#put my cursor wherever I clicked. I want to continue where I left off and now I have to be MINDFUL of where I click.

[spookaburra]

Tumblr, please, just put the thing back on the other side, I hate this.

How do I get to my likes? Where's the search bar? Where are my drafts? Please.

[like-bunnies]

Winter Dreams Pt. II ‘Pudding’ -- an Ichabbie Holidays AU Fic

Abbie Mills is closing up her bakery on Christmas Eve when a stranger comes in desperately looking for something. What will the two of them manage to find together? 

An Ichabbie AU that can be read as the next part of Winter Dreams or can be all on its own. One of these years, I will get a Christmas story done by Christmas. Oh, who am I kidding? And this is like Hallmark Channel Christmas Movie silly fluff. But with a little smut added in. And AUs really aren’t something I’m very good at but I’m trying! 

Abbie was ready for the holidays to be over. It had been exceptionally busy in her quaint bakeshop and there was an endless stream of people picking up their orders for Christmas Eve. Her sister, Jenny, was helping by getting all the internet orders shipped on time and even Jenny’s boyfriend, Joe, pitched in early mornings before his shift at the ER.

Still, she was glad that they would be closing soon and tomorrow was Christmas so she could sleep in for the first time in a very long time. The last customer had shuffled out with their goodies and Jenny was about to turn the sign on the door over to “Closed” when a tall, bearded man came rushing in from the snow.

“There’s not much left,” Jenny said as he rushed by her and to the counter, looking pleadingly at Abbie.

“I desperately need a Christmas pudding,” he said and Abbie’s ears perked up at both his accent and his weird request.

“I… sorry… a what?” Abbie stammered, still staring at him as he shook the snowflakes out of his hair. It was longer than she normally liked on guys but thankfully not long enough to pull it into a man bun. She had seen enough of those with the college in the next town. This man’s hair had the cutest curls near his neck and… he did have a lovely neck. And face. And eyes. What was it he wanted again?

“A Christmas pudding. I have tried and tried to get one right and they have all failed. I’m hosting the history department’s ‘holiday away from home’ dinner tomorrow for all my colleagues who are, well, away from home, and I promised there would be a pudding,” the man said, his hands flying around expressively as he spoke.

“I don’t have any puddings. I do have some pies left. Oh, here… these are also good,” Abbie said, offering him something from a bag.

“I can’t serve my guests something from a bag,” he said as he reached in and popped one in his mouth. “Oh, these are good.”

“Listen… Doctor… what’s your name?” Abbie asked.

“How did you know I’m a doctor?” he asked, licking the cinnamon sugar off of his fingertips.

“History department. Colleagues. Away from home so I’m guessing you’re at the university as a teacher? It doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes to work that one out,”Abbie said as he grabbed another donut hole and shoved it in his mouth.

“Besides, she used to be a police officer. Was going to be a detective one day had she not been injured,” Jenny said as she continued to clean up the small store, wiping down the few tables they had so customers could enjoy their pastry in the morning. The front door was now locked, the keys dangling from the lock so they’d be able to let this last minute customer out when he was ready to go.

“Ah. I’m sorry to hear that. I’m sure that was a great loss to the local police force, And it’s Crane. Doctor Crane. Or professor if you like. I’m actually here to teach about the American Revolution from the British perspective and to work on my book,” Crane said.

“Isn’t the British perspective that we kicked your ass?” Jenny asked. Abbie rolled her eyes at her sister but Jenny always liked a good argument.

“Only because you had the French,” he said, pointing a finger in Jenny’s direction.

“You had the Hessians. You had the best navy in the world at the time. You had an organized army with excellent leadership and still you lost,” Jenny continued on in a sing-song fashion.

“I see you’ve taken my class,” he said with a slight, wry smile.

“Jenny, could you go in back and make sure I didn’t forget anyone’s order? I can drop anything off on the way home. Now, Doctor Crane, would you like a pie or what?” Abbie interrupted, hoping to end this thing between the professor and her sister. Jenny went off to the back, whistling Yankee Doodle. “I apologize for my sister.”

