Southern Storm (44 South Book 2) Page 3

  I leant back in my seat and folded my arms across my chest and just watched.

  “We’ll start with writing. Show me your latest efforts.” Rachel looked at Mum for guidance. Dani kept staring at the teacher. “Please,” she added, her voice softening. “I’d like to see what you’ve written.”

  Dani pushed back her chair and left the room. Mum’s mouth hung open as Rachel scurried to follow. Dad just watched the teacher with narrowed eyes.

  “I realise,” she started, “that you don’t know me.” She was looking at her plate of uneaten food. “And I realise these girls are precious to you. They’re hurting,” she said, and I felt my stomach drop. “They’re frightened,” she added. My heart pounded. “Post Traumatic Stress Disorder manifests itself in various ways. Flashbacks. Nightmares. Severe anxiety. Uncontrolled thoughts about the event that triggered it.” She lifted her eyes to mine.

  I could barely breathe.

  “They are living it daily. They will not stop living it daily until something is done about it. Acting as if everything is normal will not achieve this. In patients so young exposure therapy is ill advised. But cognitive therapy has proven to be successful.”

  She talked like Turner. Like a fucking psychiatrist.

  “We start by giving them clear expectations of how they should behave. Including the expectation that they will answer each question we pose them. Closed questions are helpful when we need an immediate reply. But in the long-term ask only open-ended questions with the expectation they will be answered.” She stared out of the kitchen window, watching the clouds roll past in the sky. “They’re breathing too quickly,” she said out of fucking nowhere. “For every breath we take, they take several. I’ll need to teach them how to slow that down.”

  Her eyes landed back on me.

  “Nothing I do will harm them,” she said. “But it will force them to face whatever happened. Not directly, but through a series of cognitive tasks that will help make the memories less invasive.”

  She leant forward across the table. I noticed Mum and Dad leant toward her as well. I held my ground. It was difficult not to show how much she affected me. This woman who had turned up out of nowhere and now flipped my world on its arse.

  “What do you do when you’re faced with something stressful at work, Matt?” she asked.

  “This isn’t about me.”

  She smiled. Clearly, she was calling bullshit on that. “Humour me,” she said.

  I clenched my jaw, noticing the girls were standing out in the hallway, giving us time to finish our conversation. Or just observing the new person in their lives without the pressure of being caught.

  “I take a step back from the situation,” I offered.

  “Physically or mentally?”

  “Mentally,” I offered. “I sing a few lines from a song in my head before I talk out loud.”

  She smiled. I could see her desire to know what song was my lifeline. She didn’t ask. Her control was impressive.

  “Cognitive therapy,” she said. “Challenging a negative thought process with a course of action to prevent yourself from reacting inappropriately. You do it naturally every day in your life. The girls don’t have that ability. They need it. I can give that to them. Trust me. I am very good at this.”

  Fuck. I believed her. She had me second guessing myself.

  “How long?” I asked. She blinked. “How long do you think it will take?”

  “How long’s a piece of string?” she said… and Dani laughed.

  Chapter 5

  Narcissist

  Liv

  “Well, how’s it going, then?” David asked over the telephone line.

  “Good,” I said, leaning back on the rental’s couch. “As good as it can, I suppose, in the middle of nowhere.”

  “Do they even have power down there? Or are you reading by candlelight?”

  “They have flushing loos, too, you know,” I deadpanned.

  “You just have to go out in the dark with the spiders to use them,” David offered, laughing.

  “Something like that,” I said, picking at a loose thread on the sofa’s sole cushion.

  “You sound down, Olivia. I know it’s hard, but it won’t be forever.”

  I pushed thoughts of the twins and their father - the real reason for my distraction - out of my mind. “You’re right. Has he done anything?”

  There was shuffling in the background as if David was getting comfortable. As if talking about my stalker was a topic that elicited comfortable feelings.

  “Everything’s been quiet here,” he finally admitted.

  “Is that good or bad?”

