Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Luke
L uke had fallen onto his back on the outdoor sofa and taken Freya down with him when they returned from Sunday lunch. They hadn’t reached inside before they collapsed from carb overload. Luke had moved Freya, so her back was to the back sofa cushions tucked into his side. He’d hauled her leg up by hooking his fingers behind her knee to drape it over his thighs. Lastly, he positioned her palm over his heart and put his hand on top.
“Comfy?” Freya asked sleepily as she burrowed in further.
He fiddled with her engagement ring before he answered. “Yeah, this is perfect for an afternoon snooze.”
“Do you think the others are doing the same?”
“More than likely.”
“But obviously not Archer and Erica if we’re lounging on their sofa.”
“This is mine. Archer got fed up humping the stuff I always took from their place. Each cottage has the same furniture but in a different colour. I stripped the house and took it all to the storage rooms at Edward Hall. Looks like Archer decided I liked Turner furniture after all my bitching about wanting none of it in my home.”
“It’s very comfy. I approve,” Freya said.
She rested her cheek on his shoulder, and Luke turned his head to kiss her forehead. He never wanted to move.
Luke knew he couldn’t fix his relationship with his aunt. They were too far apart in morals for that. She’d done too much damage to him for that connection to be repairable. His brothers and sister had grouped together to give him a job that made him happy. And now Freya had his ring on her finger. It was enough.
Finally, he had enough in his life to make him happy.
“When are you moving in?” he whispered into her hair, holding her tight.
“After the wedding?” she muttered.
He didn’t take the bait because he could feel her cheek bunch up and knew she was smiling.
Freya was silent for a few moments, so he pitched his idea.
“I was thinking as soon as school breaks up for the summer holidays. Then if Mr Morris makes you work long hours in the next few weeks, I can be gallant and come and pick you up and drive you home. Then fingers crossed, you’ll be pregnant by the time school starts, and I can be overbearing and escort you home and take you to work.”
“Luke,” she said and sighed. “Don’t make Dad get his calendar off the kitchen wall and count the weeks.”
“That was so funny. I bet he’s not really outraged. We’re going to give him his first grandchild, hopefully, the first of many. ”
Freya giggled against his chest. She lifted up her hand to angle her engagement ring. Luke threaded his fingers through hers and brought it back down to his chest.
“Is it really worth six million?”
“Roughly.”
“The Tuners are seriously wealthy.”
“Technically, Cynthia is wealthy. As we’re not allowed to see the bank accounts, I would say the Turners are asset-rich rather than cash-rich.”
“How does Cynthia earn an income?”
“I’m not sure. The lease rentals on the properties on the island would keep Turner Hall warm and lit, but that would be it. And maybe only her wing. We’ve all wondered about the money that comes from keeping this estate pristine. I know the Turner Corporation has businesses overseas, but which ones will remain a mystery until Archer inherits. Then all the secrets will—”
“Luke Turner,” a woman yelled.
For a moment, Luke thought it was Cynthia hollering out his name. Then he realised it was Jennifer. He stilled on the sofa and felt Freya do the same. They stayed entwined, their fingers clutched together, waiting for more.
Luke wondered if it was Jennifer.
“Luke Turner, come out of that cottage right this minute,” Jennifer yelled.
For an eighty-something woman, she had a loud commanding voice.
“Who is that?” Freya asked, lifting her body up on a straightened elbow, her hand deep in the cushions under his torso.
Luke didn’t want Freya anywhere near Jennifer, more so if Jennifer was angry.
“That’s Cynthia’s handmaid, Jennifer. Christ knows why she sounds so angry. She never comes to these cottages. If Cynthia was dead, they’d send Bailey to see Archer.”
Freya looked at him, stricken.
“That sounds so cold.”
“If she was a nicer woman, we would be at her bedside and know if she was unwell. The sad fact is, she is a cruel person, and the staff will follow protocol should the head of the Turner family pass away.”
“That makes me sad.”
“It won’t be the case with our generation. We are going to be a loving family, sharing each other’s lives. Support through the downs, celebrate the ups and improve Copper Island.”
“I’m looking forward to it.”
“Stay here. I’ll go and see what she wants.”
Luke sighed heavily, reluctantly unentwined his legs and arms from Freya and swung his feet to the ground to slip into his trainers. He didn’t bother lacing them up and stuffed the ends into the sides of his feet into the trainers. Luke hoped the conversation wouldn’t take long.
“You need backup. Just yell my name,” Freya said.
He loved her for that, wanted to hug her, and never let go.
Jennifer had stopped fifty feet from Jason’s cottage, clearly not knowing who lived in which cottage. Luke assumed she knew the first three were occupied as she looked at each one in turn. As Luke stepped onto the grass, he glanced down the row to see Jason and Archer sitting on their low walls, arms crossed, knees apart, and feet planted.
