Page 16 of The Hidden Daughter (The Lost Daughters #7)

She paused to try one of the clams herself, loving the flavour of the white wine and garlic she’d cooked them in.

Charlotte made a mental note to include a slice of fresh rye bread or toasted wholegrain loaf with this dish if she served it on a menu—it would be a shame not to have something to soak up the juices with.

And it was then she realised that this was the first conversation she’d ever had with anyone where she’d been able to talk about her family issues without feeling emotional.

Perhaps it was because he was a stranger, but Harrison was proving very easy to talk to.

‘Have you seen him since you returned?’ Harrison asked.

She shook her head. ‘I haven’t. I will, but it’s been so long that I’m not quite sure how to go about it, so I thought I’d bide my time a little bit.’

Harrison set down his fork, and she found herself studying how handsome his face was.

‘I know I don’t know anything about what your childhood was like or how it was becoming estranged from your father, but if I can give you one piece of advice, it’s to go and see him while you still can,’ Harrison said, his eyes locked on hers as they stared at each other across the table.

‘You never know when the choice might be taken from you.’

He cleared his throat and glanced away, and she took a small sip of wine to give him a moment, feeling as if they were talking about more than just her father. But she didn’t want to ask, and he didn’t offer more.

‘I will go and see him,’ she said. ‘Because you’re right—if something happened to him and we hadn’t reconciled, I’d never forgive myself. Besides, there’s a family mystery I need to tell him about.’

‘Well, that sounds rather interesting.’

She laughed and took another sip of wine, enjoying how relaxed she was with him.

It should have felt ridiculous and strange being the only two people seated in a room designed for over a hundred, but somehow it felt like one of the more intimate dinners she’d had in a long time.

And she knew that if she did take the job, she’d never forget her first experience of cooking in the kitchen and enjoying the evening with him.

She’d always be able to glance out and remember what a nice night they’d had together, and that somehow he’d seemed to understand her complicated family relationships.

‘Trust me when I say that it’s a long story,’ she said.

He sat back and folded his hands behind his head. ‘It just so happens I have all night, especially with all this delicious food on board.’

So, Charlotte told him about the box—how it had been discovered and what was inside—watching as his eyebrows pulled together in disbelief when she got to the part about all the others being left for babies who’d been placed for adoption.

She’d barely paused for breath, finding that she wanted to share it all with him despite barely knowing the man.

‘Do you have the box with you?’ he asked.

‘Unfortunately, I don’t. I left it with my great-grandmother, Amalie. Honestly, I think I would have had to prise it from her fingers if I’d wanted to take it. Just looking at it seemed to take her back in time, maybe to a happier place.’

‘What’s your gut feeling about it all?’ Harrison asked, leaning across the table to take the bottle of Pinot Noir and pour a little more into each of their glasses. ‘Why do you think it was left? What do you think the secret is about?’

She shrugged, cradling her glass in her hand as she considered his question.

She’d gone round and round it so many times in her mind, trying to figure out why Amalie would have left it, but she’d still come up with nothing.

Her only conclusion had been that a secret adoption had indeed taken place; but if that wasn’t the case, then she had nothing.

‘Honestly? I don’t know. I think that this is bigger than just my great-grandmother keeping a secret. It feels as if it’s something that’s been kept from our entire family. But then again, maybe I’m being dramatic.’

‘Maybe not. Times were different then, secrets were kept that we wouldn’t have to keep now,’ Harrison said. ‘How did she react when you asked her? Did she seem upset by it all? Could it be that your great-grandmother had another child? Another daughter who isn’t your grandmother?’

‘She seemed, I don’t know, almost happy to see the photo.

It was as if she came to life again the moment she saw him and said his name, so perhaps you’re right about something being hidden just simply because of the times.

But honestly, I don’t think she could have had another baby, given my grandmother’s birth date. The timeline just doesn’t add up.’

‘Perhaps a secret she didn’t want to keep then?’ Harrison asked. ‘Something related to the birth but not what you’ve thought of so far? Or a secret that someone else forced her to keep for them?’

‘But if Oskar is her secret, and then she married my great-grandfather, then who was Oskar? Was he her great love, and she’s had to keep him hidden all this time for fear of hurting anyone’s feelings?

And if he was her one true love, then why didn’t she marry him?

What reason could there have been for them to be parted? It honestly doesn’t make sense.’

Harrison shrugged. ‘Maybe. But then maybe a person can have two great loves? It doesn’t mean that she loved her husband any less, so perhaps he simply came before your great-grandfather, and they weren’t to be.’

‘You truly think so?’ Charlotte asked. ‘I mean, it’s not that I don’t believe a person can fall in love twice, but within such a short space of time it just seems…’

‘I think none of us knows what love and loss will do to us until we experience it ourselves.’

Charlotte sighed, noticing the way Harrison looked away again, as if he wasn’t comfortable talking about relationships, his voice husky.

