With a breaking heart he watched his wife. The handle of the penknife felt slippery in his hand. In his mind he was plunging it into Jason’s heart, but in reality he stood motionless, watching the unfolding scene.
Less than a metre’s distance from him, Jason positioned himself behind his wife and unzipped the fly of his jeans.
Dear God, I can’t let this happen…
But let it happen, he did. Jason’s big hand circled the back of her neck, the nuzzle of the gun pointing at him through the tangle of wet hair. Jaz’s eyes were as glazed as a fish on a chopping block. Wide, shiny and staring, it was like she was oblivious to what was happening.
From his position, Ed was spared the sight of the man’s cock, but it was obvious he was guiding it along his wife’s vagina with his hand.
“Please don’t,” Ed sobbed. “Please don’t, please don’t.”
The man stopped gyrating his hips.
“I’ll tell you what, fuck face. If you eat up your vomit I’ll nail your wife in the pussy instead of the arse.”
What fucking difference does that make, he thought, but then felt guilty for thinking it.
Just because you don’t want to feast on your own sick…
We’ve never done it that way before, it would be agony for her if I let that happen.
But she might get pregnant.
Deal with that if it happens. I can’t put her through the pain of anal…
And as for STDs, surely she could get them just as easily from anal intercourse as vaginal? Without further ado, and tired of overthinking, he crouched down on all fours like a dog and lapped up his sour vomit.
The taste was indescribable. He tried to bypass his taste-buds by gulping. It didn’t work. Even though it had cooled, it burned his mouth and throat. Hot, bitter and rancid, his stomach contracted and bile rose afresh at the unwelcome return of that which it had just expelled. Absently he noticed there were lumps in it, possibly the apple he had eaten earlier.
While he was lapping up his vomit, he heard Jason grunt and the table legs squeak rhythmically over the tiled floor.
He didn’t think life could get any darker. His nose streamed snot from his crying which he consumed along with the vomit.
Ed knew he shouldn’t look. But sometimes knowing and doing were two different things.
Ed looked.
The unspeakable image of his wife getting fucked splintered his brain, and something snapped in his mind, like an over-taut elastic band. Self-loathing and disgust that he was letting this happen consumed him; so much so he that he felt an overwhelming urge to just bash his head repeatedly against the ground until he smashed in his skull and died.
No. Jaz needs you.
Yeah. Fat lot of help you are, you useless cunt.
He still gripped the knife in his sweaty palm. Yes, he had let his wife down, but that was going to change, as of this second. He was going to save her or he was going to die trying.
CHAPTER FIVE.
Boris Coleman strolled along the dark cliff path towards Dallam Avenue. He was in a good mood and whistled tunelessly to himself, thoughts of Jaz’s lush, young body clouding his mind.
“Tonight’s your lucky night, baby,” he said aloud, jangling the backdoor key of eight Dallam Avenue from his forefinger.
Oh yes, he had made sure to pocket the backdoor key when he had been inside the house earlier that day. No one made a fool of Boko, especially not some slimy little cunt whom his now ex had been so madly in love with all through secondary school. And still was apparently, the stupid, lying slag.
He was going to show her. He was going to show them all. Fucking, stuck up, know-it-all Londoners, fucking swanning into his home town like they owned the fucking place with money pouring out of their perfect, shit-free arses.
He’d show that cunt Ed who was top-dog round here. He’d rape his gorgeous wife while he watched and then he would give him a beating he would never forget. And then he would tell dear Linda all about it.
No one fucked with Boko. Fucking no one.
He paused on the cliff path for a second.
Who am I kidding? I can’t do this.
Boko was fist-happy and had never grown out of that testosterone-fuelled phase lots of young man in their early twenties fell prey to; the need to knock someone out if they so much as looked as them in the ‘wrong way.’
But rape? As thick as Boko was, and as much as he wanted to, he appreciated the difference between fantasy and reality.
He walked slowly onwards, wondering what he would do when he got there.
And there was the house now. He stood still on the cliff path, shielded by a big tree directly opposite the house. The living room light wasn’t on. He pictured them inside, sat round the kitchen table, listening to music maybe, getting all cosy and smug after a hard day sunning themselves on the beach. Drinking wine together. Toasting their perfect lives. Boko smiled, enjoying how the fantasy played out in his head and he patted the penknife in the seat pocket of his jeans.
This was gonna be fun.
Jaz clawed the edge of the table so hard she was getting splinters under her fingernails. Not that she noticed such a triviality. Jason Jacks pounded into her good old fashioned doggy-style, and her humiliation was complete.
There was little pain, just the abject mortification that this was happening in front of her husband. Her husband who was currently eating his own vomit, she duly noted in an abstract kind if way. Because for the sake of her sanity, Jaz had shut down. Her tears had long dried and Jaz had switched to survival mode. If she didn’t fully acknowledge what was happening, then she could get through this nightmare. Save it all up for a shrink at a later date. If she even lived that long.
Ed lifted his face from his evening meal and their eyes locked. She didn’t focus on them though, she didn’t want to acknowledge the depth of his torment. Instead she looked right through him as if his skull was transparent.
The rhythmic pounding intensified and she shut down further. Because of this, she barely comprehended what happened next.
One second she was getting fucked from behind, the next was a blur of movement and she was thrust to one side. She fell heavily onto her side and a muffled thump reverberated in the air. It took her a moment to work out that the gun had been fired and that it sounded funny because of the silencer.
He’s shot Ed, came the gut wrenching, crystal clear thought.
She struggled to sit up, but flopped back down again. She hurt all over and her head felt swimmy and strange.
“Ed,” she managed to croak out.
“Ed’s dead, baby. Ed’s dead.”
“No,” she whispered.
Still she did not open her eyes. Not even when strong hands lifted her up by her shoulders into a sitting position.
“He brought it on himself. He didn’t play by the rules. Why would he lunge for me when I was pointing a fucking gun at him?”
Jaz was stunned.
A strange sound floated around her head and she realised it was coming from her. A pitiful mewling that made her own skin crawl. The horrible noise broke her paralysis.
He can’t be dead, he can’t be…
Her eyes snapped open, and she crawled over to where he lay a few feet from her.
“Ed? Ed!”
His head was twisted at an unnatural looking angle to his body, propped up awkwardly against the cupboard below the sink. The entire front of his t-shirt was stained red, and on closer inspection, Jaz saw where the bullet had entered him to the left of his stomach.