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Chapter Nine

‘S od it.’

From the window seat in Troyden’s study, her legs tucked up under her, Eden looked over to Alistair sitting behind the large oak desk, glaring at the computer.

He released another curse, his shoulders hunched and lips pursed.

Across the room Troyden and Justin sat on the leather couch, looking at a shared document on a laptop.

A few days had passed since her and Jed’s confusing,can’t-stop-thinking-about-that kiss, why-hasn’t-he-followed-up encounter, and Eden had yet to book her ticket to Croatia.

Somehow, while eating Mick’s devil chocolate sauce, she’d caved, succumbing to Mick’s blatant emotional manipulation by agreeing to attend the first meeting of the charity polo match organising committee.

She wasn’t going to commit to more than that.

It would be, Mick airily informed her, sometime soon.

In the meantime she’d taken to exploring Bythesea village, and enjoyed the way it embraced its agricultural, horsey and artistic residents.

The upmarket coffee shop was owned and operated by Cody, an American hipster barista, and it sat next to a grocer, the till manned by Hyacinth Bucket’s sister.

A saddle and tack shop was bookended by a store selling animal feed and medicine, and a potter shared space with a small art gallery.

Alistair released another, more brutal curse and rubbed the back of his neck. Eden dropped her legs and wandered over to squint at the screen. He was running code.

‘Are you coding in Python?’ she asked, intrigued.

‘I’m bloody trying to,’ Alistair growled. ‘The sodding thing won’t sodding work.’

‘Can I help?’ she asked, a little hesitant.

‘You can code?’

Eden explained that she’d taken an advanced Python coding course at uni, but didn’t bother telling him that, in her spare time, she played around with software development. It was, strangely, something she instinctively knew how to do. She could speak computer.

Alistair stood up and motioned for her to take his place. Eden slid into the warm seat and listened to his concise, logical explanation of what he was trying to achieve. Her eyes read the code while he talked, looking for discrepancies.

‘Got it?’ Alistair asked.

She did. Knowing what he needed, her fingers flew across his keyboard– there was nothing nicer than a superfast computer– quickly sliding into the rhythm of the code. Oh, yeah, she’d forgotten how much she enjoyed this.

When she sat back, she tested the programme and it worked. Satisfied, she sat back in the chair and pushed her hair out of her eyes. Then she noticed three pairs of eyes on her and frowned. ‘What?’

‘You rewrote my program in’—Alistair checked his fancy watch—‘twenty minutes. You made it cleaner, faster and more efficient. It took me three hours just to get to this…’

She shrugged. ‘I like coding.’

‘You’re damn good at it,’ Alistair stated, shutting the lid to his laptop. He scooped it up and stalked out of the study.

‘In case you didn’t realise, that was Al thanking you for your help.’ Justin walked over to the desk and held up his hand for a high-five. ‘You impressed him, and Al is rarely impressed.’

‘I’m glad I could help,’ she replied, smiling. ‘It was fun.’

Justin and Troyden exchanged conspiratorial grins. ‘Being better at Al at anything doesn’t happen often, so enjoy those three a.m. calls when he’s stuck,’ teased Justin.

‘I— What? No!’ She wasn’t good at three in the morning. Her blood only started to circulate after 7am and two cups of coffee. Eden was about to ask Justin if he was serious when her phone beeped with a message from Mick, asking whether she could help her out for a couple of hours.

And if she could, could she come down to her cottage as soon as possible?

Tucking her phone into the back pocket of her denim shorts, Eden shoved her feet into her flip-flops and told Justin she’d hold him responsible if his husband called her at an obscene hour. Justin didn’t, damn him, look even remotely scared.

Leaving the house, feeling happy and useful for the first time in a while, she wandered down to the cottages, enjoying the slight breeze rustling through the tall oaks, sweet chestnut and beech trees, enjoying the patterns the late afternoon sun created on the path through the small wood.

Wildflowers, bluebells and daffodils added colour to the many shades of green, and Eden smiled at a robin’s call.

Or she thought it was a robin, but she wouldn’t place any money on it.

Through the trees, she could see the polo field where Jed and his teammates normally practised, and sighed when she saw it was empty. She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about him during the day and dreaming of him at night.

He was sex, sin and temptation all rolled up into one hearty, healthy, sexy package. If they hadn’t fallen through the door like some slapstick duo from the silent movie era, she could easily imagine him taking her where she stood. She certainly hadn’t considered stopping him.

