Sweet Seduction Shield(7)

"My card," he said, unnecessarily. "And the name of a friend at a café around the corner."

My eyes flicked back up to his. What?

"If you need somewhere quick to hide, somewhere easy to get to. Somewhere just to gather your thoughts and be secure for an hour or so, go there. It's about the safest place in the city. Tell Genevieve Cain I sent you. She'll take care of everything else."

Everything else?

He turned and walked to the door, then stopped, his hand on the frame, his shoulders tense. I was aware I was breathing too quickly again, that sweat coated my upper lip. I just wanted the damn man to leave. Leave now so I could go get Daisy. Please.

"Good luck, Marie," he said softly, not bothering to turn around. And then he was gone. Out the door and out of my life. Hopefully for good.

I took a second, maybe two, to gather my wits, then snatched up my handbag off the floor beneath my desk. I shovelled in anything personal out of my drawers, placing the photo frame of Daisy inside with care. At the last second I picked up Pierce's business card, and slipped that in my purse as well.

Within ten minutes my boss had been convinced I had a migraine and I was hailing a cab on the kerb outside our building. Another eight we'd pulled up outside Daisy's school in Grey Lynn. Every step I took, I felt like someone was watching. From this morning, when I'd walked Daisy to school and dropped her off, until now, so much had changed.

Could a few simple hours make such a difference? Was Roan McLaren already aware of where I was living, of the fact I had a child now? Daisy was my most precious secret, but she wasn't my only one. My hands shook as I waited in the school office for one of the staff to fetch Daisy from class. There was no hiding my panicked state. The receptionist kept flicking concerned glances across the high top of the desk she worked behind. But I could no further call on the ice princess now, than not hug my daughter fiercely as soon as she entered the office.

She squealed when she spotted me. My heart leapt inside my chest.

"Mummy!" she cried, releasing her small chubby grip on the adult who had collected her from class, and dashing across the space to jump into my waiting arms.

I just about broke down when her beautiful face nestled so trustingly into the crook of my neck. When she hugged me back as tightly as I did her. When her adorable stumpy legs wrapped around my waist and she clung to me as though I was her very air. Oh dear God, what world had I brought my daughter into? What world had her father left her to survive alone in? This was all of my making. Rick may have started us out on this path, but I sealed all of our fates.

Me.

I would damn well make sure she survived it.

I thanked the school office staff and clutching Daisy's hand walked out of the grounds, head held high. The entire short walk to our small two bedroom flat on Williamson Ave she babbled excitedly, thinking we were going on an adventure, or that I was taking her on a surprise trip to Kelly Tarlton's Sea Life Aquarium to visit the penguins she adored. I didn't put her right. For a few more moments she could live like a five year old should. For a few more precious moments she could believe her world was sweet and safe and secure.

For a few more moments I could live vicariously through her.

I nodded when she enthusiastically told me that the penguins at Kelly Tarlton's came from Antarctica. That they were called King Penguins because they were "m'jestic." I smiled when she advised, for the hundredth time, that she was going to work at Scott Base and study penguins when she grew up.

And I felt a tear slowly track down my cheek as she told me, "Girl's can do anything, eh Mummy?"

"Yes, Daisy," I murmured, as we turned onto the path that led to our front door. "And one day you'll be the foremost scientist to work with Antarctic penguins," I promised, and prayed that was a promise I could keep.

My hand reached out with my front door key, to slip it inside the lock. But I stilled. My heart seized, my breaths all left me, and my grip on Daisy's hand obviously became painful.

"Mummy!" she complained in a loud child-like high-pitched voice. An answering crash sounded out through the crack of the opened flat door.

I was frozen to the spot, knowing I needed to move. Not knowing how to achieve that.

When there was clearly someone uninvited inside our home.





Chapter 3


Even If I Had No Fucking Idea How To Achieve That

"Mummy?" Daisy asked, hearing the strange noises coming from inside our flat. "Who's that?"

I shook my head, panting for breath, and heard the sound of footfalls approaching on the other side of the partially closed door.

Run.

"Mummy?" Daisy sounded uncertain. Frightened. Either she was an intuitive five year old, aware the person getting closer was not a friend. Or, she was picking up on my immobile panicked state and appropriately scared because of it.