Chapter Four

Sophie…

“Why do I keep findin’ ya draggin’ around laundry every time I see ya?”

I let out a startled screech that makes me sound like a barn owl, jumping half a foot before leaning against the washer, my hand over my heart. “Are ya a nutter? Sneakin’ up on me like that?”

“Tha mi dulilich, I’m sorry.”

Michael is looming over me, but he does look regretful.

Why did he have to find me here? My terrible black dress is covered in lint from the towels and my tidy bun has loosened and half my hair is in my sweaty face.

“Och aye?”

I push off the washing machine. “What are ya needing?” I resist the urge to bury my face in my hands. Why does everything I say to him sound like I’m trying to proposition him?

“I’m set for the evening.”

He shrugs. “Da’s insisting on holding up Mum’s rule about ‘No business on Christmas!’” He does a pretty good imitation of his mother Mala. Not mean at all, I can hear the fondness in his tone. “So… I thought I’d see if ya needed any help with… the towels.”

Oh, Mother Mary and all the Saints did he see me? He’s smiling down at me with his jade green eyes and his good hair and…

It’s just not right that the things that aren’t meant for ya are just so pretty.

“Oh?”

Clearing my throat, I start again. “Oh. Well, I’m all done here. Just gettin’ some oven mitts for my ma.”

“What are you doin’ tonight? After dinner? I know Mum’s insisting on setting ya and Olivia loose to celebrate with us.”

Searching his stupidly handsome face, I’m tryin’ to figure out what the hell is going on here. “I… Wrapping presents, I guess?”

Suddenly his hands are around my waist and he’s lifting me as if I’m as light as a sugar plum fairy, putting my arse on the washing machine. Which is on the spin cycle and rattling away.

“I think instead of gettin’ paper cuts and tangled up in tape, ya should have a drink with me. Tell me about Uni. Tell me about your studies. Tell me anything.”

“Dinna ya have things to do, like…”

I’m floundering. “Like wrestling wolves or choppin’ wood or some other manly shite?”

This is too much. The washer is vibrating under me and the sneaky bastard has slipped between my legs, planting his hands on my hips.

“I’m straddling the line here, lass. Half o’ me wants to be a gentleman and the other half - the MacTavish side, most likely - wants to tell ya there’s better ways of workin’ up a sweat than chopping wood. Unless ya meant that to be naughty.”

The washer clicks into high gear and the only thing keepin’ me from sliding off into a puddle are his hips pressed against my center. “No! I mean, I dinna mean it as naughty, I just…”

His hands gently squeeze my waist and my reservations are disintegrating faster than that sweater I bought on Shein.

“I canna let another Christmas Eve go by without being with ya.”

He ran his nose up my neck. “You’re the most bonnie lass I’ve ever known. So sweet. Smart. Charming.”

“Ya- ya wouldn't think that if you’d ever seen me attack a bowl of peel-and-eat shrimp.”

The washer is shuddering side to side and the position he’s pinning me in has me pressed right against it. His thumbs are making little circles on my hips and there’s a very large and very hard thing pressing right against my lady garden. My dress is rucked up so high that my knickers are peeping out.

“Aye, I’m thinkin’ ya should sit right here for a wee bit and think about spending some time with me tonight.”

He has the audacity to give me an innocent expression. “I’ll be a gentleman. I promise.”

“That’ll be once, then,” I gasp.

There’s a high whine echoing around the little room and I realize it’s coming from me. His enormous hands slide around to my arse, squeezing it gently and pulling me closer. Between the vibration from this cursed machine and his hot, hard shaft rubbing against my clitoris, I’m gonna come. I know I am and I canna stop it.

“Good girl,”

he whispers in my ear, giving my earlobe a sharp little bite. “Show me how pretty ya are when ya come. Just like this.”

“I hate ya,” I groan.

“Aye, I know.”

His chest is shaking with laughter and rubbing against my painfully alert nipples. My dress and my ratty bra are doin’ nothing to stop it. “But I have wanted ya for a long time, sweet lass, and tonight, I want ya to spend your Christmas Eve with me. We dinna have to do anything, though this is a promising start.”

Rubbing me harshly against his hard cock, he kisses me, grinning as I shriek my pleasure into his mouth. The washer spins to an end and so does my orgasm as my head drops to his nice, broad shoulder. “While we’re in this moment of complete honesty, I wish the Earth would swallow me whole right now.”

“No, lass. That was the finest thing I’ve seen in a long time. Thank ya for trusting me enough to let go.”

Michael MacTavish, future Chieftain of the MacTavish Mafia, hugs me in his big, warm arms and I know this night canna get better than this.

***

“Oh, my god! Then what happened?”

“Damnit Bonnie! Shhh!”

I look over my shoulder as if Michael might be lurking around the corner. We’re hiding in the pantry while Ma cheerfully belts out another chorus of “Jingle Bells” while she’s stirring the cock-a-leekie soup.

After I stopped shaking and my legs were no longer the consistency of cooked pasta, he’d kissed me again before taking me off the washing machine and helping me put myself to rights, tugging my dress back down to a non-pornographic level and repeating his request for the “honor of my company”

after dinner.

“I canna go out with him!”

I hiss to Bonnie. “How can I ever look him in the eye again after he…” I glance behind me again. “After he got me off on the washer! And anyway, it wouldn’t go anywhere, ya know that. My luck is like a bald guy who just won a comb.”

“Well, ya could just slink back to the cottage, I suppose. Or, ya two could get all savage, sexing the hell out of your young, supple bodies and after some very long, sweaty sessions in bed, ya fall in love and live happily ever after. And I’m the maid of honor at your wedding, a’ course.”

I eye her sternly, “That was… concerningly detailed. I beg ya, no more of your fantasies about your cousin and me.”

“He’s my third cousin. I can fantasize all I want.”

Bonnie winks at me, strolling back out of the pantry like we weren’t just talking about Michael MacTavish railing me into oblivion.

***

The holiday table looks magnificent, if I do say so myself.

Shining china and elaborate silverware, glittering crystal goblets, and cheerful red linen napkins stretch down the endless table and the huge pine centerpieces with silver balls that I wrestled into place are the perfect, festive touch.

As I stand back to admire my work, another shadow passes by the big French doors leading to the gardens.

“This canna be my imagination,”

I mumble, hurrying to open the door and stepping outside. It’s fecking freezing and the snow’s falling harder than ever. It canna have been a guard, this isn’t part of their rotation around the house. I dinna know if they can even patrol in this blizzard. A wayward deer, perhaps?

There- movement in the boxwood hedge maze. Tall, too tall to be a deer. Squinting through the snow, I catch a glimpse as it turns to glance at me.

A new kind of chill runs up my spine like a steel blade, like the cold and damp seeping out of an abandoned cellar. Something malicious coiling in my throat.

The face is hideous; long, jagged teeth turned up in a cruel smile from a misshapen jaw, black horns curling up from its forehead, fur sprouting out in all directions like snakes.

Krampus, the mythical Christmas demon is staring right at me.