Page 91 of Top Shelf

A few weeks ago, Viktor Karlsson was simply a hot hockey player on the outskirts of my circle of friends, who I occasionally teased or argued with at gatherings. Then he appeared beside me on a motorcycle after a fender bender, proposed the most unhinged business arrangement of my adult life, married me in a courthouse, moved me into a temporary apartment, kissed me hard enough inside a hockey arena to turn my friends into professional interrogators, and now he’s carrying me toward the mountains on his bike because my brain got too loud.

Joyride feels exactly appropriate.

“You like this song a lot,” I say. “Why?”

He stills, then his helmet bobs a little as he shrugs. “It is a good song.”

I narrow my eyes. “That’s your answer? Suspicious.”

“Why is liking Roxette suspicious?”

“Because you got weird about it.”

“I did not get weird. I answered your question.”

“With the conversational equivalent of a locked door.”

A low sound reaches me through the Bluetooth, like a cross between a groan and a chuckle, and I grin, settling my cheek briefly against the back of his shoulder.

“Fine. Keep your mysterious Roxette secrets.”

The road curves again, and the chorus swells around us. I lean into it and hold tighter as the mountains draw near. We stop at a quiet pull-off above the city, and I take off the helmet and hand it to him. For a while, we stand beside the bike and let the quiet do the work. My phone stays in my bag, and I realize how much I needed to disconnect. The to-do lists are still waiting back in the city, but out here, they all have to wait until I’m ready.

“I’m scared of families,” I say eventually. “Not Sweden, really. Well, maybe Sweden a little because I don’t know what any of the signs say and some of the letters have the funny hats or sparkle thingies on top, and I don’t know how to pronounce vowels that way. But mostly… families scare me.”

Viktor leans back against Priscilla and sighs. “My family is loud, and will ask many questions.”

I snort. “That’s not comforting.”

“Ebba may seem angry, and my sister will like you too quickly and can be difficult.”

I glance at him. “Is this supposed to make me feel better?”

His mouth twitches, but he doesn’t respond with a joke as I look back out toward the city. “Questions in my family usually come with a correct answer. If you give the wrong one, you find out pretty quick what they actually think of you.”

The amusement leaves his face as he turns to me. “My family will ask questions because they want to know you.” He pauses. “You do not have to perform for them, Heidi. And I told them I would ask you. I haven’t agreed to anything without you.”

My chest tightens at the way Viktor always considers me and what I need before he makes a decision that impacts me too.

I squint back out toward the city before I can think on it too much. “Tell me again why we need to go to Sweden?”

“They want to meet you and have a family celebration of our marriage near Midsommar, a big celebration of the summer solstice—if you agree. It also helps with securing Solvik.” He’s quiet for a moment, choosing his words carefully. “The legal marriage is enough to satisfy the paperwork, but Anton is asking questions. If we go and my family sees us together, it is harder for him to say this is a trick.”

A trick.

The word shouldn’t make me feel sick, because this whole thing started as exactly that. Maybe not a trick per se, but in the vicinity of one. But somewhere between the courthouse, the bed, and this road, “trick” has become too small a word for what my body believes when he touches me.

“I have some leave Moreno has been trying to force me to take,” I say. “But I was just ignoring it.”

“You work very hard. You deserve rest, too.”

I sigh and fold my arms, keeping my eyes on the smudged city lights. “My point was, I could probably make a trip to Sweden work. The studio isn’t opening until later in September, but there’s studio stuff I’d need to plan around, so I’d have to take my laptop.” I turn to him. “I could do emails and videos from Sweden, right? Do you have internet that reaches Solvik?”

He stares at me. “Yes.”

“Excellent. Civilization survives.”

“But I would prefer if you did not work the whole time.”