When Victor Hill bought a house with his boyfriend, Jian Kouri it was a dream come true. But now, two years later, instead of living their happily ever after, they hardly see the other awake.<br><br>With Jian out the door before Victor gets up in the morning, and asleep on the couch nearly as soon as he walks in the door, the life Victor imagined couldn’t be further from reality. They don’t talk; they don’t touch, and Victor fears he and Jian have already drifted too far apart.<br><br>The holiday season is a time for hope, but when Victor comes home to find Jian with a plan to woo him for Christmas, is it too little, too late? The dates are great, and there are filled with Christmas fun to get Victor in the right spirit for the holiday, but are they enough for the two of them to fall in love again? Or is there just too much in their relationship that needs fixing?

24 Dates

“Come on.” Jian gestured for him to come sit. He’d brought up the chair cushions from their patio furniture along with several blankets.


Victor sat. “Have you any idea how cold it is?”


Jian shrugged. “Do you see the sky?”


Victor glanced up. Stars were scattered all around them. “Lovely.”


“Yes, I was a bit worried I’d have to move the dates around. With the snow coming in, we wouldn’t have been able to see a single star.”


He poured Victor some of the Arabic tea he sometimes made. It was served in a tall glass cup, as always when Jian made it. It was strong and sweet, and accepting the cup had Victor’s throat contracting. In the beginning of their relationship, Jian had served him tea at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. But he’d hardly seen the glass cups since they’d moved here.


He sipped on the tea and moaned. It tasted strongly of cinnamon. “This is so good.”


Jian looked away, and if Victor didn’t know better he’d say he was embarrassed, only Jian didn’t do embarrassed.


Chapter 24