To anyone else, Jason looked relaxed, but Luke knew he was anything but calm on the inside. While Jason was barefoot, Archer had his trainers on. Big brother was ready to come and assist if needed, even if it was against a woman in her eighties.
When Jennifer clocked Luke striding across the grass, she moved a lot slower towards him, clearly struggling with a hip or knee problem. He assumed she started bellowing after she couldn’t manage to walk any further. It wasn’t a quick walk from Turner Hall and would’ve taken her twenty minutes.
She leaned heavily on a cane. Something that sent a shiver up his spine.
The first thing he thought was, did she need the cane? Was she faking being frail? It was an unkind thought, but he remembered Jennifer from his childhood.
“What did you say?” she shouted when he was close enough.
“To whom?” Luke asked, ensuring he got his grammar correct in front of this woman who was a stickler for correctness in every form.
Sometimes he thought Jennifer was more like the old-generation Turners that his grandfather was.
“Don’t get smart with me, boy,” she hissed.
Archer and Jason’s cottages were to his left, Edward Hall was in the far distance behind Jennifer and somewhere behind him were Freya’s loving arms.
Archer had stepped onto the grass a few feet in front of his cottage. Erica was now standing in his periphery, her hand on her swollen belly. Jason stood next to Archer with his hands in his shorts pockets. He was wearing trainers now. Movement caught his eye as Freya wandered to Heidi, and they walked to where Erica was leaning against the wooden post of their back patio area.
“I only want to speak to him. You lot can go back inside,” Jennifer shouted to them .
No one moved.
The air was so still Luke could’ve sworn the tree branches were holding their breath.
“Will you say what you’ve got to say, Jennifer? I’ve had the best day celebrating my engagement. Don’t kill my buzz.”
“The doctor is with Cyn,” Jennifer said.
Luke tilted his head, not caring much about the news.
“You mean Miss Turner, right?”
“Yes,” she clipped. “Miss Turner,” she corrected, getting red in the face.
“Okay. She’s eighty. I’d be surprised if the doctor wasn’t with her weekly.”
“She collapsed.”
Her words came out as a wail, seemingly trying to get him to be as concerned as she was.
“What has that got to do with me?”
“You caused her heart attack,” she shouted.
“She’s had a heart attack?”
Luke switched to a medic in a moment. Jason and Archer were on the move getting closer but stopped five feet away.
“She thinks she did. She had pains in her chest.”
Her voice had lowered in volume but not lessened in pain.
Luke remembered for a moment that this woman had been at Cynthia’s side for sixty years. Luke’s mind took a stand-down approach. Pains in the chest could mean anything. It could be heartburn from her Sunday roast.
“When did this happen?” Luke asked, getting to the bottom of the link Jennifer was making between his conversation with his aunt and her situation right then .
“Two hours ago, I waited until you returned,” Jennifer said.
Luke instantly looked to Turner Hall. He could just about see the roof. Had she camped out in the attic rooms to wait for their return?
“How is she now?” Luke asked.
“Like you care,” she snarled.
“I don’t care. I hate her. But I don’t wish her dead.”
Jennifer narrowed her eyes, leaning forward from the waist.
“Where’s the tin?” she asked quietly.
Is that all she cared about?
“Fuck the tin. Is my aunt okay?”
“Luke Turner,” she snapped.
Luke let out a strangled groan, looking to the skies for help.
“You’re as bad as her for asking questions to which you already know the answer. You know what I said to her because she told you. You also know I said those words a few days ago. So if she is suffering from angina, clogged arteries or a heart attack, that’s on her. That’s her guilty conscience plaguing her.”
“Her conscience is clean,” Jennifer shouted.
“The fuck it is. I remember it differently. I remember what you did too. How’s your conscience these days? How do you sleep at night?” he sneered.
Jennifer didn’t answer. She huffed and moved her mouth around like she was chewing a lemon. Luke knew she didn’t have a clean conscience.
“If she dies, it will be on you. Just like your dad’s death is on you,” Jennifer barked out.
“Jennifer, that’s enough,” Archer said, coming to stand next to Luke .
Jason flanked him on the other side.
Jennifer looked at each of us in turn, her mood sourer as the seconds ticked by. Luke couldn’t believe she had the balls to call him out on his dad’s death. It’s a line his aunt had used often. Why did Jennifer care? She was the hired help. He couldn’t see her in the same light as Maggie and Bailey. They had both taken care of him when he needed it and sometimes when he didn’t. He could make his own breakfast, but he found something about sitting in Turner Hall kitchens comforting. With his brothers standing next to him and his soon-to-be wife behind him, the strength they gave him straightened his spine and filled him with courage.
