Page 46 of A Secret Scottish Escape

I heaved an inward sigh of relief when I saw Dad in his Harley Davidson T-shirt, sitting in his armchair.

“You OK? Oh, I’ve got lots to tell you. How about we go out for some lunch?”

My eyes narrowed at Dad’s stiff expression. “Dad? What is it?”

He jerked his head sideways.

From out of the connecting kitchen came a figure wreathed in a dark fringed shawl and black trouser suit.

She reminded me of a vampire.

My mother delivered one of her unreadable smiles. “Hello, Layla.”

Chapter Twenty-One

I could feel my features hardening.

“What the hell is she doing here?”

Dad jumped up and out of his chair. “She said she needs to speak to you.”

“Can you stop talking about me as though I’m not here?” she trilled in her fake London accent.

I folded my arms protectively across my chest. “It’s habit. You have been AWOL for the past twenty odd years, Tina.” I emphasised her name with as much disdain as I could manage.

Tina flicked her hair back over her shoulders. “I didn’t come here to argue.”

“Well, that will be a first,” growled Dad.

Tina flashed him a disapproving stare. “Aren’t I allowed to come and visit my own daughter?”

“Oh, not all this again. I haven’t been your daughter since the day you walked out, remember?”

Tina’s razor-sharp cheeks flinched under her foundation. “Let’s not go over all that again.”

Dad and I swapped knowing looks.

Without being invited, she seated herself on Dad’s beige sofa. Her heavily lashed blue eyes swivelled around the sitting room, with its woodchip magnolia walls and black and white prints of Dad as a young drummer.

“That was taken before you got your claws into him,” I blurted, moving to stand beside Dad’s armchair.

Tina pursed her ruby-slicked lips. “We were happy, weren’t we, Harry?”

Dad blinked. “Were we? When was that then, Tina? 2.15 p.m. one Thursday afternoon?”

I snorted into my shoulder, which made Tina scowl through her fringe.

“What do you want, Tina?” asked Dad with an air of weariness. “You said you needed to speak to Layla, and here she is.”

My mother shuffled forward on the sofa and laced her fingers together on top of her tasselled effort of a handbag. “A little bird tells me you’re going to be a businesswoman.”

I thumped my trainer on Dad’s russet carpet. “And there we have it. The reason she’s dashed up here.” I took a couple of steps towards her and she bristled. “What is it, Tina? Ramon getting fed up of writing you blank cheques?”

My mother’s fingers picked at the beige tassels dripping from her bag. “Not at all. I simply thought you might benefit from some help.”

Dad shook his head in wonder. “What Layla would have benefited from was having her mother around.”

A couple of resentful, hot tears glistened behind my eyes, but I bit them back. There was no way I was going to allow her to see me cry.