He put on a hat and crunched out into the snow. The world was strangely silent, the mountains surrounding the estate invisible behind low clouds, the air full of downy flakes.

Ángel didn’t make a snowman, but he did make and throw several snowballs. Then he discovered the satisfaction of creating a line of lone footprints across an unblemished blanket of snow. He walked for an hour, crisscrossing his footprints, the snow getting deeper and deeper around his legs.

As he rounded the house he saw, in the distance, a slim figure waiting for him. He walked toward it, his mood was so light that he considered starting a snowball fight.

The cold did wonderful things for Chandler Evanston’s Snow White coloring: her pale cheeks were flushed with red, like poppies; her black-lashed eyes were ice blue and sparkling. She was not smiling. As usual.

“This place is dead to security. The cameras at the house and the cameras on the walls—none of them give a view of this spot.”

This was weird. “Oh?” he said, abandoning any idea of playing in the snow with her.

“I wanted to thank you for intervening for me with Oberon, Ángel.” Her voice was stiff and awkward.

“Oberon overreacted.”

“He did. He was right, though,” she said. “I lied about your package. I was being passive-aggressive, and I apologize.”

“Well, that was kind of bitchy.”

“I know.” She pressed her lips together. “This job ties me in knots. But it’s not an excuse for dishonesty. I’m sorry.”

She was probably not a person who apologized very often. Too lighthearted to hold a grudge, he said, “It wasn’t a firing offense. Not bad enough for . . . what he was doing.”

“Does he ever talk to you like that? The way he talked to me?”

“No,” said Ángel. “Well, maybe once, a little. But I was definitely pissing him off.”

He looked around, newly aware of how isolated they were out here on the lawn, in the falling snow. Chandler had come out here deliberately, to talk to him where no cameras, no microphones could find them. He made a note of the location.

Chandler said, “I want you to know something, Ángel. We never watch the cameras inside the house. We installed them, because those were our instructions, and we have access to the feeds, but we’re security, not voyeurs. When we heard you’d destroyed the cameras in your room, we cheered.”

“Uh, thanks. That’s good to know.”

She shifted her feet in the snow. “If you need to get away, Ángel, please speak to me. I’ll see what I can do.”

“What are you saying?” he demanded.

She looked torn, as if what she was doing was a crime against her own loyalty. “Just that. You’re in a strange situation—none of us realized how strange until you got here.”