It bounced back hard, echoing eerily and Chloe couldn’t help but laugh at his word choice.
‘What is so funny?’ he asked her, smiling with his gorgeous eyes as well as his mouth.
‘That you chose to shout something that you said you don’t believe in.’
‘It could have been worse,’ Gunnar said. ‘I could have shouted Santa Claus.’
Chloe gasped. ‘You don’t believe in him either?’
‘In Iceland we have something a little different. We have the thirteen Yule Lads.’
‘What?’
‘They are characters that live in the mountains, in caves, that come to town at Christmas time to make mischief. In some stories they eat children and you will tell these stories so the children will have good behaviour before Christmas time. In other tales the lads just leave presents for people; these are sometimes nice and sometimes potatoes in their shoes.’
‘Are you joking with me?’ Chloe asked him.
He laughed. ‘No,krúttio mitt. I mean, I do not know if the stories are truth at all, they are Icelandic fairy tales, but these are not made by my mind.’
She knew one story that was truth. Sad truth. Her lack of fertility reality. Maybe this was the time.
‘If you like potatoes,’ Gunnar said as Chloe moved a little closer to the water’s edge. ‘I guess finding them in your shoes is a good gift.’
She wasn’t really listening to him now. She breathed the freezing air in deep and shuddered. It was like her body and her mind were both begging for some kind of release.
‘You are ready to shout your truth into the crater?’ Gunnar asked.
She sensed him standing behind her now, not touching her but close enough to make a connection if she wanted it. She had wanted it. Felt that giddy, excited churning inside when she was with him. Maybe just experiencing those kinds of feelings for someone again was enough, to restore her faith that life might not only contain career climbing, that there was a chance for something else.
‘I’m ready,’ Chloe said, teeth juddering.
With the deepest of inhales, as she closed her eyes tight, she shouted into the volcano, to the Earth and up high to the sky with every ounce of hurt and grief, but, most of all, with powerful acceptance.
‘I CAN’T HAVE CHILDREN!’
And as her words echoed back at her, she snapped open her eyes, heart pumping, body re-awakening. Something in the universe felt like it had shifted, akin to the tectonic plates that had created this place. She listened to the reverberation of her words, felt it on the surface of her skin, then, determinedly, she let it sink in, almost welcoming the final acceptance of this reality. Then, when all was still again, when the only sound she could hear was the whistle of the wind above her own thudding heartbeat, she turned around and looked at Gunnar.
He had never looked more handsome to her than at this moment. That tall frame, so solid, those astonishing eyes fixed on her, unmoving, unperturbed but definitely absorbing. Usually now would be the time she would drop her eyes, or feel some kind of embarrassment for publicly admitting something so personal in such a way, but not today. Today she was owning this moment.
And then Gunnar did move. He wrapped his arms around her and he picked her up off the ground like she was weightless, holding her tight against him as if he wanted to transmit all that he had to her – strength, resilience, energy. Chloe closed her eyes and breathed him in, feeling like she was an over-emotional monkey clinging to a tree.
‘I am here,krúttio mitt,’ Gunnar whispered in her ear. ‘Please know this. Feel this.’
She did feel it. And she so, so wanted to believe it.
52
A SECRET LOCATION…
Everything felt different and Gunnar could not explain it without wondering if the spirits of this island were absolute fact and not simply folklore. From the moment he had heard what Chloe hollered to the universe at Kerid it was as if something inside him had unlocked. Vulnerability wasn’t weakness. Vulnerability was power. Why had he not realised that there was a chance for the greatest, strongest connection if you showed someone the parts you considered to be weaknesses?
He had held her for the longest time at the edge of the lake, until his biceps started to burn and then, when he had put her down, he had taken her hand in his and not let it go until they got back to the minibus. He knew then where he wanted to take her next and he could not have cared less if it fitted with any idea for the company event.
‘This isn’t the Blue Lagoon,’ Chloe commented as Gunnar opened the door for her.
‘No,’ he said. ‘It is not.’
‘Is this a different spa?’ Chloe asked. ‘More exclusive?’
