up-and-coming artists’ early work, but they love their anonymity more.’ Georgina tutted. ‘I know you hate labels, but you are up-and-coming. If you don’t believe me then believe your own eyes. You can see all the “Sold” stickers from here.’ Watching Lottie shift her daughter’s weight to her other arm, she said, ‘Are you sure I can’t take her?’
Lottie shook her head. ‘It’s fine. They must be on their way. I mean, Lucas was supposed to meet Izzy at the station and then they were coming straight back.’
Georgina sniffed. She was not a huge fan of Lottie’s family. ‘Yes, well… I expect they got “distracted”.’ She smoothed the front of her sculpted nip and tuck dress, and then her eyes narrowed like a tigress spotting her prey. ‘Oh, my…’ she said softly.
‘What’s the matter?’ Lottie frowned.
‘Don’t look now but an incredibly hot guy has just walked into the gallery. He has the most amazing eyes I’ve ever seen.’’
Lottie shook her head. No doubt they were fixed on the woman standing beside her.
‘Ouch.’ She winced as Georgina clutched at her arm.
‘He’s coming over to us.’
‘To you, you mean—and of course he is,’ Lottie said drily. ‘He’s male.’
Georgina had the most incredible effect on men, and she was used to simply filling the space beside her.
‘He’s not looking at me,’ Georgina said slowly. She sounded stunned. ‘He’s looking at you.’
Lottie laughed. ‘Perhaps he hasn’t put his contact lenses in this morning. Or maybe he—’
She turned and her words stopped mid-sentence. Her body seemed to turn to salt. Walking towards her, his blue eyes pinning her to the floor, was Ragnar Stone.
She stared at him mutely as he stopped in front of her. He was dressed more casually than when she’d stopped him outside his office, but such was the force of his presence that suddenly the gallery seemed much smaller and there was a shift in tension, as though everyone was looking at him while trying to appear as though they weren’t.
His blue eyes really were incredibly blue, she thought weakly. But Georgina had been wrong. He wasn’t looking at her. Instead, his eyes were fixed on his daughter. For a few half-seconds, maybe more, he gazed at Sóley, his face expressionless and unmoving, and then slowly he turned his head towards her.
‘Hello, Lottie.’
She stared at him silence, her heartbeat filling her chest, her grip tightening around her daughter’s body. In the café there had been so much noise, but here in the near museum-level quiet of the gallery his voice was making her body quiver like a violin being tuned.
It was completely illogical and inappropriate, but that didn’t stop it being true.
‘Hello, Ragnar,’ she said stiffly. ‘I wasn’t expecting to see you.’
She wasn’t sure what kind of a response he would make to her remark, but maybe he felt the same way because he didn’t reply.
‘So you two know one another, then?’ Georgina said brightly.
‘Yes.’
‘No!’
They both spoke as one—him quietly, her more loudly.
Lottie felt her cheeks grow warm. ‘We met once a couple of years back,’ she said quickly.
‘Just shy of two years.’
Ragnar’s blue eyes felt like lasers.
There was a short, strained silence and then Georgina cleared her throat. ‘Well, I’ll let you catch up on old times.’
Clearly dazzled by Ragnar’s beauty, she smiled at him sweetly and, blind to Lottie’s pleading expression, sashayed towards an immaculately dressed couple on the other side of the room.
‘How did you find me?’ she said stiffly. Her heart bumped unsteadily against her ribs. She was still processing the fact that he had come here.
He held her gaze. ‘Oh, I was just passing.’
Remembering the lie she’d told, she glared at him. ‘Did you have me followed?’
Something flickered across the blue of his pupils. ‘Not followed, no—but I did ask my head of security to locate the exhibition you mentioned.’
A pulse was beating in her head. His being here was just so unexpected. Almost as unexpected as the feeling of happiness that was fluttering in time to her heart.
‘Aren’t you going to introduce me?’
For a moment she gazed at Ragnar in confusion. Was he talking about Georgina? A mixture of disbelief and jealousy twisted her breathing. Was he really using this moment to hit on another woman?
‘Her name’s Georgina. She’s—’
‘Not her.’
She heard the tension in his voice before she noticed it in the rigidity of his jaw.
‘My daughter.’
Her heart shrank inside her ribs.
In the twenty-four hours since she’d left Ragnar, and his unsolicited offer of financial help, she’d tried hard to arrange her emotions into some kind of order. They hadn’t responded. Instead she had kept struggling with the same anger and disappointment she’d felt after meeting her father. But at least she had been able to understand if not excuse Alistair’s reluctance to get involved. Meeting an adult daughter he hadn’t even known existed was never going to be easy, but Sóley wasn’t even one yet.
Okay, at first maybe she would have been a little cautious around him—although remembering her daughter’s transfixed gaze when Ragnar had come on the television screen maybe not. But even if she had been understandably hesitant it would have passed, and he could have become a father to her.
Only he’d immediately turned their relationship into a balance sheet. Or that was what she’d thought he’d done. But if that was the case then what was he doing here, asking to be introduced to his daughter?
There was only one way to find out. She cleared her throat. ‘What do you want, Ragnar?’
‘Exactly what I wanted yesterday evening,’ he said softly. ‘Only instead of giving me the chance to explain you used the moment to have some kind of temper tantrum.’
She stared at him, a pulse of anger hopping over her skin. ‘I did give you a chance and you offered me money,’ she snapped. ‘And if that’s why you’re here then you’ve wasted your time. I told you I didn’t want your money and nothing’s changed.’
‘That’s not your choice to make.’ He held her gaze. ‘I mean, what kind of mother turns down financial help for her child?’
She felt her cheeks grow hot. He was twisting her words. That wasn’t what had happened. Or maybe it was, but it hadn’t been about her turning down his money as much as proving him wrong about her motive for getting in touch.
‘I wasn’t turning down your money—just your assumption that it was what I wanted,’ she said carefully. ‘You made me feel cheap.’
His face didn’t change. ‘So what did you want from me?’
His question caught her off-guard. Not because she didn’t know the answer—she did. Partly she had wanted to do the right thing, but also she knew what it had felt like to grow up without any knowledge of her father, and she had wanted to spare her daughter that sense of always feeling on the outside, looking in.
Only it felt odd admitting something so personal to a man who was basically a stranger.
‘You’re her father. I wanted you to know that,’ she said finally. ‘I wanted