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"Can’t we take it home? It is so cute I want to keep it!" Leesha said
"Well If you want But these guys sleep during the day and eat mice, so you’d have to catch thereat hunter?"
"Pretty uess bow-hunting season is over But snowball season is just beginning" He stood and ca it, eyeing her suggestively
"Oh, no Stay away froed behind a tree and the ether a snowball of her own, but when she stood up, Jason had disappeared
"No fair! You are not allowed to go unnoticeable"
"No rules," Jason said fro a handful of snon her back She whipped around and he stole a kiss, then leapt back out of reach
"No rules, you say? You’ll be sorry" The fight began in earnest, then Although Leesha had terrible aim, she found she could explode Jason’s missiles izardry before they hit their s up a bit
By the tih the woods for an hour, Leesha was actually sweating, and it was getting dark They walked back to the park pavilion hand in hand Leesha kindled a fire on the hearth to dry out their wet things, and Jason heated up some cider They sat side by side on the hearth, their backs roasting, their fronts freezing
Leesha was aes came back to her fro snow the bird feeder, coasting down to eat out of her hand Consulting Aunt Milli’s field guide to identify the rare birds
"Co into her reverie "You know, sleep in hammocks in the trees, live off the land"
"You’re totally insane, you know that?" she said, thinking she uerrillas Hold people for ransoeons and steal picnic baskets"
"Listen, it takes a lot more than that to keep me comfortable," Leesha said "Like hot showers and manicures"
Their conversations were often like this They flirted, dancing around the hard issues that lay between them But now Jason turned serious He picked up her hand and examined it like he could read her fortune in it
"It would be cool … if we could just … be together," he said "You knoithout having to worry about all this…political crap"
"We can be," Leesha said, forcing a lightness she didn’t feel "Who cares about politics? Let’s run away Where do you want to go?"
But the mood was broken Jason set his cup of cider down and rose "I’d better go It’s getting late"
She gripped his hand "Stay a while?"
He shook his head "Hunters need their sleep" He leaned down and kissed her "See you"
Leesha followed Jason onto the porch and watched until his slender form dissolved into the trees of Perry Park Unsettled, off-balance, she went back inside the pavilion, sat down next to the fire on the stone hearth, and wrapped herself in a comforter that stank of woodsmoke She’d wait tenback to town herself
Who knew there were so many back-alley places in a s alley and the study carrels at the public library and the beach in theto spend ti her way into Jason’s confidence But then one-on-one, they could be themselves And, now …
It seemed like everybody she kneas either a hero like Jack Swift (not many) or a snake like Warren Barber (many) Jack was so virtuous he made her feel … conta, and yet … he believed in things He lived by a personal code of honor Not that she’d ever figure it out Finally, Jason had a crooked, self-deprecating, sardonic way of looking at the world that hs these days
Poking at the fire with a stick, she thought, You’re not falling for this guy, are you?
Leesha looked up, startled, when she heard a noise outside She hoped it wasn’t some kind of animal They’d put up wards to keep snoops away, but whether they worked on anied open and someone said, "Well, well I don’t believe it A babe in the woods"
It was Warren Barber
She wasbefore he finished, and so was he She tried to slam him with an immobilization char out a few attack char that, she tried to circle round hiet out the door, but he blocked her path and tackled her, slastones with his forear into his iced-over blue eyes, framed in bizarre white lashes
"So, what’s up, Leesha?" he asked "You never call, you never answer your phone I’ just a bit … abandoned, knohat I mean?"