Eden pushed her hands into her hair and tugged. Whenever she laid eyes on him, her body started to hum and she lost all the moisture in her mouth. All she wanted was to be back in his arms, her breasts pushed into his chest, his mouth covering hers, his fingers heading south…

Arrgh! Jeez, she was losing her mind. Maybe she needed to return to her flat, find her infrequently used vibrator and take the edge off. And maybe bring it back to Elmsleigh House with her. But Eden knew that some self-love wouldn’t help; it was Jed she craved.

She was in so much trouble.

How stupid was she to fall for the son of Tara’s good friend?

She’d, carefully, mined Troyden, Diana and Mick for more information about the Bancrofts’ relationship with the Castle clan, and learned that the Bancrofts had met Troyden through Jed’s mum.

Jed had spent a lot of time with them after his mum died, and they’d offered to have him live with them.

But Jed had chosen to live at Elmsleigh with Troyden, and he’d retained a close relationship with the Bancrofts ever since.

Jed, so she’d been told, was a guy whose loyalty was absolute.

He would walk through fire for the people he loved and would fight dragons on their behalf.

She instinctively knew that once Jed took you into his inner circle, you were there through everything life could throw at you.

And God help anyone who tried to hurt you…

It wouldn’t matter to Jed that she’d agonised over her decision to report them and had spent many sleepless nights weighing whether the good they did trumped embezzlement. He wouldn’t care that turning them in was agonising, but it was the only decision she could live with.

Bottom line: if he learned she was the one who’d snitched, he would never forgive her. And if the police found out she’d told them about the investigation, they’d charge her, and prison orange wasn’t her colour.

Rock, meet hard place.

And that was why one kiss was all they could ever share. They couldn’t have more, not when a maelstrom of secrets churned beneath the surface. So the sooner she stopped thinking about him and lusting over him, the better.

God, she wished attraction was a simple switch she could flip to OFF.

Eden knocked on Mick’s door, heard her harried call to come in, and stepped into a hectic, chaotic mess. Like Jed’s place, the kitchen, lounge and dining were all open plan, with the bedrooms, she presumed, upstairs.

Mick carried a grumpy-looking Liam on her hip.

She still wore her work outfit of black pants and white shirt, with a smudge of God knew what across her chest. Liam’s face was streaked with tears.

Behind her, Gemma looked mutinous. She held her kitten like a baby, and for a change, it was wide awake, eyes big in its shocking-orange face.

‘Hi, Eden, thanks for coming over,’ Mick said, looking on the edge of tears herself.

‘What can I do to help?’

Mick rubbed her hand up and down Liam’s back. ‘I need to get Gemma to a party this afternoon, but she won’t leave Bizzy on her own.’

Ah, so the kitten now had a name. Gemma lifted her deep brown eyes to meet Eden’s. Her expression was part street thug, part heartbreak. ‘He’s just a baby, and he’s in a new place.’ She glared at her mother. ‘How would you feel if someone made you leave your baby alone in a strange place?’

It was a fair question and Eden hoped Mick had an answer for her. But judging by the frustration on Mick’s face, she didn’t. ‘She’s a cat , Gemma, and we’ve closed every window, and we’ll lock the door when we go. She can’t go anywhere.’

It was obvious this was an argument she’d tried before, with little success. ‘She’s a baby , mum She’ll be alone.’

Mick closed her eyes in frustration and looked at Eden. ‘Could you please stay here for two hours max, to keep the cat company?’ she asked. ‘If I spend another minute arguing about this, I might lose it.’

She was being asked to babysit a cat? This she could do.

‘I’ll stay with Bizzy,’ she told Mick. Her shoulders dropped and relief jumped into her eyes.

Eden knew that this was probably the last straw at the tail end of a long day, and if she could make Mick’s life easier for a short time doing nothing, then she would.

Eden placed her hand on Mick’s arm and squeezed. ‘Can you take ten minutes? I’ll make you a cup of tea?’

Mick looked at her watch and nodded. ‘Yeah, we can be ten minutes late, and I’d like that.’

She put Liam on his feet and told the kids to watch TV until she called them again. Eden followed Mick into the kitchen– bomb site!– and bumped her hip when Mick picked up the kettle. ‘I’ll make it, you sit.’

Mick slipped onto a bar stool, placed her arms on the island and rested her forehead on her fist. ‘Tough day?’ Eden asked, quickly making her a cuppa.

Mick’s reply was muffled. ‘Tough week, tough month.’ She rubbed her hands up over her face. ‘Sorry, I hate whining.’