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Upstairs, to his surprise, he remains fully functional. With the lights off, Erin pushes him on to the bed and straddles him. What follows isn’t quiet; nor is it exactly gentle. He listens to his wife’s gasps, endures the pain of her nails as she braces herself against his chest. In their three years together it might be the best sex they’ve had – and the first time Joseph’s felt no shame.
Soon, they’re so slippery with sweat that Erin’s hands can hardly find purchase. For a while, she seems too lostin sensation to realize something’s wrong, but Joseph does. From there, it’s only a matter of time until his wife notices, too, and how bad it’ll be when she does.
At last she rolls off him and lies there, recovering her breath. Then she reaches out and turns on a lamp – and reveals a scene of carnage. Blood covers Joseph, covers the sheets. Erin’s palms are crimson with it.
With a cry of dismay, she flips on to her knees. Her eyes move from her bloodied fingers, splayed in front of her, to Joseph. The slash wound across his abdomen gapes red and slick, its reopening caused as much by Erin’s gyrations as her nails. ‘What the fuck, Joe?’ she whispers. ‘What the fuck?’
‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘I should have warned you.’
Levering himself on to one elbow, he swings his legs out of bed as carefully as he can. Now that the sex is over, the pain from his wound is hitting harder. It feels like someone’s dragged a soldering iron across his flesh, smoking his skin. When he stands, favouring his good knee, the hamstring in that leg feels like it’s been Tasered. He hobbles to the ensuite and hears Erin stumble to the family bathroom.
It’s quicker to shower than to wash himself at the hand basin. Afterwards, he binds his abdomen with another long strip of Elastoplast. He wraps a towel around his waist, opens the door.
During his absence, Erin has cleaned herself up and changed the sheets. She’s sitting on the mattress, hugging her knees. Joseph wonders if his wife’s nakedness is deliberate. Perhaps, in showing him she has nothing to hide, she hopes to encourage the same honesty in return.
‘You’re really starting to scare me,’ she whispers.
Joseph limps towards the bed. When she recoils he hesitates.
‘How did you get that?’ she asks, indicating his abdomen. ‘It looks fresh.’
‘It isn’t.’
Erin shivers, waits for him to speak.
‘That stupid, damned axe,’ he tells her, after a moment’s pause. ‘When I went downstairs, Friday night, Max scared the hell out of me, and I must have scared the hell out of him right back. It was dark. We had a … a coming together. Just a stupid accident, really. I didn’t want you to worry.’
‘Heattackedyou?’
‘No. Nothing like that. As I said, it was just a clumsy coming together. My fault, really. Not his.’
His wife is quiet for a while. Then she rests her chin on her knee. ‘Silly question,’ she says. ‘And maybe this is on me for not asking sooner. But why do you have an axe in the wardrobe, Joe?’
At last, she’s asked him something he can answer honestly, with no fear of the consequences. ‘Because I wanted to keep you all safe,’ he tells her, ‘and didn’t feel like I could. The world’s a dangerous place. A lot of the time it’s a brutal, unforgiving place. And I didn’t want to lose anyone else.’
Joseph fills his lungs. Then he starts to tell Erin about the doorstep seller last winter who wouldn’t leave, and how powerless he’d felt to protect Max and Tilly. And how that single incident had grown in importance in his mind, a microcosm, perhaps, of more fundamental insecurities.
‘So you bought an axe?’
‘It’s actually a tactical tomahawk, but yeah.’ He screws up his face. ‘I bought a crossbow, too – some other stuff. The crossbow’s in the wardrobe, still in its box, if you want to see. Turns out I’m not much of a home defence guy.’
Erin’s gaze moves to the wardrobe as if she’s considering his offer, but then something seems to change her mind. Her attention returns to the Elastoplast stretched across his midriff. ‘These two disappearances,’ she says. ‘Angus Roth, and now Drew. Do you know anything about them, Joe?’
‘What could I possibly know that you don’t?’
‘I guess that’s what I’m asking. Because in the entire time we’ve been together, I’ve never seen you so – I don’t know – sodistractedas you’ve been these last few days. So skittish and erratic. You drove through a red light on the way to Enoch’s, nearly hit another car. When we were sitting around that table with him, you looked terrified. Same with Angus’s brother, earlier today.’
Joseph concentrates on his breathing. Slow in, slow out. ‘I’m not sure what you think I might know,’ he says. ‘As for my behaviour, Tilly’s best friend is missing. Of course I look scared.’
‘Is it something to do with Max?’
‘Max?’
‘I saw the way you were watching him. Not just at Enoch’s but earlier, before we left. I know we talked about this already but something’s not right with him, Joe. Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed.’
‘What are you saying?’ he asks quietly. ‘Because you need to think very carefully about where you’re going with this.’
Erin hugs her knees tighter. ‘I’m not accusing Max of anything. Obviously, I’m not.’