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‘You can. You will. You’re strong, Max. Just hold on.’
Joseph glances behind him, sees Gabriel Roth marching Erin across the grass. The knife he stripped off earlier now hangs from Gabriel’s belt.
Turning his back, he tries to fish the key from his breast pocket, but the cuffs frustrate him, and by the time he’s figured out how to dig for it with his thumbs it’s too late. Gabriel grabs his shoulder, wrenches it around.
Joseph stares at him, this man who intends to kill his son. The day’s dying light has turned Gabriel’s eyes to precious stones.
He feels a rush of blood through his arteries – some primal instinct switching off his pain, readying muscle and sinew for one last burst of violence.
If he acts now, with his hands still cuffed, he’s guaranteed to fail, but every second he hesitates is a second closer to losing Max. He thinks about slamming his forehead intoGabriel’s face, but he’s unlikely to incapacitate him with a single blow. One kick of that chair is all it’ll take to set his son swinging.
He looks at Erin, sees the torment scribed into her face. Their eyes meet for just a moment before she sweeps the rest of garden with her gaze. He knows she’s searching for Tilly, that she cannot comprehend why her daughter isn’t here, nor what that might mean. He wants to scream at her for what she’s done, even though he understands the desperation that made her do it.
Worst of all is the knowledge that Joseph now has no choice but to respond, actively working against the woman he loves and who he knows loves him too.
Gabriel wraps his fist around the cuffs, gives them a shake. Satisfied, he turns to Erin. ‘Key.’
She blinks, looks at him in bewilderment. Finally, his words seem to penetrate. ‘Where’s Tilly?’ she asks. ‘You said—’
‘I know what I said. Key.’
‘Gabriel,’ she begs. ‘Please. I just want to see that she’s OK.’
In response, he drives his fist into Joseph’s stomach. ‘Key. Now.’
Joseph collapses, gaping, on to the grass.
‘My back pocket,’ Erin moans.
Gabriel finds the key and lobs it across the garden. Then, his attention still on Erin, he points to one of the chairs. ‘Sit.’
She glances left and right, a cornered prey animal contemplating its last move.
Watching her, trying to sit upright despite his body’s shrieks of protest, Joseph fears his wife is about to do something stupid, that in her desperation to find Tilly she’ll try to run; and that Gabriel will either put an arrow in her back or, worse, kick away Max’s chair as punishment.
‘Erin,’ he hisses. ‘Just do it.’
She casts him a panicked look, and perhaps something in his expression pacifies her, just a little, because she sinks down as instructed, her bound hands clutched between her knees.
Gabriel places the crossbow on the grass. He pulls more zip ties from his pocket and begins to secure her to the chair.
Joseph looks at the weapon. He stands little chance of reaching it before Gabriel, an even smaller chance of firing it while cuffed. Instead, moving slowly, he brings his hands towards his chest and inverts his thumbs. He’s sliding them into his breast pocket when Max, above him, starts to gasp.
The boy’s heels touch the seat and the noose tightens. Max chokes, barks out a cough. His face darkens. From somewhere he finds the strength to raise himself up again, but the noose doesn’t loosen completely. His lungs whistle as he tries to suck in air.
‘Jesus Christ, he’s an eighteen-year-old fucking boy!’ Joseph shouts. ‘He had nothing to do with this! Cut him down!’
From the base of the tree Gabriel retrieves a second rope, a noose already tied at one end. He throws its loose coils over the bough and strides towards Joseph, who snatches his thumbs from his pocket just in time.
Gabriel fits the noose, grabbing Joseph by the hair and forcing back his head until it’s done. ‘I’m not interested in creating a spectacle,’ he says. ‘Or drawing this out to cause more pain. This isn’t about vengeance. It’s about righting a wrong. I just want to get it done.’ He goes to the loose end of rope hanging from the tree and pulls until it’s taut.
Joseph scrabbles up because he has to. ‘Max didn’t kill your brother,’ he says, through clenched teeth. ‘And nor did I. Drew Cullen lured him into the woods, Thursday night. Tilly killed him, and Sunday night she killed Drew.’
Erin stiffens in her chair. ‘Joe, what are you saying? That’s nottrue.’
‘No,’ Gabriel says. ‘It isn’t. And he knows it.’ He drags over a chair. ‘Climb up.’
‘Listen to me,’ Joseph hisses, his words coming faster. ‘Because if this really is about justice, about righting a wrong, then you need to hear what I’ve got to say. Your brother was sleeping with my wife – I’m guessing you already know that. Somehow Tilly found out about it and used Drew to set him up. Her plan was to film Angus and scare him off. But when it backfired, Tilly killed him.