Chapter 7
Mats went into the office early the next morning, predicting that Ole would be back and keen to be brought up to speed on the London meeting.
Hanne wasn’t in yet so he made himself a coffee and sat down to text Lotta.
He should have done it last night but by the time he and Ingrid had finished dinner and he’d walked her back to her flat, he’d been too tired to think of anything to say.
The first message needed to say more than hello.
Mats: I can’t wait to see you again.
No, far too much.
Mats: Great to see you last night.
Repetitive. He’d said that when he saw her. What did he actually want to say? It needed to start a conversation. But anything more than he’d already thought of was tantamount to blurting out how he felt over a text message, and he ought to save that for when they were in the same room.
Mats: How did your work stuff go?
He sat and looked at that for a moment, feeling like this was the message he was going to go for.
‘Mats. Conference room,’ Ole said, popping his head around the door and not waiting for an answer.
He grabbed his laptop and headed for the conference room, leaving his phone on his desk.
He could only allow himself to think about work now.
The numbers he’d pored over since the meeting in London were at the forefront of his mind ready to explain to the team.
He’d come away from the meeting in London with the business agreed and with the terms they’d wanted which was great.
Now all they had to do was deliver on their promises, and that’s where Mats and his strategy came into play.
It wasn’t until mid-afternoon that they emerged, having sent out for sandwiches at lunchtime so that they could carry on.
‘You have some messages,’ Hanne said. ‘One from your sister.’
‘Ida?’ Mats said, groaning. Hopefully she hadn’t taken delivery of another chandelier.
‘No, Ingrid. She said it’s nothing urgent, and she’d message you instead.’
‘Thank you. And thanks for putting the slides together for today.’
‘No problem. Coffee?’
‘That’d be great.’
He sat at his desk and picked up his phone, only remembering then that he still hadn’t sent a message to Lotta. It was almost a whole day since she’d given him her number and he hoped she didn’t think that was an indication of his feelings towards her.
Mats: Sorry I’ve taken so long to message you. It’s been a busy day. How was your trip? Mats.
As well as his name, just in case she mistook him for someone else since he wasn’t in her contacts yet, he added a smiley face emoji at the end, then deleted it. Then he sent the message before he could second-guess himself anymore.
The message from Ingrid was a link to Lotta’s marketing agency website.
He recognised her immediately from the photo on the homepage, but her hair was down, falling in glossy waves around her shoulders.
It didn’t show her brightness, or the slightly rushed, tousled look she’d had both times he’d been with her.
Here, she looked ultra-professional, and he liked that perhaps he had seen the Lotta not everyone else knew, in much the same way as she’d seen him at the airport.
Mats: How did you find this?
Ingrid: I’m excellent at stalking people online
He laughed at her explanation.
Mats: Thanks. This would have been useful two days ago.
Ingrid: Well you should have told me two days ago. Give my love to everyone in Bergen.
He texted back a thumbs-up and got up from his desk to speak to Hanne.
‘Would you see if there’s any way I can get on the earlier flight to Bergen today?’
‘You’d have to leave now,’ she said after a minute or so of looking.
‘Okay. Thank you, I’ll see you on Monday.’ He grabbed his bag, his laptop and his coat and left before anyone could ask him to do anything else.
As soon as the plane took off, he felt his shoulders drop.
He loved these weekends where he got to check on the progress of his project, because even though there were plenty of teething issues and lots of problems to solve and overcome, he enjoyed all of that.
This was a challenge he wanted and could see the point of. It was tangible, and it was for him.
He took a taxi from the airport to the family home in Loddefjord.
The house hadn’t changed at all in the decades that the Larsen family had lived there.
And now, even though their parents were gone, all of their things were still there as if they’d just popped out, because none of them knew how to let any of it go.
The house was perched high on the side of the fjord, with the back of the house and the garden looking out over the water and a winding path leading the way down to a small boathouse.
