With the paparazzi unable to enter the Town Circle, Freya could walk around Mayleaf without fear of being followed and photographed. Despite the freezing conditions, it was still a picture-perfect place.
The trees were bare, there was frost on the branches and everyone she passed was bundled up in hats and gloves. She loved the town. It made her feel warm inside just walking the streets. It felt like home. She only hoped the security they were living under wouldn’t last forever.
Sam and Jolie’s store was quiet when Freya entered. That gave her unrivalled access to what she called “travelling food”. It wasn’t unusual for Freya to pack few clothes when escaping at the spur of the moment. But she rarely left without a family-sized bag of crisps and a huge chocolate bar.
‘Look after Willis? I’d be delighted. Oh, I wouldn’t have to set any difficult alarms or anything, would I? I mean…’ Jolie began.
‘To be honest, Jolie, right now, I couldn’t care less if the place burnt down.’ She picked up half a dozen chocolate bars from the counter.
‘Oh no, you don’t mean that, do you? You love that house.’
‘I did love it. When it didn’t resemble Fort Knox.’
‘Things no better? Haven’t the police found who’s responsible yet?’ Jolie inquired.
‘No, but then I’m sure they have far more important things to do, don’t you?’
‘So, how long are you going to be away for?’
‘I don’t know yet. A week? Maybe two? Don’t worry, Willis has stacks of food. And if he does go through it all, just get whatever he needs and charge it to our tab.’
‘No problem. And don’t you worry about anything. You both deserve a break. Make sure you enjoy it. By the way, have I heard right? Are you two hearing the patter of tiny feet?’ Jolie asked, a broad smile on her face.
‘What?’
‘Are you having a baby? I don’t usually believe what I hear on some of those news channels, but I’ve had five or six customers asking me about it this afternoon and…’ Jolie began.
‘It’s true, we’re going to be parents. We were trying to keep it under wraps but that seems impossible in our lives.’ She let out a sigh and grabbed another two chocolate bars.
‘Well, I think it’s wonderful news. You two are going to make great parents.’ She moved from behind the counter to put her arms around Freya and hug her.
‘I’ll be needing all the advice I can get. Particularly on the whole getting it out of my body stuff because I’m really no good with pain.’
‘You’ll be fine.’
‘I was fine with the getting it in there thing. I enjoyed that, a lot. I suppose what goes up must come down, one way or another. Perhaps I should abuse my privileged status and demand a C-section.’
‘I think you’ll find they’re not all they’re cracked up to be. My sister could tell you a thing or two about them.’
‘Please don’t give me her number.’
Her mobile phone began to ring.
‘It’s Nick… Hello.’
‘Hey, could you pick up some bottled water? We’re all out.’
‘I will. I’m nearly done here.’ She smiled at Josie and picked up the brown grocery bag.
‘OK, well everything’s ready to go. Roger’s going to take us to the airport and I’ve arranged flights. We leave in a couple hours.’
‘I can’t wait to be on that island. I can’t wait to be away from alarm systems.’ She waved at Josie, left the store and headed for her car.
‘No, me neither. It’ll be good to see Emma and Yiannis again. Oh, I forgot to tell you. Sasha called around earlier. She bought some baby clothes. She wanted to drop them off to surprise you. I put them in the guest room for now.’
‘Sasha? Well, what was she doing out of the office? She was supposed to be meeting with someone at two. What time was this?’ She opened the car door and put the groceries on the passenger seat before hopping up into the driver’s side.
‘Come on, Freya. Get out of Boss Lady mode. It was a nice thing for her to do. She said after you finding the wreath and stuff, she wanted to do something to cheer you up.’
‘She said what?’ She exhaled and felt a chill run up her.
‘She said after a shock like getting sent a wreath with your name on, you needed something to take your mind off of it.’
‘Nick, I didn’t tell Sasha about the wreath.’
‘Well, she knew about it. I bet you, despite what Harry promised us, he’s been spreading that information around.’
‘Have you heard it reported? Did any of the press at our gate ask you about it? Have the police released any details about it? Because no one’s said a word to me about it. But they’ve all been more than keen to ask me about the baby.’ Her mind was working overtime. She was certain she hadn’t mentioned the wreath to Sasha. It could only mean one thing but that couldn’t be true.
