Housebroken (12 page)

But his father’s cry broke his concentration. He heard the back door of the kitchen slam, and the walls of his room shuddered with the vibrations from below. He scrambled to his feet, picking up the headboard he had been cuffed to last night.

In his closet, he zipped open a camping backpack, grabbing the handheld camcorder he kept hidden beneath the other junk. Boy Scouts served some purpose. He regretted not having the time to fast-forward past where the video was paused—Jenna, in one of her better performances, trying on shirt after shirt. There was something about the act of a woman removing her shirt that appealed to Adam so much more than just seeing her topless.

He flipped the camera on, changing the mode to record. The headboard dragged across the carpet, hitting into boxes behind him. He had to catch whatever was happening outside on film.

At the window, he angled the camera and zoomed in. His breath caught. Was he really seeing what he thought he was?

An uncontrolled shiver ran through his body like a premature orgasm. He no longer regretted losing the other footage—this would be something he’d be able to watch over and over and over and over.

Blake threw the patio door open in a full sprint toward the pool. The peaceful oasis of their backyard had become a horror so unspeakable it couldn’t be real.

Jenna hung over the pool, strung up and tethered to the volleyball net, her body directly over the fire pit. A fire pit whose flames were dancing. Her arms were separated, tied or cuffed to the top of the net, her legs kicking wildly, swinging over the open flames as if she were running in midair.

She went for a run
.

Might be her last.

Blake was going to kill Drew.

He leapt into the pool, not giving his suit pants and silk shirt a second thought, and swam the few feet to the island. The key for the gas to the pit had been removed.

Without thinking, Blake climbed from the pool, standing on the ring around the pit. The heat of the flames pressed against him like a physical presence. That’s when he noticed Conrad. Or what was left of her.

The beautiful Lab he had so recently scolded was literally burning alive, staked to the fire pit. The flames licking Jenna’s legs sprang off of Conrad’s back. Her hair was gone, her face melting like a snowman, eyes oozing, snout running, and yet Blake could still see the fast thump of her struggling heart.

A thousand competing thoughts screamed through Blake’s brain, not one carrying a solution. His hands rose to his mouth of their own accord. He could hear Conrad whining, the slow leak of a tire, barely more than a whisper.

“I’m so sorry,” Jenna said, tears rolling down her face. Blisters floated up her feet and calves. The intensity of the heat was already beginning to dry Blake’s sopping suit. He couldn’t think, he just had to act.

He leapt over the dying dog, on top of Jenna, gripping the top of the net and bearing his whole weight down on it, on her. The net shifted, bending forward and backward at once. Blake lost his balance, almost went head over and back into the pool, but Jenna brought up her legs, wrapping them around him and pulling him close. He could feel the heat emanating from them, singeing his back. She cried out but held firm. The combined weight had the effect Blake had hoped for, the net tearing at one end and then plunging them into the water.

Blake was tangled, caught in the netting and limbs of his wife—she kicked out and connected with his groin. Air left in a flurry of bubbles, and for the second time in less than twenty-four hours, he was drowning, only this time he was actually beneath water. Jenna’s face was suddenly next to his, pulling him up by his shirt. Blake kicked, and the surface moved toward him.

“Hunnnhhh!” Blake gasped for air, the net still wrapped around his legs and torso. He glanced about frantically for his wife. Her head surfaced and then sank back beneath the water. Blake pulled her up, then swam to the edge of the pool, holding her tight.

“Shhh, I’ve got you,” he said. He thrust her toward the side, and she grabbed on, the net still attached to her reddened wrists. She was bleeding out, the gashes in her wrists wrapped tightly to the net with fishing line. The blood spread, pool water carrying it outward.

He untangled the net from his body and lifted Jenna from the pool, sliding her onto her side. Her eyes were starting to cloud. “Stay with me!” he yelled, cradling her in his arms. Her exposed legs and bare feet were a charcoaled red, skin peeling back like bark from a dead tree. Blood continued seeping from the gashes in her wrists, the skin folds like the Cheshire cat’s smile.

Blake heard clapping.

Joje stood just outside the patio door. “Bravo! What a performance!”

“I am going to kill you!” Blake shouted, voice cracking.

