Checking It Twice (Crashing Book 2) (6 page)

Alexei tugged harder, faster, their cocks
slipping through his fist, his breath hitching against Mike’s lips. He felt the
heat pooling at the base of his spine, the tension drawing his balls up tight.

He planted his knees more firmly on the bed
and whispered against Mike’s lips.

“Come now, Michael.”

Mike arched beneath him, his body even more
thoroughly programmed than Alexei’s, finely tuned to respond to the sound of
Alexei’s voice. To those words, in particular.

Mike sucked in a deep, shaky breath, and
Alexei sealed Mike’s lips with his own before Mike could shout and wake his
sister. Mike shook, the hot pulses of his orgasm coating Alexei’s fingers, slicking
them both, until Alexei shuddered and let himself fall over the edge.

Alexei came back to himself some time
later, slightly appalled to realize he may have passed from blissed-out-orgasm
to half-asleep, lying on top of Mike with his hand trapped between their
bodies. Mike gave him a sleepy smile and a gentle kiss to his lips.

“I thought I was going to have to wake you
up,” he teased.

Alexei grunted and dragged himself off
Mike, hating to leave all that warmth. He made quick work of collecting a warm
washcloth from the bathroom and cleaning them both up. The moment he slid back
under the covers, Mike rolled half on top of him, his head on Alexei’s
shoulder, his nose tucked to Alexei’s neck.

“I love you,” he murmured.

“I love you, too.”

“Thank you for bringing Jayne here. That
really is the best Christmas present ever.”

Alexei smiled and ran his hand through
Mike’s hair, the other trailing down Mike’s back. “I thought Erik’s dick was
the best Christmas present ever.”

Mike hummed and Alexei could feel how
Mike’s ass clenched just thinking about it, the muscles shifting under Alexei’s
palm.

Alexei chuckled.

“Shut up,” Mike murmured affectionately.

Mike woke with his face still plastered to
Alexei’s chest. He didn’t think either of them had moved an inch since they’d
passed out together the night before. He squinted at the light hitting his
eyes, his brain too slow to realize that it was coming from the hallway until
the sound of a throat being cleared reached him.

He glanced over his shoulder to find his
sister standing in the doorway, a hand over her eyes. “I’m sorry to intrude,”
she said, smirking.

Alexei muttered in his sleep and pulled
Mike closer.

Mike ran a soothing hand down Alexei’s ribs.
“You can open your eyes, Jayne,” he said. “I mean, unless the sight of our bare,
manly chests will traumatize you.”

She dropped her hand, probably to be sure
he could see how hard she was rolling her eyes. She did blink at Alexei’s broad
shoulders for a moment, though.

It was Mike’s turn to smirk. “Did you need
something?”

Jayne waggled her phone back and forth at
him. “Have you heard your phones going off like it’s…well, like it’s
Christmas
?”

Mike chuckled and reached for the bedside
table. Alexei’s arm encircled his waist and tried to pull him back down but
Mike managed to snag his cell in his fingertips. There was a series of messages,
starting at six-thirty that morning, from Christian. He opened them.

Come over now?

Please?

Oliver says hurry up.

Hello??? Wake up! You can’t sleep late
on Christmas!!!!

WAKE UP WAKE UP WAKE UP

Ugh you guys are the worst.

Mike grinned at his phone and poked Alexei
in the side. Alexei groaned and kept his eyes stubbornly shut. Mike wasn’t
buying it, but he let Alexei pretend.

“I’ll get this big lug up. You can go over
now, if you want.”

Jayne just shook her head. “I’ll wait. But
hurry up!”

It took considerable poking and prodding to
get Alexei out of bed. Mike frowned as he watched Alexei limp to the bathroom,
cursing himself for letting Alexei do all that work on the basketball court.
The boys were going to love it, but it wasn’t worth this.

Then again, no one could have anticipated
how much work they would put into getting little Eleanor settled.

Eleanor
.

Mike threw on his pajamas and tossed a
t-shirt for Alexei on the bed before dashing out to find his sister fidgeting
by the door. She looked about as eager as he expected Oliver to be when they
got across the hall. He laughed at her and pulled out all the treats they were
bringing over this morning. Because, as if they hadn’t been busy enough, Alexei
had spent the day
before
yesterday baking until they’d had to leave for
the game.

Mike was just stacking the last of the
boxes when Alexei’s arms curled around his waist from behind and soft lips
pressed to the nape of his neck.

“Thank you, Michael,” he said softly, then left
him to stand there stupidly for a moment.

Michael
? It
was his name, of course, but reserved for special moments. Mike looked over at
Alexei and blinked at the warm, happy smile he received in return.

Alexei was acting weird. Not that his
boyfriend wasn’t always loving and tactile, but this seemed…different. More, somehow.

