“I’m going to put an end to this once and for all.”
“You can’t stop him. You’ll just get hurt, and I don’t want that to happen. No matter what you’ve done, you’re still my dad.”
Robert’s eyes softened a shade. An edge of tenderness came into his voice. “He can’t hurt me anymore than he’s done already.”
“What about…” Julian glanced at the house, finishing the question with his eyes.
Robert exhaled a weary, fatalistic breath. “That’s up to you. I’ve put everything I have on the table. There’s nothing left for me to say, except, well, except I’m sorry. Sorry for all of it. Goodbye, son.”
Chapter 23
Julian watched until his dad’s car was out of sight, before heading towards the house. His step faltered at the front door. His mind felt overloaded, ready to burst. The past, present and possible future paraded relentlessly through it, melting into one another like colours on a prism. He saw his dad on top of Deborah Bradshaw, Mia as she’d looked the last time he saw her, Jake dead with a hypodermic needle in his arm, Joanne Butcher’s bloated corpse, himself on top of Eleanor in the barn. Finally, he saw his mum in hospital hooked up to all sorts of IVs, tubes and machines. You’ve got to hold it together for her, he told himself sharply, she’s going to need you now more than ever.
Julian opened the door. “Where’s my mum?” he asked Wanda, who was dusting in the lounge.
“She’s sleeping. She was up late celebrating the good news.” As Julian started towards his mum’s bedroom, Wanda added, “You’re not going to wake her, are you?”
“I have to talk to her.”
“Can’t it wait?”
Julian shook his head. Without knowing it, his mum had already waited fifteen years to hear what he had to tell her. Every extra second was a second too long. Wasn’t it? Well, wasn’t it? Of course it fucking was! But even with this thought ringing in his mind, his feet dragged into the hallway like he was wading through deep mud.
“Oh, I almost forgot,” Wanda said. “Mike Hill phoned.”
Julian turned quickly to her. “When?”
“Several times yesterday and again this morning.”
“Did he say why?”
“No. He just said he wants you to contact him as soon as possible. He mentioned something about Eleanor. I think-”
Before Wanda could finish, Julian had his phone out and was punching in Mike Hill’s number. Mike picked up on the first ring, as if he’d been waiting by the phone. “Is Eleanor okay?” asked Julian.
“That’s what I wanted to ask you. I haven’t seen or spoken to her since she left the house with you the other day.”
Mike’s words drove all thoughts other than thoughts of Eleanor from Julian’s mind. A vision flashed before his eyes of him on top of her, not in the barn, but on the bed at Mr X’s house. Her face was bruised and bloodied, her clothes and throat torn as if by some wild animal. The image staggered him like a punch to the gut. The sound of his breathing filled the line as he tried to work out whether it was the product of memory or imagination.
“I assume from your silence that she’s not with you,” continued Mike.
“No,” Julian answered, the word barely audible.
“I also assume you don’t know where she is?”
Julian shook his head. “He wouldn’t do that.” He wasn’t talking to Mike anymore. He was talking to the inner voice that told him Eleanor hadn’t returned home because Mr X had abducted her.
“Who wouldn’t do what?”
“She’s not some bad girl who might overdose or runaway. He wouldn’t dare go near her.”
“What the hell are you on about?” Mike demanded, his voice swaying between confusion, anger and anxiety. “What’s going on? Julian. Julian…”
Julian didn’t answer because he was running for his car. As he screeched away from the house, he kept repeating to himself in a low, quivering voice, “He wouldn’t dare. He wouldn’t dare.” He drove with one hand on the wheel, the other holding his phone to his ear as it called Eleanor’s mobile. It went through to the answering service. He tried again, and still she didn’t answer. His chant grew louder and faster. “He wouldn’t dare…”
At the end of the road, he didn’t turn for the forest. He turned for the town-centre. Jumping red lights, overtaking wildly, narrowly avoiding oncoming rush-hour traffic, he soon came to the antiques shop. He sprang out of the car, sprinted into the shop and grabbed the mantrap.
“Hey!” shouted the shopkeeper, catching hold of his arm.
Julian elbowed him away and returned to his car. He flung the mantrap onto the backseat and sped back the way he’d come. The driver-side mirror clipped another car and was sheared off. Horns blared. He barely noticed. “He wouldn’t dare…”
The suburbs were behind Julian now, trees passed in a blur. He took the turn for The Old Forest Road so fast that he almost skidded out of control. The speed of the car was nothing, though, compared to the speed with which the image of Eleanor bloodied and torn turned over in his mind. Over and over, looping to feed his doubt, his fear, his rage. “He wouldn’t dare…”
He hit the gravel road without slowing. Stones kicked up, cracking the windscreen. His body was bounced around by the bone-jarring impact of potholes. “He wouldn’t dare…” The car ground up the slope, barrelling around the final corner. The gate came into view. Still he hurtled onwards, arms braced as straight as ramrods, every muscle tensed. “He wouldn’t fucking dare!”
There was a screech of rending metal and breaking glass as the car slammed into the gate. The air bag blew out, hitting Julian in the face. He sat dazed for a moment, trying to catch his breath, before clambering out of the car. The front wheels were off the ground, resting on the gate, which had buckled, collapsing a section of the fence. The sound of barking reached him from somewhere near the house, faint, but getting louder. He quickly retrieved the mantrap and pulled its teeth apart. He tore the bandage off his ankle and carefully placed it on the pressure pad. Then he got back into the car and ducked down. After a minute or so the dog appeared. The instant it put its nose to the bandage, the steel jaws snapped together, biting into its flanks. The dog jumped about five feet into the air, letting out a high pitched yelp. It staggered around briefly before collapsing. Julian took out his knife and warily approached it. It was obvious at once that it was fatally wounded. Its muzzle was flecked with froth and its breathing was laboured. Blood oozed out from around the steel teeth buried in its flesh. It rolled its eyes at Julian as if begging to be put out of its misery. There was no time for hesitation. He stabbed it several times, shuddering as the blade grated between its ribs. When he was sure it was dead, grimacing with each footfall, he ran towards the house.
Julian wasn’t surprised to see his dad’s car beside the Merc, but even so his heart constricted with anxiety. There was a metal bin with smoke rising from it outside the house. He slowed to an abrupt stop. A deep blackness seemed to emanate from the house’s windows. He felt it almost like a physical force holding him back. Sweat wormed its way down his face as, step by faltering step, like a child learning to walk, he pushed through the invisible barrier. Glancing in the bin, he saw the burning remnants of some white sheets — most likely, the blood- stained sheets, although it was impossible to tell for sure. The knife held in front of him, he reached for the front door. It wasn’t locked. He half expected to find himself faced by the chauffeur — his arrival could hardly have gone unnoticed — but the hallway was empty.
There was a door to the right and left of the stairs. Moving quickly now, Julian opened the right-hand door. It led into a living-room — sofa, armchairs, television, coffee-table, deep-pile rug. Everything as you might expect from a living-room, except the furniture looked new and unused, giving it a curiously sterile, unlived in feel, like a shop window display. The door to the left led to a dining-room — six chairs around a dining-table set as if for an elaborate meal. A fine sheen of dust lay over the table, plates and cutlery. Julian would hardly have been surprised to see mannequins occupying the chairs in poses of eating, drinking and talking. “All of it a fucking lie,” he muttered.
Suddenly, the muffled sound of voices yelling came from upstairs. For maybe ten seconds, Julian stood tense
