The Twelve Hot Days of Christmas Read online

  The Twelve Hot Days of Christmas

  A Ravenous Romance™ Original Publication

  A Ravenous Romance™ Original Publication

  www.ravenousromance.com

  Copyright © 2009 by Ravenous Romance

  Ravenous Romance™

  100 Cummings Center

  Suite 123A

  Beverly, MA 01915

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher, except by reviewers who may quote brief excerpts in connection with a review.

  ISBN-13: 978-1-60777-314-6

  This book is a work of fiction, and any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Introduction

  A Patrtridge in a Pear Tree by Dahlia Schweitzer

  Two Turtledoves by Lisa Lane

  Three French Hens by Cameo Brown

  Four Calling Birds by Isabel Roman

  Five Golden Rings by Brandi Woodlawn

  Six Geese a’ Laying by Katy Sirls

  Seven Swans a’ Swimming by Cecilia Tan

  Eight Maids a’ Milking by Jesse Blair Kensington

  Nine Ladies Dancing by Rhonda Leigh Jones

  Ten Lords a’ Leaping by Debra Hyde

  Eleven Pipers Piping by Heidi Champa

  Twelve Drummers Drumming by C. Margery Kempe

  Introduction

  The Christmas season is a joyful but often stressful time of the year. So much preparation: cooking, cleaning, shopping, wrapping, and, for some, traveling. There’s so much to do and never enough time.

  And never any time for you.

  That’s where this book comes in—it’s just for you. It’s your own little collection of holiday cheer.

  In these pages you’ll find twelve delightful—and ribald—tales of creative license based on the classic Christmas song you’ve been singing since childhood. But the Twelve Days of Christmas will never be the same after you’ve read the stories in these pages—and we’re all thankful for that.

  We hope you enjoy Dahlia Schweitzer’s patridge “hunt,” and Brandi Woodlawn’s imaginative take on those golden rings, and Cecilia Tan’s interpretation of the seven swans.

  And we hope this collection inspires you to create your own erotic version of these lyrics. If they’re delightful enough, type them up and send them in to us for next year’s Christmas cheer!

  Lori Perkins

  December 2009

  A Partridge in a Pear Tree

  by Dahlia Schweitzer

  It was Sarah’s first Christmas. It was also her first winter in Vermont. She’d been raised Jewish and, as such, had never been much interested in the privileges and responsibilities of Christianity. Mass and Easter she didn’t care much about, Lent was certainly not on her radar, but Christmas had always made her jealous of her classmates and neighbors who got to install large evergreens in their living rooms. She loved the smell of the trees, the warm twinkling of the lights, and the seductive smell of the holiday cookies.

  From Thanksgiving until New Year’s, Sarah was a Christian-by-proxy. Always too loyal to her faith to celebrate Christmas directly, she made sure to be invited to as many Christmas parties as she could find, and whenever possible, she would offer to help decorate friends’ trees, and she was always available to climb ladders in order to drape lights over gutters. In December, she was as supportive a friend as she could be to those who celebrated her favorite holiday.

  Until she moved to Vermont.

  She’d only been there a few weeks, so she didn’t have any friends yet. The job she’d moved for, which was supposed to start December 1, had been postponed to January 2, so she was unexpectedly left with a month that offered little responsibility beyond the occasional trip to the mall. She’d bought a shower curtain, she’d bought a mop—there simply wasn’t much left to do. She hiked a lot. She joined the local library and became a regular, going through a book every day or two. She read everything Sidney Sheldon had ever written. Then she sampled Michael Crichton. And Michael Connolly. Then Mary Higgins Clark. (They were near each other alphabetically).

  It didn’t matter what she did; nothing could fill up her time. She took long showers after her long walks. She baked. She stared out the windows at the gorgeous Vermont landscape. She was glad she’d moved there; she liked the idea of starting over, conceptually at least, and she loved the crisp winter air, but nothing could fill the persistent vacancy created by her solitude.

