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So that meant the stables. Eden hesitated and wondered whether she’d have an allergic reaction.

She pushed back her shoulders and forced steel into her spine.

Well, she was about to find out because there was no way she was going to leave Jed to deal with his thoughts and emotions by himself.

She’d seen the pain in his eyes earlier and heard the fear in his voice.

Nobody, not even stoic Jed, should be alone after dropping a conversational hand grenade.

And if that meant her morphing into a hive-covered beast, then so be it. She wouldn’t die.

She slipped through the huge stable doors, easy to open despite their size, and walked into the cool interior, trying to take shallow breaths.

There wasn’t any reason to inhale more dander than she needed to.

She loved the stillness of the mostly empty stables, the soft sounds of a sick or pregnant horse shuffling, the occasional nicker, and the smell of hay and horseflesh.

With its high, wooden-arched ceiling it looked a little like a cathedral, and it held the same peace.

She understood why this was where Jed needed to be. There was peace here.

She was barely three steps into the stable when a muscled arm encircled her waist and lifted her off her feet, her back to his chest. She squealed and held on to Jed’s arm as he walked her out of the stables and back into the bright sunshine.

‘Are you mad?’ he roared. ‘What the hell do you think you are doing?’

Her feet hit the ground, and she gripped his arm to keep her balance. ‘Uh?—’

‘You have a severe allergy to horses, you idiot!’ Jedyelled, his eyes sparking. ‘The last time you were in a stable you fainted and scared the shit out of me.’

She could feel a sneeze coming on and prayed it would go away. She held her breath, not wanting to give his words credence. But because her body was a bitch, the sneeze hit the back of her throat, and she cupped her hands around her nose and released the inevitable.

Three sneezes later, she lifted her head to look at a scowling Jed. ‘Happy, now?’ he asked, his mouth thin with displeasure. Before she could answer, he lifted her arms and gently twisted them, checking for any incoming welts. ‘Tight throat? Difficulty breathing?’

‘No, I’m fine.’ She hadn’t, thank goodness, had a hive since that first time. He dropped to his haunches, balancing on his toes to inspect her legs. Thank God, she’d shaved them this morning.

‘Nothing on your legs yet.’ He stood up and gripped her shoulders in a tight grip. He was a strong guy, but conscious of his strength. He shook her, just a little. ‘What the hell were you thinking, Eden?’

She held his wrists and looked up into his angry-at-her and angry-for-her face. ‘I was thinking that you just dropped a bombshell. And that you might be having trouble processing it.’

He dropped his head, and his grip loosened. ‘I’m okay,’ he gruffly stated. When he looked back at her, his eyes were blazing with intensity and a healthy dose of irritation. ‘Nothing is so important… nobody is so important, that you need to go into a stable, Eden.’

Ah, she could push the point but decided that was an argument for later. Right now, he looked shattered. Edensuspected another emotional blow would cause him to become a human version of the suit of armour hitting the floor.

Eden knew he wanted to hold it together and that he wasn’t used to feeling vulnerable. He was the glue that held the Castle family together, but sometimes glue became brittle and hard, and started to crack.

She took his hand, interlinked her much smaller fingers in his and tugged him toward a small knoll of grass, under the stately oak tree.

It was where she’d lain after collapsing the first time she’d visited Elmsleigh over two months ago.

She sat, leaned her back against the tree, and patted the grass beside her.

When he turned his head away and looked at the horses in the paddock, she shook her head at his stubbornness.

‘Jed, sit down,’ she firmly stated. Imitating her mum’s taking-no-shit tone worked, even on thirty-five-year-old alpha males.

Good to know.

Jed bent his long legs and rested his arms on his knees. ‘I don’t want to talk about it, Eden,’ he stated, his voice rough.

Of course, he didn’t, because Jed was a doer and a solver, not a talker.

But her aim wasn’t to get him to talk, but to let him know he wasn’t alone.

‘I get what you said earlier, about needing to do something, or be someone for your family, to feel like you have worth,’ she said, trying to keep her tone casual.

He didn’t look at her, but Eden sensed his interest, so she continued.

‘My mum was a foster mum, I told you that, right?’ When he nodded, she continued.