“No, she does have a point, which is actually why I’m at the university here. I am researching how the Americans did overcome the odds and win. This region is filled with so much history and I’m enjoying all of it immensely. I just can’t find a bakery that has a Christmas pudding!” he said.

Abbie bit her lip and thought for a minute. If he wasn’t so cute, she would have sent him back out into the snow a long time ago but there he was in that pretty navy coat that made his blue eyes even more blue and she felt for him. Felt a lot of things for him, actually. It had to be the accent.

Jenny called out from the back that there was nothing there and she was going to go make a quick trip to the grocery store before the market closed early. Abbie mumbled that she would see her later for Christmas Eve dinner and listened as Jenny locked the back door. Both doors were now locked and she was all alone with Doctor Crane.

“What’s your first name?” she asked. “I’m Abbie, by the way.”

“I guessed that one,” he said, arching an eyebrow up at her. She looked at him puzzled until she remembered she had her name on the front of the bakery. On her apron. On her shirt. On her name tag. She never in her life thought she’d own a bakery. She wasn’t even that great at it at first but she learned and came to love the whole thing, accepting help wherever it came from.

“Yes… Abbie Mills. Formerly Lieutenant Abbie Mills. Now baker Mills. Who knows what’s next. Maybe candlestick maker,” she said, laughing nervously. He had put his hands on the counter and was leaning in her direction.

“Oh, Lieutenant. I like the sound of that,” he said, the timbre of his voice dropping even lower. “And my name is Ichabod.”

She couldn’t help herself. She let out something more than a nervous chuckle this time.

“Ichabod?”

“You can call me Crane if you’d prefer,” he said. “Ichabod was an old family name. I had some relative who came to America centuries ago with the same name. I should look up where he’s buried whilst I’m here.”

They seemed to be getting further and further away from the topic of baked goods. Abbie closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to focus. When she opened her eyes, he was still staring at her.

“Okay, Crane. How about we look up your pudding on the internet and see what we can do,” Abbie said. He looked incredibly relieved to have help. She, on the other hand, was wondering what the hell she was getting herself into.

*^*^*^*^*^^*^*^*^*^*^*^

“Well, I think we’re pretty much screwed when it comes to a Christmas pudding,” Abbie said as she scrolled through recipe after recipe. “You needed to start two weeks ago at the very least for something authentic.”

“I see that now,” Crane said as he stared over her shoulder. They were both in her tiny office near the back of the store, staring at her monitor. She normally just handled orders and inventory in here but there was a handful of personal photos around. She couldn’t help but notice him look at a few of them, especially the one of her and some of her former police colleagues. Many had died in that raid a couple of years ago. She was thankful she had lived. She missed Andy and Luke a lot but there was no changing the past.

“This one says you need to start it at the end of November,” Abbie said, trying to draw his attention back to the matter at hand.

“Surely there must be a recipe somewhere for bumbling professors who forget to do this ahead of time and can’t even figure out how to work their oven?” he asked. He placed his hand over hers on the mouse, moving the cursor so he could click back and try a different search on Google. He leaned over her and typed in instant Christmas pudding.

“How do you plan on hosting an entire dinner if you can’t work the oven?” Abbie asked, turning in her seat to look at him.

“Frozen lasagna in a pan?” he said with a laugh. Her eyes opened in shock. “I’m teasing, Lieutenant. I can work the oven. I’m an excellent cook. I just can’t get the hang of this damnable pudding. Sadly, baking is my downfall.”

She looked back at one of the recipes he had found. It was much faster than the ones they had been looking at and she did have most of the ingredients for it. She might need to make a quick trip to the market or call Jenny while she was still there. She hit print, wiggled out from under his arms, grabbed the copy of the recipe and went into her bakery with him following behind.

“I’ll make a deal with you, Doctor Crane. I will make this and bring it to you tomorrow if I can taste just how good of a cook you really are,” Abbie said. She felt her cheeks grow warmer as she realized she just invited herself to this man’s Christmas dinner. Jenny and Joe usually did their own thing on Christmas day while she spent the day in peaceful slumber but this would be nice. At least it would be if he said yes.

He didn’t say anything right away. She was worried she had read something wrong. Maybe he was married and his wife was back home in England. Maybe he had a whole family.

