by Jagger, Kait
Luna felt a sudden, hard nudge on her shoulder and turned to find Kayla hoisting herself up onto the work surface, green eyes sparkling with drink and speculation. ‘Choices, choices…’ Kayla mused, rotating her empty wine glass expectantly.
‘Not Timo,’ Luna said, reaching into the fridge for the Pinot Grigio.
Kayla nodded. ‘No, no accountants.’
‘No married accountants,’ Luna corrected, flicking some water from the sink at her friend’s flawless, mocha-coloured cheek. Shy Timo, the only Salonen brother to have settled down, was expecting his wife and two children for a family holiday the following day, for which Stefan had loaned him the lakeside cottage.
‘I quite fancy Mika,’ Kayla ventured. Luna could offer no argument there. Beneath his spiky blonde hair and brusque exterior, Mika was one of the most warm-hearted men she’d ever met, his quiet charm managing to penetrate even her own wall of reserve when they’d worked together on Shetland earlier that year. Now, she liked to think, he wasn’t just Stefan’s friend, but hers as well.
He was currently working on an assignment for her, however, and she didn’t need her marketing guru distracted by Kayla’s feminine wiles. ‘Just as long as you don’t bring any relationship drama back to Arborage,’ she warned.
‘I’m not looking for a relationship, babe.’ Kayla rolled her eyes and laid on the East End. ‘Just a quick shag, innit. Bi’ o’ the ol’ Posh ’n’ Becks.’
‘You can have Mika,’ came Nancy’s raspy voice as she hopped up on the counter next to Kayla. ‘But leave Matthias for me.’ She pointed to her empty wine glass and snapped her fingers at Luna, who went to retrieve the Pinot Grigio again. And kept to herself her view that even Nancy Richards, the smokingest PR in all New York’s five boroughs, would have a job on her hands to seduce Matthias Salonen. The eldest and least talkative of the brothers, Matthias was undeniably attractive in a rugged, every-scar-tells-a-story kind of way, but he didn’t strike Luna as boyfriend material.
Nancy and Kayla had moved on anyway, now weighing up the relative merits of the twins, both of whom worked for Matthias’s company in Finland. ‘Thing is,’ Nancy said rather more loudly than necessary, ‘how would you know which one you were shagging? I can’t tell them apart.’
‘To be fair, the whole family is like attack of the bleedin’ clones,’ said Kayla, ‘with all that hot blonde Finnishness.’
Nancy nodded salaciously. ‘And we available women are outnumbered by all this hotness, Kay.’
‘The odds are ever in our favour,’ Kay concurred, rubbing her hands together. With that, she grabbed Luna, pulling her back against the kitchen work surface, and clasped her arms around her neck. ‘Come on, bitch, carry me into the arena.’
Chapter Three
‘Oi, Lou!’ Jem shouted from across the living room two hours later. Luna, who was reclining against Stefan’s chest on a chaise next to the wood burner, looked up from the manuscript she was reading. Well into what had to be her fourth margarita of the night, Jem was perched on the sofa between Rod and Matthias, listing slightly. ‘Are you working?’ she said accusingly. Luna quickly flattened the manuscript against her chest, shaking her head, and Jem repeated herself: ‘Which one person in this room would you be most likely to tell a secret to?’
Ah, Luna smiled, the Which One Person game. Jem was a past master at drunken party quizzes, and this was one of her favourites. ‘Nan,’ she answered briefly, returning to her reading as Nancy simultaneously flipped the bird to both Kayla and Jem from her prone position in front of the fire.
‘Well!’ Kayla huffed. ‘I was going to say Luna, but now I’m switching to Timo. He’s so quiet he’d take your secrets to the grave.’ Timo’s eyes widened boyishly and he blushed. ‘Yes, I go with Timo too,’ came Mika’s voice from behind the sofa, where he was fiddling with the leads to the television.
‘If you were outnumbered in a fight,’ Jem asked no one in particular, leaning against Rod and sloshing her drink slightly, ‘which one person in this room would you want beside you?’
‘Matthias!’ all four of the younger Salonen brothers shouted simultaneously, prompting a sanguine nod from their eldest brother. Jem cocked an eyebrow at him and he frowned in thought. ‘Stefan,’ he said eventually, eliciting a deluge of groans from his siblings.
