Ghostwriter of Christmas Past Read online

  “Maybe he’s going away.”

  “Well, then we can stay here while he’s gone.”

  “Mallory.”

  She slammed her fork down on the table and bolted to her feet. “You go if you want,” she yelled at him. “I’m staying here with Tom. Tom, not Tommy. That’s not his name.”

  Tom cleared his throat. “If your uncle thinks it would be better—”

  “I’m an orphan,” she said. “I get to do what I want or I’ll cry.”

  She glared at them, her jaw set pugnaciously like she hadn’t just used her parents’ death for tantrum fodder. For a second, just a fucking second, Jason thought about hitting her. Like his dad would have. He flinched away from the thought, shoved it down deep into the bottom of his mind. The flash of anger went with it, and he was left with exhaustion and despair to deal with his scowling niece.

  “Go get dressed,” he said. She crossed her arms. “Now. Do it, or we’ll get the car and go home.”

  “You wrecked the car.”

  “I can get another one.”

  “You can’t make me do anything.”

  “Go. And. Get. Dressed.”

  Mallory glared at him, three hundred pounds of defiance wedged into an eighty-pound body. “Fine,” she snapped. “It’s because I want to, though.”

  She stormed out of the room and up the stairs. An “I hate you” floated down behind her.

  Jason braced his hands against the counter and leaned back. There was a whole lot of anger trapped in his chest like a ball of bees, but he couldn’t do anything with it. If it were a partner or a friend—an adult—he would follow them and finish the fight. Yell at each other until one of them gave up and let the other claim the high ground.

  No high ground in a yelling match with a child, though.

  “Sorry,” he said after a minute. “She’s… sometimes she’s lovely.”

  “That’s okay,” Tommy said. He flipped a pancake out of the pan onto a plate and held it out to Jason. “Pretty sure she doesn’t hate me.”

  Jason stared at the pancakes for a second—fat, round, and vaguely irregular—and then decided to hell with it. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had cooked him breakfast. Well, he could. Yesterday at Denny’s, but it wasn’t the same.

  He went over to the table and sat down. The maple syrup sat in a sticky puddle of itself. He left it there and grabbed the butter instead. He stropped it on with the knife, and it melted and ran down onto the plate. He stared at it, but his appetite refused to kick in.

  “What if I’m screwing her up?” he asked.

  For a minute his only answer was silence. Tommy pulled out a chair and sat down next to him. He hitched his knee up and braced his bare foot on the edge of the seat.

  “They screw you up, your mum and dad,” he said.

  Despite his mood, Jason couldn’t help the delighted grin that tugged at his mouth. He’d pestered that poem into Tommy’s head over a long summer, although obviously not well enough. It felt vicious with meaning back then, a secret Philip Larkin left just for him.

  “That’s not how the verse goes,” he said.

  Tommy glanced up at the ceiling. “No, but little pitchers have big ears,” he pointed out. “You’re trying. So’s she. That means you have better odds than most.”

  “I missed you.”

  The words slipped out of Jason’s mouth. He didn’t mean to say them. Until the day before, he didn’t even know they were there. Everyone was sentimental over their first love, of course, but it wasn’t as though he pined. He’d wondered how Tommy was doing, sure, but he hadn’t put his life on hold. There were one-night stands, month-long flings, and a couple of “crap, is this real?” relationships. Yet he stood in the snow with Tommy last night, and…

  …he missed him.

  “Christ, Jase,” Tommy said. He shook his head and pushed himself up from the table. “Eat your pancakes and shut up.”

  I MISSED you.

  It wasn’t like Tom didn’t have enough to keep him busy. Cops were like Santa and retail workers. They got busier during the holiday season. Office parties ended in fights, family get-togethers ended with Grandma breaking Grandpa’s urn over someone’s head, and someone always thought it would be a good idea to drive drunk on icy roads.

  But every time he took a break, over a rushed coffee in the gas station lot or a mug of weird soup from the food truck outside City Hall, that quiet admission nudged its way back into his brain.

  I missed you.

  It wasn’t true. He knew it wasn’t true. If Jason had missed him, he could have gotten in touch. His mom and dad lived in the same house and had the same phone number until they moved to Florida. There was Facebook. There was Google.

