Page 19

But she could look and keep her hands firmly in check. Window shop but not walk into the store. Look, but not touch. Okay, you’ve made your point, Eden . Enough now. And do start acting like the grown woman you profess yourself to be.

‘You still haven’t apologised,’ Eden told him, scowling at him. She might not have seen him for a while, but his accusation that she was a gold-digger still rankled.

‘I’m sorry you were upset by that remark.’

That seemed too easy. She suspected that life, and women, were a little too easy for this man and he needed to work a little harder. Wait, hold on, that wasn’t an actual apology. He wasn’t sorry for what he said, but for how she felt.

‘I thought I trained you better than that, Jedson,’ Mick said, scooting up closer to Eden in a show of support. During a drinking session at the pub a few nights back, Eden had told Mick exactly who she was, and that Jed thought she was gold-digger. ‘That was a half-arsed apology. Do better.’

Jed’s eyes didn’t leave her face. ‘Stay out of this, Michaela.’

Mick hauled in a deep breath and Eden knew she was on the verge of blasting her brother. While she appreciated her support, she didn’t want to be the reason Mick and Jed fought. ‘It’s okay, Mick,’ she murmured, briefly squeezing her arm.

Mick huffed her displeasure. ‘God, you’re annoying. Not you, Eden. Jed.’

‘Stay out of it, Mick,’ Jed repeated, his words full of steel. Before she, or his sister, could reply, Jed nodded at the kitten. ‘Cute. Where did you find him?’ he asked.

Mick scowled at him. ‘Don’t BS me, Ugly. You know that Gem found it in a cardboard box on the doorstep this morning because you put it there!’

Jed lounged in his saddle, looking thoroughly at ease, like he’d spent his whole life in it. Which, in fairness, he probably had. ‘I went to the village and heard it mewling. It was stuck between two bins and had lost its mum.’

After checking to see that the kids weren’t watching, he pulled his thumb across his throat, silently telling them the mommy cat was dead.

‘You should’ve asked me if the kids are ready for a kitten, whether I’m ready for a kitten. I’m a single mum working in a bloody busy practice, Jed, and I barely have time for all the shit I need to do, never mind adding a pet to look after.’

‘Then you shouldn’t have joined the organising committee for the charity polo match,’ Jed replied, sounding unsympathetic.

‘You volunteered me, you berk!’ Mick yelled. She lifted her mug, and Eden knew she was thinking of throwing her wine-filled cup at his head.

He dug his heels into the pony’s side and backed two steps away. ‘Not that I think you would be able to hit me if you let fly,’ he said, confirming her suspicions. ‘But you might hit Padmé and that would piss me off.’

‘I’d never hurt an animal!’ Mick shouted. ‘God, you’re such an annoying shit!’

‘Mum, do you want to go sit on the naughty step?’ Liam demanded, lifting his chin and looking like a wizened old man. ‘You’re not allowed to yell, and you’re not allowed to swear!’

‘You owe us at least five pounds,’ Gemma added, reaching up to take her kitten from Eden. She immediately felt the loss as the kitten settled into Gemma’s neck. Eden knew the kids would start a world war if Mick tried to relocate the kitten.

Mick seemed to come to the same conclusion and sent Jed a look hot enough to burn through steel. ‘I will get you back for this, you bastard!’

‘That’s six pounds.’

Jed smiled at his sister, his mouth curving up at the corners and showing a hint of a dimple deep in his left cheek.

His smile was a punch to the stomach, a kick to the head.

On seeing it, Eden felt wobbly and off balance, like the world had shifted off its axis, knocked off course.

And with the disorientation came heat, lovely and liquid, sliding through her veins, burning a path to her womb and to her long-neglected lady parts.

This was attraction, deep and dangerous. She finally understood how men could be lured off the rocks by the siren call of mermaids, because, damn, when Jed Harris smiled like that, she’d follow him anywhere. And hoped that there was a bed on the way. Lots of beds.

Or walls.

Desks.

Hell, any flat surface would do.

‘See you later, guys’ Jed said, his big hand stroking Padmé’s strong neck. Eden could not believe she was jealous of a horse. A horse that would make her sneeze and erupt in spots.

And because this was her crazy life, she released a series of explosive sneezes. When she stopped, seven or eight embarrassing seconds later, she raised her watering eyes to look at Jed. Damn, he was still there.

‘I’ll see you around, Sneezy.’

Great, now she had a nickname. She was vastly, ridiculously, stupidly, insanely attracted to a man who thought of her as one of Snow White’s dwarves.

Excellent.

‘It’s a good thing I’m leaving tomorrow,’ she muttered, watching him trot away.

‘ What? ’

Oh, crap, she didn’t mean to say that out loud. Right, now she needed to explain to Mick that her time at Elmsleigh House had come to an end. She’d tell her Croatia was calling, that she’d made plans and needed to stick to them.

She wouldn’t tell her she was so, so tempted to stay and that given the smallest excuse, just might.

* * *

Jed checked on the lasagna he’d made earlier, from scratch– it was bubbling and looked and smelled great– and reached for the glass of wine standing next to the stove.

He took a long sip. He enjoyed cooking, but he’d done enough so he had Mick making a green salad.

