The house was going to fall in on them.
Skye bit back a sob as her mum shuffled closer.
“It’ll be OK,” Cassandra said. “It’s only an earthquake. It won’t go on much longer.”
Even as she spoke, the rocking slowed, softened, stopped. Silence came, eerie and still. Not peace but the breath before a scream.
“Are you all right?” Skye whispered.
“I’m fine,” her mother replied, though her skin was pale and had taken on a waxy sheen.
“I need to find Martyn,” Skye said. She crawled out from under the table, her knee finding the broken glass.
Swearing, she staggered upright and saw a pair of feet through the open kitchen doorway. Martyn. He had fallen and was not moving.
Skye reached him just as the front door flew open. Andreas staggered in, chest heaving and eyes wild, scanning the room as if scared of what he’d find.
Skye said his name, and he found her, relief turning quickly to confusion as his gaze shifted to the still figure on the floor.
“Éla, who is—”
Martyn groaned. He brought a hand up to his head, wincing as his fingers made contact.
“Don’t move,” Skye said, kneeling beside him. “You might’ve hurt your neck.”
“My ankle,” he said weakly. He attempted to raise his chin, only to cry out in pain.
Andreas came closer and stood for a moment before crouching by Martyn’s feet.
“I am not a doctor,” he said, “but the ankle appears to be broken.”
Martyn set his jaw. Despite all the bullying and the threats and the coercive control, Skye experienced a pang of sympathy. Nobody deserved to be in pain, not even him.
“What’s happened?” Her mother stepped unsteadily into the room. “Dear God. Martyn, are you all right?”
The shift in Andreas’s expression was slight. To anyone else, it might have gone unnoticed. Skye looked at his strong hands. No rings. No sign at all that promises had been made, vows exchanged.
He was not going to ask her.
She would have to tell him.
“Andreas, this is my mum, Cassandra.”
He nodded once, unsmiling.
“And this is Mar—.”
“Her husband,” Martyn interrupted. “And you’re the bloke from the newspaper.”
Skye stilled him as he attempted to sit.
“Are you OK?” she asked Andreas. “Not injured or—”
“Óchi,” he said shortly. “There’s nothing wrong with me. I was talking outside with Joy when we received the alert. Did you not get it?”
The message on the phone, the one she’d ignored. Before she could say as much, Martyn let out another moan.
“We need to call an ambulance,” her mother urged. She fetched one of Skye’s beautiful cushions from the seating area and eased it beneath Martyn’s head.