  David made a non-committal sound. “The cops think he may know.”

  “Know what?”

  “That you’ve gone.” I sucked in a breath. “The escalation in his behaviour would indicate he was gearing up for a major event. To have pulled back now is unusual.”

  “You agree with them?”

  I heard him scratching his jaw. It was probably covered in dark stubble. David always looked better at night. Not so clean cut or proper. A bit like a certain farmer.

  I shook my head as David said, “Yes, I do. Olivia,” he added, “even if he’s aware of your departure, he doesn’t know where you’ve gone to.”

  “He seems to know an awful lot awfully quickly.”

  “But Twizel?” David said. “None of your clients have left the city.”

  “None of my current ones.”

  “You think he’s a former client?”

  “Limiting the suspects to my current patients is shortsighted.”

  “Even so,” David soothed. “You’re in Twizel. It’s miles away. You’re safe.”

  “I’m sure you’re right,” I said, wanting suddenly for this conversation to be over. “Listen, it’s been a long day. I think I’ll get some sleep.”

  “Have you taken anything to help?”

  I scowled. “I don’t need help sleeping.”

  “You said you were having difficulties just last week.”

  Damn him and his razor sharp memory. David was a lot like me in that regard.

  “There’s not as much noise down here,” I offered as explanation.

  “Not much electric light either,” he said, chuckling.

  “But there are spiders,” we both said together. I smiled. “Go to bed,” I mock ordered.

  “But it’s so lonely in there,” he mock-whined.

  “Stop bugging me,” I added.

  “Never,” he said and hung up.

  I smiled at the dial tone and swiped the phone closed. I’d known David since university. We’d dated for a while, but our personalities didn’t quite mesh. Romantically, that is. He’d been a little too clingy for me. Professionally, though, I couldn’t have wished for a more supportive partner. One who saw mental illness in the same light as I.

  Worth the effort.

  To David, mental health was a very personal crusade. His sister had committed suicide not long before I’d met him. He was the only other psychiatrist I’d ever worked with who put in the excessively long hours I did. Who made it his life’s work to reach people.

  I pushed the memories away and picked up the remote, turning off the TV, then straightened up the couch. Looking around the room, I realised there really wasn’t anything else for me to do, but go to bed. It was only ten o’clock. I’d be running on the treadmill back home or watching a movie on Netflix.

  I barely got free to air TV here.

  How long? Matt Drake had asked.

  Longer than I wanted to stay here.

  I moved into the kitchen and opened the fridge. Great, I was comfort eating now. I was just about to close it when I heard a crash outside the window. The light was on in the kitchen, and it was pitch black outside so I couldn’t see what had caused it. I stilled, like a possum in headlights. Then shut the fridge door and bolted to the light switch, flicking it off. Ambient light from the lounge spilt into the small area, but at least I wasn’t backlit.

  I crossed to the back door and flicked on the external light. My rubbish bin had been toppled over. It wasn’t that full of trash, I’d only been here a couple of days. But the evidence of poor eating habits was on display for the entire neighbourhood. Ramen noodles and Maggi soup. I cringed. I couldn’t leave it like that. There were cats bordering on feral living across the street. Hence the toppled bin, at a guess.

  I pulled an old cardigan off the back of a kitchen table chair, and shoved my arms into it, then tugged on my boots and unlocked the back door. I peered down the driveway, but couldn’t spot the furry culprit, so grabbed a broom from the laundry and headed outside.

  At the very least, I could chase the feline away like a fishwife.

  It only took me a couple of steps out into the still night air to realise no cat had done this.

  I stared up at the side of the rental house at what could dubiously be called an anatomically correct depiction of an erect penis. In lurid pink spray paint. My shoulders tensed. At least it wasn’t written in cat blood.

  I walked toward it, my eyes darting up and down the driveway, a spot between my scapulas itching, and swiped a finger through the still wet paint. The rubbish bin was toppled when they saw me go in the kitchen. They’d just been here.