  During one of her trips to the mall, while seeking out a new hair dryer, she stumbled into the holiday section—which by no means implied it was somehow concealed, inconveniently inaccessible to the general public. Quite the opposite: the holiday section dominated, sprawling over aisles, spilling out over and above the confines of the shelf space. Until then, Sarah had managed persistently to avoid the glut of Christmas paraphernalia. She’d set up her menorah and she was determined to be devout for another year, especially in her solitude. She had no excuses for being a by-proxy-Christian. She actually liked being Jewish and loved Passover. She wished there were more Jews in Vermont.

  So every time she went on one of her regular shopping expeditions, she would do her best to turn away from the mistletoe and the endless strands of lights, from the wreaths and the stuffed Santas, the wind-up reindeer and the adorably embroidered stockings. She was good. She was committed to her menorah.

  Well, she was committed until the hair dryer escapade, and then she could resist no more. Emerging from the small appliance section, heading towards the cashier, it was suddenly there, and she was suddenly in it. It was a Christmas overdose. Bombarded on all sides, she just stood and stared. Pivoting in a circle like a wind-up doll, she studied the red, green, and fake snow white consumer excess on all sides. Even she had to admit it was a bit much. There was a certain mockery to the extravagant need to market all aspects of the holiday, and she was relieved she didn’t feel the need to buy everything.

  In fact, she left quite safely, carrying only a box of ornaments, two long strands of lights, and a very cute, petite Christmas tree.

  Sarah was going to have her very first tree, and she was going to decorate it herself. This was Vermont, after all, a place of opportunity, where no one knew her and, more importantly, where no one knew her Jewishness. No one would ask why a Jew, who was happy being a Jew, would want a tree. God, she was convinced, would look the other way. It was Christmas, after all.

  She felt giddy by the time she got home. She’d been unable to restrain herself from repeatedly glancing over her shoulder at the precious possessions in her back seat. She couldn’t quite believe she’d done it, and she couldn’t believe it had taken her this long. After all, what was a tree? It was décor; it was interior design. It was the holiday spirit. It wasn’t like she was laying baby Jesus out on her welcome mat. This was just a bit of greenery, some color, and a little soft lighting. Unable to stop smiling, she practically sailed through her front door, the tree tucked under one arm, the plastic bag under the other.

  It wasn’t until she’d deposited everything in front of the fireplace that she realized she’d forgotten the hair dryer. She’d abandoned it somewhere between the ornaments and the lighting. Sarah laughed. She didn’t care. She could buy a hair dryer anytime, but this was Christmas. It was the only time when she could buy a tree, bedeck it with lights and glittering globes, and feel part of something large—and a little bit naughty.

  She assembled the tree to the right of her fireplace, hanging the various ornaments evenly throughout. She had bought two strands of holiday lights, one for the living room for internal holiday cheer, and the other to be draped
around the bushes beside her front door for obvious external holiday cheer.

  It was when she was outside, trying to determine exactly how to festoon her bushes with lights, that she first heard the bird. Not gifted with the best ability to determine sound direction, it took Sarah a moment and several glances about to figure out where the chirping was coming from. She lived beside a huge wooded expanse, but the cold weather had stripped the trees of their leaves, so it didn’t take long to spot the distinctive red beak and black stripe of her favorite partridge. Many a recent morning Sarah had sat on her front porch, wrapped in a blanket, nursing a tea, and watching her partridge fly about the trees. He would never get close enough when she was outside, but if she left the odd piece of bread out as an offering, he’d always swoop by as soon as she’d stepped back indoors.

  She also spied on him often from the anonymity of her kitchen window, watching him trot around the hardening icy ground, soaring into the trees whenever the forest belched an unexpected and startling sound. Some mornings, when she read the paper in bed, she could hear his calls resonate among the trees. Kindred spirit of a sort, he seemed as alone as she was; she never spotted him with another bird. Seeing him always made her feel a little less alone and a little more like she was at home.

