HIS

"Your 13 O'clock, midday tomorrow." The text was clear and to the point. And I was not wasting any time. It wasn't like this was my first rodeo or anything. Heck, this was a hundred and sixty-six times in the past five years. And yes, I was counting. Sighing, I placed a call to the kindergarten school my daughter attended in this little town. "Hello Mrs Morrison, yes... Yes. Yes... Yes, Yes Mrs Morrison" Damn woman couldn't let me get a word in. "Mrs Morrison, can I please speak to Ivy?" I emphasized, taking a breath to try and keep from losing my cool. The older woman apologized and, much to my distaste, yelled over the phone, nearly deafening my poor ears. This is the one thing I would not miss about this little town. Everyone knew everyone and was in everyone's business. Everyone felt the need to speak about something in everyone's life, and it was annoying. Sure they were a lovely bunch, but damn were they nosy. "Hello Didi", Ivy's sleepy voice came over the phone. Apparently, calling me dad was never part of my daughter's vocabulary, she had outgrown that phase when she was two and took to calling me Didi instead. "Hey love, do you think you can grab Mr Sponge and make your way to the playground without Mrs Morrison or any of the other teachers noticing?" I asked calmly, knowing that she would be as discreet as possible. As stated before, a few hundred times would make little kids question things, and we would have no choice but to answer. Truthfully, that is. There's only so many lies even kids can take before they call you on your bullshit. "Yes Didi," Ivy sighed tiredly. My daughter loved to sleep in class, something she did not get from me. I actually enjoyed my school years. Ivy, on the other hand, seemed to take the opposite side. Everything bored her, kids her age and people in general. At times, I wondered whether it was age or just her nature. I mean she was a kid and I expected her to make friends easily everywhere we went but... well, she did, but after a day or two she would ditch them without a word. She was a quiet and observant child for the most part, always keeping her distance from others. A smart genius that seemed out of place all the time. When I was done with the call, I walked back into my bedroom where I retrieved a backpack from the air vent. It had all our emergency funds and everything we needed for a quick getaway. A picture of Ivy peeked from one of her many fake passports. Each one with a different hairstyle or smile. Honestly, I was tired, tired of running and just tired of my way of life in general. I needed to end this, which meant finding him. Him being the man who fathered Ivy. My ex-husband. He was the only one that could help me at that point. A few years ago, I got married through a dare. I was not sober through it all, but the marriage was legal. My painful ass the next day and a kid down the line was proof of consummation. Luckily, or unluckily for me, we annuled it the moment the booze wore off. I didn't know the guy. I might have heard his name mentioned once or twice by his stupid friends, but I did not care enough at the time. I had no idea who he was other than that he had a nice face and a perfect body. Surely, I remembered how he looked, but nothing else. No pleasantries were exchanged nor addresses or numbers. However, that is not the issue here. When Mr hot bod screwed me over, I apparently left him with my family stone that contained a microchip inside with sensitive information. Things the underworld and some political players wanted to keep hidden. Ultimately, it was the only thing that was keeping me and my daughter alive. They didn't know I lost the chip or that it was potentially some dude's wedding band. And by God did I hope he had kept it. I know I kept the stupid plain ring from said marriage as a memento of some sort. I was banking my child's life on her father, who didn't even know she existed. Initially, when I realized I had left the jewel, I went back in search of it and him. But I couldn't even find the guy, it was like he just vanished into thin air. The wedding footage had been erased, and I had nothing to fall back on. Even with my resourcefulness, I still came back empty after all these years. And so, when threats arise, I would pack my kid and move to our next assumed safe location and start our lives all over again. It wasn't that I couldn't fight back or anything like that, I was a trained mercenary and death came easy to me. My enemies were too many and too strong. My back-up wasn't enough. Moreover, people have started to speculate on whether I actually had the microchip or not. Plus, I had the tiny disadvantage of having a little girl to protect. And when all you did was mostly talk about black mail without the evidence to boot, people tended to doubt and treat you like the plague. I knew a lot of things I had no business knowing in the first place. Things that could get me, my family and anyone associated with me dead. And i needed to get that chip back, by all means. A few calls and arrangements later, I picked up my daughter from the little kindergarten school in the neighborhood, and we were back on the road. Ivy didn't ask questions. Not often anyway, but when she did, she didn't back down until she got her cake and ate it too. She had ruthless traits to her personality. Yes, I was not a merciful person, but I thought my daughter took it a tad bit too far. "Do you think we could live by the ocean again?" Ivy's calm voice said over the slow music in the car. Another thing or at least one of the few things that interested her was water. Large bodies of water for some reason. Personally, I was s**t scared of water and would do anything to avoid it all together. "I don't know sweetheart," I lied, knowing damn well we were headed into the city this time around. I hated the city, but I understood why my handler was taking us there, because as much as cities had a lot of people and the potential of being spotted was high, it also...well, had too many people, And it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. Ivy shrugged and looked back out the window, completely ignoring my existence. Yes, I gave birth to her but Ivy and I were very detached emotionally for some reason. Okay, maybe because she thought I was her father. I didn't tell her I birthed her, there was no use confusing a small child with biological mistakes. And unfortunately that's what she was; an anomaly. Men didn't get pregnant and yet, by God, did it happen to me. "City it is then" I announced with a smile, while she groaned out in annoyance. I knew that if we actually hated it, then we wouldn't go there. My seven-year-old daughter would make sure of it.