He crossed his arms over his chest once more, looking like a boulder that wasn’t about to be moved.
“Okay,” I called, heading up the stairs, like I didn’t care one way or another. “I’ll change, then clean it up. I’m not the one with a schedule that is getting disrupted, who is in a big ass hurry. No skin off my teeth. I hear labor can take hours and hours, especially first babies. It’s fine, no rush.”
Honestly, I should probably be more freaked out about some rando just appearing in the living room of my childhood home, than I was. But having already come to terms the past December with my brother telling us he was pregnantandthe love of his life was the son of Santa,andsaid love of his life and baby daddy was taking over his father’s position as The Santa,andKeegan was moving to Santa’s Village,andwe could only visit him under “special circumstances”,andno one would remember Keegan even existed once all that happened to protect Santa’s Village, I was frankly just rolling with it at this point.
As a first grade teacher I needed to learn to pick my battles with my students, and that philosophy was extending to my personal life as well.
Really, I was more excited I was about to become an uncle than anything else. Thanks to some Kringle magic, Keegan had been able to contact us on some special cell phones he’d given us, so we’d been able to basically just pretend he had moved away and there was absolutely nothing weird or absurd about any of this. Oh, besides absolutely no one in the human realm, as Nik called it, remembering Keegan even existed besides us.
Ten minutes later I was dressed in dark jeans, socks, my snow boots, a warm sweater, my winter coat and gloves. Sweat was starting to form at my hairline, but I didn’t figure we wouldbe here much longer. Hiding my grin when I saw my cereal mess had miraculously been cleaned up, including the shards of glass from the bowl, I announced, “I’m ready! How do we do this?”
The elf’s silver gaze scanned me from head to toe, and I just stared back at him, wide-eyed and grinning.
“You told me to dress warm,” I fluttered my arms at my sides. “This is warm. Don’t look at me like it’s weird that I’m standing here dressed for a blizzard, when we barely got done with July. Just following your orders,” I gave him a little mock salute. “Let’s do this! I’m ready to be an uncle!”
“Well, you’re not as annoying as the other little human,” the elf muttered, and I narrowed my gaze on him, “that’s something at least.”
“What did you say your name was?” I asked suspiciously.
There was one elf that had been giving Keegan a hard time, and I didn’t put up with anyone giving my little brother grief. Except me, of course. That was allowed. As his older brother by two years, I had dibs, but no one else could. Those were the sibling rules.
“I didn’t,” he moved into my space, super close. Close enough I could feel the heat from his body burn all the way through my too warm clothes. His scent filled my nostrils. Peppermint mocha. Surely, he didn’t smell like my favorite holiday drink. My brain had to be playing tricks on me, right? Maybe it was his body wash.
“Hold on,” his voice rumbled low in my ear as his arms came around me, holding me tightly to his chest. His breath on my skin made me want to shiver but I forced myself to not let him know he was affecting me in any way.
I had to look up to see his face, way up. At five foot seven I wasn’t tall, but for an omega I was considered to be on the taller side. But this man–elf–had to be at least seven feet tall. Just trying to see his eyes was giving me a neck ache.
Doing as he ordered, I gripped him tightly, not sure what was about to happen.
“Some people prefer to shut their eyes,” he told me, his voice a deep throaty purr. “It can be…dizzying. Your brother gets a bit sick from it.”
Giving my neck a rest, I lowered it, and not really having any other choice, I rested it against his surprisingly hard chest. “He can’t deal with anything that spins. Never has been able to.”
And then the floor fell from beneath our feet, and the world around us turned black, except for what looked like a million bright stars. Colors swirled all around us; silvers, blues, reds, and purples. Wind roared in our ears, and the air turned bitterly cold.
His hands held me tight, and I swore one stroked down my back in a soothing gesture, but I had to have imagined it. And then we stopped moving, and the world was silent. Cold bit at my cheeks and hands, as I blinked my eyes open to the bright world around us.
His arms loosened around me, and I stepped away from his wonderful heat and scent. Gasping, I stared down from the top of the hill we were on at the scene below me. If I hadn’t known better, I would think we had landed smack dab in the middle of a holiday movie.
The white snow glistened all around us, looking sparkling and shiny in the afternoon sun. Below us, the village stood, buildings decorated in reds, greens, blues, and silver. In the middle of it all was a gigantic ice skating rink, where several skaters were spinning around. I could just make out the black and white twirling forms of the skating penguins my brother went on and on about.
“It’s breathtaking,” I whispered in awe.
“This way,” the grumpiest elf to ever elf grumbled, not paying one bit of attention to the stunning scene below us. Iguess if you actually lived here, it probably lost some of its shine, but…I didn’t think I would ever get tired of looking at it.
And how could he be so grumpy living here? Just looking at it had me all happy inside, filled with well…Christmas joy, I imagined.
Hurrying to catch up with his long-legged stride, I barely had time to properly take in a postcard worthy cottage. Instead of stopping, we walked past it, down a little path, then broke through a pine tree fence.
Another cottage stood here, looking like something out of a picture book. Did all the houses look like this?
A scream rent the air, raising the hairs on my arms, and I took off in a run. That was Keegan!
Throwing the door open, I nearly ran into my parents, who were pacing in the small foyer.
“Come along,” the elf ordered all of us, and without hesitation we followed him to a bedroom. Keegan was in the bed, looking pale and sweaty, Nik by his side. Two older men were also there, along with another elf. The room was so crowded we could barely get all the way in.
“Thank you for getting Keegan’s family here in time, Balfour,” one of the older men smiled warmly at the elf standing close to me.
