Down London Road

walk home. It was a fair wee walk at this time and I didn’t particularly enjoy walking down the very long London Road, but I didn’t want to hang around any more.
    I was just about to turn the corner on to Blenheim Place when something made me look back. Call it a sixth sense, a chill down the spine, a warning …
    My heart shot up into my throat.
    A dark silhouette was a few yards behind me. I recognized the lope. Growing up, we called it the ‘hard man’ lope. The gentle but forced swagger of the shoulders, chest puffed up, steps deliberate. It was usually adopted by men when they were going into some kind of ‘battle’. My dad had walked like that all the time, though. Then again, every second of every day he’d treated life as one big battle and everyone as an enemy.
    Murray Walker was following me.
    I quickly looked in front of me, and without really even taking the time to think about it, I took the path up the cobbled streets of Royal Terrace instead of London Road. It ran adjacent to London Road on higher ground, but I knew there was a path by the church that would take me into Royal Terrace Gardens. I raced into the entrance, and the climb burned in my muscles, but I pushed on, taking the wide path that veered steeply up along the outskirts ofCalton Hill. The precipitous pathway would eventually slope downward and bring me out on to Waterloo Place, and from there I’d go west back on to Princes Street. Then it was north to Dublin Street.
    All that really mattered was misdirecting Murray.
    He couldn’t know where we lived.
    I was so panicked at the thought of him finding the flat that I didn’t think clearly and I didn’t see the error in my plan.
    Me. Alone. On a dark, rough, muddy pathway. At night.
    The adrenaline was pumping through me as I marched upward. I attempted to listen for the sound of footsteps behind me, but my heart was racing so hard it was pulsing blood in rushing waves into my ears. The palms of my hands and my underarms were damp with cold sweat, and I couldn’t breathe properly, my chest rising and falling in ragged breaths. I felt sick with fear.
    When I finally heard the heavy footsteps behind me I glanced back and saw my dad’s face under the wash of moonlight. He was pissed off.
    All the determination I’d had earlier to stand and face him and show him he didn’t scare me just disappeared. I couldn’t let go of that little girl who was terrified of him.
    And so, like her, I tried to run.
    My feet slapped against the steps as I ran upward as hard and fast as I could, wishing I could conjure up people, witnesses. But no one was there.
    I was alone.
    Except for the pounding of heavy boots behind me.
    At the hard, warm grip of his hand around my arm,I made a noise of loud distress that was quickly muffled by his other hand clamping down over my mouth. The smell of sweat and cigarette smoke flooded my nostrils as I fought him, my nails biting into his arm, my legs trying to kick out as I was dragged off the path. I lost my grip on my bag with my pepper spray as I fought him.
    I wasn’t strong enough, and now I was unarmed.
    Murray slammed me back against the rocky, grass-covered slope of the hillside and pain shot through my skull before shooting all the way down to the tip of my toes. Tears leaked from my eyes as he held me there, his large hand around my throat.
    I grunted against the other hand that was still clamped over my mouth.
    He tightened his grip on my throat and I stopped squirming.
    Despite the fact that his face was mostly cast in darkness, I could still make out the anger that stretched his features taut. ‘Trying to give me the runaround?’ he hissed.
    I didn’t answer. I was too busy wondering morbidly what he was going to do to me. My body began to shake hard, and I lost complete control of my breathing. He felt the gulping breaths behind his palm and smirked.
    ‘I won’t hurt you, Jo. I just want to see my son.’
    Knowing it would bring me physical pain, I still shook my head ‘no’.
    Murray’s smirk grew into a smug smile, as though he’d won something. ‘I suppose we better come to an arrangement then. I’m going to take my hand off your mouth and you’re not going to scream. If you do, I won’t hesitate to hurt you.’
    I nodded, wanting at least one of his disgusting paws off me. As I stared up into his face, I saw not for the first time how there was nothing behind his eyes. I didn’t think I had ever met anyone in my entire life who