Lacey (Sophea Pennington) was dealt a blow last week when dad David (Jeremy Lindsay Taylor) announced that he had sold the family home.

It’s been around seven months since Lacey walked out, unable to cope with the deep family rift that followed the death of her mum, Kristina.

Lacey’s sister Jo (Maddison Brown) had been behind the wheel in the car accident that claimed Kristina’s life, but has no memory of what caused her to leave the road.

Though the investigation cleared Jo of any wrongdoing, Lacey has long believed that David pulled strings with his police colleagues to protect his daughter.

Lacey had no contact with her family for over six months until David happened to be posted to Yabbie Creek police station as the new sergeant, with Jo soon following as they looked to settle in the area.

Lacey has made it clear that she wants no involvement with her dad or sister, and was ready to turn David away again when he turned up at the surf club last week.

However, she was thrown when he handed her a suitcase of her belongings, telling her they were the last of her things remaining in the old house before he sold it.

Going through her belongings that evening stirred up lots of emotions for Lacey, and spurred on by Theo (Matt Evans), she arranged to meet up with David the following day.

Struggling to understand how he could let go of the house, Lacey listened as David admitted that living there without Kristina had simply become unbearable.

It seemed for a moment that the two could be starting to heal their fractured relationship, until a slip-up from David saw him recall a special memory of going to buy Lacey her ballet shoes.

Lacey was quick to point out that that was Jo, not her, and the two were back to square one.