“You want to spend the day with a gathering of boring historians?” he asked incredulously. She found it strange that he didn’t seem to realize exactly how cute he was. That he seemed to think he didn’t have any game.

“No, I want to spend the day with you,” Abbie said, her cheeks on fire now.

“I’d like nothing more,” he said, looking down like he was shy, his eyelashes fluttering away, before he looked up at her and smiled. She smiled right back and hoped like hell she could actually figure out how to make a pudding in one night.

*^*^*^*^*^^*^*^*^*^*^*^

Abbie had a hard time finding the right address in the blowing snow but eventually she made it, Christmas pudding in hand along with as many other of her baked goods as she could carry. Dinner with Jenny and Joe the night before had been wonderful and she crawled into her bed soon after the gifts were exchanged and they left for the evening. Up early, she was at her bakery trying her best to make this pudding seem authentic. There was no way she could make up for the time it really needed, but she thought she did a good job. If the guests didn’t like that, they could always fill up on the pies.

She used the heavy door knocker and waited with all her parcels for Doctor Crane to open the door. His eyes lit up when he saw that it was her and he took as many of the packages from her as he could.

“Lieutenant! I’m so happy you’re here! I was worried that the weather would prevent you from traveling to my home…as it has some of my other guests. Two couples have canceled out so far,” he said as he started toward the kitchen.

“You can call me Abbie… where would you like for me to leave my boots?” Abbie asked, not wanting to track snow through the house. Both had their arms filled with desserts and Crane motioned for her to follow him. Abbie did as he led her down a narrow hall to a warm and cozy kitchen. Everything smelled delicious and she could see that he had been chopping vegetables when she had interrupted him with her knock at the door. “You really can cook.”

“As I said, cooking I can do. Baking just goes wrong. All those precise measurements makes it like a science experiment. I prefer the magic of cooking instead. A little bit of this. A little bit of that,” Crane said, taking more baked goods from her arms and stacking them up on one of his granite counter tops. Abbie slipped off her scarf and coat and pulled her snow boots off, leaving her in just her stocking feet. She had her favorite lace-up boots in the large tote she had brought with her but Crane had whisked her wet winter gear off to where it could dry by the fire and was already back, asking her questions about what she had brought with. And if she had brought more donut holes.

“Yes, I did and some other donuts you might enjoy. You can save them for tomorrow, if you’d like. They would go great with a cappuccino,” she said, noticing the gourmet coffee maker he had tucked beside the toaster. “I thought you said you were only here for a short time.”

He followed her gaze and smiled. “Doesn’t matter how short the time might be, I can’t go without my coffee,” he said, going back to his chopping. “So, Lieutenant…”

“Abbie.”

“So, Abbie, how did you end up with a bakery?” he asked. Abbie fell silent as she collected her thoughts. She watched Cranes hands and his fingers as he deftly chopped vegetables, adding them to a stew that already smelled delicious. He was smartly dressed in a pair of dark gray flannel trousers and the most beautiful blue cable knit sweater she had ever seen on a man. She wanted to touch it to see if it was as soft as it looked. Instead, she focused on what he had asked.

“I…uh… after I got shot and I couldn’t come back to work, or at least not the way I wanted to, I thought it would be nice to have a place like that. It was supposed to just be a coffee shop but there are too many of those in town already,” she said.

“Starbucks on every block, cutting out any local coffee houses with precision,” Crane said, his kitchen knife stabbing into the air as if to illustrate his point.

“So I opened the bakery that would also serve coffee. Honestly, after the incident… after I lost a few very good friends in that incident…”

“I sense one of them might have been more than good friends?” he asked, looking at her as if he was trying to suss out everything there was to know about her.

“Mind your business, professor. Anyway, after that, I thought it would be a great place where the local LEOs could come in the morning. I’d serve them some warm apple pie if their shift was ending or a blueberry muffin and a cup of coffee if their shift was just starting. It was a way to stay connected, you know,” Abbie said, remembering how desperately she needed to keep close with the people she relied on for so long. “I wasn’t the best baker at first but I was determined. I learned from some of the best and now my little shop is doing rather well, and my friends are all still there bright and early in the morning. Good thing I love mornings, right?”

