In fact, it’s far worse. Max is dead; Dom can’t punish him. But he wants to punish me for even thinking about leaving him—running off with his big brother . . . The idea still feels completely alien to me, but I know my protests will fall on deaf ears. Dom said he wants to forgive me; I know he lied.
“Please, let me try by myself. I can manage.” I can’t bear the thought of him witnessing my humiliation.
“Have it your way.” He instantly releases his hands, carelessly dropping me back on to the bed, knocking the breath from my body and jarring every vertebrae in my spine. I groan in pain but he remains looming over me, unmoved by my suffering. Even through the gloom I can see his eyes boring into mine and they are ice cold, hard . . . challenging.
There are no ties on my hands or feet, and I suppose I should be grateful for that. I’m not bound up, but I might as well be. It takes every ounce of strength I possess to drag myself to the bedroom door and fall against it, but when I try to open it, I realize it’s still locked. I twist the brass knob several more times, turning it frantically from left to right, but still it won’t budge.
Dom laughs. “Silly me. Forgot the key. Now, where did I put it?” He pretends to check all his pockets before finally grabbing the small gold key and holding it aloft. “Now, how are you going to persuade me to give it to you?”
He grins, stepping towards me, backing me against the door, and his big hands grip my shoulders, thumbs digging deep. I feel a shudder roll through me as he begins stroking the hollow above my collarbone with the tip of one forefinger. “You’re skin and bone, woman,” he says in a low voice that I hear rumble deep in his chest. “Not sure even Max would find you that enticing now.”
“Let me go,” I whisper, turning my head away from his face, inches from mine.
“Never.”
His arm snakes behind my back and I feel his left hand pressing me closer to him at the same time as he pushes against me, his broad chest smothering my face. His right hand fumbles around, digging into the back of my hip, and I close my eyes and will myself not to scream or show any sign of weakness.
“There. Off you go.”
He cackles and releases me, and as he steps back I see him shove the key back in his pocket. I don’t waste a second. I turn immediately and try the door again, awkwardly twisting the knob with shaking fingers; this time it swings open.
“Don’t keep me waiting! You’ve kept me hanging around for three months already,” Dom calls after me as I stumble on to the landing and look frantically around the dark space, blinking as I try to get my bearings.
There are no lights on out here, and when my hands scramble across the wall to find a switch, pressing it in relief, nothing happens. I flick it repeatedly but the flat clicking noise simply echoes in the darkness. Blindly I step forward and my soft-soled boots crunch over something sharp. A smashed lightbulb, I think, looking up to make out something twisted and stringy dangling down from the ceiling. I stretch out my arms again to feel my way along the wall, slowly inching forward, trying to remember where the stairs are, scared I might slip and tumble down them in the dark.
After a few seconds my eyes begin to adjust and I notice tiny slivers of light slipping through the gaps around the panels boarding up each window. I manage to make out that the bedroom where I’ve just come from is opposite the top of the stairs, and another three doors stand open, leading off the narrow landing. The huge shadowy block looming above me is the underside of a second set of stairs, presumably leading up to another floor, a bedroom or attic space. A shiver prickles the back of my neck in the cold, dank air and I cross my fingers that Dom won’t take me up there. My fear is irrational rather than specific: I have no idea what is at the top of those stairs, but locked in an abandoned attic is no way to end my life.
Am I going to die?
I can’t force the fear back in its box now it’s sprung out at me, but equally I can’t bring myself to believe that Dom will actually cause me physical harm. Not seriously. He’s angry, he wants me to suffer, but he’s not a killer. Max was the one who allowed his temper to get the better of him. Frustrated, intense Uncle Max who always wanted what his brother had—and if he couldn’t have it, no one else would. But Dom is the smart, ambitious brother who really made something of his life. He’s not going to blow that now; he has far too much to lose. I can’t believe he would throw away his career, his whole life—his family—just to punish me for an infidelity I don’t even remember.
He hurt me before . . .
