Ah bugger. I’d nearly got to the end of that speech without losing it and stammering. I gritted my teeth. Atleast I’d managed to get out the majority without sounding like a complete weakling.
“What have you got to hide, Clara?” he asked in a softer tone, and I blinked at him. His blue eyes were boring into mine as if he were seeing into the very depths of my soul. My heart rate increased, and my breathing sped up. I could feel the trickle of sweat down my spine as I stared back at him.
“I d-d-don’t have anything to hide,” I said. This wasn’t going the way I wanted it to at all. For some reason, despite his size and muscular frame, up until now I hadn’t felt threatened by him. But his current tone sent a shiver of apprehension down my spine. It seemed more dangerous than the irritation from before, and I wasn’t very good at distinguishing one danger from another. The air was crackling with tension and I couldn’t quite put my finger on why. I broke eye contact with him to glance at the exit. It was rare that I would position myself without clear access to an exit in a room, but for some reason, I’d let my guard down sufficiently to allow it.
Where was Lily? She said she’d only be five minutes. I really, really needed Lily to come back. I cleared my throat and then swallowed against the lump that had formed there.
“If you’ll excuse me,” I muttered as I started to skirt round him, but he moved fast to block my path with an agility I wouldn’t have thought possible for a man of his size. I came to an abrupt stop, my eyes widening in shock. His arms had uncrossed from his chest.
“No,” he snapped. “I will not excuse you.”
He slashed his hand through the air to make his point, and that’s when it happened.
I flinched. And not just a small movement – no, Ireallyfucking flinched. My hands went up to protect my face and I fell into a half crouch, preparing to run.
At my flinch, his angry expression was immediately replaced with shock.
“What the fuck?” he whispered, holding his hands up in surrender as if I were a wild animal he was trying to reassure. “Clara?”
I backed away, shaking my head in jerky movements.
“Clara, I’m sorry,” his voice was much softer now. “Did you think I was going to hurt you? Did… did someone hurt you?”
I carried on shaking my head, unable to speak. A panic attack had set in so deeply now that I knew it would take a while to claw my way out. My ears were ringing, and my body had gone into fight-or-flight mode. I hugged my arms around my middle, forgetting about the brace for a moment, then winced in pain when I put pressure on it.
“What the hell is going on here?” Lily snapped from the doorway. Lord Sterling turned to look at her, and, to my absolute shame, I let out a very small whimper. “Lord Sterling, if you wouldn’t mind getting out ofmyclassroom, a place you have not had permission to enter, and stepping away frommyteaching assistant, I would very much appreciate it.”
Lord Sterling lowered his hands to rest them on his hips as he looked between me and Lily, his too-intelligent eyes narrowing with suspicion. Ignoring Lily, who gave a harumph of disapproval, he turned back to me but, this time, kept his distance.
“Clara?” he said softly, in a much gentler voice than I’d ever heard from him, even with his son. “I’m going to leave now. But I want you to know that I would never hurt you. I also want you to know that I’m not stupid. People don’treact the way you just reacted. Not people who are safe. I’m not going to let this go, okay?”
I pressed my lips together and looked down at the floor.
“That’s quite enough, Lord Sterling,” said Lily. When I glanced up at her, I saw that her face was flushed with anger. “You can leave now,” she told him.
He gave me one last long look and then turned to Lily.
“This isn’t over,” he told her, back to that commanding, firm tone devoid of all the gentleness from before.
Chapter 8
Non-scary voice
Rafe
“You’ve gotto be gentle with Miss Clara,” Ozzie said as he stared up at me. “And you can’t use your bad words at school, Daddy. It’sreallynaughty. Mrs Clayton doesn’t letanyoneuse bad words.”
“I promise to be gentle, Oz,” I said through gritted teeth, “And I promise not to use any of my bad words. Okay, buddy?”
“Hmm,” he muttered. “I bet you don’t use your bad words at work, Daddy.”
I suppressed a grin. Only that morning, I’d called one of the other barristers in my chambers a “fucking incompetent cockwomble”. It was an accurate description. The case he was working on as prosecutor would have been better handled by my seven-year-old son, to be honest. The defendant was part of a family that headed up a large crime syndicate in east London. These crime families had a way of spinning things; they had a way of getting to the evidence, and I had a sneaking suspicion that they even hada way of getting to the prosecuting barrister. I really hoped my suspicions were baseless, but that didn’t stop me from going off on a rant to my team when I found out how badly the case was being handled.
“Let’s just see if she’ll even talk to me today first, okay, Oz?” I said in the brightest tone I could muster. In all honesty, I wasn’t feeling the least bit bright. I was feeling pissed off.
I was very,veryused to getting my way, so the situation with Clara was totally foreign to me. But I needed to get a handle on my temper this time. Intimidating the poor girl would get me nowhere and made me feel like a total shit.
It had been two weeks since I scared the crap out of Clara in that classroom. During that time I’d dug up as much as I could about her, which was, sadly, very little. I had an address, which was a tiny flat in a dodgy neighbourhood. But I still couldn’t even find out her last name. Her only real friend appeared to be Miss Lily Summerfield, and, apparently, she had no family whatsoever.
