Page 81 of My Haven
Caiden looked around and frowned when he saw the carton of store-bought broth. “I have canned bone broth if you prefer that.”
“Absolutely. I prefer homemade as much as possible, but not to the point of it being exclusive.”
“How so?” he asked.
She pointed to the carton of broth. “Take the broth for example. In some videos, content creators will blast people for using store bought, so those viewers don’t make homemade soup at all. Cooking is not an all or nothing endeavor. If you don’t have time for making broth, then buy it. If you can’t cut up vegetables, buy them pre-cut. I always tell my viewers to do whatever it takes to make eating healthier easy on them.”
Caiden went to a side cabinet and pulled out a large mason jar. “I’ve read a lot of the comments on your videos. People thank you for being realistic.”
She shrugged. “A working mother of two is already struggling for most day-to-day things. Making organic sourdough starter from scratch and growing their own vegetables just isn’t feasible.”
Caiden popped the jar’s lid and handed it to her. “I could have used that advice when I was raising Amelia.”
She added the broth and the vegetables. “How did you end up raising your sister?”
“Unbeknownst to me and my brothers, my parents were actually on an important mission when Amelia was born. To keep her safe, she was left with us.” He exhaled loudly. “We had no idea what to do. Gods! She was this tiny thing with huge eyes that were just like ours. If she even whimpered, we were tripping over ourselves to soothe her.”
He pointed to the kitchen. “I learned to cook because of her.”
“How so?”
Caiden’s face became unreadable. “She got sick, really sick, and it was because we weren’t giving her the right foods. As I said, we really didn’t know what we were doing. So, I learned. Everything. How to grow vegetables, how to make bread, how to can, anything and everything I would need to know, to give her the best food possible, so she would never get sick again.”
“She sounds very lucky to have had you.” Genevieve hesitated, then asked. “I know Amelia is your sister, but how could she have been so cherished and Meryn so neglected?”
Caiden growled low in his throat. “We didn’t know she even existed!” He took a deep breath and leaned against the counter. “Her grandmother never even told mother that Meryn had been born. She knew mother would have come for her in a second.”
“If she didn’t want to care for Meryn, why keep her?”
“From what I have heard, Meryn’s grandmother believed mother to be one step away from devil worship. In her mind she was Meryn’s savior for keeping her from such an influence.”
“Devil worship? Did she know your dad was a witch?”
Caiden laughed. “Devil worship, as in mother wanted to wear pants and have an opinion.”
“Oh.” She added the chicken, then began organizing the spices. “Would you have taken Meryn in too?”
“In a fucking heartbeat,” he answered immediately.
“That’s a very strong stance,” she said.
“It’s hard to explain. In the paranormal world, kids are few and far between. Most families cherish all children.”
“That orphanage tells a different tale,” she pointed out.
“The orphanage is a recent development, it only came about in the last one-hundred years or so.”
She blinked. “The last one-hundred years is a ‘recent’ development for you?”
He watched her and answered slowly. “Yes?”
“I am definitely in a different world.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“I’m still making that determination. Back to the kids,” she said, measuring out the poultry seasoning.
“The orphanage started as a sort of creche for parents taking long assignments, then it just evolved into what it is today. Because birth rates are relatively low, all children are treasured. It’s the society of Storm Keep that changed, not paranormals in general,” he said.
