Her Master's Servant (Lord and Master Book 2) (13 page)

She walked out into the yard as the taxi reversed back down the drive. ‘What are you doing here?’ she said. ‘I wasn’t expecting you till—’

She got no further, Stefan’s arms dragging her toward him and his mouth coming down on hers. The kiss lasted till she was forced to disengage, laughing breathlessly, ‘You’re early!’ To which Stefan grinned and hoisted her up, hands under her butt. Luna wrapped her legs around him as he quickly squatted to retrieve his bag and carried her into the house.

He lost his balance slightly in the front hall, banging her into one of the posies on the wall, causing a shower of thyme to fall to the floor. And then he dropped his bag and devoted himself to the task of kissing her thoroughly. Luna slid her arms under his suit jacket, along his back and up to his broad shoulders.

‘So,’ he said finally, his mouth still against hers. ‘I was sitting in my meeting this morning and thinking to myself, why am I here?’ Luna pulled back from him and waited for him to continue, but first he gave her another quick kiss. ‘It’s not even a client meeting,’ he went on, ‘just a monthly video conference between my Stockholm and London offices, one of these things that started out as a quick catch-up.’ He paused and looked down at her, really looked at her, then lowered his mouth to hers again. ‘Mmm…’ Lips hovering next to hers, he continued, ‘And then it morphs into this three-hour meeting where everyone talks about their projects, who they’ve worked with that week, followed by useless things like what they’re doing at the weekend.’

Another kiss, this time with his hand on her cheek, his finger twining in a strand of loose hair near her temple. ‘And all I could think was, I know what
I’m
doing this weekend, and I would like to start doing it right now.’ A little kiss, but with a swift bite of her lower lip.

‘So I say, “Wait, I have been thinking. This meeting, it has become a monster. We’re a management consultancy and look at us. We can’t even manage our own time. So each of you has exactly thirty seconds to talk.’ Stefan gave her a look then, like God, I want to tell this story but I just can’t seem to resist you, and Luna tilted her face up toward his obligingly and received another kiss.

‘And eight minutes later I am out of there, running for my car. And—’ Quick kiss. ‘Really, I must thank you for this, Luna—’ Kiss. ‘Because I think—’ Longer kiss. ‘I think this is a much more efficient way of doing meetings.’ This time it was Luna who kissed him, out of sheer delight at his storytelling prowess. After some time, he pulled his mouth off hers and lifted a hand as if to say, I will never finish this tale if you keep interrupting me.

‘But it took some running, let me tell you, to catch the 12.30 flight to Sumburgh. Literally, I was sprinting through security to get to the gate in time.’ A final, deep, long kiss.

‘But you made it,’ Luna said eventually, resting her head in the crook of his neck, breathing in his scent.

‘I made it,’ he agreed, and kissed the top of her head.

Given that dinner wouldn’t be ready for another few hours, she decided to take him to the Fisherman’s Rest. He changed into his grey jeans and the black wool sweater Dagmar had made for her, which was oversized on Luna but fit him perfectly, then insisted that as he was demonstrating his newfound affinity for Shetland wool Luna could afford to forego wool for one night. So she wore her black silk polo neck and black jeans.

When she pulled the car into a spot next to the pub’s beer garden, empty save for a few hardy smokers puffing away in the chill wind, Luna turned to Stefan and cleared her throat awkwardly. ‘I’m, um, a little different in there,’ she warned him, inclining her head toward the pub. Stefan’s expression communicated his lack of understanding, so she tried again. ‘I come here mostly for work purposes, so I’ve had to, kind of, adopt a different persona.’

‘Evening, gents,’ she announced two minutes later as she and Stefan approached Chris Ollason and three other farmers standing at the bar. ‘What can I get you to drink?’

‘Luna!’ shouted the four men in greeting, to which she clapped her hands together and gave them a quick, impish rub. A signature Kayla move, for it was her more than anyone else who Luna pretended to be here at the pub. Hard drinking, straight talking Kayla – one of the lads.

Fortunately, Stefan seemed happy to go with the flow, if a little incredulous at the transformation of his quiet girlfriend into a back slapping, beer swilling bloke. After she’d made introductions, he got stuck right in chatting with Chris while she and the three others played darts. She felt a little thrill of possessive pride when Ruth entered the pub shortly thereafter and headed straight to Stefan, Shetland’s telegraph wires having clearly been abuzz with news of his arrival.