Justin was spreading home-made garlic butter onto the inside slices of a ciabatta and Alistair, the unsociable bastard, was on his phone, checking something.

‘Al, phones away at my dinner table, mate,’ he said.

Alistair, as he always did, ignored him.

He could push the point, but Al would, in a minute, maybe two, pick up his phone again and immerse himself in whatever had captured his attention on the screen.

His older brother was not social, and Justin had had to drag him to dinner tonight.

But it was part of their deal: they’d stop nagging him to spend time with them if Al joined his siblings for dinner once a week.

Knowing it was a losing battle, Jed decided to leave him alone until they ate, then Justin would confiscate his phone. He hoped.

Kit and Mick were bickering– if there was a world championship for squabbling, those two would win it– and Justin and Mateo were discussing, of all things, the size of a pumpkin at last year’s village fete.

Jesus. Jed felt like he’d been rocketed to his life forty years from now, minus the Zimmer frames and the occasional signs of forgetfulness.

He slugged back more wine, leaned against the counter and crossed his long legs at the ankles.

God, he loved evenings like this, even when the people closest to him acted like they were a hundred and ten.

Nothing said family like a good meal around a dinner table, good wine, or hands wrapped around beer bottles.

He’d made quite a few pieces of furniture for his house– his huge bed, his glass and driftwood coffee table, the chairs on the deck– but the eight-seater square table in his overly large kitchen was his favourite.

With a square table, no one felt left out, and everyone could contribute to the conversation.

Everyone who sat at it wanted one just like it.

He had bigger and more interesting pieces to make, but it was nice to know that if he ever ran short of cash– unlikely– he could make square tables and matching chairs.

The money earned from them would keep him in red wine and good food.

Mick’s head shot up at the sound of a shout coming from next door, and she cocked her head. Everyone looked at her, but she shook her head, completely calm.

‘Don’t you want to go check whether they are okay?’ Kit asked.

‘That’s a frustrated scream, not an “I’m dying” scream,’ Mick said with complete certainty.

Mick always hired a babysitter, normally Daisy, their favourite groom, to look after the kids for their weekly sibs supper.

She needed some time out, and to be able to swear without Gemma keeping score on how much she owed the family coffers.

Jed was quite convinced Mick could pay off the national debt with what she owed in swearing fines.

‘When Daisy starts yelling, that’s when I run. And I told her that I’m not to be disturbed for anything less than a six-foot Swedish masseur or arterial bleeding.’

Jed smiled, enjoying his sister. He’d lucked out on keeping her when Troyden’s marriage to Usha had fallen apart. They bickered like all siblings did, but he had her back, and she had his. Family. It was everything.

His only niggle, a small annoying thorn, was his guilt that Eden was sitting in the big house alone tonight because Troyden was communing with the God of Porcelain.

She wouldn’t even have Diana for company because it was Zumba night at the village hall.

The world could explode but Di would still rock up at the hall, addicted to her weekly dose of shaking her hips and twerking.

He should’ve invited Eden to join them, but these dinners were his way to relax and Sneezy made him feel anything but chill.

Jed, remembering the way the sunlight had shot streaks of copper into her hair and lightened her beautiful eyes, shifted on his feet.

Around her, he had to fight the urge to cover her mouth with his and take, and take, and take.

He could see her naked, could easily imagine the freckles peppering her shoulders and chest, and her untouched-by-the-sun, creamy white skin.

His nose still held the scent of her shampoo from when he’d carried her up to the house.

He was in his thirties, but was reacting like a schoolboy hanging around his first crush.

And damn, just thinking about her started a party in his pants, so he turned his back to the room to look into his eye-level oven.

The lasagna looked as good as it did before, but if he was more flushed than he was before, he could blame it on the oven’s heat.

He needed to get a grip. Or several grips. Immediately.

Or he needed to make a move on the bloody woman, talk her into bed and get her out of his fucking system so that he could go back to normal. Whatever normal was.

Jed gripped the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes.

He had a polo team to whip into shape and a championship to win.

He needed Eden like he needed a shot of ketamine injected straight into his heart.

He didn’t have time for this shit. He had even less inclination for complications, and Eden was a complication on steroids.

He didn’t have time for a relationship, nor the energy to put in the required effort to make someone need him.

Hell, he barely had time to keep Troyden in check.

Though, to be fair, Troyden seemed to be taking a break from dating, or whatever it was called when a billionaire met a babe.

Al had Justin; he struggled to keep track of Kael– his youngest brother wasn’t great at keeping in touch– and he kept a close eye on Mick and her kids.

For some reason, he couldn’t look at Eden and see one night of fun. He couldn’t imagine easily letting her go… and that was why he had to keep his distance. She was a huge red flag, a massive complication. The sooner she left Elmsleigh, the better.

A rap on his front door made him lift his head and he frowned. It wasn’t Daisy; she would’ve walked straight in the back door.

Mick dropped her knife and sent him a brilliant smile. He narrowed his eyes at her. What the hell was she up to now? ‘Oh, by the way, I invited Eden to supper. There’s always plenty and I hated the idea of her spending another night in the big house alone.’

His bloody sister. Seriously, one of these days he was going to…

Do something. What, he had no idea. But something. Bad.

Or, at the very least, uncomfortable.