“I didn’t kill my dad, Jennifer. This place did. If anyone is to blame, it’s Cynthia and her selfishness. Do you remember the last time I told her she was selfish? Do you? The day I accused her of getting rid of my mother?” Luke bellowed.
Luke knew the moment Jennifer remembered what he was talking about. She took a step back and tightened the belt on her long bottle green cardigan, resting the cane against her hip. She was no longer as feeble as she first made out.
Clearing her throat, she said, “I do what she says.”
Luke was shocked she could twist what happened and excuse herself from any blame. It begged the question, what did Cynthia have on her. Or, what did Jennifer have on Cynthia that she had the audacity to call out Luke on perceived bullying.
He was done with this woman and the secret he’d buried so deep it had begun to fester. It wasn’t until the split second that he thought he would lose Freya to the water that he knew. Luke knew it wasn’t watching his father die in front of him that caused him pain. It was the incident in the library .
The shame ate away at him.
“You watched her beat me with her cane,” Luke yelled. “You guarded the door when she struck me over and over again.” Luke drew a breath, trying to keep his temperament even. “I was a child.”
Archer and Jason both looked at him, but Luke was so angry, hurt, and in pain, at the memory, he couldn’t look at them. Slowly he unbuttoned his shirt. Once the last one was undone, he shrugged it off and let it drop to the floor.
Jennifer paled, trying not to look at his torso, yet Luke watched as her eyes went to the area.
“Do you like my tattoos?” he barked out. “Do you notice they’re only on one side of my body? The side of my body that was at the mercy of her beating? When I was curled up on the floor, holding my arm up to take the blows. Do you remember the sharp edge of the bottom of the cane scratched down my side, ripping my shirt?”
Jennifer’s eyes welled up, but Luke didn’t care if she had feelings about that day.
“Do you?” Luke shouted.
“You should go,” Jason said to Jennifer.
Luke ignored Jason speaking and stepped closer to Jennifer, lowering his voice.
“You guarded that door while Daisy was hammering on it, bawling her eyes out while I was screaming at Cynthia to stop. You allowed that to happen. Dad was on the rigs, Mum had gone, and Jason and Archer were at school. I dared to ask her why she didn’t try to convince mum to stay. I told her she was selfish. I got beaten for it. I was a child unaware of the levity of what I was saying. Looking back, I can see it may have been rude to ask or mean to comment. Do you think I should’ve been beaten? ”
“I’m sorry,” Jennifer whispered. “You’ve got to understand—”
“I have to understand nothing. I was nine,” Luke hissed. “Nine years old and having no idea what I was asking apart from being heartbroken my mum didn’t love us enough to stay.”
“Luke, that’s not what happened,” Jennifer said.
Luke watched as her expression changed from compassion to guilt to something completely foreign to him. He didn’t know what to make of her pale face and shaking hand. Jennifer lifted her cane, and Luke immediately felt sick and stepped back. Jason and Archer stepped in front of him.
“I wasn’t going to hurt you,” Jennifer said, her eyes welling up again.
Luke didn’t answer her. He swiped up his t-shirt and bunched it up in his hand. Then thinking better of it, he tossed it aside.
“You should go Jennifer. You just told Luke that Cynthia may have had a heart attack. He’s a medic. Our Dad died of a heart attack. He died in front of Luke’s eyes, dead before he hit the floor. What you just did was cruel. And I swear to god if her suspected heart attack was heartburn…”
Luke didn’t hear any more Archer said as he strode across the lawn towards Sabrina lodge. He didn’t look in Freya’s direction, who was still standing next to Erica, and he held out his hand. He heard her run full pelt towards him, and as soon as she was in reaching distance, he swept her up into his arms and carried her the rest of the way to his home.
“I love you,” Freya whispered against his cheek as she pressed her mouth to his skin .
“I don’t think I would’ve been brave enough to admit I was beaten if I didn’t know you’d be here to hold me.”
“Luke,” she sniffed.
“Don’t cry, Peaches. I’m just about holding on here. Let me get inside the house.”
“Okay,” she said. “Okay.”
She held onto his neck with both arms and pressed her mouth against his neck until they were in his bedroom. She undressed him as soon as her feet touched the floor because he was shaking too much to undo his trousers button. Then she removed her clothes. Luke pulled back the covers for her to slide under, and he joined her there. A moment or two later, he was inside her. Not moving. Covering her body with his. She took his weight as they sank into the memory foam mattress. When she wrapped her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck, he let out a sob he felt come from his toes. All the grief he felt for his dad came out, his sorrow for not having his mum around to console him. Every bone in his body ached like he’d run a marathon.
Freya was there, wrapping him in a cocoon and keeping him safe.
“I love you more than you can possibly imagine, Freya Riley,” he said.