Jennifer hurried over and handed it to him. Cynthia looked on, dazed in shock.
“Hello, Bailey. Can you tell me what happened? Cynthia has gone to sit down. She looked shocked.”
Cynthia listened as Jonathan gave nonverbal sounds down the line while she looked through the front doors, thinking how pretty they were compared to the wooden doors at Turner Hall that were like prison doors when they were shut at night.
“Okay, thank you. Jennifer will be in contact when Cynthia knows about her travel plans. Goodbye.”
Cynthia clung to Jonathan, her fingers curled into the hair at the base of his skull. “Is it true?” she whispered.
Jonathan kissed her temple and shifted her in his arms. He bent his knees and then lifted her off the ground. Cynthia quietly sobbed into his neck, hugging him tight as he walked up the main staircase. She looked over his shoulder to see Jennifer standing next to the marble table, the handset still in her hand. Tears dripped off her jaw, and she kept eye contact with Cynthia. Just as Jonathan turned the corner, Jennifer mouthed the wordsI’m sorry.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Two days later
“Dad was loved by a lot of the islanders. We’re having his funeral at All Saints Church,” Archer said.
Cynthia shook her shoulders like she was shaking off fallen snow. A shiver raced down her spine. She didn’t want to see any of the islanders. Her future had been ruined, but what she feared the most was Freddie’s wife turning up. If the service was in the Turner Chapel, there would be no risk.
“No,” Cynthia replied.
“Let them have the service in a bigger place of worship, child. What is the issue?” her father, Archibald Turner, asked as he shuffled into the drawing room, bashing his cane into the carpet with each step.
He was immaculately dressed in a bottle green blazer, white shirt, grey slacks and a green and red striped tie. Archibald’s full head of hair was slicked back, freshly cut. Cynthia gazed at him, furious at him siding with her nephew, Archer. But then Archer was his favourite. For that reason alone, Cynthia never laid a hand on him.
Cynthia glanced at Archer, who stood by the bay window. She would happily slap his smug grin off his face. She then looked to her father, who had made it to the fireplace and lowered his elderly body into the high-back chair. His shrewd eyes were on her. She hated her father, even now when he was in his nineties. She loathed the man, even more so because he wasn’t taking her side.
“Fine. Have it your way.”
Daisy stepped forward, and Luke came to her side. She looked directly at Cynthia with a chilly stare. Cynthia showed no fear.
“I’m glad that’s settled, Aunt Cynthia,” Daisy said. “He was our father, after all, and as far as we know, you hadn’t spoken a word to your brother in a decade. So I don’t think you should have any say in how we say farewell to a father we adored.”
“I expect you’ll all be staying at Turner Hall,” Cynthia stated.
“No, we won’t. Thank you for the offer, but we will stay elsewhere,” Luke said.
“Where?” Cynthia clipped out.
“Why does it matter? You hate it when we stay here, even when we were growing up. It should please you, we’re not staying,” Jason replied.
Archibald chuckled from his seat, staring into the fire as he poked it with the iron rod in his hand. His gnarly fingers gripped it firmly, showing the whites of his knuckles.
“Stop making enemies, child. You’re going to need them soon,” Archibald warned. “I won’t live forever.”
Cynthia rejoiced at his words, but remained stoic in front of Freddie’s children.
“I’ll require a list of who is coming.”
“No, again,” Archer said.
“It will be an open house at the church. We’ll have the front pew because, let’s face it, there aren’t many of us Turners. Then the rest of the islanders can take their place.”
“Don’t I get any say in the matter? There is a protocol to follow. Generations of Turner legacy to follow. Bailey will have a fit,” Cynthia said.
“We will have a family-only burial. How is that for a compromise?”
Still, after all these years, she still looked to her father for the last nod of approval, and this was no different. He looked at her with his pale eyes for a beat too long, making her feel uncomfortable, and he nodded once. He turned his head and looked at Archer. She couldn’t see his expression, but Archer grinned, which boiled her insides from rage. How dare grandfather and grandson have a bond? Her father was a tyrant. How could anyone bring themselves to grin at the man?