Silent Child(71)

Without the television or the radio playing, the house stood silent, with only the sound of my own movements filtering through the rooms. The loaf of bread was still on the kitchen side where I’d left it. The butter was next to it. I put it away instinctively without really thinking about what I was doing. My mind was too busy trying to process the knowledge that my husband had lied to me.

My scratching spread from my hands to my neck, and then my forearms. Every part of me itched when I thought about the lies. I stroked my pregnant belly, trying to sooth the gurgling in my stomach. I felt sick.

Suddenly, I burst to life. This was crazy. I couldn’t stay in this house. Moving as fast as I could, I hurried up the stairs and began packing. What the hell was I going to do? My husband was a liar and I was about to have his baby. I stopped and stared at the clothes in the suitcase. I’d made no plans for this situation. The only thing I could do was to go to Josie’s house with Aiden and then think about what to do with Jake. Perhaps he could move out and I could take a little time to figure out where to go next. I knew Josie would tell me that there was no way I should move out of the house after he’d lied to me, but it wasn’t my house to begin with, and honestly I didn’t particularly like it.

It was his house.

The door opened and I froze. Jake was back.

I slammed the suitcase shut and stared at my trembling hands. At this point I knew there was no innocent explanation for him lying to me. Either he had been having an affair this whole time, or he’d been hiding a second life from me. The one thing I didn’t know was whether that second life included kidnapping and abusing my own child.

I ran my hands over my hair and tried to remain calm as Jake shouted hello upstairs. I’d been so sure that Jake was innocent when the police took him in for questioning. They’d found nothing. He’d had a decent alibi. The police had questioned several men, so I’d thought nothing of it except that I was certain I knew my husband and that he wasn’t capable of hurting a child like that. I was certain. But now… this lie. It was different. It changed everything and threw my entire home-life into question.

I didn’t know what to believe. All I knew was that my son was downstairs with a man I could no longer trust. I gritted my teeth, hefted the suitcase, and began to drag it downstairs.





36


I lugged the suitcase down the stairs and left it by the front door. Then I hesitated, wondering whether to put my shoes on now or to see what happened when I talked to Jake. I scratched my wrists and tried to collect myself. This was going to be incredibly tough and I needed to be strong and calm. The baby kicked as I moved through the hallway into the kitchen, and I bit my lip to deal with the pain. Jake must have seen the strain on my face because he was next to me in an instant.

“What’s wrong? Is it the baby?”

I shook my head, biting harder on my lip. I couldn’t look at him, and I think he sensed that right away.

“Emma, you’re white as a sheet. Tell me now. Have the police made an arrest?”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you,” I said. “It’d get you off the hook.” I clenched and unclenched my fists, still itching all over my body. I felt a flush of heat work its way up my neck. My entire body was hot and itchy and I wanted nothing more than to scratch every inch of my skin until it all came off.

“What the hell?” Jake took a step away from me and tried to get me to meet his gaze. I noticed that behind him on the kitchen counter was a new bottle of Scotch.

“Is that what you drink to numb the guilt?”

“What the hell are you talking about, Emma?”

I lifted the prospectus from the kitchen table and slapped it down on the counter in front of his Scotch. The glass rattled against the bottle as I flipped the page to the art history course. The spine was already bent in the appropriate place, meaning it took only a few moments to find the evidence of his lies.

“I’m talking about this, Jake. You’ve been lying to me since we very first met. All these years. Where did you keep him? Where was he?” I flew at him, with my claws out, my nails reaching for his neck. But Jake was quicker. He grasped me by the wrists and pushed me away.

I backed away from him, wide-eyed and shaking, while Jake snatched up the brochure and read the page. When he realised what I was talking about, the blood drained from his face and his jaw slackened.

“It’s a typo,” he said. But he also reached for the bottle of Scotch and began to unscrew the cap.

“No it isn’t. I rang them. Twice. The college has never heard of you. Unless David Brown is some alter-ego you’ve dreamt up, you don’t go to York every Tuesday and Thursday. You go somewhere else.”

He poured a large measure of Scotch into a tumbler and drank it quickly. “You don’t understand.”

“Then enlighten me, because my son has been missing for ten years and I’ve defended you against people who suspected you. Now I find out you’ve been lying to me all these years and—”

“You think I took Aiden?” He shook his head and poured another large measure. “Fucking hell, Emma. Of all the… You actually think I’m capable of that? You think I’m a paedophile, do you? You’re my wife, Emma. You’re supposed to know me.”

“I thought I did. But then I found out that you’ve been lying to me all these years. What am I supposed to think?”