12 Days of Christmas - Day 2 - Mac & Archer - The Village (Patreon)

Unbeta'd/Unedited. This could have tentatively been titled Mac & Archer's No Good Very Bad Day. It might need a little polishing but hopefully you enjoy this crack fic which is loosely based on the one time we had to pull over during a road trip in a Florida town that took Christmas just a little too seriously.

There were many benefits to being married to a former soldier and wildlife photographer. Archer hadn’t thought the benefit he’d need most on this Christmas Eve road trip would be his husband’s wilderness survival skills, but Mac’s incessant need to be prepared for anything would save them.

Literally.

Outside the car window, the snow was blinding. They were still an hour away from home, and Archer’s baby, his prize possession—his Rover—had two flat tires. The cell phone reception was spotty at best. Visibility was at a zero. The world beyond the windshield looked like a shaken snow globe, white swallowing white until even the road seemed imaginary.

They couldn’t continue to drive on the two flat tires. And the only exit for miles was the small town of Holly Harbour, about a mile’s hike in the opposite direction. They’d tried to flag down a passing vehicle, but they hadn’t seen a single car in thirty minutes. Not even the faint glow of distant headlights—just the storm muting everything like thick wool pressed over their ears.

Archer had been playing passenger princess for most of their three-day drive from Nevada, mainly in charge of acquiring snacks, curating the perfect road trip playlist, and playing navigator whenever the GPS had a stroke due to a lost signal. In true princess fashion, he’d opted for maximum comfort and minimal practicality.

So while Mac was wearing weatherproof cargos over his thermals and two layers of shirts beneath his sweater, Archer was wearing only jeans, a t-shirt, and a coat that was more about looks than warmth. He was wearing his hiking boots, though. They’d really sold the look of the outfit. He looked amazing. He also looked about five minutes from hypothermia.

But thanks to Mac’s Boy Scout nature, the Rover was always fully stocked for emergencies. They had extra clothes, snacks, water, and anything else one might need to hike a mile in foul weather. Weather far worse than this. Weather they’d experienced more than once in their global travel.

They’d hiked up mountains with zero visibility, slept staked to the side of a mountain, gotten stranded in Austria in the middle of winter. But world-traveler Archer was prepared for any eventuality. Traversing the globe could be fraught with danger. Traversing an interstate during the holiday season had not pinged his ‘life-threatening events’ radar. There was something personally insulting about the universe deciding this was the moment to humble him.

So he was not mentally prepared when Mac announced they would have to hike back to the little town a mile back. In the grand scheme of things, a mile hike, even in this abysmal weather, would be a cakewalk. But that didn’t mean Archer wouldn’t whine about it.

“I cannot believe we don’t have a spare tire,” he shouted over the harsh winds.

He could feel Mac’s side-eye without looking. “We do have a spare, Katniss. We need two. Also, that little donut isn’t safe for these weather conditions. You know that. But don’t worry. I’ll have you in a heated motel room before you know it. Maybe it will even have one of those old-fashioned magic fingers vibrating beds.”

“Mock me all you want, but this isn’t exactly how we planned to spend Christmas Eve. Is it?”

“Mock you, Katniss? Never,” Mac said, mocking him. “I was just letting you know I plan to take care of everything.”

He reached out and tugged Archer’s hood up properly, his mittened fingers brushing Archer’s cheek in a brief, tender pass that warmed more than the coat ever could.

Archer narrowed his eyes at Mac behind his polarized lenses. “I don’t like your tone.”

“No?” Mac asked, his scarf hiding the grin Archer knew he wore. “I’m just trying to make you feel better.”

“Lies,” Archer shouted dramatically, the sound getting carried away by the wind.

The rest of the hike passed quickly with their back-and-forth jabs, both of them enjoying their own peculiar form of foreplay. The snowstorm made it feel like the world had been erased, leaving only the shriek of wind and the brittle crunch of ice under their boots. Snowflakes stung Archer’s cheeks like tiny pinpricks, the cold creeping into the seams of his clothes with nosy little fingers. The exit ramp was barely visible under the drifts, but ahead—through the swirling whiteout—they caught flashes of color.

