Unwrapping Her Perfect Match: A London Legends Christmas Novella (13 page)

He grinned as he watched her rolling the
condom on him. “Just following orders. You’ll find I’m good at
being coached.”

“More than good, I’d say.”

“Naturally talented?”

She laughed and moved a leg over his so that
she straddled him. “Maybe. Guess what. I can be slow too.”

His eyelids squeezed closed as she lowered
herself onto him. He filled her so well that the pressure made heat
uncoil in her belly. She lifted and lowered herself slowly, so
slowly he groaned in agony. “You’re going to kill me.”

“No, but it might hurt a little. Just a
little.”

His hands gripped her hips, and his gaze
flicked from where their bodies joined to her breasts to her eyes.
“Good.”

She rode him slowly, clenching her inner
muscles every time she rose. Pilates would never give her a hard,
flat stomach, so it had to be good for something—and damn but that
look of agonized pleasure on his face was
something
. His
head tilted back in the pillows, his fingertips digging almost
painfully into her hips. She increased the pace just a little until
he thrust to meet her. She would’ve stopped and told him off, but
her own body needed more and she couldn’t hold back. She held him
inside her and rode him harder. He bit hard on his lower lip,
watching her through narrowed eyes as he finally lost control,
slamming her hips down on his once, twice, three times until an
orgasm ripped through both of them.

Gwen collapsed onto his chest, and arms
wrapped around her. They were heavy and warm and big enough to
cover her whole back. He nuzzled her cheek and squeezed her close,
his voice sleepy against her ear. “I’ve waited my whole life for
that. I had no idea what I was missing, but it was you.”

Her body melted, and she buried her face in
the crook of his neck as she hugged him. Barely trusting herself to
speak, she whispered, “I’ve missed you too.”

As children across Britain fought sleep so
they wouldn’t miss the sound of Father Christmas’s sleigh bells,
John lay wide awake because of the piercing sound of a different
type of bell. Alarm bells, ringing in his head.

Gwen’s lush body curled around a pillow, and
he curled around her. She was so warm, so soft and so cuddly. He
could lie here with her forever.

Except he couldn’t, because Steve had sent
through the details of Toulon’s offer, and John didn’t want to
spend any time on Christmas Day reading over them. Better to do it
now, when Gwen and Agnes were asleep, because tomorrow afternoon
Gwen had promised to have dinner with her family and Agnes would go
home the following morning. He wouldn’t waste a single moment he
had left with either of them.

But dragging himself away from Gwen’s sweet
backside when he knew he wouldn’t have her much
longer...torture.

As he disentangled his arms and gently rolled
away, she made a sleepy sound of protest. He froze until she sighed
and sank deeper into the pillow she clutched to her chest. Oh, to
be that pillow for just one night.

He pulled on his boxers, grabbed his mobile,
and quietly made his way downstairs. He hadn’t turned off the
twinkle lights when he’d gone to bed. When he was a boy, his
parents had always turned them off at bedtime. He used to sneak
into the living room in the early hours of Christmas morning and
turn the tree lights on so Father Christmas could to see what he
was doing. He stopped doing it the year he interrupted his mum
laying out the gifts he would open a few hours later.

He could still remember the visceral lance of
agony that had shot through him as he realized what was going on.
The guilty expression on his mum’s face, her stuttering
explanation... The shimmer of magic that had brightened the
holidays was tarnished after that. His parents never seemed to make
much effort. It was like they went through the motions because it
was expected. They observed traditions but didn’t make any of their
own. They gave him clothes that he would quickly outgrow, socks and
underwear and other practical things. Their celebrations had come
from guidebooks rather than the heart.

He wanted better for his girl. He wanted
colorful lights to twinkle as she closed her eyelids. He wanted her
to wake up to a magical world of possibility. He wanted her to feel
warm and welcome and cherished.

Most of all, he wanted her to feel like she
had a dad who gave a fuck.

He collapsed onto the sofa and pulled his
email up on his phone. The tree’s colorful lights danced across the
screen, and he had to tilt it to be able to see what Steve had
sent.

