His head, partially bent over his plate, tipped back to look at me. “You’ve already tried me, Sjofn,” he warned then he shoved the pancake already on his fork in his mouth.
“Okay,” I nodded, “I get that but… I don’t want you calling me that.”
He did a slow blink. Then he swallowed.
I rushed on. “I… would you...?” I hesitated. “Actually, I’d prefer it if you called me Finnie.”
He sat back a few inches, his hand came down to rest on the table and after he did that, he studied me intensely for a very long time. It took a lot but I sat there and withstood it.
Finally, he asked softly, “Finnie?”
And shit, shit that sounded nice in his deep voice.
“Yeah, Finnie,” I replied softly.
He studied me.
Then he said, “Finnie.”
Yep. Oh yeah. That sounded nice in his deep voice.
I took that as a yes so I smiled at him and whispered, “Thanks.”
He kept studying me. Then he shook his head. Then he forked into his pancakes, cutting off a huge bite and shoving it in his mouth.
Okay, well, that didn’t go great, as in, after dinner I was clearly ha**ng s*x with someone I barely knew, but it didn’t go badly either.
Shit.
“You’re known for hunting, skinning your own animals and being a very good archer, wife, you are not known for cooking well,” he told his plate, I nearly choked on the pancakes I’d just put in my mouth and I stared at him as his eyes shifted to me. “I’m pleased to learn this about you.”
There it was. A sign, a small one, but one like him keeping me warm that said maybe he was a decent guy and he was going to try.
“I’m glad,” I said softly.
He looked back at his plate and shoved more pancakes in his mouth.
Okay.
Maybe that went better than I suspected.
Phew.
Chapter Seven
Mr. Conversation
While Frey’s attention was on the deer, I grabbed my stuff and nipped to the hot springs for a quick bath.
One could say the hot springs were awesome but one could not say drying off afterward was. However, I’d done it so often, I’d made an art of it so I was out, dried off and clothed in record time. Then I wrapped my clean, wet hair in the bathing cloth and nipped back quickly, luckily without him seeing me.
Since I had one day of essentially semi-kinda-dating my husband before we got down to the nitty gritty husband and wife stuff, once I got back, I lotioned, powdered and perfumed as well as put on some light makeup. I mean, I would never go on a first date without making an effort. And I had at least a couple of weeks of dates (according to my own personal philosophy of how long before I considered sleeping with someone) to squeeze in one day so I made an effort.
As I did this, I planned the dinner I was going to make that night and therefore drew up a grocery list in my head of what I needed to get from the store. I wanted something special so he would notice I was making an effort (and maybe he would make one too). I also wanted something chewy. He made light work of those pancakes, chewing approximately twice before each enormous swallow and I was hoping dinner would last a whole lot longer than that.
I was in the kitchen, all done up but hair still wet (though pulled back in the ribbon again) and I was getting the basket I usually took to town with me to carry my purchases back when Frey walked in.
I turned to the door and again, like that morning, when he saw me, he stopped dead.