Page 12 of The Christmas Book Flood

SEVEN

Tatiana craned her head to watch the PBY Catalina fly overhead, closer than she ever got to see them in the city.

She walked backward for a few steps so that she could keep it in view as it aimed toward the runway at the American base, a few of the day’s last rays of sunlight glinting off its wings.

Airplanes never ceased to amaze her. How they could strap engines to giant tin cans and get them airborne was completely beyond her.

“They say someday airplanes will be so common that everyone will be able to fly on them, if they want,” Anders said from beside her.

She took another backward step—but shouldn’t have.

Her booted foot found a pothole and a squeal escaped her lips as she lost her balance.

Her arms wheeled out, and she would have fallen gracelessly to the ground had Anders not steadied her with an arm around her back.

She looked over and up at his face, closer than she’d ever been to him before, and smiled into the warm light in his eyes.

“My hero,” she said around another laugh.

He should grin more often. When he did, it made his eyes shrink to glistening crescents that invited her to memorize the shade of blue his irises were. He helped her regain her feet and then, after a moment of clear indecision, offered his elbow. “Perhaps to... steady you?”

She’d be plenty steady once she faced forward again, but she wasn’t about to turn down the offer. Pivoting with him back toward the city and the two little girls skipping happily a few feet ahead of them, she tucked her mittened hand into the crook of his elbow. “Thank you.”

Though his scarf covered much of his neck, she thought she glimpsed just a bit of red rising above it into his face. He cleared his throat and nodded toward their nieces. “Glad they hit it off so quickly.”

She smiled, having thought the same. “Elea is always quick to make friends. She takes after her father in that. Ari and I were both always a bit more introverted.”

“Someone who loves books and art but is still an extrovert. She’s a veritable unicorn.”

Another laugh bubbled up. She’d never heard a unique person being described as a mythical creature before, but it fit.

“I can’t thank you enough for all your help with her this week.

As sad as she was when she arrived, I thought for sure this would be a visit full of tears and anger—but instead, she’s been all but bursting with stories every day when we get home. ”

It reminded her of her own childhood, how she and Ari would race home from school to tell their parents all the day’s stories.

She’d spend the entire journey trying to figure out how to weave all the little minutiae of her day into a tale with a beginning, a middle, and an end, one that exaggerated the adventures with friends or the villainy of her rivals.

And their parents would listen with rapt attention, with laughter or gasps, and then compose their own stories to share.

She’d missed that. In general, living alone hadn’t proven to be as lonely as she feared it would be, but having Elea with her for more than just a weekend.

.. it made her remember how much she loved having a family around her.

People to share her day with. People to listen to each other’s stories.

It made her yearn for children of her own to engrain with the love of storytelling that all Icelanders seemed to be born with, to a greater or lesser degree.

“You don’t need to thank me,” Anders said. Of course. “Helga is the true hero, making her so comfortable. But for my part, it has been a joy, and I have no doubt next week will be as well. Children always have such a fresh way of looking at things, don’t they?”

She nodded her agreement, smiling when Heidi, just a few months older than Elea, turned back for a second to make sure they were still there and flashed a grin at her uncle that declared without words that he was her favorite.

And no wonder. Tatiana had already learned today that, since Anders’s three brothers were out fishing every day but Sundays, he was often the one to step in on Saturdays and take the children on outings.

From the sound of it, scarcely a weekend went by when he wasn’t fulfilling the role of doting uncle with at least one niece or nephew, and often three or four at a time.

He had a total of eight, she’d learned—five boys and three girls, though two of those girls were under the age of three, so not yet good companions for Heidi.

Hence why she’d been so thrilled when he’d said Elea would be joining them.

For a moment, she let herself imagine that they weren’t just colleagues, she and Anders.

That they were a real couple walking along the road from the American base back to the city, that Heidi and Elea were truly cousins.

Or, better still, their own daughters, laughing and chattering away like she and Ari had always done.

