The Mistletoe Phenomenon (6 page)

"No, not alone." Lance managed to open Magnus's pants with a supreme effort. He pulled out the thick cock and closed his own fingers around it as far as they would go.

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The Mistletoe Phenomenon

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"God,
alskling
, what you do to me." Magnus groaned and dove back into their kiss, pushing his hips up and his cock into Lance's hand.

Lance wanted to know what
alskling
meant, but he was too busy pushing his own dick into Magnus's tight fist.

"Too fast." Magnus pulled back and panted. "I wanted this to be slow and gentle."

"We can do that next time." Lance hadn't known how starved he was for another man's touch—Magnus's touch—on his dick. It felt too good to slow down.

"Oh, God." Magnus renewed the kiss and his movements grew frantic.

Lance couldn't have held back for anything. With Magnus squeezing his dick even more tightly as he approached his own orgasm, Lance lost it. His balls drew up and he came in spurts of release that were almost painful. More heat splashed against his shirt and skin as Magnus followed him over the edge with a low growl that made him tingle all over.

Too tired to move, he collapsed against Magnus's broad chest, his eyelids heavy with sleep. Magnus's arms cam around him protectively, and he closed his eyes.

The next thing he knew he was in Magnus's arms and being carried upstairs. God, the man was strong. He was put onto a soft mattress, felt a pillow under his head.

"Sleep well,
min alskling
." Magnus brushed a soft kiss across his temple and pulled the blankets up over his shoulders.

Lance's mind was foggy with sleep but he knew something was wrong. When Magnus walked away and a door clicked 51

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softly closed, he realized that he was in the guestroom. He turned onto his side, curled up, and let the tears flow. He was still alone. Even after the first true lovemaking of his life, he'd ended up alone in his own bed. He was so close to having the love and family he'd always wanted and yet it kept escaping him.

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The Mistletoe Phenomenon

by Serena Yates

Chapter Nine

Magnus read the note he'd found attached to the fridge with widening eyes. His heartbeat sped up, and for a moment he couldn't breathe. Fuck!

Lance's flowing script made the devastating message look deceptively beautiful at first glance. He'd gone to see his parents for their biweekly Sunday family lunch and he'd be back in the afternoon.

It looked simple enough. The fact that Lance had just walked off like that after what they'd shared last night, though, spoke volumes. Something must have been seriously wrong for Lance to do that. Magnus suspected it was something he did or didn't do. But what? He'd tried so hard to make sure Lance knew how much he meant to him, yet somewhere he'd failed—and failed spectacularly.

For Lance to exclude Jakob and Magnus from this visit was another indication that something was off. They'd done everything together, were growing into a family, so why didn't Lance take them with him to meet his parents?

Magnus didn't need his recently developed sensitivity to emotions to see that there was a problem with this note. Hell, half the problem was that there was a
note
instead of Lance coming to talk to him. He suspected he'd need to understand Lance's feelings better if he wanted to solve this problem. And he'd need to do it before he went to see the man or he wouldn't even know what to say to him without making things worse.

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Wondering why Jakob wasn't awake yet, he went upstairs and quietly opened the door to the boy's room. The curtains were drawn but there was enough light for Magnus to see the curled up shape of the little boy under the covers. Yesterday's snow-shoeing expedition must have exhausted him more than Magnus realized. He grinned and closed the door again. Best to let him sleep for now.

Back downstairs he made some coffee and toast, and then sat down at the kitchen table to think. The pad of paper they used for the grocery shopping list was close if any points needed writing down. He was going to figure this out and find a solution, as sure as the biggest glacier on the planet was the ice sheet on Antarctica.

After going over the last few days with a fine-toothed comb he came up with two potential clues. One was Lance's unease when they'd discussed money, which remained unsolved because Magnus hadn't thought it urgent enough to get back to. The second was Lance's happiness when Katie had referred to him moving in with Magnus and Jakob as a

"new life," rather than the "job" Magnus had originally seen it as. But that was in the past, wasn't it? Ever since Lance moved in, it had been obvious that he wasn't "working" for them, he was "living" with them. Magnus already saw him as part of the family.

And then it clicked. Fuck, why hadn't he seen this before?

Lance had apparently wanted more than just a job with them, so getting paid must have felt uncomfortable. But since Lance had no money to speak of, he'd probably seen no choice but to accept a "salary." So when Katie referred to the move as 54

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Lance's new life, she'd actually named what Lance wanted but thought he couldn't get.

To top it all off, Magnus had then made love to Lance without telling him he loved him in so many words. So Lance might even feel like he'd been paid to have sex with Magnus, especially since he'd found himself back in the guest room instead of Magnus's bed. All Magnus had wanted was to make sure that the man got a good night's sleep, which was surely best achieved in your own bed. Or maybe not?

Which reminded him—why was Jakob still asleep at ten in the morning? That just wasn't right. Relieved that he had at least a working hypothesis where Lance was concerned, he decided it was time to wake Jakob.

He walked into Jakob's room and opened the curtains so the meager winter sunlight would help rouse the boy, but when he turned around his breath caught in his throat. The huddled shape under the covers he'd seen earlier wasn't Jakob at all; it was a pile of pillows shaped to look like a body.

Jakob was gone.

* * * *

Lance had never felt this miserable when visiting with his parents. He'd retreated to his old room after lunch, feigning tiredness. He just couldn't go on pretending everything was okay when his heart hurt so much. Normally this family time was happy and relaxed, an occasion where all of them reconnected and made sure they didn't lose touch despite their busy lives. But nothing could cheer him up today.

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Sure, he'd been depressed when he first returned from L.A. and was trying to get over Brice. He'd succeeded surprisingly quickly, making him suspect that he hadn't loved the thieving bastard as much as he'd thought. This crushing distress over Magnus returning him to his own bed last night was worse, because he'd come closer to having his dream come true than ever before. Now he was scared that it would always elude him.