The thought presses itself forward and I hesitate at the top of the stairs, toying with the idea of shuffling down them and making a bid for freedom. Perhaps, despite my earlier doubts, a neighbor will help me after all—at least let me use a phone, make a call to the police . . . I remember Michelle saying that she’d leave their business cards with the nurse, and I curse myself for forgetting to collect them before we left the hospital. I was so excited to be on my way home to the children, and I realize now why Dom was in such a hurry: there was only so long he could keep up the concerned husband act. He was certainly convincing; maybe that’s where Annabel inherited her dramatic talent, I think bitterly.
The thought of my daughter draws my eyes once again towards the stairwell. Every muscle, every nerve ending, is convulsing in fear for my children. But all Dom would have to do is follow me out of the front door and say that his wife is just having a tantrum. Bit of a domestic. Who would want to get involved? Who would care? Maybe the neighbors will even recognize Dom as Max’s brother; depending how long they’ve lived here, they may also remember him growing up here as a boy. I struggle to convince myself that anyone is going to take my word over his, the suave, well-dressed, articulate businessman who charms everyone—who once charmed me.
Conscious that I need to hurry up or Dom will come looking for me, I shuffle faster around the L-shaped landing, peering into each dark, empty room, squinting and blinking rapidly until my eyes can make out what looks like the bathroom. I’ve barely managed to use the toilet, get my clothes back in order and feel my way to the sink when I hear a sharp rap on the door.
“Just one more minute,” I call out, plunging my hands urgently into the icy stream of water, bending to angle my face under the cold tap to gulp great thirsty mouthfuls and let the water run over my face, refreshing my sticky, tear-stained cheeks.
“You’ve had your minute. Time’s up.”
The door swings open and I sense rather than see Dom’s big arm reach out, his long fingers gripping my arm, squeezing it until I cry out. He drags me out of the bathroom, ignoring my yelp of pain as I misjudge the doorway and bang my right cheekbone on the frame. Disoriented by the unexpected blow, my arms flail around as I try to recover my sense of equilibrium, but Dom gives me no time and my fingernails scrape along the walls, my feet stumbling on the uneven floorboards as he drags me behind him. I’m too shocked even to cry but my cheek is throbbing and my legs are turning to jelly; fear and exhaustion steal what little strength I’ve managed to recover in the short time since I woke up in hospital. It’s almost a relief when Dom shoves me back into the bedroom and I collapse on to the mattress, my breath coming in tearful gasps as I sprawl across it.
“Make yourself comfortable. Just got to pop home for a little while. Couple of small things to take care of. But don’t worry, I’ll be back soon.”
“No, wait, don’t go!” I don’t want to be with Dom, but I’m terrified of being alone here, trapped in this house, this room, where Max lived. I’m caught between the devil and his brother, and I will say or do anything to keep Dom from going home to the twins.
“Sweet. You want me to stay. No need to worry; I won’t abandon you. I don’t run away from my commitments. I’m your husband and that still means something, to me at least.”
“What does it mean to you?” I stall for time, frantically trying to think of reasons why he shouldn’t go back to the house—trying to think of anything at all that might convince him to stay here, away
from my children.
“Oh, I don’t know. But just as a for instance, it means that when I marry someone, I don’t sleep with their sibling, or plot with that sibling to steal everything that matters to them. Or cook up some kind of crazy, half-arsed plan together to have them shot.”
* * *
Alone again in the dark, I keep replaying Dom’s words, and terror seeps like poison through my veins, making me shudder with revulsion.
Is he suggesting I knew about the gun?
Plotting with Max. I have no memory of it; I have no memory of being secretly in love with him, either, or turning to him for comfort when my marriage began to fall apart. So I suppose it’s possible I’ve also forgotten scheming with Max to punish the mocking younger brother who so obviously resented his presence in our home. I was certainly tired of Dom’s bullying, and I’ve seen the news stories: battered wives do sometimes find the strength to take justice into their own hands . . .
