Silent Victim(19)

Thoughts of returning to that place with my husband were too much to bear. ‘See this,’ I whispered. Opening the palm of my right hand I exposed the blisters on my skin. ‘I didn’t fall off the quad. I went back there, to the grave. I dug it up. He’s . . .’ I took a deep breath to calm my beating heart. ‘He’s gone.’

‘Really?’ He shook his head in disbelief. ‘That can’t be right,’ he said, firmer this time. ‘We have to figure out what the hell is going on. It can’t have just disappeared.’

‘He is gone,’ I said, my fingers gripping my husband’s wrist and making him wince. Fingers that had been down my throat less than an hour before. Had he realised what I had been doing? I relaxed my grip, grateful he wanted to help me out of this horrific mess. ‘There’s not a single sign that he was there. No clothes, no shoes, it’s like it never happened.’

My words seemed to trigger a reaction as Alex opened his mouth to speak. He paused.

This was not the time for holding back.

‘What?’ I said, desperate to read his mind.

He turned away from me, facing the coffee table. His words came, slow and measured. ‘Are you sure? Did it really happen?’ His head hung low, his shoulders hunched, and he raised both hands to run his fingers through his hair.

A prickle of annoyance rose up inside me. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘I don’t know. I’m just looking for answers. It’s so hard to believe.’ Still, he avoided my gaze. Why wouldn’t he look at me? Was he so ashamed of what I had become? Did he think that having an eating disorder made me a compulsive liar? My annoyance grew like a hot flame inside me, and I felt a stress rash break out on my chest. I had just poured my heart out and this was the best he could come up with? ‘You think I made this up?’ I spat the words. ‘You think I’m mad, is that it?’

I did not notice his clenched fists until he banged on the coffee table, making me squeak as I jumped.

‘For God’s sake,’ he roared, ‘it’s easier to accept that you’re spinning some wild tale than believing you’ve murdered someone on our land. How am I meant to take that in? You won’t even step on a spider! What are you not telling me?’ He swivelled to face me, placing his hands on my arms and giving them a shake. ‘Tell me! What really happened down there that day?’ His eyes were filled with fury. I had broken him – driven him too far. This was a side of Alex I had not seen before. He could be overprotective sometimes, but he had never frightened me. His eyes widened as he registered the shock on my face, and he suddenly dropped his hands. As if someone had clicked their fingers, the fury faded. ‘I . . . I’m sorry. It’s a lot to take in.’

I wanted to tell him that I understood, that sometimes the basest instinct in our human nature takes control. When all you have is threatened, it’s only natural to lash out. But my tongue felt like it was glued to the roof of my mouth, and I was concerned that his outburst may have awoken our sleeping son. I wrapped my arms around myself, feeling suddenly cold. Seconds passed, and all I could hear was the swish of the wind blowing down the fireplace, whose flames had been extinguished hours ago. With sharp snapping teeth, the chilling breeze invaded my territory. When I spoke, my voice no longer sounded like my own. ‘If you want to leave me then I understand. You didn’t sign up for this when you married me.’ I doubled over, unable to keep my emotions in check any longer. I clenched my hands, biting into my fist as tears overtook me. It was a horrible, strange habit I had picked up as a child, a way to silence my tears as I cried myself to sleep at night.

At last, Alex wrapped his arms around my shoulders and drew me to him. ‘It’s over. It’s going to be all right.’ But his voice was brittle. He sounded scared, which frightened me even more. He gently took my hand from my mouth, my saliva forming in long threads as it stretched from my lips to my knuckles. I blinked away my tears, seeing the indentations of my teeth in my skin. Sometimes I really didn’t know my own strength.

‘Tomorrow,’ he said, ‘I’ll go there alone.’

I could not speak. Could I bear to imagine my husband uncovering the corpse of the man I had killed? Just by telling him, I had made him an accessory to murder, risking our son being left parentless, unprotected.

Alex held me close, both of us stiff with fear. ‘Are you sure he was dead?’ he whispered. ‘Maybe he was just unconscious. Perhaps he got up and walked away. Have you thought about that?’

How could I tell my husband that I would not let myself consider it because the thought of Luke being alive was more frightening than the thought of having killed him. If I told him that, then maybe he would wonder just how much of an accident it had been.

It was the first of many theories that he brought up. I barely remember getting into bed. I can only recall lying in the darkness, my head on my pillow as I stared up at the low beams of our ceiling. Silent tears streamed down the sides of my face, collecting in the shells of my ears. Finally, we both fell asleep.

I woke sometime later, the light of the moon strong and clear as the storm silenced at last. On the side of the bed was Alex, sitting with his head in his hands. Later I would wonder if I had imagined it. Perhaps I had imagined it all.





CHAPTER NINETEEN

LUKE