  So he didn’t know what wistful idiot part of his brain couldn’t let go of those words, but he was going to ignore it.

  It was nearly midnight by the time he finally pulled up outside his house. The headlights from the cruiser picked out the gray paint he spent the summer applying over the old white and bright-blue clapboard and trim, only to realize he hated it, and the battered old junker from Granville’s Auto Repair that Morty passed off as a loaner car. There was a seven-foot tree strapped onto the top of the car and ropes threaded through the cracked-open windows to secure it.

  Tom got out of the car and stared dubiously at the tree. Frost dipped the ends of the branches, so it had been there a while.

  “We couldn’t get it off.”

  The quiet voice from the shadows on the porch made Tom jump. Too much caffeine wasn’t good for his nerves. He squinted and found Jason slouched on the porch swing. It came with the house. Tom had never actually sat on it.

  “What are you doing?” Tom asked. “I just spent half the night telling people it was too cold to sleep on the streets. You have a bed to use.”

  He caught the sharp white edge of a grin. “I was lonely.”

  “Don’t start.”

  Jason held up a hand—a surrender. “Sorry. I was waiting for you.”

  “You could do it inside.”

  “I know.”

  Tom glanced at the tree again and climbed up the porch steps. Habit made him careful, but someone had actually swept them. He never remembered.

  “You got me a tree?” he asked.

  It was too cold to sit outside. It was too late to sit outside. It was too late for… a lot of things. Tom sat down next to Jason anyway. The wooden slats were cold against his ass, and the swing rocked gently as he leaned back. It made the hinges creak, and Tom braced his boot against the ground to shut them up.

  “We did.” Jason offered him a half-drunk mug of hot chocolate. “Do you know what I do? For a living?”

  There was more than cocoa in the mug. Tom took a drink. It was late, he was off-duty, and… if he was stupid, it was three inches of excuse in a reindeer mug. As the hot liquid hit the back of his throat, he hissed softly. Cocoa was in the minority in the mug.

  “Last time I spoke to Ben, he said you were backpacking around Australia.”

  He’d been jealous—not just that Ben knew where Jason was. He was jealous of the freedom. He’d been studying for his police exams in Syracuse, and his dad was sick—not as sick as he was before or would be later. And he was working at the canning plant. There was worse work in the world, but he doubted there was much duller.

  Jason laughed—a short, bitter bark. “Yeah, something like that,” he said, sarcasm sharpening his booze-dulled vowels. “No. These days I write books. You won’t have heard of me.”

  “Not hard,” Tom said. He risked a light push against the ground, and the swing rocked gently. The hinges creaked, but softly. He tucked the corner of his mouth up in a dry smile. “Poetry aside, I don’t get time to read much.”

  “No. I mean literally,” Jason said. He reached over and took the mug back. His fingers were cold as they brushed against Tom’s. He took a gulp and leaned his head back against the swing with his eyes closed. “I take other people’s ideas, pu
t them down on paper, and then give them back to them. Romance, not-so-autobiography, young adult. Ghost-of-all-trades, that’s me. Only now it’s like I’m ghostwriting my own life, and the guy whose brainchild it is won’t answer my emails.”

  “Ben?”

  Jason cracked one eye open. “Yeah. I have notes everywhere, plot points that I need to make sure and include so I don’t mess it up. Doctor’s appointments, parent and teacher meetings, and how to talk about periods. Then I go and forget Christmas. Forget to do Christmas. No turkey. No tree. No presents. That’s like writing a detective novel and forgetting to solve the crime.”

  He stopped talking and took another swig of whiskey-laced hot chocolate. He swiped his tongue over his lower lip to catch the dregs. Jason reached over and set the mug on the railing.

  Tom waited to feel angry. All he could manage was a sort of scratchy, irritated amusement. All those years he spent holding on to that damn grudge, and he never noticed all the anger behind it had just faded. If his dad had been anything like Jason’s old man, maybe he’d have run the first chance he got too.

  And maybe it was jealousy and guilt as much as anger. That was the year the hospital found his dad’s cancer for the first time, and it wasn’t easy to be there. Tom tried to be a good son, but there were days he wished he was gone too. Even years after Dad’s death, that was hard to admit.

