The Innocent Wife

by Amy Lloyd

  ‘Where are they?’ Dennis shouted, his face white, furious. ‘Where the fuck are they?’

  Thirty-eight

  Dennis squatted in front of Sam, resting his elbows on his thighs, trying to look her in the eye. ‘Where. The fuck. Are they?’ He stood up. ‘This is why you’ve been acting like this.’ He shook his head. ‘You were going to the cops, right?’

  Sam sniffed. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Where are they, Sam?’

  ‘I don’t have them any more.’ Her voice was high, weak. She felt old.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I sent them. Posted them. To Carrie … So if anything happens to me—’

  ‘You’re lying.’ But she could hear the uncertainty in his tone.

  ‘If anything happens to me, she’ll know it was you! Everyone will!’

  He looked at her for a few seconds. ‘They’re still here,’ he said. ‘Where’s your bag?’

  ‘It’s in the truck,’ Sam said. Dennis hesitated.

  ‘Don’t move,’ he said again before leaving her alone.

  Through the window, Sam saw him stop and say something to Lindsay before opening the door of her truck and leaning inside. She knew it was her time to move. If she didn’t go now, there might not be another chance. She crawled, knees bruising on the edge of the uneven wooden floor, through the kitchen and out of the back door. The debris that littered the area by the storm shelter cut and dug into her as she crawled, her palms stinging and her knees wet from the sodden ground.

  The gap in the chain-link fence at the back of the yard was a foot off the ground. She had to heave herself on to her leg and crouch down to get through. The welcome density of the trees was only a metre away. Once in the woods, she started to run, to the best of her ability, ignoring the pain in her ankle as she hopped and stumbled and fell again and again. She was running in the direction she hoped led to town. After a minute she allowed herself a glance back towards the house, which was obscured by the tangle of leaves and branches she fought through. It fuelled her, helped her feel invisible, and she moved faster.

  Behind her she heard Dennis call and a new flood of nerves drove her forward. She turned left to avoid a bush and left again when she came upon a pool of black water, impossible to know how deep. She was no longer sure what direction she was going in, or where she should be going. She heard her name, over and over again, ‘Sam-an-tha.’ She ran away from the voice, into thick mud and fallen trees that rotted and clouds of midges that she breathed into her nostrils and coughed out.

  Ahead of her, through the trees, she saw the white of his T-shirt. She realised she’d been running in a circle, and then the ground left her and she was sliding through mud, still soft from the rain. When she finally stopped sliding she looked up, realising she was in a hole, the entrance covered with fallen palm leaves. She pulled her feet to free them from the clutch of the soil, one shoe lost in the mud. Above she heard him still, walking right by her, past the hole.

  Flies landed on the back of her neck and she had to keep herself from gagging at the stench of rotting vegetation. She breathed through her mouth but it didn’t help.

  She reached back to get her shoe but as she lifted her foot to place it back on she felt something tangled around her toes. With her free hand she tried to rip it away. It felt, she thought, so much like hair. She followed it with her fingers and looked behind her. This time her scream emerged as naturally as a breath. She saw the glasses and the collar of a shirt, the open neck filling with mud, fingers like claws. Then she was crawling back out of the hole, digging her nails into the dirt to stop herself sliding back. It was Howard, bloated and turning a pale yellow. The muscle had rotted beneath the skin and his face sagged loose from his skull. His cheek started to twitch as if he were attempting to smirk. Insects, Sam realised with a new wave of sickness, insects eating him from the inside out.

  At first Dennis’s grip was welcome, as she allowed herself to be hauled back into the world. ‘What the fuck is it now?’ he asked her as Sam pulled her knees up to avoid the creeping sensation that Howard could reach out and drag her back to him.

  ‘You killed him,’ she cried, unable to meet his face. It was real then, all at once, and it no longer seemed worth running or fighting.

  Dennis looked towards the hole again. Warily, he moved back the fallen palms. ‘Howard?’ Sam heard him say, and then it was quiet. When he came back out he was pale, gentler. ‘We need to talk,’ he said.

  Thirty-nine

  Dennis carried her the way he had over the threshold. He pushed branches out of the way with his shoulders and tried not to let them hit her face; he even apologised when they did. At the house Lindsay stood waiting by the back door.