Not normal color.

Neon.

Not Vegas neon.

Christmas neon.

First a red glow, then green, then something sickly yellow that flickered like a dying firefly. As they hiked closer, shapes emerged: leaning candy-cane lampposts bowing under the weight of ice, each wrapped in strings of mismatched lights that blinked out of rhythm like a town having a seizure. A cracked sign half-buried in the snow welcomed them to Holly Harbour but somewhere along the way, several bulbs had burned out, leaving behind a far more ominous sign. 

WELCOME TO HOL Y HAR OUR! 

“Welcome to Holy Horror,” Mac read. “Yeah, that sounds about right.”

It felt like more of a threat than a greeting. Archer’s skin prickled, a primitive little instinct whispering that festive décor should not loom like that.

“Jesus. It looks like a Cracker Barrel and South of the Border had the world’s ugliest baby,” Archer muttered.

Beyond the sign, the storm momentarily thinned, revealing the cluster of buildings huddled near the motel. Everything was decked out for Christmas—but wrong, like someone described the holiday to an alien and the alien had tried really, really hard to capture the magic. A giant plastic snowman leaned precariously to one side, its carrot nose snapped off and lodged in the snow like a crime scene clue.

An animatronic elf in a frozen mid-wave stood outside the gift shop, its mechanical head jerking every time the wind hit it, producing a soft clack-clack-clack that sounded disturbingly like a bomb counting down. Its eyes, wide and unblinking, seemed to track them, though Archer told himself that was just the wind pushing its joints. Mostly.

Fake snow machines mounted to rooftops blasted clumps of slush that whipped sideways in the storm, creating the illusion the buildings were shedding their own skin.

Then the motel emerged from the white—a sprawling L-shaped structure washed in garish red and green floodlights that made the drifting snow glow like radioactive ash. A towering Santa stood on the roof, half of him lit and half in shadow, his plastic face split between jolly cheer and something that looked overtly menacing. His arms whipped in the wind, raising and lowering like a fire-and-brimstone pastor, beckoning them closer…then shooing them away.

“Nope,” Archer whispered to himself. “Absolutely not. This is how horror movies start.”

The storm howled around the building, rattling tinsel garlands and sending metallic ornaments skittering across little bits of pavement like fleeing insects. And through all of it, drowning under the wind, came faint Christmas music from unseen speakers—muffled, warped, and looping one single line over and over again:

“…be your shining light…”

Which, given the circumstances, did absolutely nothing to make him feel better. If anything, it made him want to turn around, brave the snowstorm, and die heroically in the woods.

By the time they trekked into the center of town, snow whipping against them like razor-sharp confetti, it was clear that Holly Harbour rolled up the sidewalks after dark.

Every shop—no matter how loudly its sign bragged about “OPEN 24/7 DURING THE HOLIDAY SEASON!”—had its lights off and blinds pulled. The only illumination came from garish outdoor decorations.

Plastic elves—lit from within—highlighted peeling paint that looked more like something out of a horror movie than a Christmas one. Strings of mismatched lights dangled off rooftops while the motel’s giant dancing Santa loomed over everything like a disappointed god. 

Just when Archer was beginning to think it was a ghost town, he spotted a squat metal garage at the edge of the motel’s property, its peeling candy-cane paint looking more like blood and chalk in the stormlight. A sign shaped like a Christmas tree read HOLLY-DAY AUTO.

Most of the building was dark, but the bay door closest to the road was cracked open just enough for orange light to spill onto the snow. Archer had seen this movie before, and he hadn’t been particularly fond of the ending. This whole town was pinging his lizard brain. There was something so deeply unsettling about Holly Harbour. It felt like stepping into a festive uncanny valley—cheerful enough to be familiar, wrong enough to feel hunted.