He sat up and hit his forehead with the palm of his hand.

His old bed creaked in protest at the sudden movement. Was it his destiny to be unhappy? It couldn't be. Did he have to just accept what happened to him? Surely not. Was there a natural law that prevented him from going after what he wanted, fighting for it? There bloody well better not be.

He couldn't believe he'd almost fallen into the same old trap yet again. He'd done what others expected him to do all his life. Hadn't he vowed to change that, just a few days ago?

Hadn't that already led to moving in with Magnus and Jakob, and him becoming the homemaker he'd always wanted to be?

He was closer now than ever before to making his dreams a reality. There was only one part that was still missing.

Maybe because the other parts had fallen into place so easily he'd been blind to the need to work for what he wanted.
He
was the only person who could make it happen.

Magnus had wanted to make love, not have sex, so what had gone wrong? He should have been looking for the reason behind the misunderstanding, not running away to lick his wounds.

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Energized and armed with a whole new level of determination, he jumped up from his bed and tore open the door. He stormed downstairs ready to get into his coat and drive back to Magnus's house, where he belonged. He was going to go and
fight
for his man.

The shocked faces of his family as he stormed past the open door to the family room on his way to the front door made him stop for a moment. The phone rang and interrupted his attempt to say a quick goodbye. His father picked up the receiver and looked surprised.

"Yes, he's here. Hold on." His father motioned for him to come over. "It's for you."

"Who is it?" Lance didn't have time for this; he was on a mission.

"Just take the call." His father handed him the receiver and sat back down on the couch, right next to Lance's mother, where he always sat.

"Hello?" Lance couldn't think of a single person who'd phone him here.

"Lance. Thank God you're there." Magnus's deep voice made Lance weak in the knees, even filtered through the phone line. "I'm really sorry about whatever I did last night to piss you off. Can you please set that aside for a moment, though? I desperately need your help."

"Sure." Lance didn't hesitate. Magnus's voice sounded heartbroken. "What's wrong?"

"They took Jakob." Magnus's voice broke and there was a soft sob. "Brian and Nancy took Jakob in the middle of last night. Got in through the side door of the garage we'd never 57

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used, which apparently had a broken lock. They grabbed him from his bed and vanished."

"What? God. Please, no!" Lance almost dropped the receiver from the shock. He slowly slid down to the floor, the wall against his back the only thing holding him up.

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The Mistletoe Phenomenon

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Chapter Ten

Magnus was shaking with fear for Jakob and anger at his own inability to do anything to help find him. He was pacing up and down the length of the living room, feeling like a caged polar bear. If Lance didn't get here soon to calm him down, he'd lose his mind.

When the lock finally turned and a very pale and shaky Lance walked in, he ran into the foyer. He slid his arms around Lance's waist under the coat to be as close to him as possible. Lance's arms moved up to twine around his neck.

When he'd buried his nose between Lance's neck and shoulder and breathed in the man's musky scent for a few moments, he started to relax a little. At least he had half his family back. Jakob missing felt as if there was a hole in his heart.

"God, Magnus." Lance sighed and squeezed back. "Please tell me that there's some news. I can't take much more of this uncertainty."

"Come on; take off your coat and we'll sit down." He stowed Lance's coat and walked them to the couch. "The sheriff's been a great help so far. When I realized something was wrong because Jakob still wasn't awake around ten, I called him, and he was here twenty minutes later. He had a look around the house and found the broken lock. He called his team, and they turned up to take fingerprints, just in case. When they were reasonably certain it was a kidnapping, 59

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and because they suspected Brian and Nancy would take him back to Florida, they got the FBI involved."

"How could Brian and Nancy do that?" Lance's eyes were red-rimmed as he leaned into him. Magnus tightened his embrace and held on. "Take a little boy like that, and probably scare him half to death? After everything he's been through?"

"I don't know." Magnus took a deep breath, trying desperately to stay calm. "I have no idea what they think to accomplish with a stunt like this. I'm not even sure they thought it through. It may just have been an impulse."

"Some impulse." Lance snorted. "Has the FBI found anything?"

"Yeah, they used the rental car's tracker. It was returned to the rental company's Salt Lake City airport office around nine this morning." Magnus sighed. "They're still trying to find out where they went from there."

"Salt Lake City?" Lance frowned. "That's not exactly on the normal route between here and Florida, is it?"

"You're right. The agents think Brian and Nancy may have wanted to throw off any pursuers by not taking the direct route back to their home. Or they may have wanted to get out of all the ice and snow as quickly as possible, since that's an unfamiliar situation for them." Magnus shook his head. "I have no clue since the whole situation makes no sense. I mean, they must know they'll get caught, right?

"Maybe they figure they can convince Jakob to say that he wanted to go with them? That he doesn't like staying with you after all?" Lance's frown got deeper.

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"No way. Jakob would never want to stay with them."

Magnus was certain. "Not after being so happy here, especially since you moved in."

"I know, but they probably don't see it that way." Lance heaved a sigh. "Okay, so what do we do?"

"We wait." Magus hated it, but they could hardly get in the car and start driving around to try and find those bastards themselves. "All we can do is sit here and wait until the sheriff calls with some news."

* * * *

Magnus rubbed his aching eyes with one hand, too tired to sleep. They'd been up half the night waiting for news. Lance had made them a meal some time during the early evening.

Not that they'd been hungry, but they had to keep their strength up to be there for Jakob once he was found.

Now the grey light of a long winter morning filtered through the living room windows. It wasn't going to get much brighter than this, not on the shortest day of the year. Not that it would feel short; more interminable waiting was sure to follow.