As Red as Blood (The Snow White Trilogy) Read Online Free

conclusions.
That was Lumikki’s second motto.
    Well, maybe calling them mottoes was too pretentious. They were more like principles or thoughts that had been useful or beneficial at some point.
    Lumikki jumped when a boy walked around the corner. Tuukka. Eighteen years old, the son of the principal, a wannabe actor who thought he could play God’s understudy if the call ever came. The teachers were amusingly adept at tolerating Tuukka’s swaggering, arrogant manner of speaking and his chronic tardiness. Tuukka seemed to be in a hurry now though. He probably would have shoved Lumikki with his elbow or backpack if she hadn’t discreetly dodged him.
    She had learned to sidestep without people noticing her sidestepping. You had to time it just right, and it had to be slight enough that it looked natural instead of like you were reacting to someone else. Lumikki had learned to be neither irritating nor obsequious.
    Tuukka continued walking, speeding up almost to a run. He barely even noticed Lumikki. Still, best to wait until he disappeared before heading to the darkroom. Once she was sure he was really gone, Lumikki opened the outer door, closed it, opened the darkroom door, and turned on the red light.
    Then she blinked two times.
    The scene remained the same. The money was gone.
    Lumikki cursed silently. This was what she got for not acting immediately. What was she going to do now? Go tell the principal that she had seen thousands of euros hanging in the darkroom without any way to prove it? Wait until someone asked her about it, and then describe what she’d seen? Forget the whole thing and chalk it up to a hallucination brought on by too little sleep and too much caffeine?
    She leaned against the darkroom wall and closed her eyes. Something was bothering her again. Something out of place, something off. Her brain had recorded something, and now it was trying to figure out what didn’t belong. Lumikki opened her eyes and realized what it was.
    The backpack.
    Tuukka never wore a backpack. He had a black leather Marimekko shoulder bag that could barely fit the books he needed on any given day. And when they didn’t fit, he leftsome of them at home. Colorful fabric Marimekko bags were part of the standard uniform for high school girls, but Lumikki had never seen anyone with a leather one except Tuukka. As an accessory, it landed perfectly in the gray zone between conformity and individuality, a carefully considered movement in step with the herd, but with a subtle twist thrown in. But now Tuukka had been carrying a dingy gray backpack, frayed at the seams and stained at the corners, slung over one of his shoulders. Definitely not in keeping with the image of a demigod descended from on high to grace mere mortals with his presence. And it had been stuffed full without looking heavy.
    Lumikki could solve this equation instantly.
    The usual morning crowd was gathered at the Central Square Coffee House: mothers with their babies and mush and conversations about sleep schedules, college girls drinking lattes that gnawed gaping holes in their monthly budgets and pretending to study for exams while really daydreaming about the future, and a couple of men in suits with laptops playing Angry Birds or checking Facebook instead of working on their PowerPoints. Coffee machines whirring and gurgling. The scent of cappuccino and hazelnut syrup hanging in the air. Pastries that looked far more delicious than they really were. The sweat that came over you instantly when you walked in the door wearing a winter coat.
    Lumikki sat at a corner table with her back to the rest of the café as she flipped through a magazine and drank her tea. At a nearby table sat Tuukka, Elisa, and Kasper.
    Once Lumikki had realized that the cash was in Tuukka’s backpack, she rushed after him immediately. She had snatched her coat, mittens, scarf, and knit hat from the coatrack. Running out of the school, she slipped and slid past the smoking spot and came