Fated Hearts (Southern Bride 8)

She shrugged. “I like to win. I won’t lie.”

The elevator opened, and we quickly went back to our room. After bundling up as best we could, we soon found our way outside and to the area where the snowman-making contest was about to begin.

“I think we got a good spot here,” Annalise said, her game face clearly on. “Lots of loose snow. Look at that family over there, thinking they’re so smart. Let’s see how smart they are when they realize they don’t have enough snow to build a snowbaby.”

The hotel had used spray paint to mark circles around their large outdoor area. Everyone got to pick a spot, and the rule was you could only use the snow in your circle to make your snowman.

“I’m going to guess they’re doing it just for fun,” I said.

She huffed. “Fun. There is no fun in this. It’s a competition!”

I raised my brows. “I was sorta thinking we might have some fun.”

Annalise stared at me. “Don’t you want to win?”

“Um,” I said as I looked over at the family again. “I think it might be nice to let the kids win. Don’t you?”

Her eyes narrowed some before she focused back on the family. They had three kids, and I honestly couldn’t imagine being stuck in a hotel room with three young children—those parents deserved a win.

Annalise sighed. “They do look excited. I guess they should win.”

I nodded. “Should we give them our circle?”

She spun back to face me. “Hold on now. Let’s not get carried away.”

It took everything I had to stop myself from pulling her to me and kissing her senseless. Whoever ended up marrying this woman was going to be a lucky bastard. Life with Annalise would never be boring.

An hour later, Annalise and I stood back and looked at our snowman.

I glanced over at the family of five and smiled. Their snowman kicked our snowman’s ass. I had heard through the snowman-making grapevine that the dad was a building engineer. They were a shoo-in to win. They had made two snowmen. Both with perfectly round and symmetrical balls. Plus, one of them was turned upside down and wearing a pair of snow boots. They had clearly had more winter clothing to work with since both snowmen had on hats, scarfs, and mittens attached to the ends of their stick arms. I spun around and looked at ours and tried not to laugh.

It was cute, with his baseball hat provided by the guy next to us, and Annalise’s scarf and mittens on. I couldn’t help but wonder how much longer she would sacrifice them before she ripped them back off and put them on. The hotel had provided carrots and a few other food items to decorate the faces with. When I looked over at Annalise, she wore a proud smile.

“What should we name him?” Annalise asked, just as his carrot nose fell off and landed on the ground.

“Truitt.”

She looked back at me. “Truitt?”

“That’s my brother’s name, and he’s the most accident-prone person I’ve ever met. So far, our snowman has lost his right arm, both blueberry eyes, and now his nose. He needs to be called Truitt.”

She giggled, and I loved how the sound of it warmed my body. Not two seconds later, she snagged the gloves back from Truitt the Snowman.

“My hands are freezing!” she said. “These gloves are more for style than warmth, I can tell you that right now.”

I took off my gloves and reached for her hands before she slipped them back on. I blew on them before rubbing her fingers between mine. “Better?”

She stared up at me with an expression that said so many different things. But one thing stood out more than the others: She wanted me.

“Should we forgo the judging and head back up to the room?” I asked.

“I think that sounds like a wonderful idea.”

As we turned to head back toward the hotel, my phone rang. I pulled it out and answered.

“Hello? Yes, this is him. Oh, great.”

I motioned for Annalise to keep walking while I listened to the American Airlines representative.

“Mr. Carter, we’ve got you rebooked on flight 4906 leaving Chicago at twelve-thirty, nonstop into San Antonio. You’ll arrive at three thirty-seven. You should have also received an email with the new flight information, and just to let you know, you’ve been booked in first class again.”

My heart felt like it had just taken a nosedive. “Great, that’s great news. Thank you.”

“Of course. If anything changes, you’ll get both a text and an email.”

“Sounds good. Thank you so much.”

When I hung up, I noticed Annalise looking at her phone and frowning.

“Is everything okay?” I asked.

She looked up, and I saw the disappointment in her eyes. “I got an email from the airline. They’ve rebooked my flight.”

“When are you leaving?”

“Ten in the morning. I guess they’re banking on the runways being cleared.”