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I eased her away from me so that I could look into her eyes. For the first time, I began to see what she was talking about. She looked tired. Living in her car, travelling around the country, almost drowning, staying up late with me – it’s only natural she was feeling overwhelmed. She needed TLC, and lots of it. And I was going to give it to her, in spades.

“Ever since the day I met you, everything’s been different,” I said, unable to keep it inside any longer. “I’ve been treading water for so long, it felt normal. Now you’re here, and I feel like you saved me. I can breathe again. I can look forward, into the future, because I was too scared to do that before. We make sense, somehow. I don’t know how, but we do.”

I saw the light return to her eyes, to her face. “You saved me, too.”

My heart was a balloon, filled with all the love I had for her, the hope I had for us, and it was lifting my feet off the ground.

“I just want you, here, with me, and happy. And I’ll do whatever I can to make that happen.”

Her body relaxed beneath my hands, and I smiled. I smiled because I couldn’t help it. I smiled because she filled me with joy. I smiled because I loved her.

She smiled back, which was all the sign I needed. I leaned down and kissed her, softly, carefully. She tasted of salty whisky and I was suddenly hungry for more of it. As the kiss deepened, my phone trilled loudly. I groaned, pulling away from her.

“Bloody hell,” I fished it out of my pocket. “Talk about shitty timing.”

Bridget’s name stared at me from the screen. Now what? I glanced at my watch. It was a little after nine. It wasn’t like Bridget to phone this late unless it was urgent.

“It’s Bridget,” I said. “I should probably get this.”

Maia nodded, stepping away to give me some privacy as I swiped the screen.

“Hey,” I said. “What’s up?”

“I need you to come over, love – right now.”

Alarm bells went off inside my head. She sounded frightened, and there was yelling in the background.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s Alex. He’s lost it. I’ve taken his car keys, but he won’t listen to me anymore – I’m scared of what he might do.”

“I’ll be right over, okay? Just stay there. I’m on my way.”

I tucked my phone back into my pocket, my heart racing. Not again. His timing was immaculate, as usual.

“What is it?”

“I’ve gotta go. Some kind of drama at her place.”

Maia wiped her eyes. “I’m coming with you.”

Bridget, Alex and I had been here before, and I wanted her as far away from Alex as possible.

I took her by the shoulders and kissed her, on the forehead this time. “It’s okay, I can handle it. I’d rather you stayed here and tried to get some rest.”

She drew herself upright. “I’m fine. I want to come, I want to make sure Bridget’s alright.”

She was stronger than she looked and twice as determined. I had the feeling that arguing with her now would be pointless.

I DON’T KNOW WHAT
made me more anxious. Bridget’s phone call or the fact that Maia was coming with me.

She would not be dissuaded, no matter what I said. It both frustrated and impressed me. She may look fragile, but she had a will of iron. I wrote that down on the mental, if short, list of things I knew about her.

“I’ve never met Alex,” she said, staring out the window at the twinkling streetlights reflected in the water as we crossed the bridge into town.

She may not have met him, but he clearly knew all about her, if his drunken tirade at the pub was any indication. This had the potential to get very, very ugly. As with any situation involving Alex, it was almost a foregone conclusion.

“Are they close?”

That was a loaded question. Yes. And no, not anymore, a fact that I knew was breaking Bridget’s heart. Alex was pushing her away, along with everyone else. When Em disappeared, Alex changed. He became obsessed with every little detail of her case. He was desperate, volunteering for every search, every march. He was everywhere, plastering photos up in shop windows, on websites, walking the streets. He second-guessed the cops’ every move. He was prone to wild accusations – that they weren’t doing their job properly, that they’d missed things – even that they’d been hiding things from us.

But as time marched on and no answers were forthcoming, he slipped into a deep rage. And, along with the police, I was the focus of that rage. He targeted me relentlessly, to the point where I wouldn’t answer the door anymore and withdrew from the outside world for fear of running into him. It took Vinnie threatening him with legal action to get him to back off a bit. He went about tearing apart everything around him, every relationship he had, including the formerly close bond he had with both Bridget and Henry.

“They used to be, before he started drinking.” I rolled my shoulders, keeping my eyes on the road. I wanted to shield her from as much of this shit as possible. “He’s a bit of a handful. He’s older than Em, we were in the same class together at school. We used to be friends, once upon a time.”

She was quiet for a few moments, and I hoped that would be the end of it. I was wrong.

“I saw him hit you, at the beach that morning.”

My heart felt like it weighed a tonne. I had hoped she’d forgotten about that. I was sure as hell trying to.

“Yeah, well. Let’s just say we’re not close anymore. These days, he drinks too much and makes a pain in the ass of himself.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. He’s so bloody angry all the time. I stay out of his way as much as possible. Like I said, he’s a pain in the ass when he’s drunk, and lately he’s almost permanently drunk. Stupid bastard. One of these days I’m just going to clock him and be done with it. I’m sick of all the bloody accusations.”

“What accusations?”

I kept my eyes on the road. “He blames me, for what happened to Em.”

“What? Why?”

Because I was the last one to see her alive. Because I didn’t care enough to do anything at the time. Because I didn’t deserve her. Take your pick.

“It’s… complicated,” I said instead.

We fell into an uneasy silence. I didn’t like hiding this from her, but it wasn’t something I was proud of. We were still finding our feet. I didn’t want her to think badly of me. I didn’t want her to look at me that way. I didn’t want to lose her.

“What do you think’s going on?” she asked a few minutes later, as we drove through town.

“I have no idea, but I could hear him shouting in the background. Might have to call the cops again if he gets out of hand.”

“Again? Does this happen a lot?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her looking at me. “Now and again.”

