Elf-napped (A Filthy Dirty Christmas) Read online

  Glancing around the place, I say, “Well, should I leave then? Let you get back to work, doing whatever it is that you do?”

  That is my oh-so-subtle way of trying to escape by my wits. The elven food has warmed me thoroughly and given me my strength back. I think I could make it back to my car at Holly Tree Farm from here on foot, even if it’s past dark now.

  Assuming Eldrin will let me leave. Indeed, he won’t keep me here against my will.

  Will he? Will I have to break out my taekwondo moves? Would that even work on a magical, mythological creature?

  “No. I don’t do work for Nicholas anymore.”

  Nicholas…does that mean Santa Claus? No. That can’t be it.

  “Alright. You’re going to have to explain that.”

  His brow furrows in confusion. “Truly, this can’t be interesting information to you?”

  I laugh. “This might all be a dream that could turn nightmarish at any moment, but I assure you none of it is boring. Tell me about this Nicholas.”

  He sighs and stands up. “Alright, I’ll tell you everything.”

  I’d thought he was about to pace around the room like some kind of orator, but no, he stands because he feels the need to pick me up again. And once again, we are seated in front of the fire, and I am caged in his arms like a pet. I’ve stopped scanning the room to look for an exit. And now, I’m not sure I have any hope of leaving.

  Maybe, just maybe, I do not want to leave. Yet.

  Eldrin begins his story. “Every Christmas elf has a contingent of human children to look after, record their behavior, and report back to Nicholas.”

  My jaw drops. I have no words.

  “Well,” he continues. “How else do you think Old White Beard manages a Naughty or Nice list? Think he does all that organizing himself? He loves to take all the credit.

  “Along with thousands of other children all over the world, you were one of my charges. Unbeknownst to you, of course. Humans are not supposed to be aware that we’re surveilling their every move.

  “When you think about it, it’s a pretty terrible system. Determining whether or not a child deserves a gift based on whether they made too many bad decisions at a time when their brains haven’t fully developed yet. Who does that? The current man in charge is the answer to that.

  “We Uncommon elves, possessing a life span of six to seven hundred years, have the magical ability to teleport, remain invisible, and to be in more than one place at a time. So the List Making fell to us. The Common elves’ magic is limited to crafting, building, and manipulating nature, making them the perfect candidates for Santa’s workshop.

  “Yet the big elf in the red suit likes to let everyone assume he does all of it—making the toys and maintaining the lists.

  “But it wasn’t always that way. Previous Nicholases were far less interested in glory. It wasn’t until this one took over in the middle of your nineteenth century that gift-giving was based on human merit.

  “I’m still one of the younger elves, but I know my history. Maybe my rebellious young ways landed me in my current predicament.

  “It goes against our code to form attachments to humans. It goes against our code to fall in love at all. And to fall in love with a human is something the elven community likes to sweep under the rug…until it starts to ‘cause problems.’

  “Those so-called problems began almost the second you, Clara, were placed in my charge. I wanted nothing more than to make myself visible and be your friend. You were such a lonely girl who only asked for books for Christmas, and I made sure you received all the books you asked for and more.”

  A strange sensation sweeps through my stomach. “I did. I always had books,” I murmur. Eldrin smiles. I’m starting to fall for this charade, or whatever this is.

  “Of course, I doctored your lists to include fantasy, science fiction, anything at all that I knew would possibly connect you to my world. It was futile, I knew that. And even the best human stories of elves and elven lore are woefully watered down. Still, I was desperate for any kind of connection with you.”

  Although I am still processing all of this, Eldrin skips on to another subject—the only subject he seems interested in. “You have eaten. When do we commence with the mating?”

  Studying his eyelids and his facial expressions, I’m beginning to be able to tell where he’s looking and what he’s staring at.

  And right now, it’s the same thing almost all men stare at. “If I say no, will it matter?”