  ‘Shit, you OK, Dennis? I told you I could watch her,’ she said as they approached.

  ‘Get inside,’ Dennis said, pushing past her.

  In the living room, he dropped Sam on the sofa. ‘You just need to be still, you need to listen,’ he said. He picked up her handbag and tipped out the contents; he pulled out every pocket and pouch and threw the empty bag back on to the floor. ‘OK, Samantha, one more time: where are they?’ he asked.

  ‘What’s she done?’ Lindsay asked from the doorway.

  ‘And what did you do?’ he said, turning to face her.

  ‘What?’ Lindsay said, suddenly afraid.

  ‘Howard?’ Dennis’s voice cracked a little.

  ‘You don’t understand,’ Lindsay said. ‘He was saying that he was going to confess. Everything. I didn’t have a choice.’

  ‘When he’s getting like that, you come to me, you tell me,’ Dennis said.

  ‘I couldn’t risk it,’ she said. ‘I was on my way here and I saw him on the road and he was pacing, he was crazy. I convinced him to talk it out, but he wouldn’t stop. I told him if he’d walk with me a while he’d feel better but he took out his phone and he was going to do it this time, I could tell. Besides, you were ignoring my phone calls, you didn’t answer my texts.’

  ‘So you did this to, what, punish me? What did Howard ever do to you?’

  ‘Dennis, he was going to tell them everything,’ Lindsay said.

  ‘I could have talked him out of it. You didn’t need to kill him.’

  ‘Why do you care so much? He’s a total freak! He was—’

  ‘Fuck you, Linds.’ Dennis stepped towards her as though he might hit her, but he changed his mind. ‘Shit!’

  Sam realised Howard meant a lot to Dennis. More than anyone, perhaps. She hadn’t known he could care so much.

  ‘How am I supposed to tell him his kid’s dead?’

  ‘This is all on me,’ Lindsay said. She spoke eagerly, the words tumbling out fast. ‘I’ve thought about it real hard and I’m gonna tell them he came up to me on the road as I was leaving here and I pulled over thinking he needed a ride, but then he dragged me away into the woods and he tried to rape me and I defended myself.’

  ‘Defended yourself?’ Dennis said. ‘You nearly cut his head clean off.’

  ‘I don’t know! I’ll just say I was scared, that I didn’t know what I was doing, I just wanted to make sure he didn’t fucking rape me.’

  ‘We’re fucked,’ Dennis said, looking at no one. ‘Without Howard I … His dad has no reason to keep quiet any more. The second he finds out his son’s dead he’s going to show them the yard.’

  ‘Look, we can fix this,’ Lindsay said. She glanced at Sam. ‘Maybe we should talk somewhere else.’

  ‘Oh, it’s way past that. Sam just fell right in to your shallow grave. So now what? You kill her?’

  ‘If I have to, yeah.’ Lindsay shrugged, and Sam felt a lurch of pure terror. ‘Say we text Harries from her phone.’ She pointed to Sam. ‘We say, “Come here, I know what happened to Howard, be quick,” and he comes over, carrying his gun, obviously, because he’s ready to kill you by now, and she answers the door all like, “He’s out back but you need to be quick …” And when he gets out back I shoot him. OK, now, af
ter I shoot him we take the gun, we shoot her, plant it back on him and we tell them she killed Howard because he was, like, stalking her, then Harries shot her when she confessed and then I shot him in self-defence.’

  Dennis looked at her, still pale. ‘Why would Sam let him in and lead him outside if we’re just going to shoot her?’

  ‘Because I’ll fucking shoot her anyway if she doesn’t.’

  ‘You don’t need to shoot me, please,’ Sam said quickly, ‘I won’t tell anybody anything. I don’t even understand what this is about!’

  Dennis sighed and rubbed his tired eyes. ‘If Samantha’s dead … I just don’t think it’ll play out. I think we need her.’

  ‘But she’s going to tell the fucking cops as soon as she’s alone!’ Lindsay said.

  ‘Sam, did you really send the pictures to Carrie?’ Dennis asked.

  Sam nodded.

  ‘And what did you say? Did you say they were from you?’