‘What are you saying?’ Nicholas asked her.
‘I think you’ve said enough to him, don’t you?’ Sasha spat.
Freya felt something press in to the back of her head and she held her breath. She flicked her eyes up to the rear-view mirror and saw Sasha sat in the back seat of the car. The hard object at the back of her head was the barrel of a gun.
‘Nick, it’s her! It’s Sasha!’ Freya shrieked at the top of her voice.
‘Freya? Freya, are you there?’
Sasha snatched the phone from Freya’s hand and ended the call.
‘Stupid, stupid Freya! Always such a big mouth and never knows when to keep it shut!’ Sasha yelled. The gun pressed harder into Freya’s head and she winced. ‘Now, are we going to be adult about this or not? Are you going to behave or am I going to have to make this even more unpleasant for you?’ Sasha hissed, her mouth close to Freya’s ear.
Freya’s heart was racing and her head began to swim. She couldn’t faint now. She had to remain in control.
‘Didn’t you hear me?! I said, are you going to behave?’ The gun stabbed into her skull.
‘Yes. Yes, please don’t hurt me.’ She held in a whimper that was threatening to slip from her lips.
‘Ooh, “please Sasha, don’t hurt me”! You sound so pathetic.’ Sasha climbed over into the passenger seat, dropping the grocery bag to the floor.
Freya made a grab for the handle of the door. Sasha immediately locked all the doors.
‘Didn’t you hear what I said, bitch? Anymore stupid moves and I’ll finish this here and now.’ Sasha grabbed Freya’s arm and squeezed it hard.
Freya fought back the tears and just stared at Sasha. The woman’s face was a picture of rage and hate and almost unrecognisable from that of the helpful, dutiful assistant she worked with every day.
‘Right, I want you to drive. I’ll give directions. Start the car,’ Sasha ordered, keeping the gun trained on Freya.
‘Where are we going?’ With shaking hands, she turned the key in the ignition.
‘You’ll know when we get there. Take a right at the junction.’
Suddenly, there was a knock on the driver’s side window. Freya jumped as she saw Brian’s face looking in at her.
‘Wind down the window and talk to him. Tell him everything’s fine, then get rid of him.’ Sasha concealed her weapon.
Freya did as she was told and fixed a smile on her face as she greeted her neighbour. She turned the ignition off.
‘Hi, Brian.’
‘Hello, Freya. I saw you parked here and I thought I’d take this opportunity to ask you about a merchandising idea I have.’
‘Merchandising? Well… I… perhaps you’d better talk to Nick about that. He’s more into that sort of area. He’s at the house if you wanted to go there and see him. Tell him I sent you.’ She winked heavily, hoping he would realise something was wrong.
‘Well, you know Mayleaf has a baseball team: the Mayleaf Maulers. Well, I thought to drum up support and in recognition of the team reaching the quarter finals of the county league, I could print some t-shirts.’
‘T-shirts.’ She looked past Brian towards the store, in the hope Sam or Jolie would come out.
‘Yes, I was hoping you’d agree to the slogan “Baby Kaden says Go Maulers Go”. I mean obviously he/she/it wouldn’t actually say that, but I’d like to think one day he/she/it might join the team and…’ Brian carried on.
‘You know what, Brian, I think it’s a great idea. I really think you should speak to Nick about it and…’ Her eyes pleaded for Brian to come out of his world and join hers. It wasn’t happening.
‘Hey, Freya, hadn’t we better get going? We don’t want to be late for that appointment,’ Sasha spoke loudly, leaning over Freya and smiling at Brian.
‘Yes. Yes, we’d better get going. Brian, why don’t you go up to the house and…’ Freya began again.
‘Bye, Brian,’ Sasha interrupted. She closed the window up.
Brian smiled and waved.
‘Simpleton. How unlucky are you, Freya? Someone comes right up to the car when you’re being held at gunpoint and of all the people, it has to be him. And he asks you about t-shirts,’ Sasha laughed.
‘Look, what the hell is all this about? Why are you doing this?’
‘Shut the fuck up and drive! No more small talk.’ Sasha poked the gun into Freya’s cheek.
She had no choice. She re-started the car.