No matter how hard he stared at the whisky in the tumbler, it refused to give Benjamin any magical solution to his problems. His jaw ached as if he had lockjaw, from it being permanently clenched. He opened it wide trying to crack some of the tension away.

He was in his study. Drinking. Again. Everyone else was in bed. He couldn’t face joining Dominique there. Wasn’t sure he could face her ever again. His grip on everything was slipping, and trying to keep hold of it all felt like trying to pin down water.

He sighed and stopped staring at the glass; instead, turning his attention to the ceiling.

A muscle in the far corner of his right eye twitched.

He was going to become a father again.

How could he even be sure it was his? It wasn’t like Kendra didn’t have plenty of time on her hands to have someone else on the go. Maybe she thought she was onto a good thing with him, that she’d struck gold. Over the years he had showered her with expensive presents, but only because he was trying to make himself feel vibrant by having a younger model on his arm and in his bed.

Now they were having a child. No, she was having a child. There was no ‘they’. He should have ended things with her a long time ago, but he had become addicted to her, his hit of the elixir of youth. Both of them knew it wasn’t a deep and meaningful relationship, though; he had explained to her as soon as he confessed about Dominique, four years earlier, that he would never leave his wife and children, and Kendra had accepted.

Still, he stared at the undeniably positive pregnancy test Kendra had gifted him, tied up with pink and blue ribbon. It sat on his desk, gazing back expectantly. Guilt stirred. He couldn’t turn his back on a child of his.

Keeping it quiet from his family was going to be impossible. He was going to lose them, if not through this then because of his money woes.

In his mind’s eye, he saw a huge countdown timer with red seconds of his life bringing him closer to zero. That was what he was going to be left with when all of this came out: a big fat zero.

If he was lucky.

For the first time in his life, Benjamin felt frozen with indecision and fear. He had always been the sort who acted on instinct, didn’t need to think too much. He was a big believer in ‘he who hesitates is lost’. Benjamin liked that attitude, it was one he could relate to. Usually. Not today though. He was on the ropes, no option but to throw in the towel.

Was there an obvious trick he was overlooking? A scam he could pull to buy some time? A deal he could land?

There were no options left.

All his hopes of where he would be by this age were shattered. As for the future, he would probably end up in prison, and be penniless when he finally got out. What would his kids – all three of them – think of him then?

Liquidating his assets by selling the house, flat, cars, jewellery, wouldn’t happen fast enough. Plus, it would get him the money he needed for the taxman but not the rest of his debts, and wouldn’t change the fact that he would now be arrested for fraud and embezzlement, and was facing prison time.

If he only had a bit longer, he was sure he could come up with something.

Someone was moving about upstairs. Creeping around. He chucked back the whisky he had been cradling, and swallowed hard as he stood, letting the fury at his situation leap to the source of the footsteps: that Harry boy. He must have come sneaking back here again. Benjamin would teach him a lesson he’d never forget.

---

Silent as death, he climbed the stairs without turning the light on. He cursed the fact he had moved the shotgun from his study to under his bed, but he didn’t need it to deal with the skinny teenager. He couldn’t wait to get his hands on the little scrote.

A figure was illuminated by the Tiffany lamp on the landing. But it wasn’t the man-child Benjamin had been expecting. It was his wife, sobbing.

Her eyes were open but vacant. Poise, manner, expressions all seemed slightly altered, as though someone who looked identical to his wife had taken her place.

She was sleepwalking. Crying over some imaginary scene playing out in her head. Even as she looked at him, he knew it. It was nothing he could put his finger on, and yet he knew, as only someone who has known and loved that person for twenty-two years can know.

Benjamin’s anger transformed into pity. He crept towards Dominique, as if she were a wild animal that might take fright any second and bolt away from him. She responded to the soothing sounds, her tears slowing. When she seemed ready, he gently led her back to bed. Curled up beside her, he murmured nonsense and stroked her hair until she closed her eyes and fell into regular sleep once more.

Sleep didn’t come to Benjamin for a long time. He stared into the darkness, wondering what the hell he was going to do. There had to be an option he had overlooked.