Chapter 1

It had been a long, hard week and all I wanted to do that weekend was relax and unwind. But I knew the chances of that were slim. Emma had a list of jobs she wanted me to do and I just knew that Dom would be hanging around being her usual bitchy self—she wasn’t around the house much, but when she was it always seemed to be when it caused me the most problems. It was as if she had a sixth sense for these things.

I was feeling every one of my forty-six years, and more, as I walked through the front door just after seven on Friday evening.

“Emma, I’m home!” At the start of our relationship, just five short years ago, she’d have come running to greet me at the door with a kiss, but it had been a good long while since she’d done that. Still, it was unusual not to at least get a reply.

I hung up my coat on one of the hooks by the door—hooks I’d put up, by the way, you’d be hard-pressed to find any of those little DIY jobs that had been done by Jack-the-Arsehole during his six or seven years as the man of the house—and meandered into the kitchen, where I’d normally find Emma.

But the lights were off and she wasn’t there.

She was a teacher at a local secondary school and she was typically home before me and usually got started on the dinner around the time I got home. But there were times she was late—when she had a parents’ evening for example. But the school never had parents’ evenings on Fridays.

I supposed she could have been at the pub with some of the other staff. But she usually sent me a text to meet her there if that was the case and we’d indulge in steak and chips followed by a movie or something.

It was very curious. I looked in the living room, then went upstairs to check our bedroom and even the bathroom. But the house was dark and deserted. Dom being out I could understand. Hell, Dom being out I actually welcomed. But Emma?

Things may have been strained between us over the situation with Dom but they weren’t that bad. For example, Emma never went anywhere without letting me know where she was and when I’d expect her back because she knew I would worry. And now I was worried. This was weird.

I took my mobile phone out of my pocket and quickly tapped on the screen to call her. But the call went to voice-mail after a few rings. She could have been driving and not able to answer. Or she could have chosen not to answer—but I didn’t think she would do that. Or maybe there was some other reason she couldn’t answer. I tapped in a text message and sent it, hoping that even if she was driving she might be able to send me a short reply to say so.

I trudged back down the stairs, into the kitchen and opened the fridge door to see what I could use to make a meal. After standing staring into the almost empty cold-store for over a minute, I swung the door shut and unlocked my phone. A few taps later I had a pizza on order from the local takeaway. Aren’t smart-phones great?

It was after I wandered back into the living room and flopped into my favourite chair, that my phone beeped its distinctive message notification. I unlocked it and read the pop-up.

Well, bugger me. I might get to have a relaxing weekend after all.

Sorry, I know that sounds horrible, but Emma’s mother was pretty much the stereotypical catholic matriarch and she didn’t like me. Okay, so it’s not that she didn’t like me, but more that she didn’t like that her good catholic daughter had a) divorced and b) remarried. If the old battle-axe had gotten her way, Emma would still be suffering in the marriage to Jack-the-lying-cheating-scumbag.

That said, I’m not completely heartless. I recognised that at her advanced age (she was eighty-something) a fall could be pretty nasty. So I didn’t begrudge Emma travelling the three hundred miles or more, five-hour journey north to see her.

I tapped in a reply telling my wife to take care on the road and not to try and drive back if was too late. I didn’t need to say that, I knew full well she’d stay until at least Sunday evening. I wondered briefly if Emma had taken Dom with her. The old biddy doted on her grand-daughter and even at nineteen Dom didn’t mind being the centre of attention and affection. But then it occurred to me that the last thing Dom would be interested in was hanging around a hospital on a Friday night. She was probably already out on the lash with her good-for-nothing friends.

I switched on the TV and watched about five minutes of a news channel then had a thought. Since I had the house to myself, I could get a little preview of something I’d planned to watch with Emma that weekend—probably on Saturday night.

Whatever may have been going on with Dom, Emma and I were still in love and we still had a pretty healthy and active sex-life. We mixed things up whenever we could and we weren’t afraid or embarrassed to introduce various marital aids into the bedroom—whether that be in the form of toys or visual stimuli. I’m talking, of course, about pornography. About once or twice a month Emma and I would watch a porno together and end up emulating the action on screen as best we could.