We pulled up outside Bridget’s place a few minutes later.

“Is this it?” Maia asked, leaning forward to get a better look. “Wow. This isn’t at all what I expected.”

I followed her gaze, trying to see it through her eyes. It was difficult, taking that step backwards. Bridget’s place was like my second home.

“It’s beautiful,” she said. “I really thought her house would be a riot of colour – something like the café, all rustic and arty. I didn’t see her as the white picket fence type at all.”

She was right, I suppose. It didn’t really fit with Bridget’s hippy persona, but it was still her. The white weatherboard villa was pure elegance, even down to the white picket fence and the white standard miniature roses lining the driveway. In the dark like this, the villa had a type of quiet grandeur, with its bay windows and grey corrugated iron roof. I had helped her plant the gardens that framed the house myself, mostly in old roses. Bridget loved roses.

“Are you sure you want to come in?” I asked, unclipping my seat-belt. “You don’t have to. You can stay here if you want. In fact, it might be better if you do.”

“I want to come in,” she said firmly, reaching for my hand and enclosing it in hers. “I’ll be okay. Maybe it’ll help if I’m there? He doesn’t know me.”

She didn’t know Alex like I did. Like we did, Bridget and I. He’d been in a bad enough state in the pub earlier. God only knew what he’d be like now, a couple of hours later. I’d assumed he’d gone back to his place to lick his wounds, but apparently I’d been wrong.

I squeezed her hand. If she was as stressed as it seemed, whatever was inside this house wasn’t going to help her relax any. In fact, just the opposite might be true.

“Look, I don’t know what’s going on in there, but when Alex gets like this, he can be completely unpredictable. I saw him at the pub earlier, and he was pissed then. Just try to stay behind me and away from him, okay?”

She nodded and I released her hand as we both got out of the car. We walked up the driveway, towards the house.

“Is that his car?” she asked, indicating the clapped-out red CRV parked haphazardly at the end of the drive.

“Yeah, that’s his alright. Look at it – looks like he abandoned it there. Jesus, I can’t believe he drove. I should’ve called the cops on him from the pub – if I’d known he was driving, I bloody would’ve. He’s gonna kill someone one of these days.”

A crash rang out from inside the house, followed by a lot of shouting. One-sided. Male. Alex. Where the hell was Bridget?

We hurried to the front door, and I knocked loudly, calling for Bridget. The door didn’t open but my cellphone chirped with an incoming text and I dug it out of my pocket.

“What the hell’s going on here?” I mumbled, shoving it back in my pocket a second later. “That was Bridget – she said the back door’s unlocked.”

“She texted you? Why doesn’t she just open the front door?”

“I have no idea,” I said, as we made our way around to the back of the house.

Sure enough, the door was unlocked, and we let ourselves into the now quiet house. The silence was worse. We stood at the door, and I looked down the hall towards the kitchen at the back of the house. There were remnants of a broken vase or bowl or something on the floor in the hallway. I could hear someone moving around in the kitchen, and what sounded like mumbling, with the odd expletive thrown in. Alex, by the sound of it. I motioned to Maia to stay behind me. I had no idea what was going on here but all was obviously not well.

“Heath!”

We turned to find Bridget peering out at us from behind the bathroom door. I went to her immediately.

“Jesus – what’s going on?” I hissed, trying to keep my voice down. “Are you okay?”

She nodded, but it looked like she’d been crying.

“Let me in,” I said, trying to push the door open.

“No, love, I… “

I ignored her, pushing the door open a crack wider. As soon as I saw the ugly red mark on her cheekbone, my blood pressure sky-rocketed.

Bridget was almost apologetic. “I’m sorry, I didn’t want you to –”

“
You’re
sorry? What the fuck happened?” I hissed, pushing the door open wider still and carefully tilting her face into the light to get a better look.

It looked painful. And recent.

“I wouldn’t give him his keys,” she said, trying to smile but looking more like she wanted to cry. “I didn’t want him to drive, not like this.”

“So he
hit
you?”

“No, he
pushed
me – I fell and hit my head on the table.”

Yeah, I bet he did. Gutless bastard. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you anywhere else?”

“No, no, I’m fine – really. I just fell, and… he didn’t do it on purpose.”

I stood there, silently debating which of his bones to break first. He had crossed a line now, a line that should never be crossed. It looked like his luck had run out. I was just in the right frame of mind now to knock him straight into next week.

“What’s he on?” I demanded. “Is he drunk or is it something else?”

“I don’t know. I think he’s just drunk. He’s not thinking straight – he started smashing up the place because I took his keys and hid them from him. I thought it best to get out of his way. I thought he’d calm down if I left him alone,” she said miserably. “I thought maybe he’d just lie down on the couch and sleep it off.”

She looked on the verge of tears and Maia drew her gently into her arms. “It’s okay. We’ll figure something out.”

Then Maia looked to me, as if for guidance. I wanted to tell her to take Bridget back to my place while I smashed the living shit out of Alex. I wanted to tell her that no one should have to put up with this, least of all his own mother. I wanted to tell her that Alex had gone too far, that this was beyond forgiveness.

But I knew that I wasn’t the one he would be asking for forgiveness from. And Bridget would forgive him, just like she’d forgiven him for everything else he’d done. Tonight, he would rant and rave and spew his poison over all of us. And tomorrow, he would wake up none the wiser. It was Bridget who would have to go to work tomorrow sporting a bruise. His own mother, who was suffering from the same grief he was – now doubled, thanks to him.

What happened to honouring Emily’s memory? What would she have done? Would she have looked at me like Maia was right at that moment?

I swallowed down the revulsion I felt towards him for putting me in this situation.

“Stay here. Leave him to me,” I said tightly, turning and heading back down the hallway.