  Eldrin sits up straight as if offended. “Of course it matters. I don’t want to touch someone who does not wish to be touched. The thought of that is vile to me.”

  I nod, sure that my relief is visible. “Would you let me leave if I asked to leave?”

  He smiles in that amused way he did before. “That I cannot do.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you are the entire reason for my exile, and you are my only key to happiness.”

  “But if you love me like you think you do, you should set me free.”

  Eldrin laughs. “Then you will run and tell all the other humans about me, and you may never come back. That scenario is unacceptable. I will just have to work harder to make you fall in love with me.”

  His black eyes change. Somehow, they grow darker, more intense. The stars in them have gone out, and now he takes on the look that is less elfish and dignified, and more wolfish. He’s another species, I remind myself. A wild thing. Be careful.

  His primal, singularly focused expression sends a shiver down my back, and I can’t decide if it’s a fearful shiver or an aroused kind.

  “Fall in love with you? You are a trip.”

  Eldrin cups my face in his two large, glowing hands and angles his face toward me without another word.

  The excellent food has given me enough mental fortitude that I could pull myself away and send him flying with a roundhouse kick to his sugar plums and candy cane. Maybe.

  Except that I’m not sure I want to. My mind and body have stopped fighting each other, and I am starting to accept that I contain worlds of contradictions. I’ll forgive myself tomorrow. Will I be forgiving myself for losing my virginity to a cosplayer? Is there a worse-case scenario? It’s all very fuzzy, and the cosplayer scenario now seems to be the most unlikely. Also, a hallucination is not likely. I now remember everything that happened to the point of passing out, and I know I hadn’t consumed anything other than water this morning before the trip to the farm. I neither drank from Daren’s flask nor consumed mushrooms in these woods.

  So what does this mean? Those ears don’t look like prosthetics. There’s no device or phenomenon that I know of that could make a human’s skin glow like that. Plus, the healing hands, how he knew about my books, and my lonely childhood.

  It doesn’t seem like it could be true, but there’s no other explanation. I’m in the arms of a bona fide Christmas elf.

  Eldrin’s smooth, angular lips are so close to mine I can feel his breath against them. He says, “This is how I’ve seen human beings kiss. Tell me, is the kissing more enticing now that you’ve been fed and entertained?”

  My lashes flutter. Here’s my chance. If I say no, his principles might let me leave. But instead, I say, “Only if you stop talking like an alien.”

  Logic, reason, and self-preservation have flown out the window.

  “I am happy to talk to you however you wish,” he says, his voice now sounding less prideful and condescending and more…hungry.

  I like it.

  I reach up and touch his face. I swallow hard and debate with myself. Demand him to let me leave or give in to what he wants…and to what my body wants.

  I always said I wanted to lose my virginity to Legolas.

  Whether or not this is real, I’m going to make the most of it.

  Chapter Six

  Eldrin

  “There’s something you need to know first,” my queen says to me. “I’m a virgin, and I’ve seen what’s under that kilt. It’s going to take a lot of foreplay to—ah—do the bonding ritual, as you say.”

  “Foreplay,” I say the word out loud, recalling my limited knowledge of that aspect. I hadn’t read enough about that.

  “What does that require?”

  She smiles up at me flirtatiously, fluttering her lashes in a very pleasing way. “Well. It depends on the person. For me, I really like for someone to make me feel safe.”

  I nod. “Very well. What or who shall I kill for you?”

  She snorts, and it’s a strange sound that squeezes my heart.

  “No, Eldrin. We start with you holding me.”

  From what I had read at one time. I thought kissing was a precursor for the sex ritual, but this human seems different. She seems to require that I hold her first, much like I did after she had fainted.

  “Oh, I…” I trail off as Clara makes herself comfortable against me, leaning her cheek against my chest. The sitting and holding seem unnecessary, as I’m already quite aroused, and my shaft is indeed pressing into her leg. And I can smell her pheromones. She’s quite ready.

