But as much as she liked it, she couldn’t have enjoyed it more than Mack. She just about ate the pattern off the plate. But it made Flora feel so happy that she could do this for Mack.

Mack finally put her cutlery down and patted her stomach. “Man, I’m so stuffed.”

“I think Dexter is too.” Mack had given him a little slice of lasagne as well as the dog food she had brought.

“I like to see ma boy happy.”

Flora looked at the casserole dish and shook her head in disbelief at the amount missing from the dishes, after Mack took seconds, thirds, and fourths.

“Where do you put it all?” Flora asked.

“My ma says I’ve got a stomach like a dustbin liner.”

They hadn’t talked too much about Mack’s mum, and she knew nothing about Mack’s dad. “What’s your mum like? If you don’t mind me asking.”

Mack shook her head and awakened the iPhone beside her. “Here.” She handed her phone to Flora. “That’s my mum, Mary, on the left, and my aunt Chrissy on the right.”

Flora saw two very nice looking late-middle-aged women in a large kitchen, cooking with chef’s hats on.

“That’s them making Christmas dinner. Christmas is a big deal in our house.”

“She looks nice. They both do,” Flora said.

“Yeah, they are. I hope I’ll be able to have you meet them sometime.”

Flora would feel terrified meeting Mack’s family. Only because Mack had described them as a loud, hustling and bustling type of family. It would be a lot for her social anxiety to cope with.

“What about your dad? If you don’t mind me asking.”

Mack smile faltered.

“If you don’t want to talk about it, that’s okay,” Flora said.

“No, I don’t mind telling you anything. It’s just a sad memory. When my ma started going out with my da, he liked being with one of the Sharkeys, thought of himself as a bit of a gangster. He wasn’t—he was just a sad bully.”

“What happened?”

“My uncle didnae approve of him, but my ma says that just made her want to be defiant and see him all the more. They ran away and got married right after I was born.”

Flora saw the look that had been there the night Mack had rescued her from the men that surrounded her.

“He took Mum and me to live in England, supposedly for a job, but I think it was to cut Mum off from her family. My first memories are of him punching and kicking her. Even at three and four, I was trying to get between them and protect her.”

Flora’s heart broke for Mack. “I’m so sorry. Why did he have the nerve? I mean, would he not have been scared of your family?”