Page 103 of Lipstick Kiss

“You’ll see Daisy, a girl needs her mother,” Pete said.

Freddie felt her body sag on his lap and knew she’s given up the fight. It was a plan, not one he liked, but it meant she would be out of harm’s way. Imelda couldn’t escape living at Turner Hall. His father wouldn’t allow them to live anywhere but at the ancestral home. He tried to reason with his dad that they could live in town, and it was shut down. Freddie was a Turner, and he would live at Turner Hall. That was the end of it.

Freddie couldn’t help which family he was born into, and he had made Imelda his wife. He wasn’t to know the lengths his sister would go to make his life miserable. So Pete had purchased the two terraced houses on the northern coast near where the helicopters landed, bringing the crew back from the rigs. Freddie had supplied the money.

Freddie would make it work. He would spend all his energy convincing his father to reverse the inheritance and give it to Cynthia.

In a few days on the last ferry, Imelda Turner would leave Copper Island like she’d walked out on him. They had planned it so she left while he was away, and he could come back shocked she’d disappeared. But, in truth, by the time he arrived at Turner Hall, he would’ve spent the previous three days with her.

He thanked Cynthia for that idea. It wouldn’t have sparked the idea if he hadn’t discovered her secret liaison with Jonathan one Christmastime. The snow was heavy, and Freddie needed to stay overnight at a bed-and-breakfast. It was one of many in the town. When he returned from the pub, he saw Cynthia holding a young boy’s hand and a man’s arm slung around her shoulder. Freddie knew what Jonathan looked like. He also saw a happy family. He’d never seen his sister laugh like he’d witnessed that evening.

He still didn’t know why they chose to spend Christmas in a sleepy town on the northern coast of Scotland as a getaway cottage. Surely she knew where the Turner rig was and where the heliport was?

Surely?

It didn’t matter. Cynthia could have her secret life, and he could have his. Freddie felt it pointless that they were tiptoeing around, but he would do anything to keep Imelda Turner safe.

He’d put her in harm’s way. He’d get her away from it.

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