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Joseph feels strangely calm. Almost a disinterested observer. He finds himself studying the various items of medical equipment. He’s never been that interested in how things work, but now he tries to guess the purpose of each machine and the components he might find inside them. He examines the bags of liquid, the beeping displays, all this high-tech wizardry brought here for the purpose of ensuring that Claire Carver’s body – for a while longer, at least – remains a living tomb.
She looks like she’s just sleeping.
Somewhere beyond the hospital grounds, police are hunting the burglar who attacked her before fleeing; but they’ll never find him. Claire’s killer won’t serve a single day in prison.
If Joseph had listened to her in the bedroom, if he’d gonedownstairs instead of back to sleep, if his antennae for danger hadn’t been so poorly developed, her body wouldn’t be lying in this bed, the rest of her gone to a place he cannot follow.
Except …except… the vital signs monitor now registers a change in his wife’s state. He hears a beeping different to that which has so marked his vigil. Onscreen, the numbers change, showing a spike in heart-rate, blood pressure, oxygen saturation and respiration.
Claire’s eye opens. Her pupil contracts, then dilates. Her mouth, forced open by a tracheal tube, begins to move. And Joseph hears her voice, not in his ears but inside his head:Protect our son, Joe. Whatever it takes.
He staggers, feels his balance going, and then he’s not in the hospital at all. He’s on one knee in the upstairs hall of this house he bought with Erin, trying to work out what just happened.
In the hospital that day, Claire hadn’t spoken, hadn’t opened her eyes and looked at him, because despite the steady rise and fall of her chest, and the regular ping of the machines, she’d already departed.
Protect our son, Joe. Whatever it takes.
His eyes are burning. His throat, too. He stares at the puddle of what can only be Tilly’s blood and pulls himself up. What he’s about to do is inexcusable, indefensible. And he’s going to do it all the same.
Limping to the bathroom, he tears two fistfuls of toilet paper from the roll. Back in the hall, ignoring the pain of his injuries, he mops up Tilly’s blood as best he can. It’s a messy job; most of it has congealed, leaving grim, jellylike trails on the wooden boards. Once it’s done, he collects the tiny pieces of broken plaster.
Downstairs, he hears Erin open the fridge and close it. A kitchen cupboard bangs. Joseph flushes away theblood-soaked toilet paper, returns to the hall. Then, lifting the runner rug, he drags it towards him until it covers what’s left of the stain.
In the ensuite, he scrubs his hands with soap and water. He tries not to think about what he’s just done. Better to focus on each new task exclusively and prevent his mind from wandering.
Joseph retrieves the landline handset, removes the batteries and hides it under his pillow. Then he leaves his bedroom for Tilly’s. On her desk he sees a stack ofMISSINGflyers, freshly printed.
There’s no evidence of violence in here, no clues to aid Joseph’s understanding of what might have happened. Did his stepdaughter hear an intruder and decide to investigate? Did Max, waiting in the hall, call out to her?
Protect our son, Joe. Whatever it takes.
Joseph leaves Tilly’s room and pauses on the landing. He needs to find Max, but he can’t leave Erin. He needs to locate Tilly, and tell Erin what has happened, but he can’t let Erin call the police. He needs to find the Honda, find Drew.
If Tilly has a head injury, she could be bleeding out. Erin might be about to lose her daughter without even knowing it. The thought of that turns his insides into daggers, makes him soul-sick. And yet if says anything he’ll lose his son.
Joseph calls his stepdaughter’s number, hears it divert to voicemail. Putting away his phone, he grips the handrail and begins to descend the stairs.
Hard to understand any of this. Impossible, really. How did his wife’s affair lead to the deaths of two people, maybe even three? In less than a month, Max is due to start medical school, the culmination of what feels like a lifetime of preparation. He’d wanted to be a doctor from an early age; the lost photo on his grandmother’s dresser is testament to that. The boy’s room is a trove of medical texts and equipment,from stethoscopes and blood pressure sleeves to the foam hearts and brains bought for him by Claire to encourage his interest.
But it was the burglary, and Claire’s death, that turned Max’s passion into an obsession. Rather than grieve, he took solace in his studies. It’s what makes the events of this past week so difficult to process, the boy who dedicated himself to saving lives taking them instead – and all to protect a father who didn’t deserve protection, who should have opened his eyes and seen what was happening around him.
All of this, Joseph’s fault. All of it.
At the bottom of the stairs he turns towards the kitchen. Erin is sitting at the breakfast bar, elbows on the worktop. She stares at him, cat-like, over the lip of her coffee cup.
He has to tell her.
Now.
He has to tell her.
As he limps into the kitchen their eyes meet. And then a bass thumping starts behind him. The floor shivers beneath his feet.
Erin slides off the stool and comes around the island. Joseph’s breath is in his throat. He twists his head towards the door, sees it reverberating in its frame, sees shadows moving beyond the dimpled glass.
And suddenly he can’t breathe at all.
Did Erin manage to call the police despite his precautions? Maybe she has a phone he doesn’t know about – one she’d bought solely for contacting Angus.