It was the same when he’d told her to be sure to see her father again before it was too late.

But she didn’t feel that she knew him well enough to ask about his own relationships.

‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘I might discover more in the morning. We’re going back to see Amalie, and hopefully she’ll have another lucid moment and be able to share some more of her story with us.

I’m only grateful that she’s still here to tell us what she can, because if this box had surfaced in a few years’ time, it might have all remained a mystery forever, and we’d never have known anything about it. ’

‘Well, on that note, I think I might call it a night.’ Harrison looked at the plates around them. ‘Actually, I’ve just realised that despite being in a restaurant, there’s no one to take these plates.’

‘It’s fine, I can—’

‘Not a chance,’ he said, clearing their plates and cutlery and leaving Charlotte to collect the wineglasses as he walked back to the kitchen. ‘We’ll get it done quickly if we do it together.’

She set the glasses she was carrying down on the counter and stood back as he filled the large sink in the kitchen with soapy water and began to wash, surprised by how at ease he was.

The one and only serious boyfriend she’d had would never have rolled up his sleeves and got to work like this—whether she’d cooked for him or not—whereas she had a feeling that no matter how much she’d protested, Harrison wouldn’t have walked away.

‘You don’t seem to mind the clean-up,’ she said, adding pots and pans to the dirty pile to his right. ‘It’s nice to see.’

‘My sisters made sure that I always did my share of the chores growing up,’ he said, ‘and we always had this unwritten rule that the chef never had to clean up. If you were on cooking, you got to do whatever you wanted once everyone was fed.’

‘Ahh, someone who knows my entire life philosophy.’ Charlotte laughed. ‘My brother used to believe it was the only reason I cooked, so that he had to be on dishes through all his teenage years. But then he was the golden child, so it did him good to have to do something he didn’t want to.’

She bumped her shoulder into Harrison’s without meaning to, but she found that she liked standing close to him and didn’t move away.

There was a calm energy about him, a feeling that he would be almost impossible to fluster, and she also found that she didn’t particularly want the night to end.

He was easy to be around, and she would have liked to have found out more about him.

She realised that all she’d done was talk about herself all night, albeit because he’d asked, but still, she’d have liked to end the evening feeling as if she knew him a little better.

‘I’m sorry you had to hear about my family dramas,’ she said. ‘It’s something I usually avoid talking about at all costs, and yet I told you almost everything in one night.’

‘It’s fine, I liked learning more about you. It explains a lot, actually. Why you’ve achieved so much at such a young age, and where the fire inside you comes from.’

‘Next time, I promise to let you do all the talking and I’ll try out some of my new mains on you. If you’re game, that is.’

‘I actually haven’t had such a nice evening in a very long time, so thank you,’ Harrison said, as he let the water out of the sink and she put the last dish away. ‘And yes, I wouldn’t miss it. You tell me when, and I’ll be here.’

Harrison moved closer to her then, and Charlotte placed one hand on the counter to steady herself.

She looked up into his eyes, wondering for a fleeting moment if he was about to kiss her, but instead he took her hand and squeezed it gently before collecting his coat, catching her eye one last time before turning away.

The wine had clearly gone straight to her head if she’d thought he was going to do anything more—their night together had been lovely, but it certainly hadn’t been a date.

‘Goodnight, Charlotte. Thank you for the most wonderful culinary experience.’

‘You’re very welcome,’ she replied. ‘Thank you for letting me experiment on you.’

She clasped her hands together, watching him go. And when he turned at the door and glanced back at her, she had a feeling that there were so many more layers to the man she’d just spent the evening with.

Usually that would make her want to run.

She didn’t have time for men in general, let alone ones she couldn’t figure out on the first date, which was of course not what this had been, but Harrison was different.

Harrison was the kind of man who made her want to find out more, and it had been a very, very long time since a man had made her feel that way.

If one ever had.

Realising that she had no way of contacting him without going through Daniel, Charlotte quickly dashed after Harrison, running out into the empty foyer and calling to him.

‘Harrison.’ Her voice wasn’t loud, but it still echoed through the vast space as if she’d shouted it.

He stopped walking and turned, one hand pushed casually into the pocket of his jeans.

‘I was thinking I could show you around tomorrow, since there’s so much you haven’t seen. If you still want that tour, that is?’

Charlotte knew she would never forget the smile that lit his face, the way his chocolate-brown eyes seemed to soften. ‘I’d like that. But could we say the day after tomorrow?’

‘Sure. After lunch? Early afternoon?’

‘I have meetings until two, but I can meet you in the lobby straight after.’

‘I’ll be here.’

And this time when he left, she knew she hadn’t been imagining the spark between them, and she also knew that it would be impossible to sleep, because the idea of showing him around, just the two of them, was even more daunting than devising a bold new menu for the biggest, newest hotel in Oslo.