14
"Oh God! Oh God, Johnny! I almost brained you," she said between big, gulping breaths. "I thought you were a burglar or, I don't know, someone. With all the sirens outside tonight, I thought…"
Johnny stepped in and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her in close. "Ssh, it'sOK. It's OK."
With her head pressed in against Johnny's chest, Rhiannon could just see Micha's face.
Her eyes were wide and sparkling as she reached up for the mobile dangling above her. There'd be no getting her back to sleep now, but for the first time in weeks, Rhiannon was happy about that.
"What you doing home, anyway?" Rhiannon asked, still content to stay snuggled in Johnny's bear hug.
"Strangest thing happened," said Johnny. "I'd picked up some guy in Blackhill and run him out Dumbarton direction. About, I don't know, couple of hours ago. So I pull up, right, and he pays me in cash."
Johnny stopped.
"I'm not sure that qualifies as 'the strangest thing'," Rhiannon said, but with her head against her husband's chest, she could hear his heart pounding much faster than normal.
"What is it?" she asked. "What happened?"
"It's just… As he was handing me over the money, this… thing fell out of his sleeve, right onto my hand."
Rhiannon drew back so she could see Johnny's face. His eyes darted left and right, as if searching for a memory he couldn't quite track down. "What do you mean 'this thing'? What thing?"
Johnny's eyes stopped shifting and fixed on her. "A spider," he said. "It was a spider."
"A spider?" Rhiannon frowned. Her whole body convulsed involuntarily. "Jesus. What sort of spider?"
"A… a big one. I don't know. Not something I've ever seen before," Johnny said. "It was big and black and shiny and I knew I should be freaking out, but… it was so weird. I wasn't."
"You weren't? I would have been. I mean, Jesus, I'm freaking out about it now," Rhiannon said. "What did you say?"
"To the spider?"
Rhiannon smiled and slapped him gently on the chest. "To the passenger. The guy whose sleeve it fell out of. I mean, as tips go, that one's not great."
"Oh, him. Um, nothing. I don't remember where he went after that."
"What about the spider? Did you kill it?" Rhiannon asked.
Johnny stiffened. "What?"
"Did you kill it? The spider?"
"Of course I didn't fucking kill it," Johnny snapped, his voice suddenly filled with venom. "Why the fuck would I kill it? What kind of question's that?"
Rhiannon stepped back in surprise. "OK. Jesus, I only asked. No need to be a dick about it. I thought you'd have killed it. What did you do with it?"
"Nothing," said Johnny, the anger in his voice now replaced by an even flatness. "I didn't do anything with it."
"Then where did it go?" asked Rhiannon, frowning again.
Johnny stepped closer. His breathing seemed unnaturally loud in the dark. "I think…I think it went inside me."
Rhiannon snorted a laugh.
"Inside you?" she said. She searched his face, but saw nothing there to suggest he was joking. "What are you talking about? How could it have gone inside you?"
"I don't know," Johnny admitted. "But I can hear it."
"Hear it? The spider that went inside you, you can hear it?"
Johnny nodded slowly. "It thinks… It thinks we should kill the baby."
Rhiannon felt her stomach tighten for the second time in the space of five minutes. "Shut up, Johnny. That's not funny."
Johnny stepped forwards and wrapped his arms around his wife again, pinning her own arms to her side. He pulled her in close, squashing her hard against his broad chest.
"I don't want to, babe, I don't want to," he whispered. "But we have to. The spider says we have to. I have to."
"Let go of me," Rhiannon said, struggling to break free of Johnny's grip. "Johnny, you fucking let go of me right now."
"We don't need it. We were fine before it came along. We'll be fine again once it's gone," Johnny said.
"She, Johnny, and this is not funny. I don't know what you think you're doing, but the joke is fucking over. Let me go right now."
Over in her crib, Micha began to cry. Rhiannon felt a scream of rage well up inside her.