They exchanged a wary glance, then approached. Inside, the radio played an old-timey Christmas song. It sounded far too chipper for the post-apocalyptic-level storm raging outside. The tinny cheer clashed violently with the metallic rattle of wind against the siding, making Archer’s nerves skitter. Still, beggars couldn’t be choosers. Mac rapped his knuckles on the metal door, the sound almost swallowed by the gusting wind.

Almost immediately, feet appeared, then the garage door shot up, causing both men to steady themselves as a blast of icy air knifed in. A man stepped out of the now open bay. He looked to be in his mid-fifties, red-cheeked, bundled in a flannel jacket and suspenders. With an extra sixty pounds, he could have made a half-convincing mall Santa. Now, he just looked like Ozempic had hit the North Pole as hard as everywhere else.

He broke into a gummy smile when he saw them. “Evenin’! You folks look chilled to the bone. Car trouble?”

Archer had a body count that would make a serial killer blush, but Diet Santa’s cheery disposition set his teeth on edge. He was almost afraid to reveal they were stranded. But what choice did they have? The alternative was hiking back into Silent Hill, and even Archer wasn’t that prideful.

“Our car ran over something and it flattened our two front tires. We had a donut but—”

“Oh, don’t you worry,” the man said, cutting him off with a smile that didn’t quite meet his eyes. “We’ll get you fixed right up. I’ll send my boy Nick out in the truck to get your vehicle and get those swapped right out for you.”

Mac’s hand drifted subtly toward Archer’s lower back—an old reflex, protective without being obvious. Archer didn’t know if it comforted him or confirmed they should keep their guards up.

His boy? As in his son, or the last poor schlep who had stumbled into this godforsaken town? Anything was possible in this walking-talking Black Mirror episode. Archer’s survival instincts pricked like needles beneath his skin. This place felt wrong in the bones.

“If I don’t have the right size, you might be stuck here until the storm breaks in the morning. I’ll call Rudy and see if he has your size once Nick gets back with your vehicle. Why don’t you folks head over to the motel for some food, maybe grab a room? Even if you’re only here for a few hours, it will be nice to get out of the cold, no?”

“Yeah, totally. We’ll do that,” Mac said, already backing away.

“Tell my sister, Peg, I said to give you the family holiday discount.”

“Will do,” Archer reiterated.

They followed him inside just long enough to give the man—Beau, according to the card on the counter—their cell phone numbers, then turned to make their way across the road to the motel.

“Okay, what the fuck is going on in this town,” Archer asked. “I feel like we’re being punked. Where are all the people? Where’s the traffic? This is just off a major highway and I haven’t seen a single car. That’s not fucking normal. Maybe we ran off the road into an embankment and this is purgatory?”

“They’re just weird small-town people with a hardon for Christmas,” Mac said, his tone sounding more self-soothing than self-assured.

“Which one of us are you trying to convince of that? Hm?” Archer asked in a hissing whisper.

“Listen, we’ve stayed in a lot of weird places. This is just another one to add to the list,” Mac said. “Also, remind me to get photos of this place before we leave or nobody is gonna believe a word of this.”

Archer nodded distractedly. “Yeah, good idea.”

The wind shoved at them from behind as if eager to get them inside, the snow swirling around their ankles.

Bells jangled jarringly as they pushed open the wooden door to the lobby. At first there was only an eerie silence that followed, but then a woman in a red dress with snow-white hair appeared. Like the man across the street, she had red cheeks and sparkly blue eyes that looked more maniacal than beguiling. She beamed at them with the same gummy smile as her brother.

“Are you Peggy?” Archer asked, giving her his best smile.

“Why, yes,” she gushed, looking them over. “Well, aren’t you boys handsome? Have you been good boys or bad?”

Archer’s smile slipped off his face, jerking his head to his husband, hoping he might have misunderstood the weird… innuendo in the question. The air in the room felt suddenly warm, too warm, as if the heater had cranked up in reaction to her tone.