  ‘Yes … I said I found them in your things and they were from me …’

  ‘Jesus.’

  ‘What pictures?’ Lindsay asked.

  ‘Doesn’t matter,’ Dennis snapped.

  ‘Don’t tell me you kept those fucking pictures!’ Lindsay shrieked. So she had known, Sam thought. Lindsay paced. ‘But if she’s dead you can control the story, right?’ Lindsay acted like Sam wasn’t even there.

  ‘I don’t … No, I don’t think I can,’ he said.

  ‘Fuck … Who’s Carrie? The film girl?’

  ‘Yeah. Why, you planning to shoot her too?’

  ‘Fuck you.’

  Dennis came over to Sam and put an arm around her shoulders. She flinched. ‘Samantha, I just wish you’d talked to me about this. You’ve made me look really, really bad. What if I told you they weren’t even mine? That I was just protecting Howard. That we had a deal.’

  ‘I believe you,’ Sam whispered. ‘Carrie will believe you.’

  ‘But it’s too late. If she gets those pictures, and you’ve already said they’re mine … She trusts you, Samantha.’

  ‘I can tell her I was wrong.’ Sam knew she was bargaining for her life. She took one of his hands in hers. ‘But if you let Lindsay kill me I can’t help. And I want to help.’

  ‘I know you do. But you really messed this up.’ He sighed. ‘You were different,’ he said. ‘When you wrote to me, you weren’t like the others. You were so sweet. So normal. You were ordinary, and I liked it. When you’re with me, it’s like, people think: He’s ordinary, too. And you stuck by me when everything was falling apart. So I could forgive it when you weren’t so normal any more; when you rooted through my things every time I left you alone. But now … I just don’t know where to go with this.’

  ‘Just let me go, Dennis. I’ll back up whatever you say. Please?’

  Dennis sighed again, left the room and returned with two of his father’s guns. Sam thought she might vomit.

  ‘Dennis, we can fix this. It doesn’t have to go any further.’ She tried to sound calm, rational.

  He handed a shotgun to Lindsay and kept a handgun for himself, tucking it into the back of his jeans. ‘I’m sorry. This isn’t how I wanted it to go.’

  ‘No! Please!’ Sam cried out.

  ‘You have Harries’s number?’ he asked Lindsay, collecting Sam’s phone from her scattered belongings. ‘It’s locked.’ He looked at her. ‘What’s the code?’

  Sam shook her head and began to cry. He sat next to her again, held her wrist, took her thumb and held it over the home button. The screen unlocked. ‘Get me his number,’ he said to Lindsay.

  ‘I don’t have it,’ Lindsay said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t know it. I thought you would.’

  Sam thought of the card from Officer Harries she’d put in her bag. It was face down among her things on the floor. She said nothing, waiting, hoping that the plan would fall apart.

  ‘Holy shit.’ He threw Sam’s phone down on to the sofa.

  ‘Dennis, we can get it. We can go to Howard and get his cell phone out of his pocket. He’s gonna have his own dad in his contacts, right?’

  ‘Fine,’ Dennis said. ‘I’ll go. Watch Sam for me.’ He looked at them both one more time before he left.

  ‘Please,’ Sam said when she felt Dennis was far enough away. ‘Let’s just call the police. Now, while he’s gone.’

  Lindsay laughed. ‘You don’t think he’s going to let you go, do you?’

  Sam felt rage swell inside her. ‘He’ll kill you.’

  ‘He won’t,’ Lindsay said. ‘Dennis needs me.’

  ‘But you killed Howard. I saw how angry he was. He won’t just let it go,’ Sam said. But the look in Lindsay’s eyes told her that her devotion to Dennis was worth any life, even her own. ‘And what if he doesn’t kill you?’ Sam continued, trying to make her see sense. ‘Even if you come out of this alive, what do you think will happen then? No one will believe your story, it’s crazy.’

  ‘Dennis has the best defence attorneys in the country,’ Lindsay said, though Sam didn’t think she sounded so sure.

