The Beach House (23 page)

Kim’s stomach turned over as Ami’s cries escalated
to an all out wail. She dashed downstairs where the noise was
coming from and into the kitchen. Mark was standing in the middle
of the floor. He had found another knife. For God’s sake, Kim
thought, why does this house have so
many
fucking knives?
Ami dangled loosely from Mark’s hand, his fingers gripping her
around the arm. She screamed constantly, the sound filling the
room, cutting into Kim’s head.

Jenni passed her, going straight for Mark,
her smaller knife extended.

“Put the baby down!”

Mark grinned. “Gonna make me,
sweetheart?”

“If I have to.”

Mark nodded. “Maybe I’d like that. Show me a
little emotion for once. Come on then.” He waved the knife at
her.

Mark’s eyes were locked on Jenni, on the
knife she held in front of her. It was such an obviously uneven
contest there could only be one victor, and both Jenni and Mark
knew it, but Kim realized Jenni didn’t care. She was ready and
willing to lay her life down for them. She advanced on Mark.

Ignored, Kim moved to one side and reached
out blindly on the worktop. Her hand closed around the handle of
the heavy skillet she had put out for pancakes. She pulled it
closer, added a second hand. The skillet was large, forged from
cast-iron and she needed both hands to lift it.

Mark let go of Ami, tossing her aside like
an empty beer can. She hit the floor and skidded, stopped when she
came up against the leg of the table. She lay on her side, face
crimson, her cries scorching the air.

Jenni advanced more quickly toward Mark.

“No!” Kim shouted, stopping Jenni in her
tracks.

Mark turned to her, suddenly aware a second
woman was in the room, the one he had dismissed as harmless. Kim
swung the skillet two handed, momentum building in her. It was too
heavy for her, but she found strength from somewhere and Mark
turned fully toward her, not believing what he saw. He started to
lift his hand holding the knife just as the skillet caught him
square between the eyes. The thwack of cast iron on bone for a
moment overwhelmed even Ami’s screams. There was a hush. Kim heard
the knife drop from Mark’s fingers and clatter on the floor. A
second later Mark’s body thumped dully on the wood. He lay still.
No blood flowed but a dark bruise spread instantly between his
eyes. Both women watched as his legs spasmed once and fell
still.

Kim realized she was standing completely
naked, the skillet still in her hand. She dropped it and went
across to Ami, picked her up and comforted her. Jenni knelt beside
Mark, placed her fingers against his neck. Kim watched as she moved
her fingers, searching for a pulse.

“Have I...” Kim failed to finish the
sentence.

“He’s dead,” Jenni said, confirming the
obvious.

“What am I... Oh my God, Jenni, what am I
going to do?”

Jenni sat back on her heels and looked at
Kim. “Nothing. You’re going to look after Kim and Joe. I’ll take
care of this.”

“Take care of what?” They both turned at
Joe’s strained voice. He swayed and leaned against the door and Kim
went to him, took his arm and led him to a chair. He sat heavily
and then stared at Mark’s body as though it was not registering on
him.

“I killed him,” Kim said matter of factly,
kneeling in front of her husband. Jenni came across and took Ami
from her, continued the comforting and slowly the infant stopped
screaming and subsided into hitching sobs.

Kim looked at the body, not really taking in
what had happened.

“You have to take this knife out of me,” Joe
said.

“We’ve got to take you to the hospital.”

Joe shook his head. “What about him?”

“I think the hospital’s too late for him,”
Kim said.

“We can’t go to the emergency room,” Jenni
said. “They’re going to want to know how Joe got a knife in his
chest, and then they’ll want to know everything, and they’ll find
out about Mark and...and…” She started crying and Ami, sensing her
pain, decided to join in.

“Ah, fuck it!” Joe said. He gripped the
black wooden handle of the knife and pulled hard. “Shit!” He
screamed, but the blade came free and the knife dropped from his
fingers. Fresh blood welled up and ran down his chest. A lot of
blood.

“Towels,” Jenni said, taking control, and
Kim ran to the sink and brought back drying cloths and hand towels.
She pressed hard against Joe’s wound, trying to stem the
outpouring.