Shrugging to himself, he followed Alexei
and Jayne across the hall, distracted from his thoughts the moment they entered
the chaos that was Rupert and Callum’s home. Oliver squealed with joy to see
them, “
finally”
. Mike pointed out that it was, in fact, only seven in
the morning, but Oliver wasn’t having it.

As far as five year olds were concerned,
that was like noon when it came to Christmas.

Rupert and Callum, both of whom looked like
they’d been hit by a truck, hugged them hello and tried to shoo them into the
living room to get settled. Alexei ignored them, taking over the kitchen and
barking out demands for requests while Jayne snuggled Eleanor and Mike got Eleanor’s
new fathers settled on the couch.

“Long night?” he asked with a pitying
smile.

“Yes, very. We hardly slept,” Callum said,
rubbing his hand over his eyes. Then he looked at Rupert, and they smiled at
each other like it had been the best night of their lives.

“Ugh. You guys are so gross,” Christian
said as he flopped down beside his dads and snuggled up under Callum’s arm.

Mike secretly agreed, but he thought that
kind of gross was awesome, so who was he to judge?

“Are we ready?” Oliver demanded from in
front of the tree, his hands on his hips and his expression making it perfectly
clear he couldn’t believe how slow they were all being.

Alexei came over and passed around coffee,
orange juice, and slices of coffee cake. As soon as he’d made sure everyone was
going to be properly fed, he dropped onto the couch next to Mike and tugged the
blanket over their legs. Mike leaned against his chest and settled in.

The Morrison family had a tradition where
the youngest person present for Christmas morning had to be “the elf”, so it
fell to Oliver to pick out the gifts, read the tags, and hand them out, one
gift to each person at a time.

Last year he’d looked supremely scandalized
that his having learned to read meant he had to
work
on Christmas
morning, but then he’d learned that this also meant he got to go first, and
suddenly he’d been on board with the plan.

Mike was on board with it the moment he’d
realized he’d get to spend all of Christmas morning curled up on the couch with
Alexei. This year it was even better, with Jayne up on his other side, their
shoulders bumping when they shared a joke or laughed at something the kids did.
He was touched to see that Rupert and Callum and the boys had all picked out
gifts for Jayne, and he could see she was, too.

“You have really nice friends,” she said.

“Not friends,” Mike explained. “Family.”

“I hope I’m still counted among that
number.”

Alexei leaned over Mike. “Of course you
are.”

“Of course you are,” Rupert repeated as he
stepped over their legs en route to the coffee maker.

He and Callum really did look as though
they’d pulled an all-nighter. Mike decided his and Alexei’s spontaneous additional
Christmas gift should be enforced naptime later. For the dads, at least, if not
the kids.

 As soon as it came time to open the “big
presents”, Mike said exactly that. Callum and Rupert looked so grateful, it was
kind of pathetic. Mike was glad he and Alexei would be here to help them get
used to having a newborn in the house. He looked at how Alexei smiled down at
Eleanor, tucked into the crook of his elbow, and hoped that someday Rupert and
Callum would be able to return the favor.

Though, Mike thought as he shifted against
the couch cushions, still able to feel some of the effects of their night with
Erik, maybe not right away. They still had some adventures to go on first, and
were enjoying being family to
these
children now.

He snapped out of his reverie when Alexei
shifted against him and stood. “Are you all ready for Mike’s and my big gift?”
he asked.

“You mean the naps aren’t the big gift?”
Callum asked.

“We have many big gifts for you this year,”
Alexei promised, and Mike looked at him curiously, since as far as he knew,
there was only the basketball court.

Which, unsurprisingly, the boys were
absolutely ecstatic over as soon as they reached the first floor.

Christian ran to the rack and grabbed a
ball, then showed Oliver how to dribble while the adults watched on, clinging
to their coffee mugs and smiling at the boys’ excited jabbering.

“Thank you,” Callum said, throwing his arm
around Mike’s shoulders.

“It’s meant to be for all of you, but I
know it’s really more for the boys.”

“I’ll enjoy it, too,” Callum promised.
“When I’m not about to fall asleep on my feet.”

“We have another gift for you and Rupert,”
Alexei said, surprising no one more than Mike. “One that I think you’ll get
more use out of.”

Mike wondered what the heck he was talking
about.

“We were going to build more apartments on
the third floor,” Alexei began, and Mike started to smile, immediately guessing
where his brilliant boyfriend was going. “But now I think instead, we should
put a staircase in your unit and build you and your growing family another
floor.”

“What?” Rupert asked, clearly stunned. Mike
was a little alarmed to see tears forming in his wide eyes.

Jesus Christ, the poor guy clearly needed
some sleep. It was a nice gift, an awesome one, even, but really.