Mac was as frozen as that elf with the failed mechanical arm, the only movement a faint twitching in his right eye. Never a good sign.

“Depends on the day, love,” Archer said, putting on his best roguish expression. “Your brother, Beau, is towing our car back in from the highway to change a couple of tires. He suggested we rent a room to get out of the cold, just in case we had to stay overnight.”

Peggy clasped her hands together like they’d just announced they were expecting a baby in June, not stranded in a Christmas-themed fever dream.

“Oh, two flat tires on Christmas Eve? You poor dears. Is there anyone missing you?”

“Pardon?” Archer managed, mouth going dry.

“Were you on your way to visit family, dear?” she asked, another creepy smile spreading across her face.

“Oh, yes. Big family. Lots. More than you could even imagine. Famous too. There would be lots of headlines should we disappear,” he said, then laughed, noting the touch of hysteria he couldn’t quite hold back.

Now she was looking at him like he was the crazy one. “How nice for you, dear.”

Before he could find a way to steer the conversation away from another verbal concrete embankment, the beaded curtain that separated the front of the lobby from the back shivered, sounding like someone had disturbed a rattlesnake’s nest, and then a man appeared. A man who, like Beau, looked like Santa—though pre-diet. 

What the fuck even was this place? Once more his gaze slid to Mac, who was just blinking owlishly at the couple, mouth agape. What was wrong with him? He wanted to snap him out of it, but he was too afraid to look weak in front of these…Santa people.

He stared at the man’s white beard. “Does everyone in this town—”

“Love Christmas?” the man asked, cutting him off. Definitely wasn’t his question, but that didn’t stop Santa. “Sure do. There’s not a resident of Holly Harbour—” Holy Horror, Archer’s brain supplied unhelpfully. “—that isn’t filled with the Christmas spirit. You should come back when the weather’s nicer and see our nativity scene in the town square.”

Archer nodded along, for the first time in his life uncertain of what to say. Given the rest of the décor, he imagined the nativity scene would be the stuff of nightmares. Probably featuring a donkey with glowing red eyes and a Baby Jesus that glitched in and out of reality. 

Archer cleared his throat, then not-so-subtly elbowed Mac in the ribs until he grunted.

“Uh, can we check in please?” Mac asked, voice wavering like he wasn’t the tallest person in the room by about a foot.

“Absolutely. Harold, should we put them in the Yuletide Suite? You boys are…” she made a limp wrist gesture that had Mac’s jaw unhinging and hitting the floor like a cartoon character once more. His husband’s reaction would have been hilarious had Archer not been afraid for his life.

“Married?” Archer supplied.

The woman seemed relieved. “Yes, that. Don’t worry. We’re not like those other small towns. Our baker is gay.”

“Oh. How… nice.”

He had no idea what the appropriate response was for that. A thumbs-up? A Yelp review? A hostage video?

Mac was frozen stiff beside him, staring wide-eyed at something just out of Archer’s line of sight. Archer leaned in, trying to get a better look, but Mac wouldn’t move a single muscle, blocking Archer’s view of whatever horror had his ex–special forces husband frozen in terror.

“Yes, Peg, I think the Yuletide Suite would be perfect,” said pre-Ozempic Santa—er, Harold.

“Why does that sound so ominous,” Archer asked, forcing another uncomfortable laugh. 

His voice cracked on the last note, because of course it did.

The two cackled like witches. Mac jumped like someone had put jumper cables to his nipples. What the fuck was his deal anyway? Was there a man with an ax dressed like a reindeer back there?

For an awkward moment, they all stood staring at each other. Then Peggy said, “That’ll be fifty-seven dollars.”

She stood there blinking at him expectantly.

“Do you take credit cards?” he asked, staring at the vintage cash register on the desk.

