found that happy ending with the king of Denmark, no less. As she takes Stellan’s hand, I feel a strange pinch. I want the kind of love that they have.
“Hear, hear!” I say, raising my glass.
Everyone else cheers, congratulating the couple.
Even though I knew about the pregnancy news ahead of time, my eyes still fill with tears of happiness. I beam at Margot. She's basically living my most basic bitch dreams.
Not that I would ever tell anyone, but all I have ever wanted is to end up living in a big house with a white picket fence. Two point five children, scruffy little dog, and a husband that loves me to the ends of the earth.
My life has never resembled a Norman Rockwell painting, but a voice inside tells me that I really should expect it still.
I know, it's stupid. It goes hand in hand with my idiotic longing for Lars.
I try to ignore it as best I can.
Margot wipes her eyes. "Thanks, guys."
Lars interjects. "When are you due?”
I arched my brow at him, wondering how he knows to even ask that question. He meets my gaze and shrugs.
Margot smiles prettily at us. "In the middle of May."
Stellan clears his throat. “We're both very excited. It goes without saying that the news doesn't leave this room. I don't even want my parents to know, much less anyone that would leak the information to the press. Sorry, Pippa."
I blush. He's referring to my job at Politiken, the Copenhagen daily newspaper.
I'm quick to assure him that I won't tell anyone. "It's not my news to share. I think you should keep it secret as long as you can, honestly."
He grins down at Margot, squeezing her in a side hug. “I’m going to try.”
Lars moves to get more comfortable, squishing me in the process. He’s arranged himself so that his thigh presses against mine. I sigh, shooting him a look.
We have established some age-old boundaries with each other, not the least of which is that we expend effort to avoid casually touching each other. He glances at me, his eyebrow arching.
“What?” he asks.
I shake my head, pushing his knee away and starting to get up. Too late though, I realize that Finn and Anders have started to reenact a skit of some sort in the middle of the semicircle of seats.
So I’m forced to sit back. Lars looks at me, his eyes twinkling, and throws his arm around my shoulders. It’s too much; he’s touching my thigh, my hip, and my shoulders. Everywhere he is touching me vaguely tingles. I think that the sensation of knowing I shouldn’t be so close to the guy secretly I’m in love with is too intense to handle.
I immediately start to squirm out of his hold. He grips my shoulder to keep me in place.
“Oh, little witch,” he teases me. “I know you hate being touched, but just deal with it for a minute. Come on. You secretly like it, I think.”
My cheeks flood with heat and I look down. It’s not that I dislike being touched.
Not, it’s the opposite.
I crave it.
I want him to do it more.
But Lars and I don’t have that kind of intimacy. We can’t, not without it turning into something more.
And I won’t be one of those nameless, faceless girls that he never sees again.
I couldn’t handle that.
Pushing myself up and out of his grasp, I stand up, straightening my dress. I shoot him a purposeful look as I walk around the circle, crouching down next to Margot.
She’s delighted to see me and starts chattering away.
But I still feel his eyes on me.
Watching.
Waiting.
For what, I don’t know.
4
Lars
There is nothing so exhilarating as flying this fucking jet. My eyes are as wide as can be, scanning the horizon. My mind is almost blank as I pilot the jet, making a thousand tiny alterations to my speed and altitude and direction. My heart pounds.
There is something zen about having so much to focus on at once. It’s very much like running a marathon in the way that every single resource you have is pulled into doing it; mentally, physically, you have to give it your all.
Or else…
Well, I would fall from the sky.
I look out my window, glancing at the ground. Up here, the world is carved into little blocks of dull gray, dark brown, and black. I can see the block of airway that I’m heading for; from the distance, it just looks like a long tetris block of heather gray. If I