Chapter 12 Frankie #2
“I hope so,” he says quietly. His thumb brushes over mine, and he brings our hands to his lips, kissing my knuckles. “And I’m proud of who I am now, too.”
I don’t know what to say to that; it settles in me like something precious. A truth he wasn’t ready to hold but gave to me anyway.
So instead of answering, I tug him down into a kiss. It’s tender, slow and sweet and the way I’d like to be kissed every single morning by him.
After, we sit together at the little table eating pancakes in the soft hush of the morning. Surrounded by snow, silence, and the quiet comfort of knowing we’re both on the brink of something real.
Once the pancakes are gone and the plates are rinsed, we somehow end up on the couch, watching the snow continue to fall outside.
It’s still pretty early, and I’m half curled into Mason with his arm draped around me, the fire crackling low.
It’s quiet. Not awkward-quiet, just the kind that makes everything feel softer. His fingers trail absently over my arm, thumb brushing a lazy path from shoulder to elbow. My head rests against his chest, the steady beat of his heart thumping beneath my cheek.
I’m full and warm and dangerously close to the kind of peace I don’t usually let myself feel.
I close my eyes as he starts to gently plant kisses all over my face, dragging his mouth down to nuzzle into my neck, but he pauses when he sees the box of baubles sitting unopened beneath the scraggly tree.
He shifts beneath me, nudging me until I’m sitting more upright. “You didn’t decorate it… was this a stand against festive capitalism, too?”
I shrug, fiddling with the edge of the throw blanket. “My mom and I used to do it together. Every year, even when I moved to Toronto. I’d come back for it and she’d wait until I got home.”
Mason stays still.
“It wasn’t about the tree, really,” I add. “Just… the ritual of it. Picking out ornaments. playing the same Christmas playlist. Arguing about tinsel placement. I loved it. And now…” I offer a weak shrug. “Now that memory just kinda hurts.”
He’s quiet for a long moment, then he nods once.
“Okay. So we don’t decorate the tree.”
I tilt my head with a smirk. “Duh.”
“We decorate you instead.”
“We what?”
“You heard me.” He stands and offers a hand, tugging me to my feet. “We don’t decorate the tree, but we can make a new memory for it. One that’s just yours.”
“Mason Fletcher, that’s the worst pick-up line I’ve ever heard.”
His gaze drops to my mouth, then lower, until I feel heat bloom across my skin. “Let me decorate you, Frankie Monroe.”
I huff a laugh, but nod, even though I’m confused by what he means. “You’re gonna have to be more specific.”
His smirk curls, and gestures at the shirt I threw on earlier.
“Strip.”
Okay, I am no longer confused by what he means. My lips part, but nothing comes out, not even sarcasm.
Mason steps back just slightly, dragging a hand over his mustache as he takes me in..
“I said, strip.”
My skin prickles at the demand in his voice. Slowly, I reach for the hem of my shirt and peel it over my head, letting it drop to the floor and feeling my nipples peak against the air.
I keep my eyes on him as I shimmy out of the soft lounge shorts next, until I’m standing in nothing but the red lace panties I threw on after breakfast.
He licks his lips. “All of it.”
I slip the panties down my legs, and the tension in the room stretches like sugar pulled to the edge of shattering.
Mason’s gaze rakes over me, and I swear I can feel it—the heat curling through my limbs, desire building hard and fast.
“Come closer.”
I step forward and he picks up a single bauble from the box beside the tree. A shiny red one the size of an orange, glittery and cold from the drafty corner.
“Now be good and hold still.”
The bauble touches my collarbone first. I jump slightly at the graze of it, but he’s already rolling it lower. Between my breasts, over my stomach, down to the tops of my thighs.
He skims it across my hipbone, then back up. It leaves a subtle sheen of glitter in its wake. My nipples tighten, and I’m already wet, despite the fact he hasn’t touched me properly yet.
He leans over and reaches into the box again, this time pulling out a silver snowflake, the kind with pointed metal tips that you can clip onto branches.
“Tell me if it’s too spiky,” he murmurs, dragging it slowly across my skin.