  I hightailed it inside the back door and bolted it closed, then pulled out my cell calling 111. I don’t think I took a breath during the entire panicked conversation with the emergency operator. I stood with my back to the fridge and my eyes on the kitchen window, my cell phone in one hand and a blunt carving knife in the other, and waited for the police to arrive.

  It didn’t even cross my mind that it would be my new boss.

  His face appeared in the kitchen window, a scowl claiming his lips. His eyes connected with mine immediately.

  “You OK?” he asked. I nodded. “Wanna unlock the door?” he pressed. I nodded.

  Then finally peeled myself off the fridge and crossed to the door.

  Matt stood there staring down at me and frowned. He did that a lot, I realised. Then he reached out and slipped the knife from my claw-like grip.

  “Bit overkill for kids, doll,” he said.

  “I didn’t… I wasn’t…”

  “Take a seat,” he said more softly, leading me by the shoulders to a chair at the breakfast table. “Heard the bin, did you?” he asked. I nodded.

  He placed the knife back in the drawer as if he knew already where it would go. Then he proved how much he was aware of the layout of the kitchen by pulling out two mugs from the cabinet and starting the kettle boiling.

  “Tea or coffee?” he asked. “No, wait. You’ve got hot chocolate here. That’ll do. Fuck knows you won’t sleep after this.”

  Speaking from experience?

  “See anyone?” he asked conversationally, watching me from under a fall of messed up dark blond hair. He’d just been woken up, I realised. He’d been asleep on the job.

  I scowled. His brow arched.

  “Well?” he asked. “Did you see anyone? Outside the window,” he added, nodding toward the thing for good measure.

  He was also speaking decidedly slowly. Extremely slowly in fact. As if talking to an idiot.

  I glared at him. He smirked back. Narcissist.

  Chapter 6

  Watched And Judged

  Matt

  “I’m quite capable of understanding you, you know,” Olivia said pointedly.

  I smiled; the fire wasn’t just in the colour of her hair, then. “Never doubted it. But did you see anyone?”

  She shook her head.

  I placed two mugs of hot chocolate down before her and took a seat across the table. It was tiny. Matched Maggie’s to perfection, right down to the chipped Formica top. I had no doubt Maggie wasn’t at home this evening. Otherwise, she would have come out of the flat next door, guns blazing. No, she’d be at Red Tussock. Helping Luke to sleep better.

  What did I get? I got the ‘shrink’ doll. The ‘psychiatrist’ teacher. Little red fucking riding hood with a psychology diploma.

  “They’re getting better,” I commented mildly, blowing on the hot chocolate to cool it.

  “Who is?”

  “The penis drawing vandals.”

  “You’ve had more penises pop up in Twizel?”

  I tried not to laugh. She was so fucking serious. “You’d be surprised,” I said. “Penises are a dime a dozen down here, Liv.”

  “Liv?” she sputtered.

  “Olivia’s too much of a mouthful,” I explained. “What? No one ever called you Liv before?”

  “Not really.”

  “Shame.”

  “They haven’t called me ‘Doll’ either.” Said in a dry tone of voice.

  “Ah,” I murmured, scratching my jaw. “Heard that, did you?”

  “Yes.”

  I stared off into the far corner.

  “Why?” she eventually asked.

  “Why what?”

  “Don’t be obtuse, Matt. It doesn’t suit you.”

  “Do you always call a spade a spade?”

  “Honesty’s essential in my profession.”

  “Teaching? I would have thought being too honest with kids is how penises come to pop up all over the place.”

  She blinked at me. The hackles on my back stood up. What was that? What triggered that reaction? My sense of humour? Maybe I was just rusty. I relaxed back into my chair again.

  “Is it not the same for cops?” she finally said.

  “Honesty?” I huffed out a breath. “Yeah, we’re honest, too.”

  I don’t think she believed me. Strange, because there was something about her I wasn’t sure I believed, too.