  Sarah nodded in his direction now, displaying the results of her lighting artistry as if the little partridge cared about her holiday decorations. She turned to duck back inside to gather a few scraps of bread to leave for her feathered friend just as the sound of the shotgun shattered the silence of the Vermont countryside like an explosion. If she’d still been in civilization, she’d have assumed it was a car backfiring. But in her new remote surroundings, she knew there wasn’t a car nearby. It was definitely a shotgun, and it was way too close.

  Whirling around, she raced towards the outskirts of the woods. The blast had been so loud, the hunter could not have been far. She looked desperately for her partridge, but he was nowhere to be found and she sighed with relief. She couldn’t see him in the trees nor could she spot his bloody carcass on the ground. Either the hunter hadn’t aimed for her bird, or he’d missed. Regardless, she knew she had to get rid of the hunter. Parts of the woods permitted hunting, but the area adjacent to her house was off limits. It was too residential. The problem was that most hunters weren’t aware of that; the change in zone wasn’t clearly marked, and as her house was one of only a few, it was hard to determine this was now a residential area.

  Luckily, the hunter was wearing the requisite orange vest and it didn’t take long for her to spot him in the thicket. She waved and shouted as she ran in his direction. He turned impatiently to determine the cause of the commotion, lowering his shotgun so it pointed at the ground.

  “You’re not allowed to shoot here,” she panted, struggling to catch her breath.

  He simply stared at her, a slight grin on his face.

  “Why’s that?” he asked.

  Taking control of her breathing, she stood up straighter to face the man, and was startled to discover that the hunter was extraordinarily good looking—well, in a rugged, chiseled, Vermont kind of way. Feeling even more discombobulated, she took a deep breath before speaking.

  “This is considered a residential part of the woods. I live”—she pointed over her shoulder—“just over there. I know it’s not clearly marked, but you’re not supposed to be hunting over here.”

  As if amused, the hunter grinned even more and leaned towards her. It was only when he leaned over that she realized how tall he was. He had to have been at least six-foot-four. But this was hardly the time to flirt.

  Apparently, the hunter felt differently. A flirtatious note to his voice, he leaned in further, his face inches to hers, and said, “I’m terribly sorry for the mix-up. Will you ever forgive me?”

  “What were you hunting?” she asked, suddenly suspicious and alarmed. Second guessing her earlier search of the snow, she realized that just because she hadn’t seen any blood it didn’t mean her partridge was safe.

  “I was hunting a bird,” he said matter-of-factly. “A partridge. Small little bugger.”

  She could feel the blood escape from her face and knew she must have gone ghastly pale.

  “What? What is it?” He grabbed her shoulder with his arm, suddenly concerned.

  “That’s my partridge,” she stammered. “Well, not mine, but mine. You know. Did you hit it?”

  He shook his head. “No, the little beast flew off when he heard me coming. He’s somewhere over there.” He gestured towards the horizon. “Haven’t a clue where, though. You say he’s yours?”

  She paused. She wanted to be precise. “I don’t own him, but we have an understanding. We share bread. I like to listen to him. Do you know what I mean?” Sarah realized she was being anything but precise and worse, probably sounded crazy.

  The hunter nodded. “I do. And I apologize. I’m glad I didn’t hit him, and I apologize for coming close. I promise to turn around, walk away, and never come back. I’ll leave you and your partridge in peace.”

  True to his word, the hunter pivoted with a closing nod of the head and began to make his way back through the woods.

  “Wait!” Sarah called.

  He turned and looked at her.

  “Do you think…would you mind…it’s just that you’re so tall…”

  “What do you need, ma’am?” he said, with the finesse of a firefighter prepared to rescue a cat from a tree.

