The Littlest Target. Maggie K. Black

thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat, when the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall.

      —Isaiah 25:4

      Thanks as always to my agent Melissa Jeglinski, my editor Emily Rodmell and the rest of the Love Inspired team who encourage authors like me and bring stories like these to life.

      Contents

       Cover

       Back Cover Text

       About the Author

       Booklist

       Title Page

       Copyright

       Introduction

       Dear Reader

       Bible Verse

       Dedication

       ONE

       TWO

       THREE

       FOUR

       FIVE

       SIX

       SEVEN

       EIGHT

       NINE

       TEN

       ELEVEN

       TWELVE

       THIRTEEN

       FOURTEEN

       FIFTEEN

       EPILOGUE

       Extract

       ONE

      Daisy Hayward brushed a kiss over nine-month-old Fitz Pearce’s tender head and gently lowered him into the crib, just as a deafening crash sounded through the darkened country house below. The baby’s eyes shot open. Fitz’s lip quivered. Tears filled his anxious gaze. Instantly, Daisy plucked her tiny charge from the crib and held him to her chest to rock him back to sleep. He nestled against her. The pervasive anxiety that seemed to fill little Fitz’s unhappy home tightened around her heart like a vise.

      Lord, I feel so trapped in this miserable place. Sometimes, I don’t know how much I can take.

      In the eight and a half months since she’d become Fitz’s nanny, there’d been moments when she’d almost felt like a prisoner in the remote Quebec countryside estate. Endless days of long, uncomfortable tension stretched whenever Gerald Pearce was away on business, only to then erupt into angry shouts and paranoid accusations between him and his young second wife, Anna, whenever he came home.

      For Daisy, growing up in a small English village where jobs were scarce, being hired to care for the son of a wealthy Canadian computer developer had felt like a dream come true. It wasn’t until she’d arrived in Canada that she’d discovered the truth. Fitz’s mother, Jane Pearce, had died in childbirth. A hasty wedding to Anna, one of Pearce Enterprises’s lead graphic designers and almost thirty years Gerald’s junior, had followed. But despite being newlyweds, their relationship was fraught with shouted accusations and slamming doors, and even one late night visit from two police officers. None of which was helped by Daisy’s suspicions that Gerald’s paranoid and scattered mind was slipping.

      She could hear things breaking now, as if Anna and Gerald had given up on shouting and decided instead to trash their expensive home. Fitz’s pudgy hand grabbed a fistful of her long blond hair and held it tightly. She slid a finger between his gums and felt the telltale bump of a new tooth getting ready to come through. He was teething.

      Daisy tightened her arms around him.

      “Don’t worry,” she whispered. “I’ve got you. You’re safe. I’m not going anywhere.”

      There was nowhere to go and reminding herself of that always helped somehow. The estate was in the middle of nowhere, and they didn’t need gates or fences to keep her there. In fact, Anna often told her with her smug little smile that she was free to leave on her days off and then wouldn’t let her use the car.

      Daisy gritted her teeth and refused to let her eyes even consider forming tears. It wasn’t like there was anything good waiting for her back home either. Her stepfather was a drunk and a thief, her mother hadn’t put up much of a fight when Daisy had been first kicked out of the house seven years ago—when she was just sixteen—and now there were four tiny half siblings back home that her mother desperately needed Daisy’s pay to help feed.

      Lord, if reminding myself of that is what keeps me here, then please don’t ever let me forget. Fitz needs me. I can’t imagine what would happen to him without me.

      Anna screamed and her shrill voice rose above the noise, so clearly it was as if she was standing on the other side of the door. “No! Don’t shoot! Please!”

      Then, before she could even blink, a sudden deafening crack seemed to split the air. Anna’s screams died. Fitz howled.

      Daisy’s heart smacked inside her slender frame, telling her to move, even as her brain scrambled to think. She crossed the nursery, slid the door open and positioned herself in the doorway so that she could look out, while keeping the child in her arms still sheltered behind her. She glanced over the landing.

      Two of Gerry’s business associates were tossing the place. Silent and hulking, with bald heads and cold stares, she’d always imagined that “Mr. Smith” and “Mr. Jones” had been