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Ash frowned at her

‘I thought you loved your life once your uncle took you hoht he saved you’

‘He did—he was fantastic,’ Fliss cried, panicking that sheother than glowing terht of all he had done for her ‘He has always been fantastic’

‘But your grandparents weren’t?’

She drew in a deep breath, unsure how to explain this to a man who had been physically hurt and wounded as a child

‘They were never unkind to , clothing, everything a child needs physically But they never showed me any love My uncle ay a lot with the Arrades were outstanding because I thought it was about their fear of ht if I worked hard I could show them that I wasn’t like that, that I would earn their love’

‘But it didn’t work,’ he guessed

She supposed he knew enough about that If the love wasn’t there naturally fro to earn it

‘No,’ she confirmed ‘It didn’t I suppose it turned out for all of us to bee who I was or what I was Behind the perfunctory well dones they never stopped looking at me as the family’s shameful little secret’

Raking his hand over his forehead, Ash closed the gap between the her She inhaled deeply, the familiar sce

nt both soothing her troubledher body

Oh, so sti

‘I don’t want to talk about it any ently ‘I’ve told you now And it’s done and it’s my past All of it’

She licked her lips, hoping she hadn’t nals

‘So how about we focus on the future? One with both of us in it?’ She hesitated for a moment ‘You told me you loved me There is still an us, isn’t there?’