Mandy sat down at the kitchen table with the baby in her lap, soothing him as best she could, glad of the distraction, the noise. Steve stood at the door a while with his back to her. She had no idea what he would do or say now. She’d believed, until today, that Steve would never physically hurt anyone, not deliberately.

She spoke before he could say anything. ‘I’ve been unhappy for a while. It’s not your fault.’

He crossed the room and leaned over her, his hand flat on the kitchen table. Blood oozed from his bottom lip. ‘A while?’ he said. ‘What do you mean, a while?’

‘Since we started trying for a baby. I never really wanted it.’

William sucked rhythmically on his dummy. Mandy let him take her finger in his hot, damp hand and shifted his position in her lap. She could feel the fright in his body.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

Steve wiped the blood from his mouth. ‘How long’s it been going on? You and lover boy next door?’

‘Not long.’

‘How long?’

‘Since Louisa left,’ she said. ‘A few weeks.’

He straightened up, knocking a chair sideways, startling the baby.

‘I should’ve known.’ He kicked the chair across the kitchen, where it collided noisily with the stove. ‘I should’ve known you were seeing another bloke.’ He walked across the room and back again. ‘Do you love him?’

William started to whine. She held the dummy in place with her finger. ‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s not like that.’

‘What’s it like, then?’ He bent over her. ‘Come on. What’s it like?’

She shifted her chair away from him. She couldn’t lie, now she needed to. She was too exposed before him, after what he’d seen. But there was no way to tell him the truth about it either. She’d never seen anger like this before in her life.

‘It’s nothing serious,’ she said.

‘Nothing serious! What’s that meant to mean?’

The baby began to cry and his dummy dropped to the floor. She held him closer, rubbing his back. ‘Don’t make me say it,’ she said.

‘It’s just sex, is it? Is that what you mean? Just sex in our kitchen when I’m not home?’

Keeping her eyes on the boy, she nodded, once.

He went to the window and looked out at Joe’s house, breathing hard. ‘God help me if I see his bastard face. I don’t know what I’ll do.’

A cupboard door beneath the sink stood ajar and he kicked it shut, so hard it sprang open again. He stood back, kicked it again, harder, and then again, until it swung loose from its hinges. In her arms the baby wailed.

‘I know you don’t want me in bed.’ He took a beer from the fridge and lifted the lid off with his teeth. ‘You don’t want me that way, not any more.’

‘I felt under pressure to get pregnant,’ she said. ‘It changed things between us.’

Steve drained the bottle and slammed it down on the counter. ‘Is that why you fucked the bloke next door?’