Free Happily Ever After: A Day in the Life of the HEA (Rook and Ronin #3.5) by J.A. Huss

Christmas Eve gift to be handed out.
    It’s always been like this. It’s like we never want this day to end. And if we could pack even more stuff into it, make it last longer, make it last forever, we would.
    Rook and I stay just long enough to get everyone settled, and then I take her hand and lead her upstairs. I catch a wink from Ronnie that says, We’ve got your back, and then the noise from below recedes.
    “We could’ve waited,” Rook says breathlessly as I close our bedroom door and twist the lock.
    “No,” I say back. “We’ve got hours of things to do, and Mrs. Flynn, I’d die if I didn’t have a moment alone with you right this second. I just want to say, I’m sorry I’ve been working so much.”
    “Ronin,” she starts.
    But I put a finger to her lips to keep her quiet. “Shh,” I whisper, my hands sliding underneath her shirt and up her back.
    She buckles away from me, squealing, “They’re cold!”
    “They won’t be cold for long,” I say, biting her lip and giving her a kiss. “Now what sort of surprise did you have in mind?”
    “One second,” she says, holding up a finger. She turns and goes over to the refrigerator we keep for adult drinks. Her dress is red tonight. Rook always wears something red on Christmas Eve. Sometimes it’s just a scarf, sometimes it’s her coat, sometimes it’s a ribbon in her hair. But this Christmas Eve, it’s a dress. A very fucking sexy dress.
    That she starts to take off. She slides the straps slowly down her arms and I untuck my white dress shirt and start unbuttoning it from the bottom up.
    She grins at me, a small squeak of delight escaping her lips as she shimmies her dress over her hips and stands there in her black bra and panties.
    I grin back as I take my shirt off and go for my belt buckle.
    Her eyes never leave my fingers as I tug the zipper down and step out of my pants.
    We stand there in our underwear for a few moments before we take that off too.
    We stand there naked, looking each other up and down, appreciating each other the way we always do on Christmas Eve, and then Rook gets the bottle of champagne from the mini fridge and grabs two glasses from the side table. Her walk towards the terrace is seductive as fuck.
    “What?” I laugh.
    “Remember when you took me to the zoo for that charity event?”
    I can’t help but smile. “We’d just met and Antoine and Elise gave us their tickets so we could have a date together.”
    “That was the best night of my life, Mr. Flynn. Well, up to that point. But every night since then has been the best night of my life. Every night I climb into bed I think, How did I get so lucky ?”
    “It’s not luck, Rook. It’s love.”
    “I know. Humor me,” she says, popping the cork on the champagne and pouring it into the glasses. “Every morning when I wake up I think, God, I can ’ t wait to get back in bed with him tonight. I just can’t wait. It’s the very best part of every single day since we met. Even after fifteen years, I still think that, Ronin.” She grabs two coats off one of the chairs next to the door and hands me mine. “Don’t ask, just put it on.”
    We slip them on at the same time, our eyes glued to each other. I want to kiss her so bad, but she’s got a hand on my chest as she holds out a glass of champagne for me to take.
    I take it. Reluctantly. I just want to take her. Every part of her.
    She holds her own glass of champagne in one hand, then takes my free one in her other and pulls me over to our balcony. She opens the door and the softly falling snow comes in as we go out.
    She closes the door behind us and then we’re in the dark. Only the lights from Vail Village leak up to our little piece of the mountain to illuminate us.
    “That very first Christmas we spent together. Do you remember that present Ford gave me after church?”
    “Eric Cartman.” I laugh.
    “Yeah,” Rook says, like she’s remembering it fondly. “Well, I was talking on the phone to Ford