He had stopped chopping and was staring at her intently, taking in every word she said. Just looking in his eyes sent a wave of heat through her and she crossed her arms, trying to protect herself from this feeling. It had been a long time since Luke had died. And then Corbin was killed a year later. She had shut herself off from most everyone. She had that one fling with that visiting FBI agent but she even kept him distant. But this… was charged with some sort of electricity she hadn’t felt with anyone in so long.

“That’s really incredible,” he said, still focused only on her.

“It’s just a bakery. Look at you, Doctor Crane. Where did you go to school anyway? How did you get involved with American history when you have ages of history of your own?” Abbie asked, trying to deflect the attention away from herself.

“I grew up in London, went to Oxford… Merton College. I ended up in America when a friend talked me into doing further studies here, I was married for a very short while but she then ran off with that same so-called friend. I got my doctorate from Penn, which is where I discovered the answer to the other part of your question. The history of our two countries is entwined and I found it fascinating. Now I’m doing more research into the British officers who turned. What would drive them to fight for a land that was not their home? And this is a great area in which to do so,” Crane said.

He was starting to clean up the scraps of vegetables when his cellphone rang. He wiped his hands off on a dishtowel and answered the call. Abbie listened as he went through a series of “uh huhs” followed by a “that’s too bad.”

“Now the Andrews can’t make it. They don’t want to venture out into what might become a blizzard. They are new here, from somewhere in Georgia, so that’s understandable but still… I hope the others can make it,” Crane said.

“Do you miss England? London?” Abbie asked. He paused from his mixing and stirring and thought about it for a beat.

“Have you ever been there?” he asked instead of answering.

“No. I made it to Paris after I started the bakery but didn’t make it to London,” she answered.

“It was my home. Yes, I miss it but home isn’t necessarily always a place. It’s the people. I try to find the right people wherever I go. My ex-wife, Kat, didn’t like that. She wanted to settle down in one place and with Abe, she could. I wanted to keep moving. To keep learning. To keep meeting people,” he said. He looked at her and smiled brightly. “People like you. I would have never met you had I stayed in England.”

“You never know. Fate might have stepped in. I might have been there on vacation and bumped into you in a coffee shop,” Abbie said.

“Our fates are entwined, just like our nations?” he asked.

“Maybe,” she said, feeling her cheeks flush again from the way he was looking at her. “Maybe.”

*^*^*^*^*^^*^*^*^*^*^*^

Abbie was putting the finishing touches on the dining room table, enjoying how nicely the place was decorated. It wasn’t over the top for Christmas but he had a fresh tree and candles everywhere and a nice table setting. Crane even had Christmas crackers at every place setting, waiting to be popped open by cheerful guests.

She stopped moving when she heard Crane’s phone ring again. Another guest was canceling because of the snow. She felt a bad for him because of all the work he had put into preparing this meal but then again, she wouldn’t mind eating with him… alone. She returned to the kitchen to find him opening a bottle of wine. He poured himself some and took a sip before pouring her a glass, too. It was a fantastic red wine and now she was also glad they didn’t have to share that bottle with as many people.

“That was Trevor, one of the doctoral candidates I’m helping out. He said the snow on his side of town is getting too deep for him to venture out on foot and he doesn’t want to pay for an Uber. Too be honest, I think Trevor would rather spend his day with his new X-Box but what do I know?” he asked with a disappointed shrug “I haven’t even taken my new one out of the box yet. Trevor is the lucky one.”

“So, who is left?”Abbie asked. She would have to go clear another place setting, which only left four.

“Doctor Hashemi and her husband. That’s it. I didn’t expect so much snow on Christmas. Everyone kept saying they never get a white Christmas. They’re getting one this year!” he said, taking another sip of wine and looking out the window. “I’m going to have to go shovel the path soon. If you want to get home before the roads get too treacherous, you can. I don’t want you to feel that you have to stay here,” he said, pouting a little as he considered the snow.

