‘Wait outside the front entrance,’ Jake instructed, his gut twisting afresh. Something was wrong. He needed to get to her. ‘I’m on my way.’
‘Okay. Dad …’ She stopped him before he ended the call. ‘Can you come on your own?’
Jake felt the hairs rise over his skin. There was something she didn’t want Emily involved in. What, for Christ’s sake? His gut turning over as he wondered whether Millie might be in danger, he dressed in record time and raced downstairs, stopping only to grab his keys and yell something to Emily about an emergency – a lie, which never sat well with him, but he didn’t want to take any risks. The fact that Millie had asked him to come on his own meant she might well be in danger. He needed to be focused on her.
His heart banging as he drove, exhaustion catching up with him, he tried to reassure himself it was probably just an argument with her boyfriend, nothing more. Why then the fear in her voice, though? He’d definitely heard that. Hoping to God he didn’t get stopped by the police, he drove fast, very aware of the dent in his bumper. His heart almost stopped beating as he realised Millie wasn’t outside the surgery where he’d asked her to wait.
Panic rising sharply inside him, he headed for the back of the building, pulling haphazardly into the car park rather than leave the car on show outside. If this man she was seeing had dared hurt his daughter in any way …
Pushing his door open, he climbed hurriedly out to search for her on foot – and stopped. She was sitting in the doorway at the back of the surgery, her knees pulled to her chest, her head resting on them. She looked small and vulnerable, more like a child than an adult. Jake’s gut clenched. Why hadn’t he been there more for her?
‘Millie …’ He walked tentatively towards her, hesitating as her head snapped up. Her face was tear-stained, her make-up all over the place. She was more than scared, he realised. She was terrified.
She got to her feet as he approached, her eyes wide. She had beautiful eyes, just like her mother’s, full now of the same uncertain agony he’d seen in Emily’s lately. His guilt weighed heavier by the second.
‘Let’s go inside,’ he said, his gut wrenching further as she took a step away from him. A small step, but a significant one nevertheless. He wanted to hold her but she’d moved away from him.
Swallowing, growing more scared himself than he dared let show, he reached to search his pockets for his keys, but Millie stopped him.
He looked down at the keys that rested in her outstretched palm, confused at first, before comprehension kicked in hard. His gaze shot to her face. What he saw in her eyes confirmed what he desperately didn’t want to believe.
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered. ‘Please don’t hate me.’
His stomach turned over. What had she done?
‘Please don’t hate me,’ she repeated, a ragged sob escaping her.
He felt his heart crack. ‘I don’t hate you, Millie,’ he said, his voice thick with emotion. ‘I could never hate you.’
‘You should.’ Her red-rimmed eyes were frantic as they searched his. ‘I would. Mum will. How can she not when she realises it’s me who’s been taking the drugs?’
Jake swallowed back his spiralling emotions. He needed to concentrate on Millie, on her feelings. ‘She won’t.’ He tried a step towards her. Millie only took another step away, her eyes flicking to the side, as if she might run. His chest constricted painfully at the thought.
‘I didn’t mean to,’ she said, swiping at the tears rolling down her cheeks. ‘I thought I could help him. I loved him and …’ She choked out another sob.
‘You thought if you did this, he would love you back?’ Jake asked softly.
She nodded and pressed her hands to her face. ‘He doesn’t. He never did. He … I wish I wasdead.’
‘Don’t. Don’teversay that, Millie.’ Anger doing battle with the bewilderment inside him, Jake moved fast towards her, wrapping his arms around her and yanking her to him. ‘It would kill me to lose you. Please …’ Squeezing his eyes closed, he pressed her head gently to his shoulder, his face to her hair. His child. His baby. He would kill for her. ‘Don’t ever say that again.’
Holding her close, he wiped a salty tear from his own cheek and waited. ‘We should go inside,’ he suggested quietly when her sobs stilled to a shudder. It was the weekend, and they were unlikely to be disturbed. Shoppers sometimes used the car park, though. He didn’t want anyone seeing her like this.
Minutes later, with Millie safely in his office and less tearful, he fetched her a cup of tea – as if that could cure any of their monumental problems, which he felt were largely down to him. His life seemed to be slipping away from him, like sand through a timer – his children, his wife – and he could do nothing to stop it.
‘So what made you see the light?’ he asked carefully, sitting in the chair next to her, rather than opposite her like an inquisitor. He didn’t want to bombard her with questions, which might only make her close up. Nor did he want to add to the guilt she was obviously feeling. That was as evident in her eyes as the fear he’d seen there.
She wiped a hand under her nose, dropped her gaze further. ‘He was seeing someone else,’ she murmured, her heart clearly breaking. ‘Someone older. Married, I think.’
Jake felt his jaw tense. ‘And he’s how old?’ He was having to work now at sounding non-judgemental.
Millie hesitated, studying her thumbnail intently. ‘About your age,’ she admitted eventually, her voice small. ‘He lied about that too. He told me he was thirty. I thought he might be a bit older, but …’
He nodded slowly. Indescribable rage burned inside him, an inclination to murder possessing him. The urge to find the bastard and remove his testicles without the benefit of anaesthetic was almost overwhelming. ‘You’re obviously well out of it,’ he said, his voice choked.
Millie looked up at last, her eyes troubled, uncertain. ‘There’s something else,’ she began uncomfortably, then stopped as a police siren sounded right outside the window. ‘Why are there so many police in the village?’ she asked, worry flitting across her face.
Studying her carefully, he debated whether to tell her. It would only upset her more than she was already. But then she would find out anyway. ‘There’s been an incident,’ he said cautiously. ‘A woman has been run over. Natasha Jameson. The police are treating it as a hit-and-run, but I think they’re suspicious about the circumstances surrounding it.’