  “You think it’s just kids?” she asked, nodding towards the kitchen window.

  “They painted the same penis on the library wall yesterday.”

  The relief that briefly flashed across her face was alarming. I sat up straighter in my seat. Again. At this rate, I’d be accused of becoming a jack-in-the-box.

  “Do you know who they are?” she asked.

  “Got a good guess, but haven’t caught them in the act, as yet. They’ll trip up.”

  “I think they might have thought I saw them,” she admitted, her bottom lip slipping between her teeth in consternation.

  “Kids,” I repeated, watching her reaction to my every word. “We had a bunch of spray cans stolen from the hardware store. And now this. Once school starts next week, the spraying will stop.”

  “Nothing on the CCTV cameras?” she pressed.

  I smiled; more of a grimace really. She wasn’t looking at me, so she missed it. “This is Twizel,” I said carefully. Maggie always jumped down my throat when I said that.

  “Oh,” was all Olivia said.

  “Do you need a hand cleaning up that mess out there?” I offered.

  “No,” she rushed to say and then laughed. It was self-deprecating. “I haven’t been to the supermarket yet.”

  I raised an eyebrow. She flicked her gaze to my face, so caught it.

  “I’ve been subsisting on packet food,” she explained, blushing. Fuck, but that was a sexy colour on her cheeks. “You’d see exactly how far I have plummeted in my dietary habits.”

  “Dietary habits,” I repeated. “You even sound like a teacher.”

  She looked up at me but just bit that lip. I expected her to say something along the lines of, ‘that’s because I am.’ But she didn’t. She just stared at me as I stared at her and the room got hotter.

  I cleared my throat. “I better get going. Dad will want to get home to Mum.”

  “You’re going home?” She didn’t sound impressed.

  “Unless you want me to spend the night.” Whoops. How did that slip out?

  Her eyes widened, and she sucked in a sharp breath.

  “You know,” I added. “For protection against spray can holding kids.” Argh, now I sounded like a condescending prick.

  “Yes,” she muttered. “But I thought you must have come from the police station.”

  “The station’s not manned at night.”

  “Everyone works from home?”

  I nodded my head and then thought of Maggie. “Well, from a comfortable bed.”

  Her eyes darted toward the door that I knew led to the single bedroom in the house. Was she thinking about me in her bed?

  Fucking hell, get a grip. She was my kids’ brand spanking new teacher. Not going there. Nah-uh. No way.

  “Anyway,” I said, scrubbing a hand across the back of my neck. “I wasn’t on call tonight, Mac was. He’s been sent out to a traffic accident in Pukaki. So, I’m second tier. Not much happens in Twizel. Usually, I can get away with not leaving the kids with Mum and Dad.” I shrugged my shoulders.

  “But I called in about a bunch of spray can wielding kids.” She looked chagrinned.

  I smiled. Her eyes darted down to my mouth. My grin widened. “Yeah,” I said, feeling a little bit too happy right then.

  “Thanks, Matt,” she said softly. And I felt something. Right there. Right in the pit of my stomach. Where all I’d felt lately was acid and bile and a whole lot of crud. But it was sweet and warm and downright unexpected.

  Even my penis started to resemble the artwork outside.

  I shifted on my feet and then strode to the door.

  “You sure you don’t need a hand cleaning this up?” I asked, looking down at the trash strewn across her driveway.

  “No. Go home,” she said. “I’ve got this.”

  “Doll,” I said. “I don’t doubt it.” Then I walked down the driveway before she could offer a comment.

  My cell phone buzzed when I reached the car. I swiped the screen and stared at the text. I’d given her my number, for the kids, of course. I just hadn’t expected her to use it.

  Olivia: Doll? I’m starting to wonder just what goes through your mind, Senior Sergeant.

  I smiled. My thumbs about two sizes too big.

  Me: Even ur txts sound like a teachr

  I held my breath while I waited. I didn’t have to wait long. Even typing long hand, the woman was faster than lightning.