The offer looked good. More than good. It
looked bloody brilliant. French teams had a much higher salary cap
than the one that choked English teams, and when John converted the
proposed salary from euros to pounds he nearly dropped his
phone.

He could play for several more years, save
some money, and build a relationship with his daughter before she
became an adult with a life of her own. He was so fucking tired of
being separated from her. The thought of suffering several more
years of a long-distant relationship made him queasy—and now he
wouldn’t have to put either of them through that any more.

So why did he feel like someone had squeezed
lemon juice into his eyeballs?

He pressed his thumbs into his tear ducts and
leaned back into the couch. His head throbbed. His brain ached. He
needed a rest. Just a few minutes. He’d rest his eyes and figure
out how he’d break the news to Gwen that he was moving to France at
the end of the season.

Lights twinkled behind his eyelids, gradually
dragging his awareness away from his deep sleep and into the world
around him—a world filled with soft, distant music, muffled giggles
and heavenly scents of warm butter and sugar. He blinked, still
groggy and not quite sure what he was doing with one leg slung over
the back of his couch and the other hanging over the side. Then he
remembered and fumbled for his phone, a shot of panic jolting him
awake at the thought that Gwen might have seen what was on it.

The screen was dark, the phone as deeply
asleep as he had been. Gwen would’ve had to have invaded his
privacy in order to see the email or the documents he’d been
reading. He laid it face-down on the coffee table and glanced
across the room to the clock that hung on the wall.

Except... He blinked again.

Where the hell was his clock? And what was
that
thing?

Someone had replaced his clock with something
that looked like a clock but had words instead of numbers. He stood
and got close enough to read it, rubbing his eyes to sharpen them
up.

French words. It was a clock, but the numbers
were written out in French. Right now the hands pointed to
huit
and
vingt-cinq
. If he’d just seen the words on
their own, he’d have struggled to remember which numbers they were.
Thanks to their position on the clock face, he knew it was
8:25.

The soft music that had been playing broke
through his thoughts. It built to a plaintive, painful cry, and he
finally recognized it. Edith Piaf singing that she regretted
nothing. He didn’t know all the words, but he knew those.
Je ne
regrette rien.

Giggles grew louder, then a shush as if one
of them remembered he was asleep. He followed the sound to the
kitchen and peeked through the door, watching unnoticed as Gwen
flipped a thin, pale crepe in a pan and Agnes cut lemons. They
hadn’t turned on the ceiling lights, so the room was lit by
colorful Christmas lights and the flickering flame of a
familiar-looking teacup candle. They whispered to each other, and
John strained to pick up any of the words above the background
noise of the music.

“Not a creature was stirring, not even a
mouse,” Gwen recited, apparently from memory.

“Not a cr…”

“Creature.”

“Oh.
Créature
?”

“Yes,” Gwen said patiently. “But we pronounce
it creature.”

“Not a creature was…”

“Stirring.
Remuait
.”

Agnes reached for the bowl of batter and gave
it a good stir. “Not a creature was
stirring
?”

Gwen’s pretty brows drew together. “Hmm.
Different kind of stirring. I think I mistranslated.
Bougeait
?”

“Ah! Oui. Okay. Not a creature was stirring,
not even
une souris
.”

Gwen laughed. “You’ve got it.”

Watching them, John felt his heart crack wide
open.
This
was what he’d been missing all his life. Not just
Agnes. Not just Gwen. The two of them together.

No—the three of them. Him included. A family
of misfits who all fit with each other.

He stepped into the kitchen and both started,
throwing him guilty looks. “What mischief are you two getting up to
at
huit vingt-cinq
in the morning?”

Gwen’s face was a picture of confusion before
it cleared. “You saw the clock!”

“I did.”

“What did you think?”

He crossed the small kitchen and pulled her
into his arms, lowering his head to give her a good-morning kiss.
He kept it chaste, knowing they had an embarrassed audience who was
pretending blindness. When things began to shift and stir inside
him, he forced himself to pull back. He tipped his forehead against
Gwen’s and told her softly, “I love it even more than my first pair
of rugby boots.”

