Julian
Thanksgiving had never beenmy favorite holiday. Family and feasting and gratitude were all well and good, but I already saw my family plenty, and I just couldn’t get excited about a dinner that took twelve hours to prepare and featuredturkey,the blandest food in all the land. I was more of a Valentine’s Day guy; a day devoted to chocolate, sex, and romance should happen at least twice ayear.
This year, though, I was actually getting into the Thanksgiving vibe as I drove down the Camden Road. The sun was shining through the multicolored trees, making the leaf-strewn road look like it was paved in gold, Johnny Mathis Christmas carols—my dad’s favorite, to be started right on Thanksgiving Day—were playing on the radio, and I was on my way to fetch Daniel, my fake-ish boyfriend, who’d be sitting next to me at dinner this year and coming home with metonight.
Nowthatwas something to inspire gratitude, especially given that I’d barely seen the man since he’d found me at the clinic the other day. We were planning to spend the weekend hanging out though, and I’d woken up rock hard just imagining what that might mean, but I’d ignored my aching cock. I was pretty sure any fantasy I conjured wouldn’t be as hot as the realthing.
My Monday had already been booked solid, thanks to a peculiar number of mysterious pet illnesses plaguing the town, coincidentally occurring just a couple of days after I’d lost my temper with Lina Davenport. After Daniel had pushed me into the exam room and the entire waiting room had heard us “rearranging the furniture,” as Kathy put it, my Tuesday and Wednesday had gotten booked up, too. When I hadn’t been working, I’d been making pumpkin bread pudding for Thanksgiving dessert and taking my mom shopping. And while Daniel had stopped by with some pastries for me at lunchtime on Tuesday, it hadn’t been nearly enough. I still craved him. I craved the consuming kisses that took me out of my own head, and the free, comfortable conversations we’d always had. And I really, really needed things to be settled betweenus.
I drummed my fingers on the steering wheel as the trees flashedby.
Friends with benefits. Did that mean fake boyfriends who weren’t entirely fake? I got the impression it would definitely involve more kissing. More… itch scratching. But was it scratching an itch for him, too? I didn’t want this to be a thing where he gave me what I needed and gained nothing for himself. Idefinitelydidn’t want this to be a thing where he was thinking of someone else—someone female—while we were…scratching.
And now I was officially banning that euphemism from my brainforever.
I pulled up to the cabin and opened my door to the sound of Honoria’s barking. Daniel pulled open the front door of the cabin before I’d even reached the top step of the porch. He stood there for a second, framed in the doorway, grinning at me, and my heart stuttered. He was wearing jeans— dark blue ones that molded every inch of his legs and looked like they’d be butter-soft to touch—and he was naked from the waist up, but for the towel thrown around his neck. I wanted to lick every inch of his flat belly and broad chest, to rub my face against the sprinkling of hair on hischest.
I cleared mythroat.
“Hey. Happy Thanksgiving,” Icroaked.
“Hey,” he said, his eyes raking up from my brown leather shoes, to my own jeans, which were beginning to feel uncomfortably tight in certain areas, and then to my dark purple button-down. “It’s definitely a happy Thanksgiving now. How long until we have to be at yourmom’s?”
Wow.Okay. So this benefits-thing was really happening. I felt my cheeks flush. “Not nearly long enough for you to act on the look you’re giving me, so pack it up until later.” I waved a hand at him. “She expects us in twenty minutes, and I refuse to show up with…” I waved a hand in the general direction of my dick and felt my face burnhotter.
“An erection?” he said. He licked his lips and the look in his eyes was purewickedness.
“Yes,” I agreed. “That.”
“Is ‘that’a word you can’t say?” He backed further into the house and Honoria wiggled past him to greet me, so I knelt down to run my hands through her fur, distracting myself. “Three little syllables. Not that hard. Or maybe it is.” He snorted at his ownjoke.
“It’s not that I can’t say it,” I argued. “It’s just that talking about it isn’t conducive to it goingaway.”
“Interesting,” Daniel drawled. “And byityoumean…”
I sighed, giving in. “Myerection.”
His smile was smug. “Okay. Just wanted to make sure we were on the same page.” He backed up a step further and ushered me in with the dog leading theway.
On the same page. I glanced at the front of his jeans because I couldn’t help it and sure enough, there was a noticeable bulgethere.
This wasdefinitelyreallyhappening.
Whateverthiswas.
“I… but we… I’m fully dressed,” I reminded him, shocked. “And we haven’t…doneanything.”
He shrugged, unconcerned. “Doesn’t seem to matter. I’ve been thinking about it. Alot.”
I really, really disliked Thanksgiving. I closed my eyes and groaned. “Eighteen minutes,” I remindedhim.
He sighed. “You should have comeearlier.”
Yeah, I really, really should. In every sense of theword.
“I’m almost ready. Just need to shave and throw on my sweater. Come keep mecompany?”
I opened my eyes and watched him walk into the bathroom, leaving the door open behind him.Holy fuck. Was it possible for a guy who was mostly-straight until, like, five minutes ago, to be so cool with this? To discuss erections like he’d done it a hundredtimes?