Alexei continued quickly. “We can move your
bedrooms downstairs and add a few more,” he said, then eyed the boys and Eleanor.
“Maybe five total? ...Or
six
?” he asked when he saw how Callum smirked.

“We can convert Christian’s room back into
an office. And what is now Eleanor’s room would be the perfect place to put the
staircase,” Mike said, throwing out ideas as quickly as they came to him. He stared
off into the middle distance, rearranging the rooms in his head. He was already
excited to get started on the project. “And you can convert the master bedroom
into a guest suite, Callum, so that your parents don’t have to navigate the
stairs or bother with the elevator when they visit.”

Alexei grinned at Mike, and Mike smiled
helplessly back. Until, that is, Rupert gave out a hiccupping breath that was
almost a sob.

Callum pulled Rupert in close, holding him
against his chest, and smiled apologetically. “Rupert sat up half the night
rocking Eleanor, worrying about what it will mean if we get to keep her.” He
rubbed his hand up and down Rupert’s back soothingly. “He thought we’d have to
move.”

“Oh,” Mike said, his heart dropping. “But,
of course, if you want to move, we—”

“No!” Rupert’s head came up and he smiled
ruefully as they all got a look at his red-rimmed eyes. “No, I don’t want to
move. I mean, unless you move with us.”

Alexei laughed. “Then, perhaps, staying
here will be easier. We’ll make sure you have all the room you need.”

Mike shrugged. “We won’t build out the
second floor underneath you, either. Just in case you need bedrooms seven
through ten.”

Rupert actually blanched at that, but
Callum just smiled. He was one of seven children, and clearly he liked that
idea just fine. Before Mike could tease Rupert about it, though, Oliver managed
to get a basket and Christian let out a great whoop.

While the others were distracted by the
kids, Mike hugged Alexei tight and whispered, “You’re brilliant.”

Alexei squeezed him back. “How would you
feel if we didn’t build out the space below our apartment either? In case we
need the space later.”

Mike jerked back and looked at Alexei, his
heart knocking against his ribs. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Alexei said, his voice gruff.

Mike couldn’t stop smiling. That seemed to
be sufficient answer for Alexei.

Once the boys had burnt off some energy,
they all trooped back upstairs to open the rest of the presents. Rupert and
Callum gave the boys a trip to Disney World with their Mimi and Grandpa
Morrison, which set them off cheering and jumping around again. At this rate,
Mike figured,
everyone
would be napping after lunch.

At last all the gifts had been opened, and
all that was left under the tree was the envelope Mike had hidden amongst the
piles of boxes while Alexei had been out the night before. Oliver picked it up
and held it out to Alexei.

“It’s for you.”

“It is?” Alexei said, taking it from Oliver
and looking puzzled when he saw Mike’s handwriting on the front. He looked over
at Mike. “Another gift?”

It was sweet that Alexei honestly thought
that all Mike had gotten him was some new socks and a nail gun. They usually
did at least one bigger gift, but Mike knew Alexei would be fine if Mike didn’t
do anything else.

But Mike had. And he really, really hoped Alexei
would be fine with that, too.

Alexei looked down at the envelope in his
hand, curious, until Mike jumped to his feet and stood in front of the tree.

“Go ahead and open it,” Mike said with a
smile.

Alexei studied Mike’s narrowed gaze, the
twitch of his hands, and wondered why Mike would possibly be nervous.

More than a little curious now, Alexei tore
into the envelope. At first he didn’t understand what he was seeing, though he
recognized the majestic building in the picture, of course. Everyone in Moscow
knew the Hotel Metropol—even Alexei, who hadn’t seen it in almost twenty years.

Then Alexei shuffled the papers and two
plane tickets landed on top.

Alexei slowly rose to his feet, his heart
lodged somewhere in his throat, stealing his voice.

Mike stepped closer, hovering in front of
Alexei. “I know you’ve said you’d never go back, but—”

Alexei shook his head, because he couldn’t
believe Mike had done this. He reached out and curled his hand around Mike’s
arm, trying to find the right words to express everything he was feeling. Mike frowned
down at the papers now clutched in Alexei’s hand.

“We don’t have to go if you really don’t
want to, of course,” Mike said quietly. “But I called the Russian consulate in
Montreal, and they said there would be no issues getting a visa, even though
you renounced your Russian citizenship when you became a Canadian citizen, and I
know we’ll have to be careful because of those awful laws, but…” Mike finally
looked at Alexei. “I want to see where you grew up. I want to eat the food, and
hear the music, and I want to see where you fell and scraped your knee as a kid,
and go to the museums you always talk about. I want to sit in the park and play
chess and hear what it sounds like to be surrounded by people speaking your language.
I want to take you home.”