It burst from her lips as she brought one knee up sharply, driving it deep into Johnny's groin. He groaned and stumbled back, clutching his balls and looking like he might throw up.
Rhiannon ran for her crying daughter, but before she could reach Micha, Johnny caught her by the arm and spun her round.
"You ungrateful fucking whore," he growled, his face twisted into an expression Rhiannon had never seen before in all their years together.
His fist hit her like a wrecking ball, spinning her to the floor. She landed awkwardly on the carpet, her wrist twisting painfully beneath her.
David started to wail out in the hallway, his teddy clutched in his hands.
By the time she'd rolled over, Johnny was over the crib, reaching inside.
"We don't need it," he whispered. "We don't need it. These are the things a good daddy does."
Rhiannon was on her feet before she'd even thought about moving. Her arm drew back, and she was surprised to see the candlestick in her hand, swinging towards her husband's head. It hit not with the hollow thud she'd been expecting, but with a nauseating crack that she felt more than heard.
Johnny spun around, hissing like a demon.
He flew at Rhiannon, but her arm came up all by itself again and the heavy base of the candlestick connected just above his right eye. He staggered and fell, a curved line of blood already appearing where the edge of the rounded base had struck him.
With a crash he hit Micha's toy box, his forehead slamming against the side of the lid. A sound, like bubbling water rolled from between his lips. He twitched violently, then seemed to deflate into stillness.
Rhiannon hesitated, fighting the instinct to check on him. Instead, she wrapped Micha in her blanket and pulled her in against her chest.
She was half way to the door when she heard Johnny stir. Without looking back, she raced out into the hallway, scooped up her son and made for the front door. She had to get outside, flag someone down, get help, get away. Johnny was clearly having some sort of breakdown, and much as she loved her husband, she'd kill him before she let him hurt their baby.
The street outside was empty, and much darker than she'd been expecting. The street lights were out in both directions, but there were more lights on in the other houses than was normal for that time of night.
Bare-footed, Rhiannon ran past the first house, which was in darkness. She hammered on the frosted glass door of the next one, where lights blazed in every window.
"Please," she whispered, knocking rapidly. "Please, someone be up. Someone be up."
There was a sound from somewhere inside the house. Rhiannon glanced back at her own front door and held the crying children close. There was no sign of Johnny yet, but it was only a matter of time.
A shape appeared through the frosted glass of the door.
"Open up, please," Rhiannon said. "I need help."
The flat of a hand slapped against the inside of the glass. There was a long squeak as the hand slid down, leaving a streak of blood on the door.
Rhiannon stepped back as the hand became a fist and began to pound at the glass. The person inside the house squealed and screeched as he kicked and punched and threw himself at the door. Rhiannon backed away further, past the parked cars and into the road, watching the distorted shape thrash harder and more violently against the glass.
"Rheeeeee!"
Johnny staggered from inside their house, blood painting both sides of his face. He was partly hunched over, his fingers curled up like claws. As he spotted his wife and children, he lurched towards them, his mouth gnashing at the air.
"No, please, Johnny, no," Rhiannon sobbed, backing all the way to the other side of the road. Johnny broke into a run. His movements were jerky, his face now twisted almost beyond all recognition.
Rhiannon clutched Micha tightly against her children, shielding them.
Whatever happened. Whatever Johnny did, she wouldn't let him hurt their babies.
"No, Johnny, please, stay back," Rhia whimpered, then she squinted in a sudden glare as Johnny was silhouetted by two powerful beams of light.
A black SUV hit him like a battering ram, sending him skidding along the road on his face. For a moment, Rhiannon could only stare at his unmoving body in shock. But then his foot twitched and his fingers curled, and, to her amazement, he began to sit up.
With a creak, the SUV's passenger door was pushed open.
A small man with dark eyes leaned over from the driver's seat and beckoned urgently to her.
"Oi, lady," he called with a cockney accent. "You getting in or what?"