Jenni placed Ami back on the floor, ignoring
her renewed cries, and went to the freezer. She cracked ice and
poured it into a plastic bag, brought it back and pressed it
against Joe, who groaned loudly. Blood now covered half his chest
and was running down over his belly. It dripped from his thighs to
the floor.

“I think I’ve ruined these speedos,” he
said, in a perfectly rational voice.

“How much blood is that?” Kim asked, her
eyes wide as she took in the widening pool.

“Not enough to kill him. Not yet,” Jenni
said. She lifted the towels from Joe and peered beneath. “Get more,
Kim.”

Kim went to the laundry room and brought
back the big white towels Jenni had fetched that morning, still
wrapped in plastic. She split them and ran water over each towel in
the sink, took them back and Jenni tossed the soaked ones aside and
pressed the new towels against Joe’s wound. As Jenni revealed the
gash, Kim watched in horror as fresh blood gathered and ran
out.

“It’s okay. I think it’s stopping,” Jenni
said. “What about you?”

Kim glanced down at herself, aware for the
first time that blood streaked her belly from the cut beneath her
breast. The wound had stopped bleeding, the blood drying.

“I’m fine. But we’ve got to take Joe to the
ER.”

“Not yet. Give it five minutes. If he’s no
better we’ll take him, but remember, Kim, it was me hit Mark, not
you.”

Kim shook her head. “No. I hit him.” Her
mind was confused, but she recalled that clearly.

“You didn’t. Did you see her hit him,
Joe?”

“I didn’t see anything,” Joe said.

“You did. You saw
me
hit Mark with
the skillet,” Jenni said firmly.

“Fuck, it hurts,” Joe said.

“Good,” Jenni said. “That means you’re
alive.”

“Ha ha ha,” Joe said, slowly and
deliberately.

Jenni pulled the towel away from his
shoulder. Kim felt relief flood her. The bleeding was definitely
slowing, the towel not completely soaked like the first had been.
Jenni leaned forward to examine the wound, watching fresh blood
well up and run down Joe’s chest. She nodded as though
satisfied.

“He’s still bleeding,” Kim said. “I’m
calling an ambulance.”

“No!” Both Jenni and Joe spoke together.
Jenni said. “Have you got a first aid kit?”

“First aid kit?” Kim said, not sure a first
aid kit was enough for this. “We brought Ami with us. Fuck, Jen, we
got enough medical supplies to service a small war.” She turned
away and came back after a minute with a large plastic box.

Jenni rummaged through the contents, pulled
out gauze and padding and wide strips of plaster. She lifted the
towel from Joe again.

“Okay, this is going to hurt some,” she
said.

Joe nodded. “Just be quick.”

“You know me so well already,” Jenni
joked.

Joe shook his head. “Bad timing, honey.”

“Okay. Sorry.” She wiped as much of the
dried blood as possible from around the wound, pressed a gauze
bandage against his shoulder then wrapped more bandage under his
arm and back around his shoulder. She tore strips from the roll of
plaster and stuck it all down.

“Try and stand,” she said. “Lean on me and
see if you can stand up.”

Joe put his arm on her shoulder and let her
take most of the weight as he stood.

“Dizzy?” Jenni asked.

“Some.”

“Gonna pass out?”

Joe shook his head. “Don’t think so.”

“Good. Sit down again.”

Joe did as he was told and Jenni pulled a
chair across. She sat and leaned her elbows on her knees, stared
down at the dead body of her husband. Watching her Kim thought
perhaps that ought to be ex-husband and giggled, some part of her
knowing she was hysterical but unable to stop herself. She needed
to be busy. She opened the first aid box and found Tylenol, shook
two out and made Joe swallow them.

“I want you to help me,” Jenni said to
her.

Kim nodded.

“Kim and I are going out for a while, Joe,”
Jenni said, speaking clearly. “When we come back we’re going to
clean that wound and check you out, and if I think you need the ER
we’ll take you.”

“We can’t leave him,” Kim said. “And where
are we going?”

Jenni nodded toward Mark, lying exactly
where he had dropped. “His pickup’s going to be around here
someplace. I’m going out and find it and bring it down. Take Joe
through to the back bedroom and sit him up. Don’t let him lie down.
Put plenty of pillows behind him.”

