Read Online TRAPPED by JACQUI ROSE - Free Book Online Page B

all.
    Gypsy touched Frankie’s hand in response. She’d had such a fright when Johnny had called. She’d thought the worst but hoped for the best. Thankfully she’d got the latter. And the more she thought about what had happened the more thankful she became. Now Frankie would be laid up for the next few weeks perhaps she’d get some of that longed for freedom quicker than she thought. She’d be able to go to the shops and go to the bars to meet the girls without him popping up from nowhere. She hated to say it but perhaps Max Donaldson had done her a favour after all. Smiling, she looked at Frankie who smiled back just as warmly.
    Frankie’s phone rang, jarring them both out of their own thoughts and waking Johnny up from his cat nap. Gypsy picked it up in her most eloquent of tones.
    ‘Hello? Gypsy speaking.’
    There was a pause and she rolled her eyes as she listened to the caller on the other end, then quickly passed the phone to Frankie. It was his sister. Gypsy watched as Frankie spoke loudly with a big grin on his face.
    ‘Lorna! Alright girl, how are tricks?’
    Gypsy looked at Johnny who was dropping off to sleep again and pulled a face. She got up to go and find something to eat. She wasn’t interested in listening to her husband’s conversation with Lorna.
    She didn’t like Frankie’s sister. She was a loud-mouthed meddling bitch who thought she was Lady bleeding Muck because Frankie had a few bob. Before she’d met Lorna, Gypsy had been looking forward to meeting her, wanting to take her shopping and to hear about what her husband had been like as a child, but within an hour of picking her up from the airport she’d hated every bone in the woman’s body. From the moment Lorna landed from Belgium, she seemed intent of trying to cause a rift. Instead of being pleased that her brother was happily married to Gypsy, she wanted to cause problems. Bad mouthing her to Frankie behind her back and making constant snide comments. Not only had it irritated her, it’d hurt because all she’d ever wanted was to be friends.
    It’d taken some hard negotiation but Frankie had managed to persuade Lorna to get back on a plane to Belgium one week later. She’d kicked up a fuss, wanting to stay another two weeks but they’d waved her off, all breathing a sigh of relief to see the British Airways logo speeding past them on the runway.
    That’d been fifteen years ago and Gypsy hadn’t seen her since. Apart from occasionally picking up the phone to her, Gypsy had hardly spoken to her either.
    Lorna’s occupation when she’d lived in London was as a small-time fraudster. Gypsy knew the police had wanted to question her on a number of chequebook scams; apparently one of the reasons she’d run off to Belgium. Her scams hadn’t been on any grand scale, though according to Frankie she’d done a couple of short stretches inside.
    This was one of the reason’s Gypsy had been saved from any more of Lorna’s visits. Lorna couldn’t just jump on a plane. She was wanted but had no intention of serving any more time and unless Frankie provided her with a false passport to travel on she was stuck in Belgium.
    Gypsy had managed to persuade Frankie not to sort one out, but it was getting harder and harder to do so. Frankie was a good man by nature, so the idea of his sister pining for the streets of London hurt Frankie, to the point of restless nights.
    Twenty minutes later Gypsy found her way back to the cubicle. Plonking herself back on the chair next to Frankie her cockney twang was clear to her.
    ‘Well, what did the old witch want? It’s unlike her to call on a Tuesday; thought she’d be busy flying about on her bleeding broomstick.’
    Frankie scowled at Gypsy. Lorna
was
a witch, a great big interfering one, but she was also his sister. Whatever trouble she had or hadn’t tried to cause between him and Gypsy the last time, she’d proved her loyalty to him by the weekly phone calls, the sending of the birthday