“Well, I thought about throwing a few snowballs at you, but I forgot that you’re super fast so none of them would actually land,” I explained. “See? Dumb? And you’d probably fracture my skull if you threw one back at me.”
He didn’t say anything for so long that I glanced over to see why.
Were his shoulders hunched up? It seemed like they were. He had a thoughtful expression on his face as he met my eyes.
“What?” I asked him.
“I’ve spent my whole life moving like a human.”
What was that supposed to mean?
And did he suddenly look kind of excited?
Was he… interested? Really?
“Did you want to…?” I gestured toward the small collection of snowballs beside me, trying not to look like I was on the verge of being over the moon. I was probably failing big-time though.
That incredible gaze lingered on mine, and his hands slipped into his pockets. “I’ll count to ten before I come after you.”
Would it be worth it? Eating some snow if I could peg him a couple of times?
Yes, yes it fucking would. When the hell would be the next time I’d get a chance like this? I had no idea where I would be a month from now. Fuck it.
I yelled before jumping up to my too-big feet and crouching in front of my small mound of snowballs. Then I attacked. The first one I threw far to the right, the second and third landed closer.
He barely moved to the side to avoid the fourth, letting his guard down with a smirk aimed at me like he’d thought he’d gotten away with it, when I threw two back-to-back, fast as I could.
He batted the first away, and bless his soul, he purposely let the next one hit him in the forehead when I knew in my heart he could have dodged that too.
What I did know for sure was that I was way too excited and threw two more at him before he said slowly and breathily, “Time.”
Yeah, I knew I was in for it.
I tried to run, I really did, but my main problem was the shoes. My foot slipped out of one of the boots on the second step I took trying to get away, and it was over pretty much instantly. His hand caught me by the back of my pants, and he was suddenly holding me up by them, by my pants, leaving my body parallel with the snow and the ground.
Alex lowered me back down, and I was on my hands and knees, about to try and crawl away, the cold sneaking in through the thin material of my pants, when I felt the waistband get tugged again. My ass wentfreezing.
“Alex!” I screeched, shoving my hand inside them to dig out the snow he’d shoved into my underwear.
The son of a bitch was laughing. Laughing hisass off.There was a sock covering his hand! When the hell had he managed to put that on? Where had it even come from?
I pulled his leg out from under him and pushed his stomach as hard as I could so he landed on his ass. It wouldn’t hit me until later, way, way later, that he’dletme do it.
He stopped laughing, but then I started cracking up, tossing a little bit of loose snow at him even as I shivered. I grinned. Alex took the sock off and shoved it in his pocket.
“Why are you smiling?” he asked, wiping the melted snowflakes off his face and hair with his bare hands.
“Because my ass might be suffering from hypothermia soon but that was fun.” I blinked. “You didn’t have fun? You were laughing.”
I’d swear there was a twinkle in his eye as he admitted in that gruff voice, “I had fun.”
See? I tossed a little more snow in his direction. “Picking me up like I’m a little kid or shoving snow between my butt cheeks?”
“Both.”
Figures.
He leaned back, planting both hands behind him, propping himself up. “What else have you wanted to do in the snow?”