I shudder at the contrast—the coolness against a delicate sting. He traces it over the swell of my breast, and circles my nipple with it. Then, without warning, tweaks it between his fingers.
“Fuck—”
He smirks. “Want more?”
“Yes.”
Leaning down, he sucks my nipple into his mouth, releasing it with a loud pop, then clips the snowflake lightly to it. I cry out at the pinch, but my knees wobble because I love it.
“Good girl,” he praises, voice rough as he slowly dips his hand low between my thighs. “You’re dripping, Frankie.”
“Yeah,” I pant, barely able to speak. “You’re a fucking tease, that’s why.”
He huffs a laugh, reaching back to the decorations again and this time tugging out a long trail of silver tinsel. Coiling it lightly around my torso, then unspooling it to drag the strands in slow loops over my breasts, my stomach, between my thighs.
I audibly sigh at the tickling sensation, my head tilting back slightly.
“Give me your wrists.”
My head snaps back to offer them up without question, and he binds my wrists together, looping the tinsel snug and secure.
Then he turns, eyes darting toward the armchair next to the fireplace. Above it, a simple black iron light fixture juts from the wall.
His smirk could melt snow.
“C’mere, baby.”
He guides me over and positions me so I’m standing facing him, then secures the rest of the tinsel to the fixture above the armchair.
When I test the tension, it holds. Just enough to keep my hands suspended above me, fully exposed.
Mason moves and drops into the armchair behind me, legs wide, cock thick and hard and waiting.
“Ride me.”
“What?”
“Sit down on my cock and ride me reverse.”
I bite my lip and lower myself slowly until the thick head of his cock nudges my entrance.
“Christ, Frankie.” His voice is ragged. “Look at you, all tied up and sparkling with nothing but my cock to bounce on.”
I roll my hips once, then widen my legs a little to sink further onto him. A breathy moan rushes out of me as I grind down harder, arms straining against the tinsel.
His lips find the crook of my neck and he sucks, hands hooking under my thighs to seat me deeper and stretch me wider.
He finds the snowflake still clipped to my nipple and gives it the barest tug. The pain and pleasure sparks through me and I gasp loudly.
“Mason—”
“That’s it, sweetheart.” His breath is hot against my skin. “So greedy for it. So fucking wet.”
I ride his cock faster now, hips slapping against his thighs. The position has me stretched open, helpless to do anything but take him again and again as he controls the pace.
“You love this, don’t you?”
“Yes—fuck, yes—”
“Say it.” His tone sharpens, deep and commanding as his fingertips squeeze my thighs to keep me open. “Tell me how much you love riding my cock.”
“I love it,” I cry, the words tumbling out. “Love how hard you are, how fucking deep you feel—”
“Louder.” He thrusts up into me hard, hips pistoning. “Be loud, baby. Make the snow shake off the damn roof.”
I cry out, bouncing faster and chasing the edge. One hand slips between my thighs, fingers finding my clit again to give it a light tap.
My whole body jerks. “Oh god—”
“I love how wet that gets you,” he rasps, lightly stroking where he just slapped. “You like when I spank this pretty little clit?”
“Fuck—yes—”
“Beg for it.”
“Mason, please—”
“Please what?” he growls, his palm making a wet slapping sound against my pussy. “Tell me, sweetheart.”
“I want…” My hips jerk helplessly. “I want you to tell me I can come. Please, I need it so bad.”
“Look at you,” he pants. “Decorated in tinsel, dripping and stuffed full of cock, begging to come. Fucking stunning, Frankie.”
I whimper, trembling from the effort to wait for his command, every muscle locked tight as I writhe on him, desperate and slick and so close.
“Wanna come on my cock, baby?”
“Yes yes—please, Mason—”
He spanks my clit again, then presses down hard, fingers moving fast and filthy.
“Mmmm, fucking do it.” His breath is hot in my ear, mustache tickling my jaw. “Come for me, Frankie.”
My body snaps and I scream his name, the orgasm ripping through me—clenching and straining against my tinsel binding, everything slick and wet and overwhelming.
