we having a boy or a girl first?”
“Um… can we back up a little to the bloody snow? I wasn’t done with that topic.”
“I think we should have a boy first,” he says, since apparently he is. “Protective big brother and all that.”
I blink at him a couple more times, but when he doesn’t fall back and further explain about the blood he handled the day he met me, I give up. “That’s true, but if we have the girl first, she’ll be older and she can help out with the second baby.”
“Boys can help out with babies,” he says dismissively. “I was a boy, I certainly helped out.”
I guess that’s true.
Wait, why am I thinking about this like we’re actually going to have babies?
This joke was funnier before he kissed me senseless, now the idea of having babies with him is… well, still batshit crazy, but no longer amusing.
I know the concept should still seem ludicrous to me, but pretending to be a couple this week… it doesn’t feel fake. It feels like I really have gone home with my boyfriend to meet his family.
He wasn’t faking anything when he kissed me last night in the bathroom. It didn’t feel like we were pretending when we curled up on the couch and watched movies together with his sister and her boyfriend.
Jasper feels like my boyfriend, he just… can’t be.
Some part of me wishes the sanitized version of how we met was the truth. That Jasper was some normal man living in Chicago who just happened across my path.
It would be easier if I didn’t genuinely like him, but I do. It makes no difference to me, knowing all the bad things he’s capable of. Maybe that’s crazy in and of itself, but whatever he’s capable of, he has been totally honest with me.
He loves his sister. He loves the niece he just met yesterday.
He’s not bad; he just does bad things for a living.
I don’t know how he does those things, but I don’t believe he’s malicious, and I don’t think he’d harm someone innocent without good reason.
I don’t believe he would ever hurt me on purpose, but I still think he’ll do all kinds of damage if I let him.
Amira toddles over, bringing my attention back to the task at hand. She holds up her little squirt bottle—nearly empty, but somehow with enough tinted water left to make our snowman blush.
“You ready?” Jasper asks, lifting her up in his arms so she can reach the snowman’s head.
Amira nods enthusiastically, her finger poised on the trigger.
Then she starts shooting the water at the snowman’s face, but instead of aiming where his cheeks would be and giving him a friendly glow, she hits the area all around his mouth.
She empties the rest of the spray bottle, then she wiggles until Jasper lets her down and runs toward the house calling for her mom and dad to come look at her snowman.
Jasper takes a step back and stands next to me as we gaze at the gruesome thing.
“Now it looks like it’s been drinking blood,” I tell him.
“Why don’t you know what blood looks like? It looks like he spilled Kool-Aid down his chin, at worst.”
“He’s a cannibal,” I state. “He ate all the other snowmen and that’s why there’s blood all over the lawn.”
Jasper shakes his head, looking at the rotund snow figure. “And here I thought it was Christmas cookies.”
“Now you know. Frosty is a monster.”
“All the best ones are capable of wearing friendly faces. I really should’ve known.”
I crack a smile and look over at him. “This was fun. Even if Amira abandoned us and made us do all the work.”
“Mm-hmm. You know what else would be fun?”
I shake my head.
“Snow angels.”
I’m delighted and surprised that he would suggest such a thing—but then he pushes me down into the snow and climbs on top of me, and I realize he wasn’t really suggesting we make snow angels together.
Even though it’s cold outside, a sudden spike of warmth makes my coat feel like a sauna. My cheeks are rosy from the cold, so his touch feels even more startling when he removes his glove from one hand and caresses the side of my face.
I’m crushed beneath his weight, but it feels nice to have him on top of me.
“I don’t think this is how you make snow angels.”
“No?” he asks innocently. “This is how I was taught.”
I bite back an indulgent smile. “Then the girl who taught you had