A silly dream. But one so potent she knew she’d better dislodge it from her mind pronto. She turned her face up toward his. “Do you have plans with your family for Christmas?”
“Mm.” His agreement didn’t sound exactly exuberant. “There will be dinner on Christmas Eve at my mother’s, as always. We’ll exchange our gifts, then go to the midnight service at church.”
She lifted her brows. “You don’t sound excited.”
He sighed, keeping his gaze focused on the girls. “It’s just... sometimes I feel more alone with my family than I do when I’m actually alone.” He darted his eyes toward her, then forward again. “That probably sounds ridiculous. I’m blessed to have them. I know that. But...”
“But when you’re different from them, you can feel so very out of place in their company.” She nodded. “I’ve thought the same on occasion. Don’t get me wrong—I love my family, and we’ve always gotten along well. But they’re all perfectly content with life in our little village, where they run our farm or spend their days fishing. Where my mother and sister busy themselves all day long with housekeeping tasks and find joy in it.”
Well—Ari’s joy had been hard to come by in the last few years, but it wasn’t because she didn’t find the life of a farmer’s daughter and fisherman’s wife fulfilling. It was just the grief of losing so many babies to miscarriage.
Tatiana sighed. “I knew that wasn’t the life for me. I tried so hard to imagine it, tried to fall in love with someone from the village, tried to pretend that was all I wanted in life—but it justwasn’t.” She shrugged, daring a quick peek up at Anders and finding his gaze steady on her, despite the fact that they kept walking. “So I wrote to Uncle Valdi and all but begged him to give me a job. An opportunity to move to the city, to work with books.” To learn how to write them, though she wasn’t about to confess that. “Not that I don’t want a family someday, of course.” Too pointed? She hoped not.
His smile said he understood perfectly. “We are more alike than I thought. My family all lives in Reykjavik, of course, but they have been fishermen for generations, both sides. I’m the oddball too.” He sent her another smile, then looked forward again, clearing his throat. “And I am... quite glad your uncle gave you a job. You... you bring sunshine into the office.”
She knew very well his cheeks would be reddening if she looked over at him, and since she felt her own flush, she instead kept her face forward. But she leaned a little closer, so that their arms brushed. Anders was always kind, but that was by far the most personallycomplimentary thing he’d ever said to her, and she knew it had cost him to say it.
For the first time, she wondered if Elea was right. Maybe hedidlike her. Maybe the fact that he’d never said anything was more because he was bashful than because he saw her as nothing but her uncle’s assistant.
Her pulse thundered in her ears. She should encourage him. Make it clear that she’d welcome it if he ever decided to ask her on an outing without the excuse of their nieces.
Of course, if they were to date, then she’d have to confess that they were already more than office colleagues—that he was, in fact, her editor. That the rapport they’d developed via correspondence wastheirs.
It made anxiety knot her stomach, and she realized as the first buildings of town rose up around them that she’d waited too long to respond. Which triggered a whole new anxiety—she didn’t want him to think his opinion wasn’t treasured, but they had only minutes left of their walk.
She lifted her free hand and rested it against his forearm, sending him a warm smile. “This has been so nice. I’m glad you asked us to come.”
His face turned her way, a smile upon his lips—butthen it froze, and his posture shifted as his gaze fastened on something beyond her. She turned too and saw that they’d drawn even with the building he’d pointed out as his on their way out of town, and that two women were standing outside the door, the older of them even now lifting her hand in greeting.
His mother, she could see that at a glance. And the younger woman beside her looked exactly like her, minus thirty years, which meant it must be his little sister, Ada. And given the confusion on their faces, clearly neither of them had a clue who she or Elea were.
“Anders,” his mother called out in greeting as he adjusted course. “Heidi.”
The girls spun toward the building too, Heidi shouting, “Ommu!” and rushing to wrap her arms around the woman.
Tatiana considered drawing her arm from Anders’s... but if he’d wanted her to, he would have lowered his, releasing her. The fact that he held his arm steady made her think he didn’t mind his mother seeing them walking like this, together. And it wasn’t just curiosity in the woman’s gaze, unless Tatiana was mistaken. It was intrigue. Excitement, even.
“Who are your friends?” his mother asked in a tonethat implied,And why didn’t I know you were taking a woman and another little girl with you today? Have you been hiding things from me?
Tatiana smiled. Mothers were the same, it seemed, wherever they were.
Anders cleared his throat. “Mother, this is Tatiana, Valdi’s niece. She works as the publisher’s assistant at the Story Society. And this is her niece, Elea. I thought Heidi would enjoy making a new friend so invited them to join us. Tatiana, Elea, allow me to introduce my mother, Gilla, and my sister, Ada.”
They exchanged hellos, Gilla’s gaze moving from her son to Tatiana and back again, clearly trying to discern what might be between them. But she said only, “It looked as though you’d intended to walk on by—were you seeing Tatiana and Elea home?”
“Of course. Then I was going to take Heidi home to Ram’s house.”
His mother beamed. “I was just saying I could use a walk. We’ll join you.”
There was no refusing such an invitation, but Tatiana didn’t mind the new additions, even when it somehow resulted in her hand losing its place wrapped around Anders’s arm when the little girls darted between themin a game of chase. In the ensuing laughter, Ada ended up beside her brother and Tatiana beside Gilla, since the sidewalk wasn’t large enough to walk more than two abreast.
“How long have you been working at the Story Society?” Gilla asked with a smile that said she’d maneuvered them exactly to her liking.
Tatiana had no trouble keeping her own smile fresh. If it wereherparents who had found them instead of his, she knew very well Pabbi or Mother would be angling for a conversation with him too. “Five years now. I was so excited to be hired—and your son is a large part of that.”
She knew very well he could hear her, and the fact that he almost tripped over his own feet told her he was more than a little surprised by her words. Her smile turned into a grin. “I’ve long admired his writing and illustrating, and my uncle had told me that he’d been the lead editor on several of my favorite books. I couldn’t believe I’d actually get tomeethim! You must be so proud. Uncle Valdi is forever saying how Anders is one of the most brilliant literary minds of our day, and I thoroughly agree.”
Gilla sent an indulgent smile toward her son’s back.“Always smart as a whip, Anders was. So much cleverer than the rest of us. I knew he’d do great things.”
