Her lips curved into a small smirk. “My brother-in-law has just purchased a farm nearby and is looking for a gardener.”

“Congratulations to him. May I suggest he try the internet?”

“Any gardener you have must be good enough for him.”

“That’s one way of putting it.” I paused my not-so-cordial conversation to serve two twin girls some soup. They’d already raided various bread baskets, given the abundance they had on their plates.

Heidi waited until they’d gone. “Is Miles available?”

“You’d have to ask my father,” I replied nonchalantly. “That’s his business, not mine.”

“I don’t think I’ll need to.” She paused. “Is he single?”

I barely restrained myself from rolling my eyes. “I can’t say either way. As you so succinctly pointed out, he’s an employee. We’re hardly best friends.”

And we never would be, either.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” She smiled, but there was nothing kind about it. “Would you give him my number?”

“I’d rather pour this hot soup into my eyes and never set eyes on you again,” I replied honestly. “Do it yourself, Heidi.”

“No need to be so tetchy,” she tittered. “I will. I’ll be back soon.”

She turned away, and I paused.

Her brother-in-law bought a farm nearby?

There was no farmland up for sale here.

There was, however, a few smallholdings of less than five acres up for rent.

“Heidi, that farm?”

She stilled, looking over her shoulder. “Yes?”

“Do you know the address?”

She frowned. “I think it’s… Hang on.” She pulled her phone from her hand and tapped at the screen with a glossy blue nail. “Oak Wood Cottage. Just outside Arrow Woods.”

A childish little fissure of pleasure ran through me. “That’s about four acres, right? With a small two-bedroom cottage? A couple of livestock buildings?”

Heidi froze. “How do you know that?”

It was my turn to give a knowing, smug little smile. “Oak Wood Cottage is a smallholding on Arrowwood Estate that went up for rent three months ago.”

Her jaw tightened.

“Whatever your brother-in-law told you, he’s renting. From my family.” I stared at her. “So you needn’t bother telling him about Miles. If a gardener is needed on that property, Miles already tells them what to do.”

If she hadn’t frozen before, she really had now. Given the way she spoke to me, she hadn’t known that information, and the expression that tightened her face said she wasn’t happy about it.

“I have brea—” Miles froze, and I caught his gaze as it flickered between me and Heidi. “—Ed,” he finished after a moment. “Is something wrong?”

“No, it’s fine. Heidi was just leaving. Weren’t you?” I said coldly, giving her a look that said I was done with her bullshit, and I wasn’t going to take it anymore.

That despite the years of bullying as a child, where she’d always made me feel less than, I was reclaiming ownership of who I was in this particular relationship.

I was no longer going to let her walk all over me.