Page 43

He linked his hands behind his neck and tipped his head up to look at the ceiling. Before he could formulate his next question, she spoke again. ‘I understand they are likely to be arrested. They’re going to need a very good lawyer. Maybe Troyden or Alistair can recommend someone.’

He couldn’t believe what she was saying. ‘There must be some mistake, Eden.’

‘Money, lots of it,’ she said, her voice flat and emotionless, ‘is missing from the foundation. There’s no mistake about that, Jed. There are only two options… Eitherthey took it, or I did, setting them up to take the blame. And you’re leaning toward option number two.’

She slammed her suitcase shut, clothes poking out from the sides.

‘I didn’t say that!’ he yelled, an out-of-control car skidding wildly on her layer of ice. ‘I’m just trying to understand, Eden.’

‘No, you’re trying to make the facts fit to make you feel more comfortable,’ she retorted.

She released a sound that was a cross between a snort and a sob.

‘But you’ve yet to tell me that you believe me.

What’s missing is your emphatic show of support, even a vague statement that you’re sure I haven’t done anything wrong and that we can find our way through this. ’

Hadn’t he? He winced. But in fairness, she’d kept this from him. ‘You’re the one who didn’t tell me any of this, Eden!’

‘And why do you think I did that, Jed? What would you have said if I’d blurted this out when I first met you?

’ she asked, her voice rising. ‘If I came to you and said, “Hey, your mum’s best friend is a thief and she’s nicked a load of donor money”, how would you have reacted?

You and Troyden would’ve kicked me out!’

Okay, that was a fair point. They would’ve reacted swiftly, and probably without bothering to hear her out. But they’d been sleeping together for a while now and they had… something . ‘But you’ve had ample time to tell me, so why didn’t you?’

‘I couldn’t tell you, Jed. I was instructed not to by a pretty intimidating detective at the Metropolitan Police.

’ She threw up her hands. ‘Besides, I knew you wouldn’t believe me, and this conversation proves my point.

You don’t want to believe me, Jed. Because your loyalty is to them, to the people who knew you when you were a kid, who were connected to your mother, who loved your mother.

They are Troyden’s friends. I didn’t want to hurt you with this.

’ She rubbed her hand across her forehead.

‘I was waiting for the news of their arrest to come out, for the police to make a statement. At least then I would’ve had a chance of someone believing me. ’

She disappeared into the bathroom and almost immediately returned holding a toiletry bag.

In quick, sure movements, she unplugged her phone charger and laptop and tossed both into a large tote bag.

The toiletry bag followed, and she looked around the room, scooping up a tube of lip gloss, a five-pound crumpled note and the keys to her car.

Her sexy shoes went into the tote bag, and she slid her flip-flops on.

Tears smudged her mascara and eye make-up, but he couldn’t go to her, not when he was so churned up and off balance.

If he did, he might confess his love and beg her to stay.

He couldn’t do that, not until he had all the facts.

As he’d recently learned from his interactions with Henry, there were always three sides to a story, and the truth wasn’t something that could be determined from one heated conversation.

And his deep, innate sense of loyalty was screaming its disgust for even considering the idea that the Bancrofts were guilty of theft. As Eden pointed out, they’d been good to him, good to his mum, part of the fabric of his life.

But believing them meant disbelieving Eden, and he couldn’t do that either.

She’d slipped into his heart and was what he never thought he needed.

She’d, somehow, with her red-gold hair and sea-glass eyes, her softness and grit, become the glue that stitched his life together.

She was his future, his way forward. He knew he was fucking this up, but he didn’t know what to do or say, or had any idea how to walk this tightrope stretched over a fathoms-deep, soul-sucking cavern.

Eden sniffed and pushed her hair off her forehead. ‘Nothing else to say?’ she asked, her words pointy-spear sharp.

‘Don’t go, Eden,’ he implored, his voice gritty. ‘Let’s work this out.’

‘That’s your way of asking me to spend the next few hours begging you to believe me,’ she snapped. ‘Thanks, but I’ll skip.’

‘C’mon, that’s not fair! I’m just trying to understand!’

She grabbed the handle of her suitcase, pulled out the extension and rolled it to the bedroom door. Hoisting her heavy tote bag over her shoulder, his instinct was to take it from her, lighten her load, but he knew he would probably lose his head if he tried.

‘This is what I understand, Jed,’ she said, her words low and so very sad. ‘You didn’t take my side. Your instinct wasn’t to support me, but to defend them. Yet again, I wasn’t someone’s first choice. I really should be used to it by now.’

And with those heartbreakingly, pierce-his-heart words, she walked out of the room. And probably his life.