  ‘He might decide you’re a risk, that you won’t stick to the story. Just think—’

  ‘You think you know him?’ Lindsay said, her eyes lighting up in anger. ‘You think I’m just some dumb bitch who doesn’t know what’s what but I know him. I know when you think you’re in control or you think you understand him that’s when you’re really fucked. The only way to understand him is to know you fucking can’t and be fine with it. You think you’re manipulating us right now? You don’t have a fucking clue. And he’s always relied on me. Always. So I wouldn’t get too cosy, bitch.’

  ‘You’re still afraid of him,’ Sam said, watching the gun against Lindsay’s shaking leg.

  Lindsay snorted. She took a cigarette from her pack and went to light it.

  ‘He won’t like it if you smoke in here,’ Sam said. Lindsay shrugged but the flame didn’t touch the end of the cigarette before it disappeared.

  ‘Get up,’ Lindsay said, grabbing her weapon. ‘Out.’ Sam led and Lindsay followed, the gun aimed at her back until she was sitting on the porch. Outside she asked Lindsay for a cigarette and they smoked together, looking into the trees around the yard. Nothing was the same as it had been.

  ‘I’m not pathetic,’ Lindsay said, blowing the smoke out of the side of her mouth.

  ‘What?’ Sam said.

  ‘I’m not pathetic. For caring about him.’

  ‘I didn’t think you were,’ Sam lied.

  ‘Yeah, you did. Fuck it. It’s not like I don’t know what people think. I know what he’s done, what he could do. But I also know who he is. Dennis, like, saved me in high school. Nobody cares about that. In school these guys … I was at a party and I got too drunk, I guess. It wasn’t rape. I don’t know.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t. Anyway, afterwards, everyone had something to say about it. Acting like I’m some slut who gets drunk and likes gang bangs. And Dennis and Howard were the only guys who still talked to me like I was normal. They told the other guys that if they ever touched me again they’d fucking kill them. It worked, too. They shut up about it; they wouldn’t even look at me. But the girls just kept on. So Dennis told me he could shut them up. He had this little smile on his face when he said it. Then they started disappearing.’ Lindsay paused and took another puff of her cigarette. Sam heard the crackle of the paper burning as she inhaled. ‘The first time … the first time I know it was an accident.’

  ‘What was?’

  ‘That bitch Donna. Dennis said they were gonna mess with her. There was this party and … Howard gave her those stupid fucking pills. It wasn’t supposed to hurt her. We were gonna spike her drink, take some embarrassing photos with Howie’s camera, copy them and pin them around the school.’ Sam flinched. ‘I know, OK? You don’t get it. She called me a whore; she told everyone I had AIDS. She never let up. We were kids! Anyway, she left the fucking party, just stormed out,
so we followed her in my car. She’s stumbling along. Dennis rolls down the back window and he asks her if she needs a ride. Of course she says yes – you know, it’s fucking Dennis. At first she was so out of it she didn’t even realise me and Howard were in the front.

  ‘Then she’s saying, “Why do you always hang out with these weirdos?” and Dennis is like, “They’re just giving us a ride.” She fell asleep on him. We all thought it was hilarious, you know? She doesn’t even wake up when I blow the horn.

  ‘So we go to Howard’s house, since his dad is working the night shift. Only when we lie her down and Howard is taking the pictures she starts making this noise … we know she’s puking so we put her on her side but it’s stuck in her throat. The guys aren’t doing anything – they’re useless; Howard’s just hitting her back like a retard. I stick my fingers in her fucking throat. I tried, I really tried, you know? But she stopped breathing. I was freaking out. Howard was freaking out. Dennis was the only one who could think straight. He told me to leave and they would take care of it, so I did. I didn’t know what else to do.’

  ‘What happened then?’ Sam asked.

  ‘They buried her. Dennis told me later. On the edge of the Harries’s yard. We’d all have been fucked, Sam. All of us. It was like Dennis said, they were Howard’s pills, it was my idea, and Dennis …’

  ‘She’s buried in the Harries’s yard?’ Sam said.

  ‘Howard was too scared to say no. He thought it would all be his fault.’ Lindsay stopped. ‘Afterwards, he wanted to confess. I told him … I said they’d know it was him, that he’d taken the pictures with his camera, they’d think he was a pervert. I told him they’d put him in the chair for it. Dennis told him, too.’