Her eyes grew shiny, and she blinked a few
times. “I, uh, I got you some other things. This crepe pan, for
example. I hope you don’t mind that we’re breaking it in.”

“Not at all. Especially if some of those
crepes come with Nutella.”

“Absolutely.” She pressed up to steal one
more quick kiss and pulled herself out of his embrace completely so
she could take the pan off the burner. “Not for this crispy little
crepe, though. I’m afraid he’s not going to make it.”

The three of them ate and joked and teased
each other in two languages. When they’d finished and dumped their
plates in the dishwasher, Agnes clapped her hands with barely
contained glee. “Presents now!”

John rolled his eyes at Gwen. “Notice how
quickly she picks up the most important English words.”

“Mmm hmm. I bet a few words will stick with
you too. That’s why I got you the clock and the CD…and a few other
things that’re under the tree. The more you’re surrounded by the
language, the easier it’ll be for you to retain.”

And just like that, John’s good humor fled,
leaving him off-kilter and desperate. “Yeah, that’s…yeah.
Great.”

Agnes led them to sit at the base of the tree
and distributed the gifts. Soon she was surrounded by a pile of
them, most looking like they’d been wrapped by someone with big
hands that weren’t used to such nimble tasks as tying bows in
ribbon. John had several beautifully wrapped gifts next to him, and
Gwen had a couple unexpected presents in front of her.

“You first, angel,” John said to Agnes. She
practically overflowed with excitement as she carefully tore into
the first gift from her dad. The box was little, and her face
completely lit up when she took its top off. Her mouth softening
into an O, she carefully pulled out a charm bracelet.

“
C’est joli.
” Her voice was breathless
with awe as she examined each charm. “Gwen! Ooh,
regarde,
London bus! Rugby ball!” She gasped. “Ice skate!”

“I got that one when you weren’t looking
yesterday.” The twin beams of pleasure that his daughter and Gwen
gave him were the best presents he could’ve imagined. His heart
turned inside out. It killed him to know that this would all be
over soon. This wasn’t his everyday family. They were a special
gift for the holiday season, and it would be months before he got
to experience this again—if he didn’t mess everything up with Gwen
first.

“You now, Papa.”

“I’ve already received a few of my gifts this
morning,” he replied. “It’s Gwen’s turn.”

“That’s okay,” she said. “Agnes wants you to
open yours. Go ahead.”

Reluctantly, he picked one up and slid his
finger under the tape holding the paper together. A feeling of
dread settled over him, as if once all the presents were open this
moment would disappear forever. He wanted to hold on, never let it
go.

Eventually, the paper fell away and he held a
stack of DVDs. He shuffled through them, many of their covers in
black and white and showing passionate embraces.

“They’re classic French films. Mostly
romantic dramas, but I got a couple of thrillers too, in case
you’re not into…you know, mushy stuff. I thought we could watch
them together. Maybe learn some new words.”

John laid them on the floor, leaned over and
kissed her softly. “
Merci
, Gwen.”

A flush spread across her cheeks. “
De
rien
.”

“It’s the turn of Gwéen!”

She smiled and picked up the poorly wrapped
package in front of her. “I wonder who this could be from.”

“Someone whose fingers aren’t very nimble and
who’s feeling a bit mentally slow the last couple of days.” John
tried to swallow his nervous anticipation as she opened the gift
he’d bought while she’d gone home to change her clothes yesterday.
He hadn’t had much time, and he really wished he could’ve got her
something meaningful. Something to show how much he appreciated
her. This little gift had been the best he could do, but he hoped
it showed that he had paid attention.

She pulled the book out of its wrapping and
stared at it, expressionless, for several long seconds. “It’s a
food diary.”

Nerves sizzled to life in his belly. “Yeah. I
know how you like to cook and bake and stuff. I thought you could
keep track of your favorite recipes and, y’know, stuff like who you
were with and…”