An image of a gun flashes across my mind. An old, military-issue firearm that needed cleaning because it had lain in the attic all these years; the attic at the top of the stairs. I try to picture Max there—I try to imagine lying in this bed with him, talking through how it would be. We would make it look like a terrible accident, maybe a suicide, and we would run away together with the children, somewhere peaceful, to the seaside, to Brighton . . . I would go on ahead so as not to arouse suspicion, and he would join me there. Then I read Annabel’s diary and everything changed. I felt guilty, vulnerable and on edge; I was too scared to take the risk of leaving our home.
I remember my sense that DCI Watkins wanted more from me. Perhaps it wasn’t just my infidelity he hoped to flush out, but the fact that I was an accessory to a crime that went wrong—a murder attempt that quite literally misfired. I can’t believe it of myself, but I can’t dismiss the possibility out of hand now that Dom has planted the idea in my mind. Maybe I really am a guilty wife as well as a bad mother, and this is my punishment. Max tried to kill me and failed; Dom is going to finish the job his brother started.
I try not to be completely swallowed up by fear. At least I’m not afraid of the dark any more—I’ve spent enough time trapped inside my own mind—but I am frightened of Dom. I’ve lived intimately with him for so many years and yet listening to him now I barely recognize him. I can’t let terror take hold, though, because if I do I think there’s a strong chance I might lose my mind completely. Then I will have proved Dom right and he really will have won. But alone in this cold, dark room, there is nothing to divert or distract me, no outward sights to pull my gaze away from looking inwards to the darkness of terror.
Perhaps if I trick myself into believing that I’m just having a weekend lie-in, that this is all perfectly ordinary . . . I remember joking to Dom that I’d give anything for just one night alone in a hotel—one evening when I could have a long, relaxing bubble bath without someone hammering on the door needing to use the bathroom, when I could sleep without having to get up in the night to pull up the twins’ blankets or fetch a glass of water, and wake up when my own body clock decided it was the right time. I remember Dom rolling over in bed to give me a lazy, wry smile as the twins bounced into our bedroom, jumping all over the bed and telling me to wake up, sleepy head, it’s fun-day Sunday. I remember Dom pulling Annabel into the bed for a cuddle, and Aidan offering to bring me a glass of juice . . . I remember my quiet, ordinary, happy family life, and it all feels like a world away and a lifetime ago.
Tears sting my eyes. Everything is such a mess and I’m gripped by an overpowering feeling of having let both my children down, not just Annabel, and I know this guilt will haunt me until my dying day.
Which I’m beginning to fear may come sooner rather than later.
THIRTY-EIGHT
I smell cigarette smoke. And whiskey. The acrid combination teases its way through my nostrils, catching sharply at the back of my throat. I open my eyes to look around me, but there is only blackness. I lie rigid as I feel a hand stroking my hair. I try not to move; I try not to breathe.
Am I going to wake up and this will all be a dream?
I remember the first time Dom visited me in the hospital. I dreamed then of someone smothering me, a rough palm gagging my mouth. Am I having the same nightmare? Or did Dom really try to—
“Morning, sleepy head. It’s a beautiful day. Such a shame you won’t get to see it.”
The overhead light snaps on and I blink in the weak, grainy glow. Everything comes flooding back to me. Max’s house, Dom locking me up in this room before returning home to the twins . . . my children who still think I’m asleep in the hospital.
“Annabel . . .”
“Missing the kids, are you?” I hear Dom’s slow, labored breaths next to my ear.
He’s just arrived—he’s out of breath from running up the stairs—I’ve been here all night—another night away from my children . . . He’s close to me; I can feel the heat of his presence. There are tiny specks of blood on his white shirt collar, and I can smell his citrus aftershave; it mingles with whiskey fumes evaporating from his skin, and I want to shift away. But I cannot move. Why can’t I move?
“You know I am.” The words are razor blades tearing my throat to shreds.