“No, I’m good. I’ve lived here all my life and I’ve driven in worse than this. Besides, I can help you shovel the sidewalk,” she said, standing beside him as they looked out of the kitchen window over the sink. His narrow backyard was pristine white now and although she wasn’t fond of shoveling, it did look like it would be fun to play in. If that involved playing with him.

“They are going to miss out on the best pudding ever,” Crane said with a smile.

“How did you end up responsible for this Christmas dinner?” Abbie asked.

“I do like to cook. I thought it would be nice to get together with friends and colleagues and enjoy a nice meal,” he said. The phone rang again and he looked at it and sighed heavily. He turned away from the window and took the call. When he hung up, he looked at her and shook his head. “Samira and Bahram will not be able to make it, either.”

“You wanted dinner with your friends but now instead, you’re stuck with a stranger,” Abbie said, honestly feeling sorry for him.

“If we do get snowed in here, at least we will have plenty of food,” he said, looking around the kitchen at everything. He didn’t say anything else for a moment before he turned to her. “And I don’t consider spending time with you as 'stuck’ and I don’t feel like you’re a stranger at all. I feel like I’ve known you longer than just one day. It’s like we’ve been friends forever.”

She laughed nervously because she had been feeling the same way.

“At least I don’t have to worry about serving that rushed Christmas pudding to anyone. Unless you plan on eating it?” she asked.

“God, no. I never liked them in the first place but I had promised the Andrews. We can just stick to the donut holes,” he said and they both laughed.

*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^

He had put on a suit coat over his button-down shirt and his gorgeous sweater and Abbie finally put on her shoes, not wanting to dine without them on while he was trying his best to look like the perfect holiday host. They had agreed that shoveling the walk could wait until after dinner and he poured her more wine before they put the last side dish on the table. He pulled out her chair for her and helped her take her seat before tucking himself in.

“This is all good. Next Christmas, I’m going to make you some of my mama’s mac and cheese, though. That’s the only thing missing,” Abbie said.

“Next Christmas?” he asked, his one eyebrow arching up on his forehead.

“I’ll still be here. How about you?” she asked, taking another serving of the stew she had found him preparing when she arrived.

“I don’t know, to be honest. I’d have to have a pretty good reason to stay,” he said, tilting his head slightly, asking so many questions without using a single word.

“So, do you believe in fate?” Abbie asked. It was a pretty serious question for holiday dinner conversation but she wanted to know everything he felt and believed.

“Do you mean that two people are supposed to meet? Across time and space and all that? Over and over?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I don’t know. Does this mean that I keep meeting my ex-wife first? Because to be honest with you, getting my heart broken like that over and over and over would become rather exhausting. And annoying,” he said and they both laughed.  

“So she wasn’t your soulmate but she taught you a lot, I’m sure. All part of the path to the right thing?” Abbie asked.

“I did learn a lot about who to trust and that sometimes you just have to do your thing first before you can bring someone else into your life. That is one thing she did teach me,” he said with a shrug. “Thankfully we didn’t have children together. That would have been a disaster!”

They both fell silent. She watched him as the flickering candles sent shadows over his face. He was watching her right back, nervously smoothing out his beard before focusing back on the dinner at hand.

“Dessert?” she asked, breaking the tension filling the air.

“Capital idea! And I’ll make coffee!”

*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^

With their stomachs full, the dishes done, and fueled up on coffee, they bundled up in protective gear and headed outside during a break in the snow to shovel the walk. He only had one snow shovel so they took turns while one of his neighbors up the street used his noisy snowblower. Finally, he finished and went inside, leaving the two of them alone in the eerie stillness. There was the sound of the shovel scraping and him asking her questions about her life and her taking the shovel from him and asking him more questions about his.

Just when they had finished, the snow starting drifting down again and Abbie sighed. The good thing about her apartment was someone else did this! Crane put the shovel near the front door and returned to where Abbie was standing, catching snowflakes on her tongue.

“You are so beautiful,” he said, taking her gloved hand in his. “I have not even known you for an entire day and I’m smitten, Abbie. If this was fate, then yes I believe in it. Absolutely. Completely.”

Abbie’s heart starting beating hard in her chest when he said those words and she didn’t know what to say. She felt the same way about him but… it was so fast. Is this how it worked? You met the one and it was like throwing a switch?

