Shit. Was she serious about her age? Because out of everyone I’d met who was older than they looked, like Freya and even Mrs. Knight here, this girl was probably the first who I would have guessed was sincerely in her early twenties. She had a similar feel as Heidi did, like someone’s little sister, who broke into her mom’s makeup and went wild.
Though apparently that wasn’t the case if her lips were naturally this color.
Winter just laughed again. “You, of all people, should know age is just a number,” she giggled. “If you go out to a club, half the people there are going to be in their forties and fifties! A lot of them will look younger from taking those expensive pills they have nowadays, but I’ve met plenty of people in their twenties who acted like old farts, and those in their sixties who acted like teenagers.”
She laughed again, glancing back at Mrs. Knight while still speaking to me. “You should see my aunt sometimes! You’d never guess she was over seven-hundred!”
“Okay, that’s enough out of you!” Liz hissed with a playful glare. “Keep that up and I’ll knock you over!”
Winter was grinning ear to ear now, like she was a kid at an amusement park, having the time of her life. “Like, just a month ago–”
Instantly, it was as if an invisible sumo wrestler shoved the lean woman, causing Winter to jerk roughly before gracefully taking a few steps down the stone stairs to avoid falling, still giggling her head off. “See?” she continued, now much closer to me. “Look at her face!”
Liz just rolled her eyes, and huffed. “I swear, I don’t know what’s gotten into you.”
Winter tried to collect herself, before smiling widely at me again. “Oh, and no I’m not wearing some kind of exotic lingerie.” Her expression abruptly became serious, her smile vanishing, her pale green eyes narrowing. “It’s fur. I get it from my mom. And if you look again, especially if my aunt’s not around to blur that extra vision of yours, I won’t hesitate to punch you in the face.”
I gulped, a little embarrassed that she knew I’d taken a peek underneath her clothing. I mean, it wasn’t like I was checking her out or anything, but I could understand why she might be irritated that I’d done so.
“Good,” she said in response to my thoughts. “Then I think we’ll get along just fine.”
“We should probably head inside,” Liz interjected before I could respond, glancing up at a helicopter landing, which I realized I couldn’t hear at all. “Don’t want to be the reason he’s late to his own party.”
Shit, I’d forgotten about the time. Yanking out my phone again, I was glad to see we were still doing fine. Still, it was bizarre to see a helicopter up above and not hear it even a little.
“Let’s go then,” Winter agreed, gesturing for me to follow her.
However, as I started walking up the steps, my brain finally registered what she’d just said about her fur. Except, this time I decided to just keep my question in my thoughts, in case she wanted to ignore it, since I assumed she’d be able to hear me.
‘Wait, what did you mean about getting the fur from your mom? Superpowers can’t be inherited from parents.’
She automatically dropped back a step to walk at my side, prompting me to realize she was exactly the same height as me, not looking up as she answered under her breath. “My mom is a little unique. The fur isn’t technically classified as a superpower, and can be passed on like any other trait, even though it was caused by the same mutation that created powers. But her real superpowers are super-strength, speed, and making people piss their pants.”
She burst out laughing again when I looked at her like she had three heads, with her not seeming as if she had any intentions on elaborating.
“Nope!” she agreed out loud, laughing even harder.
“Okay Winter,” Liz said firmly, holding open one of the glass doors for us to enter the lobby. “Time to be serious again.” She focused on me. “Oh, and Mr. Archer–”
“Sam is fine,” I interjected, finding it strange she continued to refer to me by my last name after having just offered for me to call her by her first. Then again, I supposed I hadn’t made the same offer until just now.
She nodded. “Sure. Sam, we’ll obviously be in this meeting with you, but you should pretend like we aren’t there. Don’t expect us to help with your negotiations or anything like that. Our role is to simply keep all those little pricks safe,” she explained, scoffing.
I finally smiled a little.
“Okay, granny,” I retorted without thinking.
But I supposed I’d gone too far – gotten too comfortable – at least, if getting smacked by an invisible sumo wrestler was any indication.
At least I had Winter practically rolling on the floor with laughter, gracefully stepping out of the way at lightning speeds as I fell hard on my ass.
4: Negotiations
Lexi Stockton
April 10, 2735 – Current Day – Morning
Lexi sat at her desk in her secondary office with her elbows on the table, her hand covering her forehead as she stared blankly at her monitor. She felt stressed, wanting this meeting to go well for Sam, but concerned that it wouldn’t. If her boss, Jackie Hendricks, was the only person making the decision, then she was sure the woman wouldn’t try to lowball him at this point.
And she would have been the primary decision-maker if Sam’s demands only involved money and more standard requests.
But the others