“That’s such a shame. They’re not missing you at all. Lucy has taken them swimming, and then they’re all going out for pizza with Jasper. We might go and see a film later this afternoon. Plenty of quality weekend time together while lazy Mummy carries on sleeping.”
I shake my head from side to side, wondering why the rest of my body feels trapped, immobile. Have I had some kind of physical relapse?
Dom tuts loudly and in the gloom it sounds like acid on metal. “You really shouldn’t fight it, you know. You can’t win.” I can hear the smile in his voice.
I let my body go slack; he’s right, there’s no point fighting any more. Dom clearly hasn’t finished with me yet, and he isn’t going to release me until he’s said his piece, completed whatever agenda he’s working through. I just hope he makes it quick. I will myself to lie still and appear compliant, biding my time.
“When did you get to be so cruel? Why do you hate me so much? We still had a chance. We could have made everything right again,” I say persuasively. “There were good times, weren’t there? Don’t you remember? Surely they haven’t all been wiped out by one stupid decision I didn’t even go through with.”
“Is that what you think this is all about? Plotting to run away with Max? Is that really your only crime?” I could get splinters from his voice.
“I have no idea what you mean,” I say, my mind whirling as Dom switches track yet again, constantly trying to destabilize and confuse me. I have to stay resolute; if I give him an inch, I know he’ll take a mile.
“Oh, come off it. Think. All those years together—what did you call them? The good times? Me out there working all hours to build up my business, you sitting around at home with the kids, Max popping in for afternoon tea and cake, all of you having fun without me, enjoying the home I paid for.” He paces up and down the room as he delivers his bitter lecture.
“Is that how you saw it, Dom?” I’m genuinely shocked. “That I was some kind of freeloader? Not that I was trying to run a happy family home, supporting and looking after you, raising our children—”
“Our children.” He grates out the words, his eyes petrol blue, flashing fire.
“Yes, our babies, Dom,” I say huskily, trying to keep the tremor out of my voice, trying to appeal to the strong paternal instinct I know he has. “They wouldn’t want you to treat me like this, Dom. They love you, I know they do, but they love me too. We brought them into this world and—”
“You brought them into the world, Madeleine.” He leans over the bed, spitting my name at me, tiny pinpricks of saliva hitting my face.
“Well, if you want to be strictly technical about it, yes,” I say, trying to grasp where he’s going with this, old habits kicking in as I try to second-guess
him so that I can anticipate his complaints and mollify them. “But we made them. Both of us. And they need both of us. Please, don’t keep them from me any longer.” My resolve cracks and I plead with him even though I know from experience that, once I’ve started begging, his cruelty will increase, fueled by his sense of power over me. “They need me too.”
“Do they?”
They don’t even know I’m awake . . .
A wave of helpless fury surges through me and I wiggle and twist my body, more defiantly this time, desperately trying to sit up, move, do anything other than lie here like a lamb to the slaughter while he torments me.
“You can’t keep my children from me. I won’t let you!” I say fiercely, but no matter how much I wriggle and writhe about, I can’t sit up.
He tied me up while I slept.
A cold sweat breaks out on my skin as I realize my hands and feet are bound. My threats are empty, and Dom knows it.
“Oh, you won’t? That’s very interesting. So tell me, what exactly do you plan to do about it?” He reaches out to stroke my hair, his fingers trailing down my cheek, across my lips, pressing inside them to probe the soft flesh inside my mouth. I feel sick at his touch; I taste cigarettes on his finger and it makes me want to vomit.
I wrench my head to one side and he chuckles as he withdraws his hand and straightens up. “I hate you for this, Dom. If you’ve hurt them, I will kill you! Just stay away from them. They’re mine!” So this is what murderous rage feels like, I think, my fists clenching with a will of their own. I squeeze them so tightly I almost think they might snap the cords I can now feel around my wrists. I didn’t know I was capable of such fury. Maybe I did know about Max’s gun, after all. Maybe I—
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