  With no anger to brace against, Tom gave in.

  “If you need a place to stay—” he started.

  Jason interrupted him with a snorted laugh, his warm breath turning into fog as it left his lips. “Still gotta be the good guy, huh, Tommy? That’s how you got stuck with me in the first place, remember? That school trip to New York, when you agreed to swap with my roommate.”

  “That was not entirely selfless.”

  “Yeah. Well, you don’t need to put yourself out.” Jason pushed himself up out of the porch swing and shuddered as though it were the first time he’d felt how cold it was. He folded his arms and shoved his hands into his armpits. “I’ve booked a room in Ithaca tomorrow night. It’s not what I had planned, but it’ll do.”

  It didn’t feel like the solution, but it was well past midnight, and maybe Jason was right. His life wasn’t Tom’s business. Besides, the charm of sitting out in the dark had started to pall.

  “Okay,” he said as he stood up. “It’s up to you.”

  It was warm inside. Jason shed his heavy parka, revealing a bulky gray sweater that was a bit more suited to the weather than the thin cashmere he was wearing the night before. He chafed his hands together and lifted them to his mouth to huff warm air against his palms.

  “It got colder than I thought,” he said.

  “The snow and darkness make it look summery,” Tom snarked as he shrugged off his coat. He shoved his hand through his hair to ruffle the damp, matted curls up from his scalp. “The tree be okay until tomorrow?”

  Jason glanced at the door and pulled a face. “It looked a bit ragged to start with,” he admitted. “I don’t think we’re going to notice if it wilts a bit overnight.”

  “Good.” Tom hesitated. The words had been stuck in his head all day, but he couldn’t bring himself to hand them back. “It is good to see you again, Jase.”

  “You know, I never correct you.”

  It took a second for Tom to realize what he meant. When he did, he twisted his mouth ruefully. “Sorry. Habit, I guess. I’ll stop.”

  “Don’t. I’m kidding.” A slow, almost wistful smile tugged at the corner of Jason’s mouth. “I like it.”

  That made Tom feel bad about his constant corrections. “Yeah. Well, you don’t have to try and play cop to a whole town that remembers the time you got caught skinny-dipping in Mr. and Mrs. Byrnes’ pool.”

  “Well, no,” Jason said. His smile turned into a grin, wicked and smug. “That’s because I legged it when Mrs. Byrnes turned the lights on.”

  “I was naked.”

  “Me too. I just didn’t want to end up naked in front of Mrs. Byrnes.” He reached and brushed his fingers over Tom’s jaw. The unexpected caress caught Tom off guard. He probably should have stepped back, but he… didn’t. “Is that what this is about? Trying to look like a responsible member of society?”

  Tom swallowed. He could feel Jason’s fingertips resting against the hinge of his jaw. “You don’t like it.”

  “I’m not sure.” Jason took his hand away. “I guess it’s not my business, Tom.”

  It was stupid. Far more stupid than he could lay at the door of one gulp of boozy hot chocolate. Tom did it anyway. He grabbed a handful of Jason’s heavy-knit sweater, the wool coarse against his fingers, and dragged him into a quick, impatient kiss.

  Jason laughed into his mouth, a tickle of sound against his tongue, and leaned into the kiss. He cupped Tom’s face in his hands, grazed his thumbs along his cheekbones, and chewed hungrily along the curve of his mouth. He stripped away the night’s chill and replaced it with restless hunger that crawled under Tom’s skin and pulled tight in his balls.

  It felt desperate, as though it had been years since Tom got laid and not a couple of weeks. Jason used his body to push Tom up against the banister. The carved wood was uncomfortable against his spine, and part of Tom wanted to object. Usually he came across as the dominant one, the one in control. He was a cop. The need to keep control of a situation had been trained into him.

  Jason apparently didn’t give a crap about that, but then, he never cared to be controlled. He twisted his fingers into Tom’s hair and pressed his knuckles against the back of Tom’s skull. The fit of their bodies from shoulder to thigh still felt familiar. The muscle over Jason’s shoulders and stomach was heavier than he’d carried as the school’s wiry pitch stealer, but not much else had changed.

