, this is my new favorite thing. It’s like playing on a swing and fucking, all at the same time!”

  I smiled at him and said, “This feels amazing.”

  “For me, too.”

  He jerked himself off as I fucked him, and in just a few minutes, he moaned as he shot onto his stomach. I came in him moments later, holding him steady as I drove myself into him. The orgasm made my legs shake, but I stayed inside him for an extra minute, because I knew he didn’t like it when sex ended abruptly.

  Skye caught his breath and reached for the towel, but I took it from him and used it to wipe the cum from his body. Then I slid out of him and cleaned myself up before retrieving the blanket and joining him on the sling. He curled up in my arms as I tucked both of us in, and we grinned as the sling spun and swayed.

  Whenever we swung close to the wall, I stuck my foot out and gave us a push, which sent us in a wide arc. After a while, I asked him, “Did you sleep at all tonight?”

  “I tried, but I couldn’t fall asleep, so I decided to get up and work. The good news is, I made some progress on the couple.” He tilted his chin toward the huge sculpture. “It’s still not quite right, though.”

  I brushed his overgrown, royal blue hair from his eyes and said, “You probably won’t believe me when I tell you it’s perfect.”

  “It’s getting there, but it could be better.”

  Skye had a tendency to dismantle his work over and over again until he got it exactly how he wanted it, and I was worried he’d take a crowbar to the sculpture when it was so close to completion. But I knew better than to try to talk him out of it if that was what he decided, so I just asked, “What’s left on your to-do list?”

  “Besides finishing and delivering the giant couple in time for my client’s holiday party, I also have to reinforce Nana’s Christmas display and install it in time for her neighborhood’s holiday decorating contest. Since the deadline for both of those things is Saturday evening, the fact that it’s now about three a.m. Friday morning is freaking me out a bit.”

  “What needs to happen to get those done?”

  “I think I need to source some new materials, because I’m not really feeling inspired by what I have. Let’s do that first thing in the morning. Oh, and don’t let me forget, I need to wrap my mom’s presents and get them in the mail today. I want to make sure they reach her before she and her honey take off for that cabin in Washington, or they won’t get them until they return in January. It’s a relief that my dad’s Hanukkah gifts were mailed weeks ago, but my to-do list is still a mile long. I can’t believe Christmas is next Tuesday already! I’ve barely begun shopping for my friends, and you and I don’t even have a tree or a single decoration up in our apartment.”

  “There’s still time, and I’ll do everything I can to help.” We swung close to the wall and I pushed off again, sending us in a wide spiral.

  “I know, but you’ll be busy, too. Since your dance troupe’s holiday showcase for charity is tonight, you’ll need to spend most of today in last-minute rehearsals. Plus, there are the set pieces and costumes to finish up.”

  “Even so, I’m planning to devote every spare moment to helping you. And once the show’s over, we’ll have almost twenty hours to finish your stuff. After that, our schedule’s wide open through Christmas, so we’ll have plenty of time to get a tree and put up decorations.”

  Skye kissed me and ran his hand over my jaw, which probably felt rough, since I hadn’t shaved in two days. “I really wanted us to have a relaxing holiday season, considering how much we’ve both been working. Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful there are actually people who want to pay me for my sculptures. But I feel like I’ve been on the go for months, and I’m exhausted, Dare.”

  “Let’s do something about that.” I brought us to a stop and got out of the sling, then held my hand out to him as I said, “Come on, let’s go back to our apartment and sleep for a few hours. You never get much rest on that crappy fold-out couch.”

  He gestured at the sculptures and said, “I don’t have time to sleep. There’s too much work to do.”

  “You’ll get it done, Skye. You always do. And it’ll come together much easier if you let yourself rest, even if it’s just for three or four hours.” He was too tired to argue. Instead, he just let me pull him to his feet.

  After we got dressed, our dog followed us to Skye’s blue-on-blue-on-blue truck. I was so glad we’d moved from San Francisco to Oakland, because that meant our drive home took less than fifteen minutes. Skye leaned against my shoulder and dozed off as I drove, and the dog curled up on him. Benny was a sixty-pound boxer, but he was fully convinced that he was a tiny lap dog.

  Once we reached our apartment, I led Skye to our bedroom and undressed him, since he could barely keep his eyes open. He curled up on his side, and after I tucked him in, I turned on what I jokingly referred to as his nightlight. ‘Welcome to the Buena Vista’ was spelled out in neon letters on a rusty but still beautiful antique sign, which hung over our bed. Skye had rescued it from a junkyard, and I’d had the neon replaced as a surprise a couple of years ago.

  Benny jumped onto the mattress and took my spot. He was welcome to it, since I wasn’t going to bed anyway. I made sure S
kye was asleep before I slipped from the room.

  My first stop was the bathroom, where I splashed some cold water on my face to wake myself up. Then I frowned at my reflection in the mirror. My green eyes were bloodshot, and my straight, dark hair was at least a month past needing a haircut. Also, I looked a bit pale beneath my slightly olive complexion and really could have used about six more hours of sleep. But I had some things I really needed to do, so I left the bathroom and got to work.

  Dare: Chapter Two

  Skye’s hair was wet and spiky from a shower when he stepped into the living room the next morning. He looked around and stammered, “Am I dreaming?”

  I’d put up all of our Christmas decorations while he slept. Most of them were vintage and dated from the 1950s and 60s. They included a lot of tinsel stars and garlands, which I’d hung from pretty much everything, and weird little gnomes and forest creatures whose bodies were glittered pinecones. I’d added endless strands of colored lights to the mix, along with clusters of two- and three-foot-high plastic Santas, reindeer, and snowmen. They were meant to be displayed outside, but instead filled every corner of our apartment since we didn’t actually have a yard.

  Draco, our cat, was fascinated and slightly alarmed by all of it. He sat near the fireplace, staring at a trio of light-up plastic snowmen as if he was trying to decide whether he should let them live. Benny was sprawled out on the couch and seemed happy as always. Meanwhile, the mouse family that lived in front of the window in a cage shaped like the Taj Mahal couldn’t have cared less. They had, however, emerged from their shoebox bedroom long enough to spirit away the fresh veggies I’d slipped into their food bowl that morning.

  The crown jewel of Skye’s holiday collection was a funky, pale blue tinsel tree, which he’d bought because he adored kitsch. It rotated slowly on a base similar to a record player while a projector shone colored lights onto it, and I gestured at it and said, “We can get a real tree on Sunday if you want to, after your deadlines.” I guided him to the table in front of our open kitchen as I added, “Come and sit down. Breakfast is ready.”