It wasn’t unique, all the houses in the street had been the same to begin with but over the years, new owners had upgraded them, terracing the gardens to make huge patios, and building extensions with enormous windows to take in the wonderful views.
‘Hello?’ he called out as he let himself in. He dumped his bags in the hallway and headed through to the kitchen where he found his sister, Ida, making dinner. She had headphones on and didn’t hear him.
‘Oh my god!’ She smacked a hand onto her chest and dropped a wooden spoon on the floor. ‘I thought you were coming later?’
‘I got an earlier flight,’ he said, hugging her.
‘You look like you made a run for it.’ She grabbed his lapels and kissed him on the cheek.
‘I’m sorry about the other chandelier. Did Knut sort it out?’
‘Yes. It’s fine. I spoke to Becca, and she was so excited explaining how it’s going to look in the grand scheme of things. It’s hard to stay cross about it.’
‘Are Becca and Anders here yet?’
‘No, they’re coming at the time they actually said rather than giving me a heart attack by surprising me.’
Anders was a friend of the family from Iceland.
He was already in the hotel business and had been acting as an adviser to Mats on his plans.
He’d put Mats in touch with Becca, who was a colleague of one of his friends, and she was on board now as the interior designer.
She worked freelance and was busy working on a project in Reykjavik, which meant she and Anders were in the same country at the same time for at least a few months.
She was English and had been based in London, so they often struggled to see each other as much as they’d like.
‘Sorry. What’s for dinner?’
‘Chilli with crusty bread.’
‘I’m going to get changed.’
He took his things upstairs to his bedroom.
It was still the bedroom of eighteen-year-old Mats.
He hadn’t been inclined to bother changing anything once he went to university, and after that he’d never really lived here.
Coming back still felt like home, although he wished he had a double bed.
He pulled on sweatpants, a hoodie, and some thick socks, and, feeling more like himself, he headed downstairs.
Ida was opening a bottle of wine.
‘How’s your week been?’ he asked, fetching two glasses down from a cupboard.
‘Okay. I’ve taken on another new client.
’ Ida was working as a virtual assistant.
She’d always worked in admin roles in many different businesses and was so good at it she had taken temporary contracts to set up processes for businesses to streamline their operations.
She’d been highly sought after. But since their mother died, she’d struggled to cope and hadn’t taken on any new contracts.
This virtual assistant thing was relatively new and seemed to be going well.
It was just a few hours a week, but Mats had noticed over the past few weeks that she seemed happier, and he thought that was why.
‘That’s great news. Anyone interesting?’
‘It’s for a woman who coordinates influencers for some of the big clothing brands. I’m helping her with scheduling and wrestling her mailing list into some sort of order.’
‘I bet Ingrid would know her,’ said Mats.
‘Probably. You had dinner with her last night?’
He could tell by the way Ida looked at him that she’d heard about Lotta from Ingrid.
‘Yes.’
‘Lotta looks lovely. She must have a Norwegian connection with a name like Lotta Jansen.’
He groaned and rested his forehead on the counter. ‘Can I keep nothing to myself? I barely even know her yet.’
Ida laughed. ‘We’re pleased for you, Mats,’ she said, putting her arm across his shoulders and briefly laying her head against his. ‘So come on, tell me about her.’
Mats told his sister how they’d met. ‘I don’t know why I didn’t ask for her number.’
‘Because you were worried that once she knew you were a rich investment banker, she’d see you differently.’
‘True. I don’t want her to see me like that, and until I left her at the airport, she had no idea. But now I guess she knows I have an office job.’
‘I expect she’s stalked you too.’
‘I didn’t stalk her, that was Ingrid. And she doesn’t know my last name yet.’
‘Look, Mats. You don’t know what she thinks about you, whether she knows who you are or not, so you have to give her a chance to show you she’s different from all the other women. But I feel like you already think she is, or you wouldn’t have been regretting not getting her number.’
‘I do really like her,’ he said, his honesty fuelled by the few sips of wine he’d taken.