A silly dream. But one so potent she knew she’d better dislodge it from her mind pronto. She turned her face up toward his. “Do you have plans with your family for Christmas?”

“Mm.” His agreement didn’t sound exactly exuberant. “There will be dinner on Christmas Eve at my mother’s, as always. We’ll exchange our gifts, then go to the midnight service at church.”

She lifted her brows. “You don’t sound excited.”

He sighed, keeping his gaze focused on the girls. “It’s just... sometimes I feel more alone with my family than I do when I’m actually alone.” He darted his eyes toward her, then forward again. “That probably sounds ridiculous. I’m blessed to have them. I know that. But...”

“But when you’re different from them, you can feel so very out of place in their company.

” She nodded. “I’ve thought the same on occasion.

Don’t get me wrong—I love my family, and we’ve always gotten along well.

But they’re all perfectly content with life in our little village, where they run our farm or spend their days fishing.

Where my mother and sister busy themselves all day long with housekeeping tasks and find joy in it. ”

Well—Ari’s joy had been hard to come by in the last few years, but it wasn’t because she didn’t find the life of a farmer’s daughter and fisherman’s wife fulfilling. It was just the grief of losing so many babies to miscarriage.

Tatiana sighed. “I knew that wasn’t the life for me.

I tried so hard to imagine it, tried to fall in love with someone from the village, tried to pretend that was all I wanted in life—but it just wasn’t .

” She shrugged, daring a quick peek up at Anders and finding his gaze steady on her, despite the fact that they kept walking.

“So I wrote to Uncle Valdi and all but begged him to give me a job. An opportunity to move to the city, to work with books.” To learn how to write them, though she wasn’t about to confess that.

“Not that I don’t want a family someday, of course. ” Too pointed? She hoped not.

His smile said he understood perfectly. “We are more alike than I thought. My family all lives in Reykjavik, of course, but they have been fishermen for generations, both sides. I’m the oddball too.

” He sent her another smile, then looked forward again, clearing his throat.

“And I am... quite glad your uncle gave you a job. You... you bring sunshine into the office.”

She knew very well his cheeks would be reddening if she looked over at him, and since she felt her own flush, she instead kept her face forward.

But she leaned a little closer, so that their arms brushed.

Anders was always kind, but that was by far the most personally complimentary thing he’d ever said to her, and she knew it had cost him to say it.

For the first time, she wondered if Elea was right. Maybe he did like her. Maybe the fact that he’d never said anything was more because he was bashful than because he saw her as nothing but her uncle’s assistant.

Her pulse thundered in her ears. She should encourage him. Make it clear that she’d welcome it if he ever decided to ask her on an outing without the excuse of their nieces.

Of course, if they were to date, then she’d have to confess that they were already more than office colleagues—that he was, in fact, her editor. That the rapport they’d developed via correspondence was theirs .

It made anxiety knot her stomach, and she realized as the first buildings of town rose up around them that she’d waited too long to respond. Which triggered a whole new anxiety—she didn’t want him to think his opinion wasn’t treasured, but they had only minutes left of their walk.

She lifted her free hand and rested it against his forearm, sending him a warm smile. “This has been so nice. I’m glad you asked us to come.”

His face turned her way, a smile upon his lips—but then it froze, and his posture shifted as his gaze fastened on something beyond her.

She turned too and saw that they’d drawn even with the building he’d pointed out as his on their way out of town, and that two women were standing outside the door, the older of them even now lifting her hand in greeting.

His mother, she could see that at a glance. And the younger woman beside her looked exactly like her, minus thirty years, which meant it must be his little sister, Ada. And given the confusion on their faces, clearly neither of them had a clue who she or Elea were.

“Anders,” his mother called out in greeting as he adjusted course. “Heidi.”

The girls spun toward the building too, Heidi shouting, “Ommu!” and rushing to wrap her arms around the woman.