Later, as Luna sat at a table with Magnus Petersen, Stefan sauntered over with pints for both of them, leaning down to whisper in Luna’s ear, ‘You drink. I will drive home.’ Luna, or rather Kayla, rewarded him with a quick parting pat on the bum, drawing a cheer from her friends at the bar.

‘Hunh,’ Magnus Petersen grunted, taking a sip of his pint.

‘What?’ Luna asked.

‘I t’ought du and dat Swedish wummun were…’

Luna’s brow wrinkled, but then she took his meaning and smiled at him enigmatically. ‘Who says we’re not?’ Prompting a double take followed by a roar of laughter from the older man.

It all went so well, Luna inhabiting her Kayla façade so completely, that she felt the need to explain herself to Stefan on the ride home two hours later.

‘When I got here back in February, I didn’t feel equipped to do
anything.
But I couldn’t just curl up into a ball and hide like I wanted to,’ she said as Stefan negotiated a bend in the road. Sitting next to him in the passenger seat, Luna twisted her fingers together. ‘For one thing, I had your father to think of.’

‘My father, who had handed you a poisoned chalice,’ Stefan said in a mildly jaundiced tone.

*

‘So,’ she summed up later as they sat at the kitchen table over two bowls of stew, ‘I pretend to be other people sometimes, when I’m feeling out of my depth.’ She looked down at her spoon, then across the table to Stefan, her dirty little secret out in the open.

But he merely nodded and topped up her wine glass, like what she’d said was perfectly reasonable. When she continued to stare at him, he reached over and clasped her hand on top of the table, saying reassuringly, ‘Luna, everybody does this. Do you think I don’t sometimes ask myself what my father or one of my uncles would do, when I’m in a tricky meeting with a client?’

‘No,’ she said, ‘you don’t understand. I actually pretend to be other people. I pretend I’m
them.
’

He lifted his eyebrows and Luna stumbled on, telling him about the time when she’d imagined him sitting in the car with her, commentating on her disastrous first visit with Petersen. Stefan’s eyes softened at this and he squeezed her hand on the table.

‘And then later, when I saw Mr Petersen in the pub and my first impulse was to run away,’ she said, ‘I heard your voice again, telling me not to. So I went up to him and I… acted like you, and insisted on buying him a drink.’ She was silent for a few seconds. ‘And that’s what I’ve been doing ever since. Acting like Kayla or Nancy. But mostly like you.’

‘Hmm,’ Stefan said, spooning some stew into his mouth. Mouth sexily full, he lifted a finger off his spoon and said, ‘Well,
flicka
, let me first say that—’ he chewed reflectively and swallowed, ‘—you couldn’t have chosen a better person to impersonate. I don’t mean to brag, but yes, I see why you went with me.’

Luna pursed her lips and raised a knuckle to her mouth. For a moment Stefan just blinked at her as if to say, what’s so funny?, but then he smiled his honey on toast smile and added, ‘And second, although you have my approval to do this from time to time, please do not do it while we’re in bed together.’

Luna nodded. ‘Because you wouldn’t want to…’

‘Fuck myself,’ he said. ‘That’s right. I have no desire to fuck myself.’ Luna lost it then, laughing so hard she eventually groaned and pressed a hand to her aching ribs.

After that, it was like floodgates had opened. She spent the better part of the next hour talking almost non-stop, telling him about the wooing of farmers’ wives, and the strategic joining of clubs and the cajoling of Dagmar. About her rules for living in Shetland, and how she’d invented them as a way of coping with her sadness, but ultimately found that they benefited her in other ways.

Stefan listened to all this largely in silence, occasionally interjecting with a comment or question. He seemed to realise early on that Luna was looking for something from him, seeking validation. That having been essentially on her own for the past two months, with little guidance from Dagmar and no real template for how to proceed, she remained unconfident of her methods, and worried about her endgame.

She finished by telling him about Magnus Petersen signing his contract earlier that week, concluding, ‘But I… well, it hasn’t exactly prompted a stampede of farmers to my door, ready to sign on the dotted line.’ She drew her fingernail along a crack in the wooden table, shoulders dropping a little.

‘Luna,’ Stefan said seriously, ‘I wasn’t joking earlier when I said this assignment of my father’s was a poisoned chalice. There is resentment here among the crofters and others for our family. “Absentee landlords”, “Swedish know-alls”, that sort of thing. And some of them must suspect that the reason my father is doing all this, playing the benevolent landowner, is because he wants to raise their rents.’

