Page 75 of Ship Wrecked

“Ja,” she said, then tugged him down with a hand on the back of his head and planted a smacking kiss on his cheek. “Welcome to Sweden,skitstövel.”

Someone was saying... something.

Peter couldn’t seem to focus. He was still dazed from jet lag and a long flight aboard a crowded plane. Not to mention exhaustion from several days of incessant fucking at every opportunity. Also the brain fog resulting from a too-short, sweaty nap spent atop a very narrow guest bed, beside a radiator pumping out tropical air, covered by a stiflingly heavy duvet so he couldn’t inadvertently expose Maria’s entire family to freshly showered, full-frontal goodness—

He rubbed his forehead, his erratic train of thought entirely derailed.

What was with the lack of bedding, anyway? Did Swedes not believe in top sheets and blankets? Didn’t they experience sleeping temperatures anywhere between Steamy Heat Requiring Absolute Nakedness and Hypothermic Huddling Beneath a Down Duvet Suitable for Antarctica?

If he’d known, he’d have packed pajamas. Or purchased pajamastopack. Or, alternatively, gotten used to sleeping in boxer briefs rather than going commando.

Which raised yet more fuzzy-minded questions: Was Marianaked right now? Was her bed bigger than his? Might she want company? And did her mattress creak too? Because if not—

Someone cleared their throat, and Peter raised his head, blinking wearily.

Oh, right. While Maria continued her own nap, he’d stumbled downstairs and found himself surrounded by the entire remaining clan of Ivarssons. Most of them were working on dinner, and he’d wanted to assist, but when he’d offered, the outraged refusals had been too fierce to resist. So now he was sitting at the large dining room table with Maria’s brother Vincent, who appeared to be the family’s chosen diplomatic representative to the Sovereign Sleepy State of Peter Reedton.

Vincent, who also appeared to be waiting for a response to a question Peter hadn’t heard.

“Sorry. Jet lag is a beast.” Peter straightened in his chair and marshaled his straggling thoughts. “Can you repeat what you just said?”

“What did you think of ICA?” Vincent didn’t appear offended. “Is it very different from American grocery stores?”

Peter took a moment to blearily consider the appropriate level of honesty in his response.

Under normal circumstances, staying in the guest room of complete strangers for an entire week—as Maria had finally persuaded him to do—would necessitate a certain amount of tongue-biting and noncommittal small talk, for fear of offending his hosts. Who were, after all, feeding him, and could thus spit in his food whenever the spirit so moved them.

Plus, he didn’t want her family to hate him. They were a close-knit group, maybe closer than he’d even guessed, and if they disapproved of him...

Well, if pitted against them, he was pretty sure he wouldn’t come out on top. Not yet, anyway. So he was making a concerted effort not to be surly or silent or in any way like himself.

That said, they were Maria’s family, so he figured they couldn’t be too easily offended. Also, her parents had spent the entire ride from ICA to their yellow-painted two-story home outside Stockholm feeding him yet more complete bullshit about Sweden.

For example: According to Stina, sixty percent of Swedes self-identified as ABBAsexuals. Including her and her husband.

After she made that pronouncement, Olle glanced over at her and placed a hand on her knee. “Knowing me, knowing you, being ABBAsexual is the best we can do. Right,älskling?”

Yeah, they were smartasses through and through. But maybe Maria’s siblings weren’t.

Vincent, in his late thirties and the oldest of those siblings, was still looking at him, blond man-bunned head cocked. Still waiting yet again for an answer to a completely innocuous question.

Aw, fuck it. Other than a few television appearances and interviews, he and Maria would be spending a lot of time with her family, and he didn’t want to pretend for seven days.

“Your checkout lanes scare the shit out of me, man.” When he saw Stina gathering silverware for the table, he half rose out of his chair to help, but she waved him back down. Reluctantly, he turned to Vincent once more. “I don’t mind bagging my own groceries, but I wasn’t prepared for the intensepressure. By the time I managed to get all our stuff in the bags, two separate families were waiting for me to finish so they could pack their own groceries, the checkout clerk had stopped scanning things and was giving me a look of disdain and pity, and I think I panicked and threw an entire ham on top of our eggs.”

“You did,” Stina called from the far end of the kitchen.

Olle nodded, mouth grim. “Somewhere, a lone hen felt a disturbance in the Force. A century from now, historians will trace the origins of the Great Chicken Rebellion to this very incident and blame you for the carnage.”

Peter could now identify the owner of the sci-fi novels stacked on the coffee table.

“And without those eggs, we’ll all starve.” Stina shook her head and removed a stack of plates from a white-painted cabinet. “It’s a shame. I actually like one or two of you. Mostly Filip, if I had to specify.”

Filip snorted and kept stirring his pot of gravy.

Astrid, Maria’s younger sister, grinned at Peter as she set the table. “Mamma and Pappa didn’t help you pack the bags?”

As if. “The three of them sat down on a bench to watch and laughed until they cried.”

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