“That’s just for show,” Peggy said. She grabbed something from behind the counter, then slapped it down in front of him. It was a plastic sign with two QR codes. “Venmo or Cashapp?”

“V-Venmo,” Archer said, pulling his phone free and pointing it at the square.

Nobody was ever going to believe him. When he finished paying, he pretended to double-check the purchase while covertly snapping photos of everything in his path, which included half of Harold and Peggy—which made for a horror movie–worthy poster. The fluorescent overhead light flickered at just the right moment, giving Peggy the expression of someone who lured lost children into houses made of gingerbread and candy. 

She handed Archer a strangely shaped key. “Up the stairs to your left, follow the L to the very last room.” He nodded. “Oh, and don’t worry. There’s not another soul here tonight. You two feel free to be as loud as you want. Nobody can hear you scream.”

When she gave him a garish wink, he fought the scream building within him, giving her another stilted nod before backing out of the door, dragging his near-catatonic husband with him.

Once they were safely away from the pod people and back into the icy winds, Archer slapped Mac on the arm until he hissed.

“What? Ow. What?” Mac said, having the audacity to look affronted as he rubbed his arm.

“What? Welcome back, Major Tom. How was your flight? Where the fuck did you go in there?”

“I-It was nothing. They were just weird is all,” Mac muttered, face flushing red in a way Archer rarely saw unless they’d just had sex. 

The color looked painfully out of place against the washed-out glow of motel floodlights.

“No shit. That’s why it would have been nice to have you as backup. Did you see that place? Did you see the—” he made the same limp-wrist gesture she had.

“Huh? No. Were they being homophobic?”

“No, actually. They were whatever the opposite of homophobic is? Homophillic? Homo-enthusiastic? Aggressively queer-positive? She practically showered us in condoms and lube as we left.”

“Huh,” Mac said, making his ‘imagine that’ face, seemingly back from his fugue state.

They followed the instructions to the flight of stairs that led them to the second floor. Well, Archer followed her instructions, dragging Mac and their backpacks with them. The metal stairs creaked beneath their boots, a tired warning groaning through the empty halls.

“How much did this room cost us? Whatever it was, it was too much,” Mac said, glancing warily at the darkened windows with their dusty shades and suspiciously shredded screens.

“Did you hear anything that happened there, darling?”

Mac gave a dull shake of his head, then a full body shudder. “Sorry, Katniss, I was a little preoccupied.”

“With what?” Archer prodded, wanting to shake him and scream ‘what did you see?’ like he was Brad Pitt in the movie Seven. 

He turned the key in the lock, noting that someone had painted the door red with a green bow so the door looked like a decaying Christmas present. It even had a sprig of holly. Yeah, that tracked.

This place was a nightmare. A festive, glitter-coated, candy-cane-scented nightmare.

“Don’t worry about it,” Mac said, following Archer past the threshold.

Archer heaved a sigh, then flipped the light switch, gasping dramatically, as the room sprang to life. They’d thought the town was bad; this room was quantifiably worse. They stared, both too stunned to speak, taking in the festive horror show posing as interior décor.

A massive Santa portrait hung directly over the four-poster bed, its too-rosy cheeks and glassy eyes painted with such unnerving realism it felt like he was breathing. He somehow glowed even though there were no lights present. 

The bed itself was draped in a heavy quilt embroidered with a huge reindeer whose proportions were just… wrong—its eyes red-stitched, its grin too wide, its hooves curling like claws. Dusty tinsel and old string lights choked the bedposts, the bulbs casting a sickly flicker across the room. The flicker didn’t so much illuminate as haunt, every shadow stretching just a little too long.

On the dresser, a fully automated Christmas village chugged to life, tiny Victorian skaters gliding endlessly around a mirrored pond—except one had tipped over and was now being dragged face-down by her partner, scraping along the ice in a loop of mechanical misery. Her tiny squeaking motor made a sound like a dying mouse, which absolutely did not help.