Luna frowned and Stefan nodded, ‘Yes, he didn’t tell you
that
, did he? And Dagmar…’ He made a dismissive face. ‘He puts you here with someone like her and expects you to move mountains.’

Seeing the anxiety on her face, Stefan took her hand again and said, ‘I think you have done very well, Luna, and I’m not just saying that because I love you. Honestly, there isn’t much I’d have done differently, in your position.’

She smiled at him, raising the side of her hand to her mouth. And then it was Stefan’s turn to frown. ‘Why do you keep doing that,
flicka?’
he asked, reaching his hand up to hers and drawing it away from her lips. ‘It’s like you’re afraid someone might see you smiling.’

Luna cringed inwardly. She hadn’t been aware she was doing it, but she knew the reason why. ‘I think the house likes me better when I’m sad.’

‘You…
what
?’

She tried, then, to explain about her rules, how she’d allowed herself to be unhappy here in the cottage, and how she’d started to get the impression that the cottage approved, Dagmar too, and how Liv thought the place was haunted and… the more she talked the crazier it sounded, so eventually she petered out, giving him a guilty, shamefaced look.

At which point Stefan drained his wine glass and stood, taking her by the hands and drawing her to her feet. ‘It’s good,’ he said as he led her out of the kitchen into the hallway, ‘these little reminders of how irrational you can be.’ Luna made a noise of dissent and he tightened his grip on her hand, pulling her along in his wake as he climbed the stairs. ‘Every time I start thinking you’re too clever for me, I discover that you’re afraid of your bathroom, or you think a house wants you to be miserable.’

Floodgates still wide open, Luna continued talking as Stefan undressed them both, and backed her onto the bed. She was still talking sometime later, when he was nestled between her legs, his hands gripping her buttocks, his cock buried deep within her.

‘And then Liv gave me this look, like, “He’s an absolute
stallion
, Luna, do you really think you can cope with that much man?” and I swear I was about to say something to her…’ She paused. ‘Am I putting you off your stride?’

‘Does it
feel
like you’re putting me off my stride?’ he asked, biting her ear and pushing so far into her she could feel the tip of him just touching her cervix. ‘No, you carry on, Miss Gregory. I’m enjoying this.’

‘But anyway, I decided to let it pass, keep my powder dry for now,
ha is i
magen
,’ she said. And then he did break stride, stilling inside her, removing his hands from her ass and placing them on the pillow beside her head. Looking down at her.

‘What did you say?’

‘
Ha is i magen
,’ she repeated, translating, ‘Like I had ice in my stomach.’ Stefan stared at her and Luna added shyly, ‘I’ve been learning Swedish. Just a little, so I can talk to Dagmar. Mostly basic stuff, like
Ha en bra dag
and
Jag ar törstig.
’

Stefan shifted inside her and said, rather emotionally, ‘This… pleases me very much, Luna.’

‘I also know a lot of sheep terms, like
svarta får
and
vita lamm.
’

Stefan withdrew from her, then plunged back in, exhorting, ‘That’s right,
älskling
, talk wool to me.’ He slid his hands back down to her ass and she laughed as her Swedish boyfriend commenced to shag her in earnest.

‘Right,’ she said sometime later, propping herself up on her elbow beside him in bed. ‘What’s the situation between you and Dagmar?’

Stefan rolled his eyes and exhaled noisily. ‘I knew you would ask this.’

‘Well, she’s my boss, Stefan. And she lives here three days a week.’

He made a slight huffing noise as if to say this wouldn’t be the case if he had anything to do with it. Luna continued to stare at him and he finally said, ‘First, I should tell you that regardless of any past issues Dagmar and I have had, I owe her a debt. It was only because of her that I found out you were here.

‘Not,’ he added swiftly, ‘that she did it for my benefit. I saw her at my friend Astrid’s restaurant in Stockholm several weeks ago and she couldn’t wait to tell me what a bounder I was, for the way I’d treated her lovely new PA.’

Luna smiled and said, ‘Awww,’ and Stefan rolled his eyes again. ‘If she’d known how pathetically grateful I was to hear about her new PA, she’d have kept her mouth shut, believe me.’

‘But,’ Luna said, ‘you two have known each other for a while, right? And disliked each other from the start?’