Page 35 of Iron Cross

He didn't want to go. He wasn’t done counting and looking at the numbers. He loved counting. He loved seeing numbers in the wild, and saying them one by one.

“No! I’m not overreacting, you need to get here now,” Vanilla Pumpkin whispered harshly into the phone.

“Yup, definitely time to go,” I said, as my son fussed in my arms.

He kicked, trying to squirm out but I held him close. I kissed him and he settled, never one to deny a cuddle when it was offered to him. He put his cold gloves on my cheek and we nuzzled noses.

“The kid obviously doesn’t know her…” Pumpkin kept on chirping, as her friends seemed to bob their heads in agreement - as if the dispatcher could fucking see them.Idiots.

If I was still Kira Green, I would have stood my ground. But Anna Jones couldn’t. Anna Jones was weak. She was typical.

Bitches. All of them were fucking bitches.

As I got up, the head pumpkin followed me, as she directed one of her minions to watch her brat who was eating wood chips off the ground.

The cop came fast - certainly faster than they had to. They came with sirens blaring, surrounding me as I tried to step towards my car.

“Ma’am?” A cop stepped out of the black and white car, one hand on his gun, and the other out towards me like I was a lion that escaped the zoo.

“Shit,” I said under my breath.

“Shi’!” my son mimicked, as I cursed myself.

I could not get arrested. Not as Anna Jones. My cover was good, but it wasn’tthatgood. My fingerprints were still what they were, and if Paradigm didn’t get to it in time, my real name would get flagged. It would only be a matter of time before I was found.

“Ma’am, is that your son?” he said, with a brow lifted, already believing that he was not my baby. “Do you two have some form of ID?”

“Of course, I do.” I rolled my eyes. “He doesn’t. Or do you think two olds have driver’s licenses?”

A second car careened up, stopping with one wheel on the pavement. Another man came out, hand on his gun as well.

“She said that she found him in a cart and it’s not her son!” Tiffany-Karen-bitch said, as she yelled at the cops, that smarmy look on her face made me wince.

One moment of sarcasm and now my kid would go with child protective services… or worse, he’d go into Eoghan’s care. All for the sin of not looking like his mother.

Fuck.Fuck!

“Want to do a DNA test?” I said, irritated. “That bitch assumed I was his nanny!”

In this day and age, there was no excuse for that.

I looked at her, the woman who was hell-bent on having mychildtaken from me for the sin of not sharing her complexion, and gritted out, “You’ve seen us here before. You’ve seen us come here for over a year!”

I wanted to spit in her face.

The cop looked at me, obviously bristling at the implication. Thank God we lived in Massachusetts, and not in another state where the silent part would be seen as a challenge.

“Ma’am,” the policeman said, suddenly slightly placated, having made a strange assessment of the kid who had his arms wrapped tightly around my neck. “Listen, do you know anyone who could vouch for you?”

No. No, I didn’t. I had no one.

No family. Magda was probably home but I couldn’t bring her into this. I couldn’t risk her knowing that I might ping a different name. If she knew my real name, then she’d be under threat as well. God knows what Eoghan might do to get information on me.

“It’s just me,” I said, helplessly.

“Because she’s lying!” Tiffany-cunt-bitch said.

I rolled my eyes. The slightly perturbed police officer, who had swung in thinking he was a hero, was now in the middle of twowomen fighting over a baby. He was definitely no King Solomon, able to dole out wisdom.

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