He fucks me through it, hips pounding up into mine as I shudder and cry out again and again, until his rhythm stutters.
“Frankie—fuuuck, baby—gonna fill you up.”
With one final thrust, he spills inside me with a long, guttural whimper. Then he collapses back into the chair, still buried deep, his arms wrapping tight around my waist.
I’m still gasping and shaking, the aftershocks rolling through me, when his hands move to bracket my hips.
“What—?”
He lifts me off him, setting me gently down in the armchair, my back against the soft cushions, arms still bound above me.
“Legs wide,” he murmurs, dropping to his knees.
I do as I’m told, my thighs falling open, utterly bare and dripping. He must like what he sees, because a strangled growl breaks from his throat.
“Look at this mess,” he says, voice still filled with hunger. “My cum leaking out of you.”
I whimper, the tinsel pulling taut. But he doesn’t rush, just kneels there, eyes locked on my pussy, his fingers reaching out to slide through the slick mess between my thighs.
“Can’t waste it,” he mutters, pushing two fingers back inside me. “Fuck, a month of voice sex and you’re better than every fantasy I’ve ever had.”
My head tips back as he pushes his fingers into me slowly, watching the way I squirm.
“You love it, don’t you?” He thumbs my clit with just enough pressure to make me jolt. “Love when I push it back in.”
I can’t even speak, all I can do is moan, arms straining in the tinsel above as he works me open again. His fingers are slick, and his mouth’s so close I can feel the heat of his breath on my skin.
“So pretty when you’ve been fucked so good.” His mouth brushes the inside of my thigh. “You’re perfect for me.”
Something soft and wanting bubbles in me. His words land low in my stomach, deeper than where his fingers still are, deeper than I’m ready to admit.
My breath stutters, wrists straining in the tinsel above, and suddenly the heat in me blurs into something else.
Mason feels it, because his hand stills, gaze flicking up to mine with a focus that strips me bare.
“Hey.” His voice gentles. “Too much?”
I shake my head, breath stuttering. “Not too much. Just… intense.”
“Good.” The corner of his mouth lifts. His fingers slowly ease from me, withdrawing with a drag that makes my whole body shiver. “But we’re done for now.”
A palm glides up my thigh, warm and steady, grounding me as the aftershocks fade.
Then he rises, unclamping the snowflake on my nipple, and then untying my wrists from the light fixture with careful fingers, making sure it doesn’t snag.
My arms drop bonelessly to his shoulders and he catches them, steadying me with one big palm against my lower back.
Then, ridiculously effortlessly, he scoops me up.
“Jesus,” I breathe, startled but arms still looping around his neck. “Are you carrying me like some kinda fire rescue right now?”
His mouth curves. “You were in a dangerous situation.”
“Oh yeah? Which part? The orgasm or the tinsel?”
“Both.” He shifts me higher against him, his hands strong under my thighs. “Lucky for you, I’m trained for emergency extractions.”
I snort, burying my face in his throat as he walks us toward the bedroom. “If you start narrating steps like a fire drill, I swear to God—”
“Baby,” he says, voice deep and amused, “you can’t even walk.”
Heat rushes through me again, embarrassing and thrilling and stupidly tender.
He steps into the bedroom and lowers me onto the bed, setting me down with slow, careful hands. Then he climbs in after me, tugging the blankets up and pulling me into his chest.
I melt against him, tucking my leg between his as he presses a kiss into my hairline.
His hand drags lazily up my spine. “You don’t have to decorate the tree, you know,” he murmurs. “Not if it still hurts.”
My eyes slip shut. “I know.”
“But I think we made a pretty damn good start on a new memory.”
A small smile curves my mouth. “One involving tinsel bondage?”
He huffs a quiet laugh, thumb drawing slow circles on my hip.
“I like the idea of new memories that go with the old ones. They don’t replace anything, just make room beside them.” His voice drops lower. “And I like making those with you.”
My chest tightens with pain, with hope, with something unbearably soft.
“Yeah,” I whisper. “Me too.”