  But If she is content for me to wrap her up against me like this, I am happy. Whatever my queen wants, my queen gets.

  “What is this called?”

  “This? This is hugging and cuddling,” she says, her voice muffled against my bare chest. “It relaxes me, and it builds trust. Trust is a big part of sex, especially for a twenty-something virgin like me who’s been saving herself for the right moment.”

  I don’t mind it, but I don’t understand this strange feeling that builds inside my body cavity, somewhere near my sternum.

  “Am I doing it right, my queen?”

  Clara’s sweet face nuzzles against my skin, and she laughs softly. It is thrilling
just to feel her breathing, to know she’s here with me. “Well, you’re even better than my La-Z-Boy at home, so you’ll do.”

  I do not like this. “What is a Lazy Boy? Do you have someone in your house who does nothing but allows you to sit on his lap like this? Show him to me so I can send him away. He will be crying for his mother before I am through with him.”

  Again, Clara makes the noise of a piglet that makes me smile. Her laughing noises warm my loins even though my anger grows the more I picture Clara sitting on someone other than myself.

  “Oh, you sweet man. Elf. Whatever. It’s the name of a chair. A very nice, squishy chair. It’s not a man.”

  This makes me feel better.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t have a lot of proper human furniture, but I can service you any way you like.”

  At this, she leans back away from my chest, and I do not like that feeling. Clara looks up into my eyes and squints. “I wish Reba were here because you, sir, are something else.”

  “I would like you to rest your head on my chest again. I want to see something,” I say.

  Giggling, she obeys, but this time she wraps her arms around my torso and squeezes. There is a rush of warmth through my body. I am familiar with the concept of chemicals and hormones in humans. Still, the elven anatomy doesn’t work the same, or at least I hadn’t thought so.

  “Why does this cuddling thing you like also make me feel things?”

  She sighs, and this time her breath causes tiny bumps to appear on my skin. “That is oxytocin.”

  I correct her. “Elves don’t produce that.”

  “If cuddling feels good, then you most definitely do. Have you never been cuddled before? Not even as a baby?”

  “I was carried at my mother’s breast until I was able to walk and talk at the age of three months. That is normal for us.”

  My queen is silent for a moment. I can sense something is wrong. But instead of pulling away, she squeezes me tighter, to the point where I feel there will be an imprint of her on my torso. I would love that if it were possible.

  I feel good protecting her; that much is true. I know that this rush of chemicals through my body is also equal in strength to sexual arousal. This makes the end goal confusing, but perhaps human goals are different? Maybe she and I are different from other creatures with overpowering instincts to mate. Except, no. I need to breed her as soon as possible.

  Before I met Clara, I had thought protection amounted to clothing her, warming her, sheltering her, and killing predators with my arrows in the forest.

  This is different, and I don’t comprehend it. But I like it. Maybe this is what it feels like when elves fall for humans? I wish I knew someone to ask. I know that half-elves, half-humans exist somewhere. But they, too, are exiled.

  This strange desire to protect more than her physical being…it must fall into the realm of human emotions. Emotional safety is something I don’t quite understand as an elf. Still, I’m beginning to feel the other side of that. I feel happy knowing that I’m needed for something like this. It costs me nothing and keeps her still. She isn’t trying to run away while my arms are around her. I can smell the chemical reaction in her pheromones. Soon, she will be ready for me, both in body and spirit. But I’ve learned since meeting her that I should not say things so…clinically.

  “Can you help me better understand what else you need?” I ask Clara.

  Her face peers up at me. I look down at her huge hazel eyes and lose myself in the flecks of gold and green. Her skin doesn’t glow in the same way that mine does, but her luminescence of spirit gives her face a softness that entrances me.

  My eyes watch her thoroughly, glossy lips as she explains. “Just be you, and tell me why you chose me.”

