Page 79 of Ignited in Iceland
‘And you thought this was the best time to introduce yourself?’
He choked out a laugh. ‘I know. Stupid.’
‘Siggi. Don’t be so hard on yourself. It’s natural to want to know your daughter.’
‘But you are right. I cannot turn up at their door and tell her who I am.’
‘No, but have you talked to her mother about this?’
‘Hekla and I, we do not talk. I left her at the worst time. It was something we should have done together.’
‘It’s easy to say that now. You’re not twenty-odd with your whole life disappearing before your eyes. It’s easy to think a different decision would have been simple to make.’
Siggi looked at her with enormous relief in his eyes. ‘I couldn’t tell you before. I didn’t think anyone would understand.’
‘When I made you knock on their door in Hraunvik, we’d just met. I’d have thought it was so weird if you’d blurted out your life story to explain why you didn’t want to do that.’
He smiled. ‘When you put it like that. Can I have another pastry?’
Iris tried to stifle a yawn as she passed the bag to him. Now that she’d stopped, she felt exhausted.
‘You look tired,’ Siggi said, tucking a stray curl behind her ear. ‘Want to nap together?’
‘I don’t think there’s room for me on the sofa. I might go back to the hotel and come back later.’
‘Don’t go.’
She didn’t want to go, but now that she’d noticed she was tired, her bed was calling.
‘Are you sleeping on the sofa?’ she asked, nodding at the mezzanine where the bed was. There was no chance of Siggi making it up there.
He shook his head. ‘There’s another bedroom in there,’ he said. ‘Come on, stay.’
She went through the door he’d gestured to, into a very smart kitchen. A door off to one side led to a small room which was entirely filled with a bed. It was a very inviting-looking bed, almost entirely covered with various throws, blankets, and more pillows.
‘Okay,’ she said, frowning when she went back into the lounge, where Siggi was standing on one leg, grappling with his crutches. ‘How did you even get into the house?’
‘Jonas helped. You expect me to be an expert with these already?’
‘I’m sorry. Are you alright?’
‘Yes,’ he said, sounding more confident than he looked.
‘Is there anything I can do?’
‘Nothing except get into bed.’ The glint was back in his eye, just as it had been before.
What was she meant to do? Pretend the breakfast conversation had never happened? Did the fact that he could have died yesterday mean that there was some kind of free pass and everything just went back to how it had been before?
The thing was, she wanted it to be like it had been before and she was too tired to fight that. The bed was beckoning her.
She watched anxiously as he made his way to the doorway of the bedroom. He sat on the edge of the bed and propped the crutches against the doorjamb. Iris pulled off her jeans and top until she was standing in the kitchen in her underwear. Maybe it gave the wrong message, but all she could think about was sleeping. It was getting harder by the minute to keep her eyes open.
Siggi reached for her and she took a step towards him. He put his hands on her waist and pulled her closer, then laid his head against her chest. ‘Iris…’ he breathed into her.
Now would be the perfect time to launch into the conversation about where they were heading. What did he want? What did she want?
Instead, she kissed the top of his head, then clambered over him onto the bed. She pushed the pillows aside, pulled the covers down, and climbed in, moving over to the wall to make space for him. He lay down beside her, shifting around until he was comfortable, then he took her hand and almost immediately, she fell asleep.
