Betrothed to Jack Frost (NOW A PUBLISHED SERIES!)

3)Intruder

Elle could not wrap her mind around the bizarre exchange with the boy. He had been too strange; his eyes did not seem to even be a real color. His sudden disappearance was even stranger. The boy had vanished within the blink of an eye, leaving no footprints behind in the wake of his departure. None of it had seemed real, and yet Elle had the strange snow globe from her childhood as proof that the encounter happened.

"Okay, start over," said Lucy Donovan, a heavy frown on her lips. "You're saying some guy with crazy contacts said he was friends with Aiden and was going along with the whole arranged marriage joke?" They sat in a dimly lit Chinese restaurant, their choice for dinner after their shift at the coffee house. Lucy stabbed a piece of Kung-pao chicken with her fork and chewed slowly as she listened to Elle yet again replay the conversation with the boy named Eros.

Elle and Lucy had been close friends ever since they had met freshman year of high school. Aiden had been reserved and unfriendly to Lucy for a time...he wasn't someone who liked meeting new people. He seemed to grow to accept that Elle was going to be friends with her whether he liked it or not, so Lucy and Aiden became friends as well. Even though Elle knew Lucy wasn't wrong in her belief that Aiden only spoke to her because they shared Elle as a mutual acquaintance. "And he gave me this," Elle revealed, brandishing the snow globe. Elle couldn't help but rehash the entire exchange with the strange boy; it was all too weird and it gave her an eerie feeling when he just disappeared so suddenly.

"Wow, pretty," said Lucy. It was then that Elle noted how truly quiet it was inside the small restaurant. It was only the two of them eating and a waitress cleaning up a table across the room. Elle strangely developed the feeling she was being watched. As she looked around, she couldn't find anyone directly looking at her.

Lucy turned the notch on the globe to make it play once again. "Did you call Aiden and ask what was up with the weird friend?"

"Hasn't called me back," Elle explained, a frown slipping on her face as she couldn't shake the bizarre feeling someone was watching her. "Seriously, it was all so..." she paused, trying but failing to find the proper wording, "...weird."

Lucy leaned forward, gently shaking the snow globe. The beautiful light pellets of white were gently covering the glittering city inside. "And he told you your dad didn't want you to have it?" she asked, looking puzzled.

"That and a few other creepy things. He also said I was supposed to have it so my future husband could find me." Elle nodded seriously, rolling her eyes at that last bit. "He said my dad got rid of it."

Lucy was quiet for a moment, watching the snow globe with a curious expression.

"I won't lie, Ells, that's the weirdest exchange I think I've ever heard of," she mused, shaking her head in wonder. "Don't worry about it, it's probably just Aiden's idea of a prank." That was the moment Elle decided to look out the window of the restaurant. In the dark of the parking lot and far enough from the large lights illuminating the lot, Elle could see the silhouette of someone standing and looking at the restaurant. Snow was falling heavier than before, making it a strange sight to see someone merely staring at the building instead of coming inside for warmth. "Elle?" Lucy snapped her fingers. "You there?"

Elle looked back at her friend to listen to her theory. As she transferred her gaze back to the parking lot, she found the person was no longer there.

It didn't matter how long Elle spent with Lucy, the exchange with the boy didn't make any sense to either of them. A stranger surprised her with a snow globe she hadn't seen since she was a small child, and then he disappeared without leaving any footprints on the ground. Lucy didn't have any words of support either. Her best idea was that Elle must have told Aiden about the snow globe at some point in her life and he and his friend surprised Elle with that and the bizarre exchange. It was just Aiden's strange idea of a joke, and the reason he wasn't calling back was probably because he now felt stupid for it.