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“You are beautiful, Vindur,” he murmured, tracing my bottom lip with a thumb. “I need to get to the train station soon.”

“Yeah.” I kissed his fingertip.

“Just one more.” Kjartan brought my mouth back on his for a half open kiss.

Ugh.

I wanted him to strip my clothes and put me through the wringer. Yet the idea of doing things differently with him felt…right?

Maybe he wants more than a one-night stand. Or maybe that’s just wishful thinking.

“Can I have your phone number?” he asked me as he put on his boots.

“Yes, of course.”

I typed it into his smartphone and handed it back. Kjartan pocketed it, took hold of me, and had me up against the wall in a flash.

“Good night, Vindur,” he said, lips ghosting over mine with every word. Then he kissed me one last time.

I watched him limping down the street towards Kirkmuir’s central station.

No ‘See you soon’ or ‘Can I get a second date’.

I was never the one to fall in love. Rhys called me ‘flighty’, whatever that meant. Not thathewas cut out for commitment.

Yet, I could imagine it all with Kjartan. All the domestic bliss. When I closed my eyes, I saw us cooking dinner together and dancing in the kitchen, grinning at our own cheesiness but neither stopping nor letting go. I wanted to kiss him while folding laundry and put on fresh sheets only to get them dirty straight away.

I bet we’d have fantastic, messy sex.

I will probably never see him again.

Chapter 6

Kjartan

Ibeat myself up for messing things up with Beryl most of the week. If my new colleague, Ragnar, noticed anything, he didn’t let it on.

We were making a custom kitchen table. As we cut the wood to size, joined it, and sanded it until it was silken to the touch, I let the evening play over and over again in my head.

My favourite moment had been when Bee had ground himself on my lap. Arousal looked so good on him.

I suppressed a little sigh, then straightened up.

“I need to make a phone call,” I told Ragnar in Suitian. He didn’t look up and just growled to indicate he’d heard me.

My heart hammered in my chest as I left the workshop with my phone clutched in my sweaty hand.

After a few deep breaths, I dialled.

Nobody picked up.

I didn’t just call him once but many times over the course of a couple of hours.

“Hello?” a grumpy voice finally answered my hundredth call.

“Hello, Vindur? It’s me, Kjartan.”

I missed you.