Page 102 of Reckless Kiss

“Was it a secret?” he asked, scratching his chin and looking at the sky. Cynthia was incensed with Pete’s calmness compared to her irate manner.

“Yes, Pete, it was. So how the hell did you find out?”

“Betty and me were having a cuppa and heard Imelda talking on the phone about you two. We had no idea it was a secret.”

Imelda. She knew it. Her brother Freddie was dating Imelda, Pete and Betty’s daughter.

“So Betty told my father?”

“I told no one, nothing, Cynthia Turner,” Betty bellowed from the upstairs window.

Pete and Cynthia turned to look up at the upper level of the butchers where Pete, Betty, and Imelda lived. It was also where Jonathan lodged in their spare room.

They had their daughter young when Betty was sixteen. Betty and Pete weren’t much older than Cynthia, but were never friends.

Cynthia wasn’t very good at making friends; when she did, she rarely kept them. Based on her track record, it astonished her that Jonathan was still in her life.

“My father is making me marry a man twenty years older than me because he found out about Jonathan and me.”

“He can’t make you do that,” Pete clipped back. “There are laws about that.”

“You have met my father, haven’t you?”

“Yeah. He’s in… here… all the… time.”

They both knew what had happened as soon as he slowed his sentence. Cynthia was ready to kick something or someone.

Instead, inhaling deeply, she glared at Pete. “When was the last time you saw my father?”

“He was in the shop a few days ago.”

“And you weren’t gossiping about me?”

Betty’s face went pale in the open window, and she retreated inside the house, pulling down the sash window. Cynthia and Pete waited for Betty to appear, but she never did. Finally, after five minutes, Cynthia looked at Pete.

“Someone told my father about my relationship with Jonathan Cranford. He said it was you.”

“It could well have been. Imelda was on the phone in the shop in the preparation area when we overheard. Then Betty and I discussed that you two make a lovely couple. When I came out into the shop area, your father was waiting to be served. I thought nothing of it. Jonathan is my friend, and he said nothing about you two courting. Betty and I were wondering why that might be.”

“Loose lips sink ships, Pete Boyle. Your gossiping family has ruined my life,” she screamed.

Cynthia pivoted on the spot and ran from the backyard, through the preparation area and out into the shop. She pushed through the customers, jostling them from side to side, earning her some choice words. Cynthia couldn’t care.

She had to get to Jonathan before her father did.

Chapter 47

Cynthia wasn’t returning to Turner Hall until she found Jonathan and warned him of what had happened.

Where could he be?

She ran to the quayside as she knew he liked to fish. Running full pelt to the stone wall at the end, there was no one she could see. Then, out of breath and crazy desperate, she looked over to see if he was in a small fishing boat. She looked up when a yell came from the other end of the quay. Jonathan was waving frantically. When she stood still, he set off to her at a run and hugged her fiercely when he reached her—kissing her deeply.

“What has happened?” Jonathan said, peppering kisses all over her face. “Pete found me in the pub and said I had to find you immediately.”

Cynthia burst into tears, sobbing into her hands as she rested her forehead against his chest. He hugged her to his body, smoothing his hands up and down her back until she calmed.

“My father knows about us.”

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