Instead of saying anything, she led him toward the part of the yard where the snow wasn’t too deep but was packed just enough and pulled him down into it, urging him to make a snow angel. He complained about the wet and the cold only briefly before he joined in. As her arms were forming the angel wings, he propped himself up beside her to look at her.

“What?” she asked, crossing her arms over here.

“You truly are heaven sent,” he said, pulling her scarf away from her face just enough so he could lean in to kiss her. It was slow and soft at first, like the snow drifting around them. Slowly. Softly. The snow was falling and Abbie was falling, too. Her lips explored his and she wanted to feel more. To explore every bit of him. She touched his face but her damn gloves were in the way. He pulled away, his eyes searching hers. She shivered from the cold and from the way his eyes were devouring her.

“Should we go in and warm up?” Abbie asked.

“I have some wonderful ideas on how we can do that,” he said, his voice dropping. She scrunched up her nose and giggled at him. “No! I meant we could sit by the fire and have a drink… I didn’t mean to sound so forward! Abbie, I’m sorry!”

“I wasn’t laughing about you being so forward. I was laughing because I had plenty of ideas of my own. But starting with a drink by the fire would be good,”she said. He stood up, put his hand out to assist her to her feet, and wrapped an arm around her shoulder as they walked to the door.

“What ideas do you have?” he asked.

“I’ll just have to show you.”

*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^

She swallowed the Scotch and felt it warm her all the way down. After getting out of her snow boots and her coat again, she settled down on his couch while he tuned in to a satellite radio channel playing jazzy Christmas music. The old house had several fireplaces in different rooms and the one in the living room was now stoked to a roar.

Abbie made herself at home and covered up with a soft and worn plaid quilt that had been over the back of the couch. Crane sat beside her and took a long sip from his glass.

“I have to tell you… I don’t do this very often. I rarely have the bakers I meet on Christmas Eve spend the next day at my house helping shovel snow and set the table,” he said.

“I rarely go home with my customers,” she said. “Only the special ones who are desperate for a Christmas pudding.”

“Yes, I only invite over the bakers with the best donut holes,” he joked. They both fell silent for a quiet, comfortable minute. “I want to see you again. I don’t want to do anything that would make you not want to come back.”

“You haven’t done anything yet.”

“I want to.”

“I want you to.”

He set his glass aside and pulled her to him. His mouth was warm and tasted of Scotch. The blue sweater he had on was as soft as she imagined it. Didn’t matter. She wanted it off of him. Wanted everything off of him. Wanted him on the floor in front of the fire. Wanted him.

A moan escaped his throat as her tongue delved past his lips, meeting his. Heat burned through her, settling between her thighs and she thought about how crazy this all was but she certainly wasn’t going to stop. She pulled away from his kiss and stood up, putting the quilt over her shoulder and reaching out to him. He grabbed her hands and she knew he’d follow her anywhere right now. She put the quilt down in front of the fire and they both sank down to their knees on it. The twinkling lights from the Christmas tree danced across their skin and she pulled his sweater off over his head. He unbuttoned his shirt and shed it quickly. Abbie looked at his chest, gasping when she saw a scar across his heart.

“What happened?” she asked, her fingers running across it.

“It’s silly, really. I was doing some research in grad school at a battlefield reenactment and I got in the way of something I shouldn’t have. Thankfully, I had modern medical care and an ambulance that arrived in a matter of minutes,” he said. She leaned in to kiss the scar, running her lips across it, her tongue teasingly flicking out at his nipple. He moaned and leaned back away from her, sitting on his heels.

“I have scars, too,” she said.

“I’d like to see them,” he said and she pulled off her wool sweater, revealing her silky black bra.

“Here,” she said, pointing to a bullet wound on her abdomen. Abbie then unfastened her trousers and wiggled out of them, showing him the wound on her thigh that ended her career. “And here.”

Now his fingers explored her flesh, feeling where she had to be put back together with titanium and screws and stitches.

“Does it still hurt?” he asked.

“Not as much as it used to. Sometimes when it’s cold and I have to shovel snow for some guy I barely know…” she teased and he rolled his eyes.