‘There were so many kids, and I was just another one. She couldn’t give anyone too much attention; she didn’t have the time or the emotional resources.

Kids came in; kids went out. I was the one that stayed.

I only got as much from her– brush your teeth, make your bed, fix your hair– as they others did.

Food, a roof over my head, a bed. Not much else. ’

Eden looked for the right words to explain her unique situation. ‘My mum wasn’t… warm, is the right word. She did a lot of good, but…’

‘But you were a long-term foster kid. Someone she didn’t connect with on an emotional level. Now I understand why raising funds for Hope Harbour is so important to you.’

God, he got her. On levels no one else had ever before. It was like he could peel her apart and look directly into the heart of who she was. It scared her on levels she didn’t think were possible.

But this wasn’t about her; it was about him.

And the fact that he’d been dealing with the death of his biological father– that had to raise some unwelcome feelings– and his brother’s sudden reappearance in his life, demanding a relationship.

Maybe demanding was too harsh a word, but Henry could be persistent.

He clearly wanted the relationship with his brother that their father had denied them, and Henry appeared to be determined to make it happen, no matter what.

Eden sighed, remembering the flinty stare in Jed’s eyes as he’d told his family the truth.

How worried he’d been that Henry’s arrival would affect his relationship with his siblings and his stepfather.

‘I remember spending a couple of nights at a foster home like your mum’s,’ Jed said, his voice lower than normal. Holy hell, really? She whipped her head around and took in his profile. ‘Really?’ she asked. ‘How did that happen?’

‘My mum went through a rough patch a couple of years before she met Troyden. She came to London. I presume she thought she could find work here and look after me. But childcare, even back then, was so damn expensive, and she fell out with the Bancrofts for a few months. We ended up moving, often, eventually into a shelter for a week or so.’ Jed’s voice trembled a little.

‘I was young, and I still don’t know why they took me away.

I only spent a night in care, and the Bancrofts picked me up the next day.

It was something that embarrassed her, so I didn’t push for the hows and whys it had happened. ’

He took a shaky breath, then quirked a half-smile. ‘It would’ve been cool if we’d briefly met as kids, though, huh?’

She never pegged him for a romantic. Shifting closer she curled her hand around his big bicep, and kissed his shoulder, feeling the heat of his skin beneath his cotton t-shirt.

‘Very cool,’ she sighed in response. But she knew London was a big city; there were so many shelters, so many foster homes, so much need.

‘Was your mum always religious?’ Jed asked, his hand playing with her fingers holding his arm, as they settled into this pocket of vulnerability.

Was he done talking about his father? It seemed so.

But maybe by talking about herself, she’d ease him into opening up.

Eden shrugged. ‘Yes, although I didn’t realise how religious until I was an adult.

But she was very… how do I put this?… private.

She didn’t talk to me, Jed. Or to anyone.

’ Her mum had no friends. Eden had been just like her up until a few weeks back: lonely, isolated, friendless.

Now she had Mick and Troyden, Al and Justin and, to an extent, Jed.

She rested her temple on his bicep. ‘I didn’t even know who my dad was until I met Troyden.’

Could she say the words she thought often but had never expressed?

Yeah, she thought she could. ‘My mum joined the Church when I was eighteen, and I didn’t understand why.

When she went into the cloister, I finally understood: I’m her sin, Jed, her biggest mistake.

Every day for eighteen years, whenever she looked at me, she was confronted with the fact that she’d gone against God’s will and had sex and a baby out of wedlock. ’

He started to protest, but she shook her head. ‘It doesn’t matter if we think it’s archaic or whether we believe in it or not; she did, profoundly . She felt that she had disappointed God, and I was the living proof.’

He was silent for a long time. ‘You couldn’t possibly be a disappointment, Eden.’

That was the nicest thing anyone had said to her, in a long, long time. ‘I now get why she joined the convent, sort of, why she retreated. She could concentrate on her relationship with God and on repairing it. I think it was the only relationship that ever mattered to her.’

He turned his head to lay his lips on her forehead and she closed her eyes when he kept them there, murmuring against her skin, ‘I’m so sorry, sweetheart.’