  Her smile pierces my heart. “I have watched you from a distance for so long, but I could always feel the bigness of your heart. I watched you smile at others but never at me. I longed for that. And now, nothing compares to seeing you up close. You are warm and soft, and I feel connected to you. Even now, I can feel your human blood pumping harder in your veins. Does that also happen when you hug people, normally?”

  Clara blinks up at me. “Oh. No, not especially. Usually, hugging helps to sort of settle the blood pressure.”

  “I am very sorry. Then I must be doing this wrong because yours is not settled at all. In medical terms, you may be close to danger.”

  Shaking her head and biting her lip, I sense that she is shy in responding to this news about her blood pressure. “It’s a normal reaction to…arousal.”

  “Then I am delighted. Shall we begin kissing?”

  Her eyes grow wide, and once again, I think I have said the wrong thing.

  But no, that’s not what has happened. She rests her small hands on my chest and looks into my eyes with a plea in her expression. Her tongue darts out to moisten her lips, and the sight of that pink tongue makes my wand inside my kilt strain to make contact with it.

  Gently I press my lips to Clara’s.

  Her kiss is so much better now that she’s not resisting. I’ve stared at her glossy lips all day and craved their softness. Her full lips fit against mine, and they are sweet like candy. She feels and tastes like plump fruit. I’m suddenly aware that the kissing is not just to service a woman’s readiness, but it also spikes my need for her. I have been reading the wrong books. Everything leading up to the mating is just as enjoyable for me as it is for her. The feeding, the talking, the laughing, the snuggling, and the kissing. I love all of it. I love all of Clara.

  The dance of our lips heightens my awareness of her hands which palm my chest and run over my shoulders and down my arms, making me feel wanted and savored.

  Her eyes open when she feels the nudge of my straining cock.

  Her cheeks flush. Her nostrils flare.

  I want to be closer, and I need to make her wetter.

  I shift my queen, so her luscious thighs straddle my hips; she gasps in surprise at my effortless movements.

  “You will have to get used to my easy manipulations.” I don’t want to brag out loud, as I’m beginning to understand humans don’t like that. But it’s true. In addition to being bigger and stronger, we elves are supernaturally graceful. I could just as quickly bend her over and take her from behind without breaking a sweat.

  For now, I’m happy to have my queen wrapped around me and her lips exploring my lips. This way, I can feel and smell her heat and her dampness. I don’t know how she would react if she knew that, so I keep it to myself.

  I run my hands over her backside and squeeze. Clara gasps, then fixes her arms around my neck, dragging her warm pussy over my bulge.

  “Oh gods,” I rasp at this teasing friction.

  Cramming my hands down the waistband of her long underwear, I slide over her juicy rump and reach down her split, the fingers of both hands landing between her folds.

  Clara gasps and jerks her lips away from mine, eyes wide in surprise. “El,” she whispers.

  I begin to move my fingers through her wetness, pulling her folds apart. My mouth nips her neck. “Yes, my queen.”

  It pleases me to feel her essence drip down my fingers when I call her “my queen.”

  The whimpering from her drives me dangerously close to climax. I kiss her again, and I feel her tongue swipe against my lip. It’s a curious, erotic sensation.

  I am overcome by all the things she’s doing to my body. I had not been prepared to feel this good. “My love. Now is the time to tell you I have fantasized about this moment, but I am overwhelmed by how sweet this is. I have spent myself in my bed thinking about you, missing you. My imaginings are very powerful, but I had no idea. But I have to tell you….”

  As I ramble on, Clara’s sweetness soaks my hands. Her lips brush lightly against mine, and the feeling is so sweet that it triggers that feeling of attachment she explained to me before. I only sensed jealousy, lust, and obsession before she was in my arms; now, I don’t know if I can ever stop touching her. I never want to leave her side.

  She wiggles, nestling in closer, rubbing the front of her pussy against my cock. My gods, the throbbing ache to be inside her is overwhelming. I am dangerously close to climaxing.