Rose pulled up to the grand iron gates of her childhood home in the exclusive Sovereign Islands on the Gold Coast, grabbed her phone off the passenger seat and re-read the text her mother had sent her and her sisters two days before.

Sitting in her heat-blistered Kia Carnival, nausea swirled in her gut and she could feel sweat beginning to bead on her top lip. She desperately tried to recall what her therapist, who she’d stopped seeing over a year ago, had told her about the importance of boundaries and breathing.

She rolled down the window and gratefully inhaled the Queensland winter air as she reached for the buzzer on the intercom. It had been three years since she’d been to The Castle, which was what her mother, business tycoon Jacki Turner, called her opulent seven-bedroom waterfront mansion.

Situated within an affluent gated community, The Castle sat alongside other multi-million dollar residences overlooking South Stradbroke Island. It wasn’t called a millionaire’s playground for nothing. These luxurious homes were reserved for the elite. When Rose was about eight years old, her mother had joked that she was the ‘Queen of the Castle’, and while Rose’s sisters had giggled then fought over the dress-up costumes, each wanting to be the queen, Rose had fallen silent. Even back then, she knew her multi-millionaire mother’s playful manner was a façade. Jacki Turner was the queen of her empire, and she expected everyone in her kingdom to play by her rules.

With a click and a buzz, the gates rolled open to reveal the white, sprawling, flat-roofed fortress. The black and white paved driveway led into a looming porte-cochère framed with tall white pillars and an oversized front door imported from Italy. It was the kind of opulent entrance you’d expect to see at an expensive hotel. The only thing missing was the porter waiting to park your car and whisk your luggage away…

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