  He still had that last inch in height on Tom after he snuck in that last growth spurt at eighteen. Competitive asshole. Tom slid his hands down to worm them up under Jason’s sweater. His skin was hot underneath, his sweat clammy on hard muscles that twitched under Tom’s cold fingers.

  “Yeah,” Jason finally mumbled as he tore his mouth away from Tom’s. He kissed his way down Tom’s throat until he found bare skin with his tongue and teeth. His cropped hair brushed Tom’s cheek, soft and lemony-clean scented. “I think I can live with the beard.”

  Tom could feel the hard ridge of Jason’s erection against his hip, eager and hot under the skin of denim.

  “I noticed.”

  He felt Jason’s smile slide over his skin. Then he had to choke back a groan as Jason shifted closer and nudged his thigh between Tom’s legs. The pressure of hard muscle against his cock sent a jolt of reaction up his spine.

  “I can see that,” Jason murmured.

  There was a thump overhead. For a second, caught in the old familiarity of taste and touch, Tom half expected to hear his dad’s heavy steps and the irritated mutter of his voice as he gave them time to scramble apart. Instead he heard a much lighter thud and a creak as the guest-room door opened.

  Mallory.

  They froze, their bodies pressed hard and hot against each other and sliding their hands over skin as they listened to the surprisingly heavy thud thud of Mallory’s feet. A door opened, and then a worried voice scratched out, “Jason?”

  Jason bumped his forehead down onto Tom’s for a second. He groaned and pushed himself back. The slice of air between them suddenly felt very cold and full of bad decisions. Jason tugged his sweater back down over his stomach and wiped a hand over his mouth.

  “Down here,” Jason said. His voice caught in his throat, and he had to clear it. “Go back to bed, Mal.”

  “Why? Is Tom back?”

  Tom closed his eyes for a second and tried to will his erection away. It didn’t work. When he opened them, Jason shrugged at him apologetically. Tom pushed himself off the banister and looked up the stairs, his mouth twitched into a smile for her.

  “I’m here, Mallory,” he said. “We didn’t mean to wake you.”

&nb
sp; She sat down at the top of the stairs and hugged her knees. Her feet, in borrowed oversized socks, were crossed over each other, and she blinked owlishly at him.

  “It’s your house,” she said. “Did you see the tree?”

  Tom drew a blank for a second as his brain struggled to remember anything that wasn’t Jason’s hands or the hard press of his mouth. It finally unearthed “the tree,” and he nodded as he scruffed his hand through his hair.

  “The tree,” he said. “Yes. Thank you.”

  Mal bumped down a step on her backside. “Did you bring it in?” she asked. Her eyebrows creased together in a frown that looked breathtakingly like her uncle’s. “You haven’t decorated it, have you?”

  “No.”

  “Not yet,” Jason said. “Go back to bed, Mal. It’s late.”

  She slid down another three steps and looped one arm through the railings. “You can’t leave it outside. It’s freezing. What if it gets so cold the tree explodes?”

  “It’s not going to get that cold.” Jason went up two steps and tried to shoo Mallory up ahead of him. “Stop worrying so much, Mal.”

  She didn’t move. “What if someone steals it?”

  “Why would—”

  “Why would we leave the tree outside?” Tom interrupted. He shrugged when Jason frowned over his shoulder at him. “We’ll have to bring it in anyhow. Unless you want to take it to Ithaca with you?”

  “I’m not going to Ithaca,” Mallory said flatly. “I told you already. I’m staying here.”

  Jason heaved a shoulder-rolling sigh and rubbed his hands over his face. “Thanks, Tommy,” he said. This time Tom didn’t correct him. “Fine. We’ll go get the tree off the car, but you go back to bed, Mallory.”

  She pursed her lips. “What if the tree falls on you? You could both die in the snow because I was in bed and couldn’t call for help.”

  “Bed.”

  “Did you know that a hundred people die every year just shoveling snow?”

  Jason sighed again. “Fine. We’ll get the tree in and then straight to bed for you. If Tommy drops the tree on me, you get to call the fire department.”

  She looked smug as they dragged their coats back on and trudged outside. The chill had turned to snow. Flakes floated in the dark. By the time they wrestled the tree through the front door, Tom’s libido had given it up as a bad idea for the night.