But none of that compared to the corner by the window, where four life-sized Victorian carolers stood arranged in a perfect semicircle, porcelain faces smiling wide, eyes bright and dead all at once. Just when he thought it couldn’t get worse, they appeared to come to life, winding up with a horrific whine before belting out Jingle Bells in a high shrill child-like chorus.

Archer couldn’t stop himself from muttering, “Oh, sweet bloody hell.”

But Mac didn’t make a sound—he went statue-still, just like in the lobby, the color draining from his face as he stared on in what Archer could only describe as unbridled terror. It was the look of a man who had seen combat, death, disaster… and decided this was worse.

He didn’t move for a full minute. He was so still that when he snapped back to life, Archer jolted with surprise. Mac was now shaking his head back and forth.

“Nope. No. No. Just no. I can’t—I can’t do it. I can’t. I don’t…I don’t do…I don’t do dolls. Not those dolls. Not any dolls. Especially not singing dolls. Carollers. I’ll sleep in the car. Hell, I’ll sleep in the snowbank. Fuck it, I don’t care. What’s a little frostbite? How important are toes really?”

Archer could only stare as his afraid-of-nothing husband rapidly unraveled in the presence of plastic animatronic Christmas decor. “Babe?”

Mac shook his head. “It’s like their eyes are following me. I gotta get out of here, Katniss. I’m not cut out for this. Bombs, guns, murder, torture… teaching. No problem. But I draw the line at four creepy life-size fucking Victorian dolls singing at me like I’ve landed in the ninth fucking circle of hell.”

When Archer just blinked at him in shock, Mac continued his rambling. “No. It’s not right. They’re not right. I can deal with Santa and weird little pointy-eared elves and this freakishly Willy Wonka mismatched striped wallpaper but I cannot—No, I will not—sleep in a room where I’m being stared at by those…things.”

To prove his point, Mac took a stumbling step backward, hand clutched dramatically to his chest like a Regency widow discovering her husband’s gambling debts. Meanwhile, the carolers hit the word ‘HEY!’ with bloodthirsty enthusiasm, all four porcelain heads jerking forward in unison. Archer couldn’t even blame him. If the room had offered a trapdoor exit, he would’ve used it first.

He had never seen his husband this unglued before. He needed to get those dolls out of there. Or get them out of there. But if he requested a new room, they might take offense and, as a professional gambler, he was certain there was at least a seventy percent chance that—should Ma & Pa Christmas be offended—they would sneak into their room and dismember them in their sleep. Frankly, those odds felt generous.

“Do you have to pee?” Archer asked suddenly.

That seemed to jar Mac enough to pull him from his downward spiral. “Huh?”

“Pee? Urinate? Empty your bladder? Tinkle? Do you need to go? If you do, do it now.” Mac frowned, but Archer held up his hand. “Do not ask questions. Go pee. Then stand outside in the hallway until I say.”

Mac did as he was told, then stumbled from the bathroom with a haunted look. Archer didn’t ask what he’d seen. He’d know soon enough. As soon as he was out of the room, Archer got to work.

He started by flipping the quilt to the less terrifying side. He unplugged the village, righted the skater, twisted the tiny figurine so she was facing away from the bed—just in case, put a towel over the looming Santa picture, then took each Victorian caroller and stuffed them behind the shower curtain in the bathroom. Moving each one was his own personal nightmare, half afraid he’d feel teeth sink into his neck as they came to life in his arms. 

Once they were all in, he dusted off his hands, feeling a bit steadier. It was a tight fit but hopefully out of sight, out of mind. It was only a few hours after all.

He laid out their sleeping bag across the bed for good measure. He honestly didn’t want any part of him or Mac touching the fabric beneath them. He would sacrifice the sleeping bag if he had to. The mattress looked like it had absorbed at least forty years of peppermint-scented trauma. When he decided the room was now suitable for all ages, he flung the door open.

“Ta-da.”

