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She watched with a mix of regret and relief as he shook his head.
‘No, I’m just sulking because you didn’t talk to me about it.’
Reaching out, she took hold of his hand and gave it a quick, apologetic squeeze. ‘I wanted to but I was worried about what you’d say. What you and Mum would say,’ she corrected herself. ‘I didn’t want to let either of you down.’
Lucas frowned. ‘Let us down? Sóley is your daughter, Lottie. It’s up to you, not me or Mum, if you want her to know who her father is.’
‘I know, but you’ve always been so definite about it not mattering—you know, about our dads not being around—and Mum’s the same.’
She thought back to her childhood, the hours spent watching Izzy’s casual intimacy with men, the cool way she seduced and then discarded them without so much as a backward glance. To a child it had seemed both shocking, and eye-wateringly brutal, but as she’d grown older she had seen it as something else—something that underlined a fundamental difference between herself and her mother.
She felt his fingers tighten around hers.
‘I do feel like that, but I know you don’t—and that’s okay. You’re just not programmed that way, and I know that makes you feel left out sometimes. But you’re my sister and I’m here for you and nothing can change that.’
Feeling the knot of tension in her shoulders loosen, Lottie nodded. It was a relief to tell Lucas the truth, but his fierce affirmation of their sibling bond mattered more. It was nothing new. She’d always needed reassurance of her place in her family. But since being confronted by Ragnar and Sóley’s kinship she’d felt even more precariously placed than before.
‘But that doesn’t mean you have to rush into anything with Sóley’s dad.’
They had reached the river now, and Lottie stared down into the water, her brother’s words replaying inside her head as Sóley began to crow excitedly at a group of mallards sifting through the mud for insects and seeds.
‘I can totally see why you’d want to,’ he said slowly. ‘But it’s not like there’s a time limit on paternity.’
Except there was, she thought. And at a certain point time ran out.
The blood pulsed inside her head as she thought back to her meeting with her own father. She had left it too late. So late that there hadn’t been any room left for her in Alistair’s life.
‘In theory, no,’ she agreed. ‘But every day that passes is a day that tests that theory, and that’s why I don’t want to wait with Ragnar.’
As the silence stretched out between them she could hear the booming of her voice inside her head. Lucas was staring at her, and she could sense that he was replaying her words, mentally tracing back over the last few days.
Finally, he said slowly, ‘Ragnar Stone is Sóley’s father.’
It wasn’t a question but a statement of fact, and there was no point in pretending otherwise.
She nodded.
He tilted his head back and whistled soundlessly. ‘At least now I get why you’re going to Iceland.’ Hesitating, he looked her straight in the eye. ‘Unless there is some other reason you and Mr Stone want to spend a few weeks together.’
Her face felt hot and tight. ‘Of course there’s no other reason.’ She knew she sounded defensive and, remembering how her body grew loose with desire whenever she thought about Ragnar, she knew why. ‘There’s nothing between us,’ she said quickly. ‘This trip is about Sóley getting to know her father.’
It was hopeless. The tangle of her thoughts might just as well be written in huge letters across a billboard by the side of the road. But that was the problem. She didn’t know how she felt or how she should feel—not about Ragnar, nor about going away with him and having him in her life. But if anyone could help her make sense of her feelings, it was Lucas.
‘So you still like him?’ Lucas said gently.
‘No.’ She shook her head, hesitated. ‘I don’t know. Maybe—but it’s not conscious. I mean, I don’t actually like him as a person.’
There was a small beat of silence.
‘Okay...’ Lucas raised an eyebrow. ‘So what do you like about him?’
Her heart shivered.
His skin. The curving muscles of his arms and chest. His smell. The way his hair fell in front of his eyes when he was gazing down at her. The fierce blueness of his gaze.
‘I don’t know,’ she lied. ‘It just felt good with him, that night.’ She could admit that much—although that too was a lie, or perhaps an understatement.
It had felt glorious. An ecstasy of touch and taste. She had never wanted it to stop. Never wanted to leave that hotel room. Never felt so complete or so certain. Every fibre of her being, every atom of her consciousness, had been focused on the pressure of his body and the circle of his arms around her. Nothing else had mattered. And in the flushed, perfect aftermath of that night she had been so blazingly sure of him.
