AllFreeNovel
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He glances up. “Hm? Ah. No.” He puts his phone in his pocket. “Sorry, I’m being rude.”
“Not at all! I can occupy myself. I just thought… you looked kind of upset.” I cock my head, studying his face. “Are you okay?”
His lips part. He pauses for a moment, like he’s trying to work out whether or not to tell me. “My parents keep messaging me,” he says eventually. “My mother is trying to get me to come home for the summer.” His face twists. “She’s now resorted to offering me money.”
I cut a dumpling in half. “Wow. She must really want you back. Does she live near here?”
He shakes his head. “America. My parents emigrated there when I was a teenager. Mom thinks that if she can just get me to visit, I’ll be so amazed by the pool and her yacht and her mansion that I’ll never want to leave. She’s convinced that there must be something wrong with me, wanting to live up here in the cold, away from all the malls.”
“You don’t really seem like the mall type.”
His lip twists. “No.”
I take another spoonful of stew. “So you lived in America?”
“For two or three years, while I was in high school. I came back here when I graduated to study medicine.”
“It must be hard, being so far away from your family.”
“Not at all. My dad is….” he smiles grimly. “Well. Maybe you know him. Hans Nilsson.”
The name does sound familiar. I think about it. “Wasn’t he in the news a few years ago? Something about a rapper?”
Riven nods stiffly. “He’s a lawyer.”
It all falls into place. “He’s the lawyer who got that rapper off the murder charge!”
Riven looks down at his bowl.
I remember that case. It was an ugly story. A really famous rapper stabbed his girlfriend to death when she walked in on him with another woman. The crazy thing is, the guy literally confessed to the murder; but somehow, his lawyer still got him acquitted. It was in all the papers.
“How did he do it?”
Riven shrugs. “He has a reputation for winning impossible cases. Whenever a really, really rich person fucks up, he’s the first person they call.”
“Even if they did it?”
He huffs a bitter laugh. “Especially if they did it. He specialises in getting innocent bystanders put in jail.”
I lean back in my chair. “Shit.”
“So you can imagine, I try to avoid family barbecues. Every so often, though—” he grimaces when his phone buzzes again. “Well. My parents have donated a fair amount of money to the local hospitals. I can’t stop talking to them altogether.”
I take a sip of my water, my head reeling. “Is that why you came up here?”
He shrugs. “When I was in America, I was surrounded by very rich people, and nothing felt real. Out here—” he jerks his head at the door. “People have less, and everything is a lot simpler. People take care of each other. They know human beings are more important than bank accounts.”
“Wow.” I look down at my bowl. I’d wondered why Riven decided to work so far up North. Now it all makes sense.
Charlotte bustles up, holding a candle in a carved candlestick. She plops it down between us and lights it, saying something in Swedish to Riv. He shakes his head, but she just chuckles, nudges him, and wanders off again.
“What did she say?”
He sighs. “That she’s never seen me with a girl in here before. And if we’re on a date, we should have romantic lighting.”
I snort into my stew. “Well. I’m honoured to be the first girl you bring here.”
We eat quietly for a bit. Now that I think about it, the situation is kind of date-like. Especially with the yellow candlelight flickering over our faces and hands. I don’t remember the last time a man took me out to eat, one on one. Sam was never big on dates.