Mac crept back in the room, eyes narrowed as he searched the space for any other Christmas horrors that might be lurking. Archer considered it a good sign when Mac’s shoulders sagged.

“Better?” Archer asked. “I–” 

Instead of answering, Mac shoved him against the wall hard enough to drag a pained, “oof,” from him and rattle the door in its frame. Before Archer could right himself, Mac’s mouth crashed into his. Right away, it was all teeth and hunger and too much tongue. Archer grimaced from the hit, but not the feel of his husband plundering his lips. 

He wrapped his arms around Mac’s neck, letting him take the lead as he mapped every ridge and groove of his teeth. Mac kissed him like he was reclaiming territory, all heat and adrenaline and leftover terror channeled directly into Archer’s mouth. Archer felt the shiver roll through him—half arousal, half relief that Mac’s brain was finally rebooting. 

Clearly his husband had an inappropriate fear response. Archer wasn’t complaining. This seemed like as good a way as any to pass the time. 

Archer tore his mouth away. “Are you sure you’re good?”

Mac pressed his lips to Archer’s cheek. “So I’ve been told.”

Archer rolled his eyes, but didn’t push him away, just let him keep exploring the skin of his jaw, then lower to his throat. Mac’s breath was still uneven, warm puffs ghosting across Archer’s neck as if he was trying to ground himself there.

“Hardy-har-har,” Archer said softly. “Are you trying to distract me from asking the origin story of your terror surrounding Victorian dolls?”

They were both a little out of breath. “Carollers. Not dolls. Carollers. I’ll blow you if you promise to just never bring it up. Ever.”

“You’ll blow me anyway. How about we make a deal? You suck me off without forcing me to touch that mattress and I promise not to ask about your carollers until we are far from this place. As an added bonus, I will call my father and ask him to get us the fuck out of here and hire someone else to retrieve the car?”

Mac paused only long enough for his pupils to blow wide in interest—fear apparently no match for sex and an exit strategy.

Mac bit Archer’s lower lip, then kissed him again a little slower. “Deal.” 

Archer fell back into it enjoying the slide of Mac’s lips over his, his soft tongue teasing his own. A contented sigh escaped as he let Mac do as he liked, exploring his jaw, his ear, just below it. He tangled his fingers into his auburn hair, not guiding, just grounding, perfectly content to just do this.

Mac slid to his knees, tugging down the zipper. His eyes slid shut as Mac freed his cock from the confines of jeans that were starting to feel a little too tight. Mac’s mouth closed around Archer’s half-hard cock, swallowing him down. He groaned deep in his chest, the sound dragging out like a warning as his head once more thudded against the wall. 

Mac hollowed his cheeks, sucking in a way that had Archer’s eyes rolling behind closed lids, his mouth going dry. “Oh, fuck.” 

Mac pulled off, flattening his tongue and running it along the underside of Archer’s aching cock before swirling his tongue around the swollen head, humming around it in a way that made Archer’s thighs shake. 

He couldn’t stop himself from looking down, moaning at the picture before him. His hot husband on his knees, lips stretched around his cock, messy and eager. When Mac sucked harder, Archer’s hips bucked, going deep enough to have Mac gagging wetly around him. 

“Fuck. Your mouth is a goddamn weapon,” he said, rolling his hips, half gone on the feel of Mac’s soft tongue on the underside of his cock.

Mac didn’t answer, couldn’t really, not with the way Archer was using him, driving past his lips lazily, enjoying the way he tried to choke himself on Archer’s cock. It felt incredible, goosebump inducing, really. They’d been together long enough for Mac to know just what he liked and how he liked it. There was comfort in the familiarity, there was also mind-numbing pleasure. “Fuck, just like that,” he said, quickening the thrust of his hips, unable to stop himself from fucking his mouth even when he heard him choke a bit. 

There was nothing particularly elegant about his technique. Maybe that’s why it was so perfect. His mouth was hot and wet and sloppy, drool dripping from his chin as he let Archer fuck his throat. When he started moaning around Archer’s length, he knew Mac was jerking himself off while he sucked him. 

