But this was her second day here and she’d not thought once about the ‘next’ meeting, or checking the daily schedule to ensure she knew everyone’s names, faces and enough about their lives to make the connections that were so important to her and to the success of her charities.
She inhaled, low and slow. The kind of peace that was found here... She understood why Kjell had chosen this as his home. But it was a sad sort of peace as she recognised that while she might have this calm in her future, it hurt to know that she would be saying goodbye to all the good she could do as a royal.
And, rather than dwell on it, she allowed herself to be hypnotised into an aching sort of restfulness by the falling snow. The wind was beginning to slow—the eddies and currents in the flakes less frantic, more graceful and she couldn’t help but wonder what the windows revealed in the summer. Where, instead of shades of grey, the landscape would be awash with greens and browns, blues and yellows. To be able to sit here and watch the seasons change...
She heard a pan drop onto the stovetop and another Swedish curse. Peering around to the kitchen area, she saw Kjell shake his hand, angrily staring down at the offending cooking equipment.
‘Can I help?’ she asked as he rolled his shoulders back, the muscles rippling beneath the fine thermal jumper that pressed as close to his skin as she wanted to.
‘Could you set the table?’
It was such a domestic moment it struck right to her heart. For a second she was frozen in place, remembering how they’d once laughed in her dorm room at university the first time Freya had ever set a table. He’d always had her doing things that were unfamiliar to her, from the smallest to the greatest. He’d always encouraged her. Another clatter came from the kitchen, thrusting her into action. As she went to the shelves that held stacked plates, glasses, mugs and cutlery, she couldn’t help but ask, ‘You still swear in Swedish?’
When she looked up she caught his gaze and something passed across his eyes.
‘My father is Swedish,’ he said, turning back to the large pan on the stovetop.
Then she remembered. ‘Oh, I thought that was...’ She trailed off, wanting to bite out her own tongue.
‘Not a lie, Princess,’ he said, his tone brutally bland.
She hated the twist of shame that unfurled at her implied accusation. She wanted it gone. This tension, this awkwardness. She wanted the ease that they’d shared all those years ago.
‘My father is Swedish but moved to Svardia to be with my mother when they married,’ he said, as if presenting the information as a peace offering.
‘He gave up everything to be with her?’ she asked, surprised. ‘Why?’
‘He loved her. And her job is...important.’
‘What does she do?’ Freya asked, beginning to ease into the back and forth of the interaction.
There was a pause and when she looked up his back was to her, his hands pressed against the sideboard. ‘She’s the Principal Private Secretary of the Royal Household.’
Freya nearly dropped the plate she was holding. ‘Anita Bergqvist? Your mother is—?’
‘Yes.’
‘Kjell!’
‘What?’
‘I see your mother almost on a daily basis!’ she cried, hating the feeling of pins and needles creeping across her skin, humiliation and guilt vying to win out.
‘And?’
‘And doesn’t she blame me for separating her from her son?’
‘I’d imagine she blames her son for making a monumental mistake and getting himself exiled,’ he ground out, stalking towards the table with two bowls in his hand. ‘The bread is on the side, there’s butter in the cool box under the sink by the window.’
A monumental mistake.
If he only knew. Thinking of her diagnosis, thinking of the future she would now have, he’d had a lucky escape and just didn’t know it. He’d always been interested in her siblings, not because of their titles but because of their relationship. The bond, as loving and frustrated and downright painful as it was sometimes. She’d told him how much her brother’s retreat had hurt her, confessed that she had spoiled their sister sometimes but hadn’t been able to help it. Kjell had relished every part of that because he’d relishedfamily. By the time she returned to the table she thought she’d gathered herself, but the assessing gaze he sent her way made her think again. He’d always been able to do that. See the truth of her.
After placing the bread and butter on the table, she scooped up some papers and felt Kjell flinch as she placed them at the far end. Glancing down at the top of the pile, she saw an unfilled After Action Report with a due date of a week ago and felt her pulse leap.
Retreating behind a mask of innocence, she sat down and helped herself to dinner, while her mind tripped and turned over the report and Kjell’s reaction. Ithadto be connected to the medal. But AARs were vital military assessments, to let one slide past the due date was...wrong. It just didn’t fit with the by-the-book excellence that would have been required for Kjell to reach Lieutenant Colonel in such a short time.
To cover her thoughts, she returned to Anita. ‘Your mother is wonderful,’ she said, her tone infused with genuine warmth.