How the Hitman Stole Christmas - Sam Mariano Page 0,76

with him, I don’t even care. I know kids aren’t in Jasper’s plans for the near future, but they are in mine, and I’d love to convert him.

Now that the gifts have been opened and everyone upstairs is busy, we’re free to linger in bed, kissing and touching and holding onto each other.

It’s the best Christmas morning I’ve ever had.

Magical, some might say.

As day turns swiftly to night, Jasper’s mood begins to change.

The whole week we’ve been preparing for this day. Now that it’s ending, we all have to start preparing to leave.

For Tarek and Nora, that doesn’t mean anything bad. Sure, Nora tells us how she’ll miss us—mostly Jasper—and tries to lock in plans to visit, but as soon as she talks about bringing Amira and Tarek to Chicago to see us for a weekend, Jasper shuts down.

I wouldn’t have understood it a few days ago, but now I know how he thinks about having his loved ones with him in the city. Now I, too, envision a little girl with a bullet hole in her dress, being shot at because her father is a dangerous man.

I’m not as convinced as he is that the risks mean he can’t have a family, but maybe that’s only what I want to believe.

Everyone is still awake when Jasper suggests we head downstairs and start packing our bags. His sister and Tarek are here for another day, but he wants to leave early in the morning.

I think he is feeling the weight of time running out as keenly as I am. As soon as we get in the bedroom and put down the armfuls of stuff we brought with us, he doesn’t grab his duffel bag and start packing.

He grabs me.

I wore my cranberry-colored sweater dress today, no stockings underneath. Jasper grabs the fabric and bunches it up around my waist so he can get to my panties and shove them down.

I hold on as he bends me over the bed and shoves into me without even taking the time to undress first. We undress piece by piece as we move across the bed, and I try not to cry out too loudly when he makes me come again and again.

We’re both panting and tired when we finally collapse on the mattress. I crawl close and wrap my arms around him, feeling at peace when his strong arm settles around my waist.

For a long time we don’t say anything, but I finally break the silence.

“I don’t want to go.”

“I know,” he murmurs.

I don’t know if he thinks I just don’t want to leave Stillwater, or if he knows it goes deeper than that.

“I don’t have to fly home Sunday,” I say, pushing my fingers through his hair and looking up at him. “I don’t even like my job that much. I could stay in Chicago with you. I’ll send a rent check to my landlord so I don’t lose my apartment, but… I don’t have to go right now. Who’s making me?”

Jasper pulls me into his chest and kisses the crown of my head, but he doesn’t say anything.

Our bags are all packed. Piles of presents fill Jasper’s backseat again, only this time, they’re ours.

I haven’t given him his present yet. Jasper asked me this morning to wait until tonight. I don’t know if he hadn’t wrapped my gift yet, or maybe he just wanted privacy for our gift exchange.

Whichever reason he had, it’s just the two of us left on the couch in front of the tree on Christmas night.

It has been a lovely day, and I’m eager to spend some time just the two of us. I know we’ll end up back in bed before long—once we opened that door, we’ve had a hard time containing it—but before we do, I want to enjoy what’s left of Christmas with Jasper.

“Should we watch a movie?” I ask him, pulling my warm blanket from his mom up over my legs.

Jasper is sitting on the couch behind me, but not with me between his legs this time. His feet are planted firmly on the ground, his arm slung around my neck as I lean back against him.

“If you want to,” he murmurs.

I twist around so I can look at him. “What do you want to do?”

His lips curve up faintly, but the smile doesn’t reach his eyes. “You.”

I smile back, tilting my head so I can kiss his arm. “That can be arranged. Don’t you want to watch a movie or something first,