Kim felt dizzy, Jenni pushing her too hard,
but she had no option but to follow instructions.

“You might want to put some clothes on,
too.”

Kim smiled. “You weren’t complaining
earlier.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, get a room you two,”
Joe said.

***

Jenni found Mark’s pickup on the hill above the
beach, drove down and parked as close to the house as possible.
When she went inside Joe was sitting up on the single bed in the
small downstairs bedroom. Kim had removed his trunks and he lay
naked on top of the covers, Ami cuddled against his uninjured side,
dropping off to sleep again, all the excitement too much for
her.

“Don’t get any ideas,” he said, as Jenni
came in.

“Damn. Kim, come help me get Mark into the
pickup.”

Between them they dragged Mark outside and
somehow managed to push him into the passenger seat. Jenni climbed
behind the wheel and pulled the door shut, noticing how much
smoother Mark’s pickup was than hers.

“I’m going to try and make this look like an
accident,” she said through the open window. Kim leaned against the
door, her head almost level with Jenni’s

“How will you get back?”

“I won’t. I’ll go home. I’m going to call
the cops in the morning and say he didn’t come home. They won’t
take me seriously, because he’s always not coming home and they
know all about Mark, but it’ll cover us.”

Jenni started the engine but Kim stayed at
the window.

“I’ve gotta go,” Jenni said.

“What about afterwards?” Kim asked.

“What about it?”

“You don’t need to stay here anymore, you
know.”

Jenni looked at her. “I know.”

Kim leaned in through the window and kissed
her. “See you soon.”

Jenni nodded and drove in a big circle
across the beach and then bounced up the rough track.

***

Kim checked on Joe. He was sitting up in bed, his
head back against a pile of pillows, eyelids starting to droop. Ami
lay against his side, a trail of drool running from her mouth along
his belly. Kim smiled and lifted her, took her upstairs to her cot.
She stood for a long while watching her perfect daughter sleep, and
a mix of fear and longing washing through her. She shook herself
and went downstairs to start cleaning up. There was a lot of blood
on the floor.

***

Jenni drove slowly through town, but it was after
six Saturday evening and most of the shops closed early out of
season. The restaurants and bars hadn’t opened yet or were quiet.
She passed through town and headed up Lighthouse Road. After a mile
it degenerated into a rough track climbing through short grass
where sheep grazed. The track ran another two miles along the long
spine of the island and then split in two. The right fork would
take her down and across to the structure the road was named after.
The left hand track petered out after a quarter mile at a rough
pull in where kids came to make out and the occasional fisherman
parked before climbing down over rocks to the deep water that ran
fast here between the island and the mainland. There were no other
cars and Jenni pulled up, left the motor running. Outside the
daylight was almost gone, which suited her just fine.

Jenni stepped out and walked around to the
passenger side, pushed Mark’s body across the seat. It took her ten
minutes of straining, pushing, pulling and tugging before she had
him sitting behind the wheel. She ducked in and placed his foot on
the gas pedal. She didn’t suppose it was going to make much
difference one way or the other, but she wanted to leave nothing to
chance.

Beyond the pull in grass started, running
downslope to a sudden drop off where the cliffs fell away. There
were two hundred yards of grass. Jenni hoped it was enough.

She turned on the headlights, she was going
to have to risk that much. It would have been easier if the pickup
was automatic. She sat in the passenger side and released the
brake. The pickup started to roll slowly forward. There was a low
ridge around the edge of the pull in which would stop progress if
she let it, so as soon as the truck was moving Jenni pulled the
gear stick into second. It fought back, grinding because no-one was
depressing the clutch, but finally the gear crashed home and she
felt their speed increase. The front wheels hit the edge of the
pull in and the steering wheel rocked, came back straight. Now they
were running over short grass directly toward the cliff. Jenni
glanced at Mark to make sure he was still in position and a scream
rose in her throat. His eyes were open and he was staring back at
her.

“Where are we going, sweetheart?” he asked,
his voice completely rational. “I must have tied a good one on, I
don’t even know where we are.”

Jenni froze in the passenger seat. He was
supposed to be dead. She had checked, he
was
dead.