Carolers in matching red sweaters.
Sugar cookies shaped like snowflakes.
Reindeer petting zoo.
Hot cocoa fountains.
Santa meet-and-greet.
Elves on stilts juggling candy canes.
Charity snowball toss.
I blink. "This is aggressively wholesome."
Nox leans over my shoulder. "I feel attacked by cocoa."
The head elf gulps. "There’s… one more thing."
He snaps his fingers, and two elves wheel in a mannequin dressed in Santa’s clothes.
I gasp. "Oh! You’re wearing that."
Nox narrows his eyes. "I don’t do costumes."
He circles the mannequin like a predator sizing up its prey, like it had insulted his bloodline. The cigarette between his fingers glows faintly, casting shadows across the velvet folds of the costume. It is red.Veryred. The kind of red that screams “holiday cheer” but whispers, “I bite.”
He takes a slow drag and exhales smoke that curls around the mannequin’s shoulders like a ghost. His eyes are still narrowed, jaw tense, every inch of him radiating "I don’t do costumes."
My arms wrap around him. The cigarette hangs from his lips. His coat smells like frost and danger, and his body is all tension—coiled, restrained, barely holding back the urge to destroy something festive.
