Daddy's Little Wild One

Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

I could still hear my old sergeant lecturing me from the past for being such a loner. “Why don’t you come out for drinks after work with the rest of us like every other normal cop on the force?“

“Thanks, Sarg, not my cup of tea. I need my alone time.“

I was still alive, but my life had ended the night after that gentle socializing refusal, and no matter how tough I thought I was, the memories proved otherwise. There wasn’t enough alcohol in the world to block them out.

So here’s to you, Sgt. Barney. I’ve sure as hell made up on the drinking front since leaving the force. I toasted my invisible companion in the air and sipped Arran Robert Burns single malt scotch on the rocks.

I didn’t like it peaty, and I could afford the splurge.

Just because I chose to live in the middle of nowhere as a hermit didn’t mean I had to suffer when it came to creature comforts.

Early retirement—aka disability—was hardly enough to live on, but my mother’s inheritance set me up pretty. Again, I raised the glass to toast the air.

Thanks for nothing, you old b***h. The kindest thing you ever did for me was die.

“Don’t be dramatic, Mia,“ I could hear her retort. “You always were prone to exaggeration.”

I flipped off her invisible a*s and stuck my tongue out at her.

Real mature.

My bath was drawn and the water steaming hot, as it should be. The back slope of the Japanese tub cradled me, and my eyes closed as my neck rested comfortably against its ledge.

I drifted off a while and jerked upright when the bright flashes of gunfire exploded like fireworks behind my eyelids.

Not drunk enough.

I shook my head, as if the frightful images that threatened me even in my unconscious state could be shaken off, gulped a swallow of scotch, and set the heavy glass down hard on the ledge beside the tub.

My scars throbbed. I rubbed the angry, raised strip splitting the smooth skin of my collarbone and shoulder like a miniature dragon’s spine, and traced its tail, bleeding down my chest and fanning out in a pattern of shaded dents above my breast. Luckily, I’d only been grazed and not pierced by bullets that night. Others hadn’t been so fortunate.

Or, according to my mother as she lay on her death bed, I was the unlucky one. “You’d be better off dead than living with those ugly scars. What man is going to want you now?“

It was futile to try and convince her my main objective wasn’t putting a ring on my finger. After all, it had worked for her. Her first marriage had rescued her from poverty, and when that husband died, she was left with enough in the bank so that she never had to worry about money again. Still, true happiness had always eluded her.

I grabbed the small wooden chest off the window ledge next to the tub and took a Vicodin out of it to calm my nerves. It was a potentially deadly combination with the scotch, but maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.

I soaped my breasts and tried to focus on the scent of glazed apricot soap.

Whelp, looked like these babies would be going to waste. I’d be the only one stroking them from here till eternity.

And you wanted it that way, didn’t you?

Solitude.

Safety.

No one to notice how truly whack you had become.

A knock at the front door had me almost leaping out of the tub.

What the f**k? I was either dreaming, or drunker than I thought. Both options were possibilities.

A quick mental check put me at ease—the doors and windows were locked tight. I had performed my nightly security protocol and checked them all three times. No one could enter my fortress.

Calm down. Breathe. You’re all right.

I quickly toweled off, threw a robe on, and grabbed my Glock from the counter. The thing was practically an appendage, never more than an arm’s length away.

I learned my lesson—and what a useless and tragic lesson it had been.