He motioned for her to lie down and she did, shivering as he continued his study of her with his mouth. Her thighs fell open to his gentlest demand and her back arched up when he kissed her clit through her thong. Crane tugged the tiny scrap of fabric down her legs and off and she closed her eyes, hardly able to believe this was happening.

He kissed up and down her thighs, teasing her until she couldn’t take it anymore. She reached for him and showed him exactly what she wanted. His tongue danced over her clit and then inside of her and she couldn’t stop moaning. His beard tickled and his hair kept flopping into his face and he’d have to push it back before diving back in. His hands would grab her hips and pull her closer but there was no way to be closer. Abbie’s back arched as she came and all the lights seemed to grow brighter before fading into nothing. When her body finally calmed down, Crane climbed up beside her and kissed her. She could taste herself on his lips, a combination of the two of them, and it was sweet.

“Better than any Christmas pudding could possibly ever be,” he said. She reached up and tucked a loose lock of his hair behind his ear.

“Since I didn’t really expect anything like this to happen… I mean, I only expected dinner… I didn’t exactly come prepared. Except with a lot of baked goods,” Abbie said.

“I haven’t been with anyone in a long while – not since Kat. I was tested afterward because of that whole thing with… well, you know. So. I’m clean,” he said. She knew this was stupid. She was on birth control but still. Why did she want this person so badly that she’d throw away common sense and wisdom?

“So am I. Clean. And on birth control,” Abbie said.

“Well, then, Lieutenant… do you want to move somewhere more comfortable or do you prefer right here, by the warmth of the fire?” he asked. She liked it here, with the crackling fire and the lights filling the room. It looked and felt like Christmas. She always imagined being with a man she loved on Christmas, enjoying each other. This might not be love yet… but she was certain it could be soon enough.

She took off her bra and then fumbled with the buttons on his pants (who wore button-fly anything anymore?) but finally slid them down his narrow hips along with his silly Christmas boxers.

“Who was supposed to see these?” she asked, laughing at the ridiculousness of them.

“Can’t a man enjoy some festive underwear for the holidays?” he asked. She was looking over his lean body and when her eyes got to parts she hadn’t seen already, she forgot all about the boxers. He was already hard and it was impressive.

“Well, Merry Christmas to me,” she said, licking her lips in anticipation. He blushed, his eyes turned down shyly until she wrapped her hand around his cock and stroked it a few times. The thrust into her grip and she leaned in to flick the head of it with her tongue as her fingers kept moving.

“Uggh,”he managed to say as her tongue continued to dance around him. They surely looked ridiculous here in the middle of the living room on nothing but a quilt on the floor, nearly naked except for their socks. It was too cold to go without socks.

He moved quickly, and was on his knees with her legs wrapped around his hips and her arms around his neck, slipping into her body. He filled her completely and she was mesmerized by the way he was staring into her very soul as he thrust in and out of her. It was like he had known her forever. Like this wasn’t their first time together.

Everything was a bit hurried and frantic but they could take it slow later. Right now they both needed to satiate this thing that was between them. He threw his head back when he came and cried out her name over and over and she never wanted this precise moment to end.

They fell down next to each other on the quilt, Crane struggling to catch his breath. She was only supposed to deliver a pudding. Just a pudding. Not pudding and sex.

Oh, but she was so glad it turned out that way.

“Please say you’re staying the night?” he asked when he could finally speak coherently again.

“I have to go into my store at about 3 am and prepare for the day,” she said and he sighed with disappointment. “Unless I call my sister and ask her to go open the store. That’s always an option. Or I could tell her I can’t make it because of the snow but she’d never believe it.”

“I have nowhere to go tomorrow. I could come in with you and watch you while you bake,” he said and she looked at him with disbelief. “Oh, Abbie, I’d go anywhere to watch you.”

She laughed.

“You sure it’s not to get more donut holes?” she asked.

“There is that, too,” he said.

She was snuggled in his arms under the glow of the tree, the quilt now partially wrapped around them. And Abbie knew without a doubt that fate was real and they were meant to be together this Christmas and every Christmas for the rest of their days.

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fin