‘She’s the first woman I’ve met for ages who wasn’t trying to impress me.
She’s beautiful. Her hair was all over the place,’ he said, smiling as he remembered.
‘And she was full of nervous energy about the business trip she was on. I like that she’s passionate about what she does. ’
‘Oh, Mats. Are you in love with her?’ Ida looked serious and a little shocked.
‘No,’ he said, batting away her comment. ‘Like I said, I hardly know her. We’ve spent less than a couple of hours together.’
‘Some people fall in love at first sight,’ she said. ‘Look at Anders and Becca. The first time he asked her to come here, they’d known each other a lot less than two hours.’
‘I think that’s unusual.’ He didn’t want to comment on his friend’s relationship, but he didn’t think it had been love at first sight. That was something people said, but it wasn’t real.
Anders and Becca arrived just as Ida was taking the fresh, crusty bread she’d baked out of the oven.
‘Something smells delicious!’ Anders said, hugging Ida once she’d put the bread down, and then Mats.
‘Thank you. It’s ready. Mats, pour the wine.’
He hugged Becca, then fetched two more glasses from the cupboard, taking them over to the dining table with a fresh bottle of wine. Ida followed him with bowls of steaming chilli.
‘How’s the project?’ Anders asked him.
‘It’s coming along slowly. It feels too slow.’
Anders nodded. ‘I think until you can get a building crew onto the island it’ll feel like that. But everything you do now is preparation for that and should help it all to go more smoothly in the end.’
‘I’m hopeful the better weather is on the way, so it shouldn’t be too long before we can start. I have a couple of guys over there clearing the farmhouse and the cabins at the moment.’
‘What’s going to happen to all that stuff?
’ Ida asked. They all knew she was thinking about the hundreds of troll figurines that their grandmother had collected and had been on display in the dining room of the farmhouse.
For some reason she’d taken a liking to them and had brought several back with her last time she’d visited.
‘We’ll put it in the storage unit until we can sort through it properly. I don’t want to throw anything out accidentally that we’d like to keep for the family.’
‘I can sort all of that out, go through it gradually,’ said Ida.
‘Really?’ Mats had thought it was a job that would fall to him and would be another thing on his list that he would have a hard time getting round to. ‘That would be amazing. Thank you.’
‘I could give you a hand when we’re here,’ Becca said. ‘There might be some gems in amongst all of that. Things we can introduce into the design to link the hotel to your family. Telling stories like that can bring a place to life, give it a depth that resonates with people.’
‘Like the trolls,’ Mats said, his face a picture of innocence.
‘Oh, shut up,’ Ida said, throwing a chunk of bread at her brother and laughing. ‘There is nothing wrong with rescuing a few trolls.’
Even Becca was giggling.
‘Are we all heading over there tomorrow?’ Anders asked.
‘Count me out,’ said Ida. ‘I’ve got better things to do on a Saturday. I’ll come when there’s actually something to see.’
‘Knut is coming over to go through the quantity surveyor’s report and he’s bringing one of the building contractors who tendered for the work. It’s a local firm, so they’ve come in quite reasonably priced,’ said Mats.
‘Keeps the costs down if they all live around here, and I expect they’re genuinely interested in being part of something like this.’
The enormity of the project always hit him harder when he was here.
It was easy to dream about it when he was in Oslo, but back in Bergen reality hit, especially so now that other people were involved.
Not Anders so much; he was a friend, but bringing Knut on board had been a big step towards it switching from a plan to actually bringing it to life.
And finding a builder felt like another landmark.
‘It’s starting to feel scary,’ Mats said, looking at Ida and his friends.
‘But that’s what tells you it’s one of the greatest things you’ll ever do,’ said Anders.
‘Something that changes your life is always scary and difficult. Most of the time it’s something you can’t control, like losing someone.
But when it’s in your hands and you could be the one to end it, to end those feelings of being out of control, it’s harder to keep going.
But if you do, Mats, getting to the end will feel like the best thing in the world. ’