‘Oh yes,’ mocked Kimi. ‘You want the “management consultant” at your side when you’re in a life or death situation.’ He sat up straight and mimed tapping someone on the shoulder. ‘Ahem, excuse me, but I don’t think you’re attacking this man in the most efficient way possible.’
‘Have you considered outsourcing your fighting services?’ Kiki quipped.
‘No, no, Matthias is right,’ Mika said, emerging from behind the sofa, dusting his hands on his jeans. ‘With all his talk of downsizing and restructuring, Stefan would bore your enemies to death.’ He sat down in front of the coffee table and plugged the lead from the telly into his laptop, then nodded to Luna. ‘Ready.’
The project Mika had been working on at Arborage for the past two months was a new ad campaign to be rolled out on British Airways flights in the coming year. Luna had appealed to him personally after being underwhelmed by the London agencies tendering for the work. ‘Staid’ was one word that came to mind when she went through their storyboards, one of which featured a drawing of Stefan and her standing in the portico waving. ‘Nauseating’ was another.
No, she had an entirely different direction in mind for the campaign, which she made clear to Mika on the October morning he flew in from Helsinki, his trusty Logmar S-8 in tow. ‘This is about Stefan,’ she said as they walked arm in arm through the gardens. ‘He’s the face of Arborage. I want every fifty- to seventy-five-year-old woman on every long-haul flight into Heathrow looking at him and wanting to…’ she trailed off speculatively.
‘Deflower him?’ Mika supplied. ‘Caress his family jewels?’
‘Visit his estate,’ she corrected tartly. Mika responded with a characteristic blank look, but his eyes were twinkling. And they were twinkling something fierce now as he pressed play on the laptop.
The TV screen glowed to life, fading in from black to an aerial view of the estate’s woodlands, in glorious autumn colour. ‘Five hundred years of history,’ intoned a plummy, thespian narrator. ‘Seventeen lords and masters have stood bestride this hallowed land.’
‘Oh my God, is that fucking Gandalf?!’ Nancy screeched, running forward to join Jem and Kayla in front of the telly. Onscreen, the camera descended, skimming swiftly along the tops of the trees before cutting to a shot of trainers running through the forest, panning up to reveal high-tech black running leggings encasing a pair of lean, muscular thighs. Kayla let out a whistle and Stefan shifted slightly behind Luna.
The next scene found the camera racing along the polished marble floor of the portrait gallery, past paintings of Stefan’s predecessors, before closing in on a portrait of the 11th Marquess on the battlefield at Waterloo.
‘Kingmakers, battle-raisers… the roar of lions!’ boomed the voiceover as the footage cut back to the runner leaping like a gazelle over a log, impressively sculpted glutes pumping toward the estate’s ornamental lake in the distance.
‘Oh my days,’ Kayla panted, fanning herself. ‘That’s quite a—’ Only to be interrupted by Jem, who began jiggling and pointing at the screen, yelling, ‘I know that arse!’
Barely contained bedlam descended on the room for the next several seconds, the men in the room looking on in bemused puzzlement as Luna’s friends alternately watched images shot in the house and gardens in rapt silence, then erupted into shrieks every time the runner’s straining thighs appeared onscreen.
The ad finished with the runner slowing to a jog on the gravel path approaching Arborage House, climbing past twin lion statues up the steps to the portico. He bent over, resting his hands on his knees, panting heavily, and the camera closed on hi
s broad shoulders, heaving and flexing under a thin Lycra running shirt.
And then the 17th Marquess of Lionsbridge turned to face the screen, the lightest sheen of sweat on his face. Running a hand through his dark blonde hair, he locked his bright blue gaze on the camera and said, ‘Welcome to my home.’
As the screen faded to black, Kayla collapsed dramatically against Jem, clutching her chest, and Mika gave Luna a surreptitious wink. ‘That’s some serious granny porn there,’ Nancy said. ‘You sure you want the rest of womankind seeing that?’
‘My thoughts exactly,’ Stefan murmured in Luna’s ear.
‘Well, I don’t know about the grannies,’ Kimi said, rising from the sofa, ‘but I certainly want to shag him.’ He leaned in for a kiss and Stefan slapped him away good-naturedly.