“Oh, fuck. That’s it. God, keep this up and maybe I’ll forget all about your super secret caroller fear.” 

Mac pulled off, glowering up at him with a sulky face that made Archer so fucking happy, he couldn’t help but laugh. He loved this sexy, dangerous, silly as fuck, chaotic man. He loved him so much it made him want to punch something. Archer didn’t know if he was a psychopath or a product of early trauma or just someone misdiagnosed, but nobody could tell him he didn’t love this man with every atom in his body. 

“I’m sorry, darling. You know I’m just kidding. Continue…please?” he added when Mac seemed like he was contemplating whether to leave him in his current condition or not. 

Mac swallowed him down with purpose, working him with deep, sucking pulls of his lips. He wasn’t trying to drag it out or elongate anyone’s pleasure. This was quick and dirty, meant to get them both off, not reaffirm their love for each other. Pleasure pulsed through him like a heartbeat, his cock throbbing hot on Mac’s tongue, seconds away from bursting. 

“I’m close. Fuck, are you close?” he asked, knowing Mac wouldn’t stop to answer. 

Mac’s responding hum was all it took for Archer to let go, his release flooding his husband’s mouth until it dribbled from his lips. Archer didn’t care if he’d made a mess of him, he couldn’t. He was too busy seeing the face of God as his vision went white and his knees went wobbly. 

He hissed as he felt Mac come, groaning around his over-sensitive cock. 

When he pulled off Archer, he tipped forward, leaning his forehead on his bare hip, both of them catching their breath. Mac’s breath came in hot, uneven bursts against Archer’s skin, grounding them both in the absurd contrast between what they'd just done and the Christmas-horror-hellscape surrounding them. Somewhere from deep within the recesses of the bathroom, the carollers whirred softly, like they knew.

“Well,” Archer finally said,  a little breathless.

He felt Mac nod against his hip. “Yeah,” he agreed.“Now call your dad and get us the fuck out of here. I don’t care if he has to land a helicopter on the roof of this hellmouth. I need to get out of Holly Harbour now.”

“Can I put my dick away first?” Archer asked around a laugh, petting his fingers through his husband’s ginger tresses. The gesture came out softer than he intended—half affection, half reassurance that Mac was truly back among the living.

“If you have to,” Mac mumbled, getting to his feet and grimacing when he looked at his sticky cum-covered hand. Instead of going to the bathroom, he headed to their backpacks, rummaging one-handed until he found the pack of wet wipes they kept in there, wiping his hand before handing the pack to Archer to clean himself up. A true act of love: field sanitation after panic-driven sex in a murder motel.

Archer cleaned himself then tossed the wipe aside, eyeing the bathroom door suspiciously. From behind the shower curtain came the faintest plastic clunk, and every hair on the back of his neck stood up.

“Mac,” he whispered, horrified.

Mac held up one warning finger. “Katniss… don’t. We aren’t acknowledging anything else in this room tonight.”

He was contemplating calling his father using the landline—the rotary phone, which absolutely had not existed anywhere near this century—when his cell began to trill in his pocket. He pulled it free and looked at the screen, frowning.

“Weird. It’s Lucas.”

Mac’s brows went up. “Lucas? Maybe he’s calling for an ETA?”

“You don’t think anything’s happened to anyone…do you?” 

Archer felt a faint sense of dread tighten in his chest—not the Holly Harbour kind, but the Mulvaney kind. The ‘something happened’ kind. Even through the walls of the Yuletide Suite, he could hear the storm ramping up outside, the wind dragging icy claws across the window in long, slow scrapes.

A storm that bad plus a Mulvaney calling unexpectedly never equaled good news.

“Lucas? What’s wrong?” 

Lucas’s voice was a half-octave higher than usual when he asked, “How fast can you get home…” 

Next up: Adam and Noah.