  “It’s just my Christmas lights. They’re not high enough. I can’t get them on the gutter, and I just moved here, so I don’t have a ladder. Do you think you could…?” Sarah’s voice trailed off. She was embarrassed. She didn’t like to ask for help. She was always the one doing the helping. This role reversal felt foreign to her.

  Clearly, the man was used to such requests. He smiled obligingly, gestured her onwards with his arm, and told her to lead the way.

  Feeling a little bewildered by the recent turn of events, but also convinced it was somehow part of the Christmas spirit, Sarah did just that.

  It wasn’t until they got back to her house that it occurred to her she didn’t know his name, and she turned to him, her mouth just beginning to form the words, when he reached out his right hand to shake hers. One step ahead of her, he said, “Will.”

  She closed her mouth, smiling at their silent communication, and shook his hand. It was surprisingly warm, considering the chilly Vermont winter air. “Sarah.”

  They held each other’s hands for a moment, the surroundings completely still in that way that only happens when snow lines the ground and the trees are bare. The heat of their bodies flowed through their fingers and for a minute, Sarah forgot about the lights and about Christmas. She even forgot about her partridge.

  As he released her hand, she snapped back to her senses. With a slight cringe, she asked him to rest his gun in a remote corner of the porch. Then she explained exactly how the lights should hang. With Will’s height, it took him mere moments to drape the lights along, his long, lean arms never hesitating as they reached first one gutter corner, then another, and then in what seemed like only a moment, all was perfect and Sarah smiled. Somehow, even with the shotgun, it had still ended up being perfect.

  “Would you like some cider?” she asked. “A beer, maybe?”

  The hunter grinned. “Sure. That sounds great.”

  Sarah slid past him, past the porch bench where she’d sat many a morning watching her partridge dart in and out of trees and around her house, past the silent shotgun in the corner, and turned the handle on door to the house. As the heat from inside washed over the front of her, she became acutely aware of a different kind of heat behind her. She looked over her shoulder to find Will close behind. Too close? Maybe, but she was surprisingly comforted by his presence.

  In the kitchen, Sarah stuck her head into the fridge and grabbed the cider. As she pulled a pot from beneath the stove to warm it, she watched out of the corner of her eye as Will lifted one foot an
d expertly unlaced a boot with one hand before unlacing the opposite, then stepping out of them both. The musky scent of his wool socks wafted through the kitchen.

  “Forgive me,” he said. Was there a twinkle in his eyes? “I should have done that at the door.” Startled, Sarah realized she was still wearing her own boots and she bent to clumsily unlace them as she turned the knob on the stove and the short click, click, click was quickly replaced by the whoosh of the igniting burner under the cider.

  She nervously smiled at the hunter who stood nearby, absently scratching at the stubble on his chin. She stepped out of her own boots, kicked them aside, and turned to grab a wooden spoon, stirring the cider on the stove.

  Suddenly, Sarah felt that heat behind her again and simultaneously a hand snaked around her waist. She froze as Will’s hand grabbed gently at the wooden spoon just above hers. “You’re still wearing your jacket,” he said quietly, seductively. “Let me stir the cider…get comfortable.” She turned to him, chest to chest, and stared up into his eyes.

  “Cups are there,” she said, waving to a rack on the wall without breaking her gaze. Her hand, just below his on the spoon, lingered for a moment longer than it might have. She ducked under his arm and shed her coat. Will reached for two cups and ladled cider into each. Silently they sipped and stared at one another.

  After draining his mug, the hunter deposited it on the counter and moved to stand directly in front of Sarah as she leaned against the kitchen sink, his hips only a few inches from hers. The electricity between them sparked, denser than actual flesh.

  She felt drunk on the cider, even though it was nonalcoholic. She continued to stare at his face, the face of the man who had almost killed her partridge and who had absolutely violated her woods, and she knew she yearned to see him naked. That, with a hunger intensified by weeks of solitude, she wanted his hands all over her body, to feel his sheer physicality against her and inside her.