The chalet reverted to party mode after that, the twins breaking out the vodka and shot glasses and Mika cueing up his latest party playlist on the laptop. Luna returned to her reading, losing herself in it again until she heard the words, ‘I’d pick Luna.’
It was Kayla who’d said them, standing in front of the fire, nodding at Luna seriously. ‘In a fight, I mean,’ she clarified. Nancy greeted this pronouncement with a disbelieving guffaw and even Jem had the ill grace to snort. ‘Hear me out,’ Kayla said, holding up a hand. ‘You remember the first time the Arctic Monkeys played V Fest, when that bloke tried to grab Jem?’
Nancy and Jem immediately stopped laughing. With a brief, that-shut-you-up-didn’t-it eyebrow waggle at them, Kayla raised her hands and launched into storytelling mode. ‘So,’ she said, ‘we’re standing in the middle of this muddy field, second encore and the crowd is going fucking manic around us, when all of the sudden Luna is like, “Where’s Jem?” And let me just tell you, we are all completely pissed, Luna included, so I don’t know how she even noticed that Jem was gone.’
‘Next thing we know,’ Nancy cut in, ‘Lou’s running through the crowd—’
‘She is fucking legging it across that field,’ Kayla affirmed. ‘Pushing people out of her way, climbing over them.’
‘I don’t even remember this, I was that blathered,’ Jem admitted. ‘But I do remember Luna standing next to me twisting some giant man’s ear, saying, “If you don’t—”’
‘“Take your hand—”’ chimed in Kayla.
‘“Off her arm!”’ thundered all three women.
‘I do not lie,’ Kayla recalled with relish. ‘He completely shat himself.’ At this, Stefan tightened his legs around Luna, wrapping his arms around her collarbone. Kayla shrugged. ‘I know she doesn’t look like much, and if she was just fighting for herself, Luna’d be all—’ She mimed a limp-wristed slap and mewled in a breathless, cut-glass accent, ‘“Stop. Please don’t hurt me!”’ Her merciless impression prompted chuckles all around the room, even from Luna.
‘But if someone was threatening me, or Jem, or anyone she loved,’ Kayla concluded, ‘Luna would be on them like a mama wolf. She would chase them down, get her fangs in their throat—’ She paused for dramatic effect, drew back her lips in a snarl and snapped her teeth together. ‘She would bring that fucker down.’
*
Luna woke at 3am to find herself alone in bed. She peeked over the mezzanine railing next to her bed and saw only Timo, snoring softly in front of the fire.
Wrapping herself in a throw, she walked to the sliding glass door that led to a small balcony and pushed it open a few inches. A sharp shaft of freezing air blew into the room and she heard Stefan’s voice drifting up from below, then smelled cigarette smoke. And knew he must be talking to Matthias.
They were speaking in Swedish, and most of it went straight over Luna’s head. A business discussion, it sounded like; talk of money, transactions. Stefan was doing most of the talking, with Matthias asking the occasional question, but the timbre of the Finn’s voice was so low Luna strained to hear him.
In truth, Matthias was a mystery to her. She got the impression, when he came to Arborage on an overnight visit to see Mika the previous month, that he didn’t think much of women – or maybe just of her. Nothing he said, because he said very little, at least in her earshot. But she felt his gaze upon her more than once, over dinner in the family’s private quarters. Assessing her, weighing her up… and, she believed, finding her wanting.
A sudden gust of wind blew a swirl of snow into the bedroom. Luna shivered in the cold, drawing the blanket tighter around her shoulders. She was on the verge of shutting the door when Stefan sighed heavily and three words drifted up to her: ‘Ugglor i mossen.’ It was an expression she’d heard him and his father use often, literally translating as ‘owls in the moss’. An uneasy feeling. Something wrong.
He joined her in bed shortly thereafter, sidling up to her and rubbing his feet against hers. ‘Otch!’ he exclaimed softly, ‘You’re freezing, flicka.’ She wriggled up against him and briefly considered asking about what she’d just overheard, but then Stefan said, ‘It’s going to be sunny tomorrow, less windy. We can finally get up on the mountain.’
‘Great,’ Luna said. ‘Can’t wait.’