“You’re under a little duress, so I’ll let that slide,” Joje said. He turned, looking up toward the house. “Good mauwning, Adam!”

Blake glanced up in time to see Adam’s shutters slide closed. Joje threw something toward him. A towel opened up, falling short on the stamped colored concrete.

Blake set Jenna gently on the ground, running to snatch it, then hurried back to her. He wrapped both her hands in the towel, applying pressure to her wrists. He went to lift her, but she refused.

“I’m okay. I need to watch.”

She lay in his arms as they silently observed the flames consume the rest of their dog. In the end, she never howled, never barked, and eventually, her extinguishing whine was no more. The fire crackled, both over the pool and inside Blake, a white-hot fury the likes of which he had never before known.

Blake laid Jenna on the couch, her body so limp and lifeless he couldn’t tear his eyes from the rise and fall of her chest, the only proof she was still alive. Joje too stared at her chest, though for other obvious reasons—the wet nightgown clung to her body, as see-through as plastic wrap.

“Get a blanket. Linen closet’s upstairs next to the bathroom.” To Blake’s surprise, Joje immediately left.

“You’re gonna be okay,” he said, combing back Jenna’s hair from her face. “We’re gonna be okay.”

Oh, God, let her be okay
 . . .

Blake went to the kitchen, tearing through the bottom cupboard where Jenna had found the Band-Aids the other day. That seemed a lifetime ago. He grabbed a roll of gauze, what was left of it, searching through bottles of tanning lotion.

No burn cream.
Damnit!

He grabbed a large bottle of aloe vera, realizing at the same time he should just leave it there. “For temporary relief of minor sunburns and pains,” it read. Jenna would need something a little stronger. Like morphine.

“Your omelet’s cold.”

Blake stopped halfway to the family room. Drew stood on the other side of the island, a smug smile on his face. It was the most absurd thing someone could have said in the moment, and Blake’s fractured mind struggled to make sense of it. That ridiculous apron, that pale white skin still wet and shiny—not from sweat, Blake realized. From water.

Pool water.

Blake leapt against the island in a surge of adrenaline, reaching across and grabbing a surprised Drew by the apron and pulling him forward. The metal rack holding fruit on the island went reeling, mangoes and oranges tumbling and spinning to the floor. Blake tried to slam Drew’s head against the counter, but his reach was too far extended, and the momentum didn’t carry. Drew twisted back, wriggling from his grasp.

“Boys!” Joje said, having reentered the room.

That sliding noise of a gun cocking was enough to bring Blake back to his senses and reprioritize his agenda. It was a skill he had mastered, as had every successful individual he’d ever known—attack the most important task first without losing sight of what’s next in line.

As Blake moved back to his wife, retrieving the blanket from the ground, he went through the list in his head.

One, get Jenna help.

Two, kill Drew.

Three, kill Joje.

Four, save his family.

The order of those last few might need to be rearranged, but he couldn’t think right now. Anger clouded judgment.

Joje kept his distance, gun still pointed toward him. Blake laid the blanket lightly over Jenna, praying her skin wouldn’t stick to it when he would need to pull it back. He knelt beside her, sliding the fishing line down and wrapping her wrists with gauze. The trickle of blood had all but ceased. He paused as he worked, really seeing her for the first time in a long time. She was so beautiful. Without makeup, her face swollen and bruised, eye crusted shut, she was still perfect. He tucked her hair behind her ear, and she opened her one eye, looking into his.

“Conrad,” she said.

Before Blake could shake his head, she had fallen back under. Her legs were shaking, spasming beneath the blanket. He pulled it up to take a closer look.

Blisters and boils dotted her legs and feet like raindrops stuck to a pane of glass. Several of the toes on her right foot had fused together, skin melting into one connected piece. The bottle of aloe vera slipped from his hands to the floor.

“I can’t do this,” he said. “I can’t play this game anymore.”

“Think of all we’ve accomplished in just two days,” Joje said. “Convincing your boss to keep your job. The lengths you went to to save your family? Your wife’s still alive. You still have your son. That’s a lot worth continuing for.”

“I’m taking her to the hospital,” Blake said.

