He was now starting to get nervous. Just past midnight. Even in the middle of summer, it was now dark outside. She said she would be in by 11. And there has been that group of young men hanging around the train station recently. Rumour had it they had gang raped a 19 year girl at knifepoint, but she was too afraid to report it.
He jumped when his phone beeped. Yes, it was Daisy, saved under his pet name for her - Flower. The brief text message was initially cryptic:
Hlp stat knvs
But he knew his daughter so well. Help. Station. Knives. Typed under duress. Surreptitiously.
He muttered "Fuck" under his breath, ran to his bedroom table to pick up what he considered his insurance, and bolted out the front door.
The train station was normally a 3 min jog away. He reached it in 2.
At the far end of the platform, out of the lights and the searching eyes of the CCTV, he could just about make out 4 young men in hoodies, surrounding Daisy and her 3 friends. As he got closer he saw the glint of a blade in the moonlight.
The group heard his heavy footfall and turned to face him when he was 10 yards from them. The young men had time to form an aggressive phalanx facing him, two with short knives drawn, as Daisy shouted "Daddy!" in a tone that signified both relief and apprehension.
"Who the fuck is this cunt" was spat into the air by one of the armed youths.
Daddy came to a halt a couple of yards from them. Still within the circle of lights, he looked imposing. His tank top revealed his muscular tattooed arms, gleaming with sweat. Bullet-like nipples poked through it, erect from the fight-or-flight response pumping adrenaline around his body. His powerful legs were barely contained within his tight shorts. But what stood out were his dark eyes. Normally a green-brown, the urge to protect his girl had turned them to pools of dark ink, sucking light into them, never to escape.
His girl's voice broke what had become a silent stand-off of potential male combatants sizing each other up. "Daddy, they said they were going to slice us unless we sucked their cocks".
The ringleader smirked and looking directly at Daddy, in a menacing, cold tone responded "Yeah, and once we have sliced this auld fella into ribbons, we will get back to you four, and you will beg to suck our cocks."
Daddy's heart was racing. He forced it to slow and started to gather his breath. He felt that calm descend. He may have a PhD, a well-paid desk job, but he grew up on the other side of the tracks. He had always managed to use his head to avoid fights. But he had come close, and had learned that controlling your own body and then engaging your brain was key. Although, this time he knew that talking wasn't going to work. He reached back and pulled his insurance from where he had secreted, stuck down into his shorts.
Now Daddy was the one smirking. "Guys, you are probably too young to get this. But. That's not a knife. That's a knife!"
Only a tiny sliver of the huge blade he drew fort glinted in the light. It was a combat knife, blackened except for the very sharp cutting edge that caught the light. The thick 7-inch blade was gripped tightly in Daddy's hand by its sturdy leather-wrapped handle.
Daisy could see the knife over the shoulder of her assailants. She knew it well. It rested on her father's bedside table. She would see it there when she would run to his bed after a nightmare or when lightning flashed and thunder crashed. Now aged 18, those nights were less frequent, but she still loved waking-up with her Daddy's strong arm around her a couple of times a year.