A Nordic King(50)

I’m not sure if I’m fond of this tradition. I’ve devoured nearly the whole bowl, even though I’m bursting out of my seams at this point and I don’t have the damn almond.

“Okay, I’m out,” I say, leaning back in my chair and pushing my bowl away. “I got nothing. And now I’m so full I might die.”

Princess Anya, Aksel’s niece, giggles from across the table, looking awfully suspicious.

Her mother, Princess Stella, finishes the spoonful of dessert and looks over at her daughter’s bowl. “Din lille snydepels,” she admonishes her, pointing at it.

“What?” I ask.

Now Clara is laughing. “I think Anya has the almond.”

“That figures,” Aksel mutters.

“What?” I ask again.

He looks at me, and the bright clarity of his gaze makes me realize we haven’t really looked at each other in a long time. It’s arresting, to put it mildly. “Sometimes, if one has discovered the almond early on, they’ll hoard it until the very end.”

“Forcing everyone else to finish their bowls,” Stella says with a sigh, patting her stomach. “This child of mine. So devious.”

“At least it’s delicious,” Maja says pragmatically. “And I guess this means you get the prize, Anya.”

Her prize ends up being a marzipan pig, which apparently is also tradition. Anya calls her pig treat Snarf Snarf, of course, before she gleefully bites the pig’s head off, making Clara and Freja squeal with horror.

When dinner is over, we take everything into the kitchen and wash up. Because Karla and a few other cooks slaved over this food all day, Aksel made sure to give them the rest of the holiday off, which means we’re all on wash-up duty.

It’s actually kind of fun to watch Aksel wearing an apron at the sink, scrubbing the roasting pans and pots, his sister teasing him, the girls occasionally spraying him with water. This is probably the most relaxed I’ve seen him all month, maybe even since I first started working.

I know I’m watching a bit too much because at one point Stella gives me a curious look and I quickly avert my eyes, as if I’ve been staring at the sun. The last thing I need is for her to tell her brother she thinks the nanny has a full-blown crush on him.

Because that’s the only name I have for this … affliction. It’s a crush. And yet, that word doesn’t seem enough. God, if only I could just stop these feelings growing inside of me. I’m afraid of what might happen if they don’t go away. Will it just bubble up and rise until they’re bursting out, like water spilling from a boiling pot? Or can I just keep trying to bury it, deep, deep down, without being driven insane?

The funny thing is, I don’t even know what I’m feeling most of the time, just that it’s there and it’s deep and raw and persistent and centered around him. It’s like everything now is centering around him. He’s the first thing I think about when I wake up and the last thing I think about when I go to sleep. He haunts my dreams, my thoughts, and the more I deny it, the more it hurts like salt in a wound. Being obsessed with a man you share a house with is a recipe for disaster.

I’m in the living room, setting out hot cocoa for the girls while they play downstairs with Snarf Snarf, when Stella comes out with a glass of wine for me.

“Aksel tells me you decorated the tree,” she says, nodding at the tree in front of us, mounds of presents piled underneath it. “You did a good job.”

“Well, technically the girls did the first four feet and I did the other ten,” I admit, taking the glass from her. “Tak.”

“And he also says your Danish is coming along nicely.”

“That’s a bit of an exaggeration.” I wonder how much Aksel has told her about me—and when. So, of course, I ask, “What else did he say?”

She smiles, and her smile matches Aksel’s on the rare occasions he uses it. “Only good things.”

I take a sip of my wine. “I have a hard time believing that. Has he always been so …?”

“Serious?” she provides. “Moody? Brooding?”

“Yeah, all those.”

She nods and sighs. “When we were little he was a lot … looser. He smiled and laughed more. He was certainly more adventurous.”

“He used to race cars in his twenties.”

“As a rally driver, yes. Then he raced boats. I’m sure he’ll take you out on his yacht come summertime. But to answer your question, that’s just the way he is.” She looks furtively toward the doorway as if to check if anyone is listening but we’re alone in the room.

“Our parents weren’t the best,” she admits in a low voice. “I know it’s terrible to speak of them this way, especially with how our mother is, but it’s the truth. For some reason, they were kinder to me. At least our mother was more loving. They were both cold with Aksel. Harsh. They were like teachers rather than parents. I think they were just trying to prepare him to be King one day. They knew I’d never take over the throne so they treated me more like a daughter than an heir, if that makes any sense.”

It makes perfect sense. Definitely explains why Aksel is so closed-off.

“Then of course he became King before he was ready, he lost our father, our mother, there was the accident and Helena and … he got worse.” I nod, my heart pinching every time I think of him suffering. “But then he got better.”