Page 3 of Snow One Like You

“Why not?”

“I need something from you first.” She wrinkles her nose, doing an adorable impression of a rabbit, but her eyes seem to burn like that of a dragon. Before she can scorch me with that flame, a heat I’m sure I’ll eagerly welcome from her at some point, I explain, “Your name.”

“You won’t believe me,” she responds with resignation.

“Using my detective skills,” she grins at that, “I surmise that others haven’t in the past.” It’s not a question because her tone wasn’t teasing.

She nods. “Don’t even get me started on my parents’ names.”

“That means I have to know them now.”

“I don’t even know yours.”

“I tell you mine you tell me yours?”

“Seems like a good deal.”

“Does that work for show, too?” She snickers as I wiggle my brows suggestively. “It’s Calvin Wells.”

Extending her hand, she reciprocates, eye quirked as if waiting for my disbelief, “Snow Dey.” It’s a pattern my paternal grandparents unknowingly started by naming their son, Rain. He then fell in love with my mom, Sunshine, or Sunny as she prefers. They continued the theme with me.

Instead, I press my palm to hers as I raise it to my lips. Placing a kiss there, I sincerely state, “Those are my favorite days.”

She – Snow, I mentally correct myself – smiles at me with happiness. Her next words, however, are a peek into how cruel kids can be. “Before certain classes, when I’d enter, those most vocal as to the ‘peculiarity’ of my moniker would dance around a chair, spin in a circle, then reverse it and go counterclockwise.”

It takes me a second to decipher what they were doing. “Snow day dance.”

“Got it in one.”

“Do I get a gold star?”

“You already have a gold shield, don’t you?”

Glad we’re back on silly ground and she’s not stuck in the past with painful memories, I tap her nose, silently indicating she’s correct. Snow beams at me, any lingering trace of sadness fading. “So, why do you need the time? Planning on making an escape?”

“Something tells me you’ll do your best to foil it if I say I am.”

“Look at you reading people. Vying for a job with the department?”

“I don’t think I’d be the right fit.” I open my mouth to learn more, but she deftly changes the subject. Or rather, returns to it. “I forgot to charge my watch last night and my evil coworkers won’t give me back my cell until they allow me to leave.”

“He can get it back for you,” Nate chimes in, the only outward sign he’d been eavesdropping. No wonder he’s the department’s go to when an organization needs infiltrating. “Protect and serve.”

“And if I don’t need either?” Snow retorts, not in the least effected by Nate’s dark looks that have rendered many women speechless. In Nate’s defense, he never acts on the numerous offers extended his direction by any of the ladies. That could be because his interests lean a different direction or he’d rather not shit where he eats, so to speak. Either way, I haven’t asked as it’s none of my business, unless he wants to make it such.

“What do you need?”

“The time,” she stresses.

“He has time for a date,” Nate interjects, continuing his endeavor to be a part of this conversation.

“Your wingman is persistent,” she points out.

“He’s simply making his case for the Fate versus Nate argument. If we follow his advice, that’s just more proof he’s been the one in charge all along.”

“Well, for Nate’s sake…”

“And mine,” I add, wanting full disclosure.

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