Page 52 of Adrift in Iceland
Eva laughed, snapping Astrid out of her daydream.
‘Exactly! And at least everyone saw that, even if it wasn’t as good as we saw this morning. It’s nature. Everyone knows that.’
‘Hmm, I’m not so sure,’ said Astrid. ‘One woman asked me when we were going to see the fin whale and the blue whale, as if she was on an outing to the zoo.’
‘What did you say?’ Leifur asked, amusement in his eyes.
‘I told her we can’t predict which whales will show up.’
‘Ha! She probably went away thinking she still has a chance to see them in Faxaflói Bay.’ Leifur chuckled to himself.
‘It’s too shallow, right?’ Eva said.
‘Yes, it’s only thirty metres deep. Nowhere near deep enough for a blue whale, although I did hear that a blue whale brought her calf here to keep them away from some orcas who were further out in the ocean,’ said Astrid.
‘I saw that,’ said Leifur.
‘Really? That’s incredible,’ said Eva.
Astrid thought so too and waited for him to elaborate.
‘It was about six years ago,’ he began, settling himself down on a bench and taking a swig of the bottle of water in his hand as if it were a bottle of beer and he was a salty old sea dog of a fisherman telling stories in a dimly-lit seaman’s bar.
‘I heard it was ten years ago,’ said Astrid, grinning.
‘Who’s telling this story?’ Leifur said, raising an eyebrow.
It was very sexy, so Astrid sat down on the deck, leaning back on her arms and with her legs out in front of her to listen. Eva did the same.
‘I was out onBrimfaxion a frosty February morning. The sun was barely up, but I heard a noise I’d never heard before. It was like the sound the humpback whales make, but deeper. It felt as if it was vibrating through the boat. I cut the engines because I had a feeling it was something out of the ordinary, and I waited.’ He paused for dramatic effect. ‘All of us were standing on the deck and it was eerily quiet, then we heard the sound again and this time, we saw the calf breach. That calf was bigger than a humpback. Bigger than anything else I’ve seen in these waters. Then the mother came up beside it, and she was huge. And when she dived, her tail in the air, it was one of the most incredible things I’ve ever seen.’
‘You never told me about that,’ Astrid said.
Leifur shrugged. ‘I haven’t thought about it for a while.’
‘Incredible,’ said Eva, shaking her head.
‘Eva, thank you for today. You can go. We’ll see you in the morning,’ said Leifur.
‘Are you sure? I don’t mind staying to help.’
‘No, you’ve had a long day. We can finish up,’ Astrid said, hoping that Leifur was thinking the same as her. ‘Thank you, you’ve done a great job.’
Eva blushed with pride and headed off, waving as she walked along the quay.
‘I don’t know about you, but I might need a lie down before I start prepping for tomorrow,’ Leifur said.
‘Oh, so that’s why you sent Eva home.’
‘Think of it as a debrief,’ he said, raising an eyebrow before taking her in his arms. She lifted the bottom of his sweater and ran her hands over the front of his chest, sighing at the release it gave her. It was hard, even for the few minutes since he’d pulled his suit down around his waist, to sit with thefeeling of wanting to rip his clothes off. All the pent-up frustration came out in that sigh when she touched him.
They headed below deck and into the cabin. Astrid untied the sleeves of Leifur’s suit and pushed it down his legs. He sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled her so that she was standing between his legs. Now it was his turn to run his hands over her, and in one swift movement, he pulled all of her top layers off.
‘Look at you,’ he murmured, his hands on her waist.
He dropped tender kisses onto her stomach, but impatiently she wanted more. She pushed him with one hand on his chest so that he was lying on the bed.
‘Who’s in charge here?’ he said.
