Page 82 of Return

Pip usually fought against going to bed, but the magic of Santa wasn’t something the little girl was prepared to mess with. She rose quickly, then looked at Dean. “Are you coming too?”

Dean looked at Vivian with hopeful eyes that were just as deadly as Pip’s pleading ones. She reached out and grasped his hand, pulling him down the hallway with them.

Once Pip was tucked in, good night kisses given, they returned to the living room.

This time, it was Vivian curled against Dean as they cuddled next to each other on the couch, watching the flickering lights of the Christmas tree.

“We’ll give her half an hour to conk out and then ‘Santa’ can arrive,” she said, air-quoting Santa, since she was the jolly old man.

“Christmas Eve is a lot more fun with a kid. Beats the hell out of spending the night alone.”

“Is that how you spent it last year?” she asked.

He nodded. “Watched National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, ordered in Chinese, and fell asleep on the couch. Didn’t even bother with a tree because McKenna was in Ohio, celebrating with Ellie.”

“That sounds awful.”

Dean chuckled. “It’s not so bad when you don’t know anything else. After this year, though, yeah…I guess it was pretty awful.”

Vivian rested her head on his shoulder. “You fit here,” she said softly.

Dean shifted slightly so that he could see her face.

“With us,” she added.

He cupped her cheeks in both hands, pressing his forehead to hers. “Thank you for saying that. For letting me break into this incredible family of yours. These past few months with you have been the best time of my life.”

He kissed her deeply, sweetly.

Vivian twisted until she was straddling his lap and for the next half hour, the two of them made out like horny teenagers. When they finally managed to come up for air, Dean gestured toward the tree with a tilt of his head.

“Magic time?”

She nodded. “Yeah.”

The two of them tiptoed to the guest bathroom linen closet, where Vivian had hidden the wrapped Christmas presents. It took them a few trips, Vivian spending nearly ten minutes spreading them around the tree, aware she might have gone overboard this year.

“Did you break the bank?” Dean asked, equally taken aback by the sheer number of presents.

“No. Pip is still at an age where her wish list is fairly cheap. The pile will no doubt get considerably smaller as she gets older, and she starts asking for expensive tech instead of a ten-dollar Barbie doll or Play-Doh set. Plus,” she gestured to the left-hand side, “Santa didn’t just deliver Pip’s gifts.”

Dean rubbed his hands together with glee when he spotted his name on several of the boxes. She held him back when he started to reach for one.

“What are you doing? It’s not Christmas morning yet,” she said, giggling.

“I just want to shake them.”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re as bad as Victor when it comes to waiting. Stay away from those boxes.”

Dean sighed dramatically, as if her request was a hard one. “Fine. But unlike you…”

She watched as he returned to his coat, pulling out another small package.

“How many presents do you have in that coat?”

Dean admitted that he had a pile of gifts in the trunk of his car, but he didn’t want to compete with Santa, so she and Pip were opening his presents at Victor and Belle’s house later tomorrow morning.

“This is the last one,” he said.