Chapter Four
At just after 8am the following morning, Luna stood on a gondola next to Kayla and Jem, clutching her brand new snowboard, ascending to 1200 metres. A layer of fresh snow blanketed the slopes beneath them and the sun was rising on the horizon. It was a perfect day for skiing, Luna thought to herself, privately wishing she could make herself vanish before they got to the top.
Her heart had secretly plummeted when Stefan strolled into her office a few weeks earlier to announce this trip. Having been brought up in relative wealth in Stockholm, with parents who expected him to ‘try and excel’ at sports ranging from riding, to ice hockey, to, well, everything, it clearly hadn’t crossed his mind that his betrothed might not be able to ski. But even before she became an orphan at age twelve, Luna’s parents hadn’t had the money for ski trips. And after their deaths, when she only managed to stay on at St Catherine’s by grace of Lady Wellstone’s generosity, there was no question of her going on European ski excursions with the rest of her class.
What she probably should have done, standing in her office with Stefan, was to just admit this, tell him the truth. And watch him wince at his own presumption, smile that understanding smile of his, and say, ‘Don’t worry, flicka. I will teach you.’
And she couldn’t. She just couldn’t.
So instead Luna embarked on her first deception in their relationship, and quickly found herself a snowboarding instructor. Telling Stefan that she was trying out a new gym, she rose at 5am every morning for the subsequent two weeks, hopping on her Enduro and blazing up the motorway to an indoor ski centre in Hertfordshire, receiving an hour-and-a-half’s tuition in the half-lit, empty centre.
Her first session was a humbling experience. After learning how to strap and release her boots from the snowboard’s bindings and ride the drag lifts, Luna spent the better part of the next hour on her arse. (‘We need to work on your core fitness,’ her instructor said curtly after helping her up from her tenth fall on the artificial snow.) It was slow going, over the ensuing mornings, but gradually Luna improved, learning how to stop herself without falling, how to use her hands and arms for balance and resist her instinct to lean into turns. (‘You aren’t on your motorbike!’ snapped her instructor. ‘Move with the board.’)
Two weeks’ tuition does not an Olympic snowboarder make, however, and Luna had never tested herself on real ski slopes, in real, Swedish cold. ‘Bloody hell!’ Jem gasped as the door of the gondola slid open and the crystalline, sub-zero Arctic air blasted into their faces. But God, it was beautiful; a stark, almost other-worldly splendour to the frozen crest of the mountain, thin wisps of clouds appearing to hang at touching distance on the skyline.
First out of the gondola, Kimi and Kiki strode ahead in what could only be described as a blinding combination of neon snowboarding gear.
Stefan and Matthias, both dressed in black, followed behind. Nancy, looking like a Bond girl in her Oakley ski goggles and jaunty headband, led the rest of their motley crew. A skier almost since she could walk, she’d insisted they board the very first lift up the mountain, to ‘catch the powder’.
Luna, meanwhile, brought up the rear, boots crunching on the snow and heart thumping ominously underneath her puffa jacket. On the plus side, at Kayla’s insistence, they were starting on a relatively easy blue piste, which this early in the day was practically empty. On the not-so-plus-side, the incline still looked incredibly steep to Luna, steeper than the indoor centre for sure.
She sat down on the slope to fasten her snowboard on, glancing over toward Stefan, who was already strapped into his board and ready to go. He smiled and for one panicked moment she thought he was going to insist on waiting for her. But then he and Matthias lit out, carving a quick, aggressive trail down the hill. Not to be outdone, Nancy was next down, racing in hot pursuit of them. After that it was like lemmings, everyone heading down the slope except for Luna. And Mika, who stood chatting with a couple of teenagers.
Snowboard securely fastened, Luna donned the bright red waterproof mittens her instructor had bought her after she’d stripped off her sodden gloves one morning to reveal fingertips white with cold (oh the embarrassment of being dragged by him into the loo, him thrusting her hands under a stream of lukewarm water till the colour returned to them, glaring at her all the while like she’d been trying to get frostbite).
Scooching her knees up, she slid the board till it was just under her bum and levered herself into a standing position. Down below, she could hear the twins whooping to each other and Kay screaming, ‘Out of my way!’ Her instructor’s voice came to Luna then, calm and authoritative: ‘Board perpendicular to the hill till you’re ready to go. Knees bent, athletic stance.’ Luna took a deep breath and edged her lead foot forward, angling her board down the hill. And off she went.