“We never intended for anyone to get hurt,” Joje continued. “It doesn’t have to be like this, but that’s up to you. Not me, not Dwew. You determine how we behave.”

Blake stood, moving back into the kitchen to the rack of keys.

“I wowee you’re not listening,” Joje said.

They were gone. The car keys, gone.

“Where are they? The keys!” Blake yelled.

“Dwew, will you kindly fetch Adam?”

Drew removed the apron and headed out the kitchen through the living room, shirtless.

Blake opened a cupboard, then another. He wasn’t looking for medicine, he was looking for something—anything—that would give him a chance to take on Joje.

“She really is exquisite.” Joje stood over Jenna. “Was your first wife this beautiful? Or did you upgrade after your success?”

Blake slammed the cupboards closed, grabbing the only thing that came to mind—the frying pan from the stove. Still warm. He rushed into the family room with it.

“This won’t end well,” Joje said. “Put it down.”

Blake swung at Joje who sidestepped the pass with the practiced efficiency of a martial artist. Blake realized how little he really knew about his captor.

Adam peeked his head from the corner of the entryway, Drew undoubtedly behind him. Blake yelled, charging forward and swinging the pan left, right, and down, whooshing through air with each attempted strike and never seeing the opening when Joje moved in, his fist catching Blake in the throat. His bruised, swollen throat.

Blake’s vision went black; when it returned, he was on his knees, leaning against the couch next to Jenna. To not return to that void beckoning to him as he inhaled and exhaled required all his concentration. He felt Joje’s breath on the back of his neck.

“You still don’t understand how this works. You can’t fight it. When you try, you only hurt the ones you love. And next time?”

Joje grabbed Blake by the hair, tilting his neck back to stare at Adam, who stood wide-eyed in the hallway. “It will be your son.”

Blake drove to the pharmacy with Joje in the same vehicle that had started it all. Joje’s refusal to allow Blake to take his wife to a hospital forced him to take the only alternative he could get. Joje made calls on Blake’s behalf, playing secretary in an effort to track down a physician of a friend of a friend; they hadn’t had the time or the need to locate a doctor since the move. The spotty reception along the coast kept Joje occupied.

Eventually, they got a contact for a physician who dealt with patients only through e-mail. For what he charged, those e-mails should have performed surgery. The sense of urgency must have come through, as half a dozen prescriptions for pain meds, antibiotics, and some enzyme cream called Santyl were waiting at the pharmacy for them.

The pharmacist, a tall man with thick white hair and a thicker mustache, couldn’t take his eyes from Blake as he scanned the drugs. His bifocals slid down the bridge of his nose as he asked, “How’s the other guy?”

It took Blake a moment to remember how bruised and cut up his face was. “Pretty sure he came out ahead.”

Joje made conversation as Blake confirmed he understood the risks of the prescriptions on the digital keypad and swiped his card. Joje then asked the pharmacist how to treat a burn wound on a canine.

“How bad are the burns?”

“I’d say pretty bad, wouldn’t you, Bwake?”

“Card Declined” flashed on the screen, giving Blake pause. He swiped it again.

“You talking blisters? Pus?” the pharmacist asked.

“Blistered,” Blake said. “Skin’s . . . cracked. Like dry leather.”

The small display repeated its ominous message: “Card Declined.”

Blake took a step back. His Cyborg—the phone— was connected to every one of his accounts. Savings, checking, even his slush account Jenna didn’t know about. Had he really handed Joje a skeleton key to every locked vault in his name?

He brought out another card, a black American Express he rarely used, slid it through the reader, awaiting the confirmation of his fears.

The pharmacist continued his conversation with Joje, politely pretending not to notice Blake’s predicament. “Second, maybe third-degree burns. Take her to a vet. She’s going to need fluid, IVs. Burns that severe require serious treatment.”

Joje held up one of the pill bottles. “Why we have these.”

“For a dog?” the pharmacist asked. “You trying to kill her?”

The display above the reader spit out the same message. Blake held his wallet in his hand, realizing how utterly worthless the plastic he carried had become.

“I got it, Bwakey,” Joje said, throwing two hundred-dollar bills onto the counter. “You can pay me back later.”