That would never do.

In deference to the hour, he chose a can of tomato juice to mix with his gin instead of vermouth. It went down pasty and tasted mostly of salt. He cleared his throat and poured another shot, unadulterated, which he took back to the desk with him.

On a scrap of hotel stationery, he fiddled with Ambrose van Weill, adding letters where they would fit, modifying others. Perdition, why had Cyril chosen such an awkward name? Though Enselmese Ambroses were common as Jacks in Gedda, so really that left the surname, with its bothersome preposition. The v could be changed to an A, perhaps, and …

Yes. Ambrose Adam Wallis. That was doable. Perhaps one of his parents came from the Hellican Islands.

Aristide put the pen down, breathed deep, checked his hands were steady. Then picked it up again and put it to the paper. The less thought that went into this, the better.

In victory, he reached for his gin. Heart hammering and fingers numb, he fumbled and watched in horror as the glass wobbled and then tipped, spilling across the fresh ink of his forgery.

Terrified and still a bit drunk, Aristide sat behind the wheel of a box van hauling a load of soiled laundry. Ahead of him, Tabby rode shotgun in the cab of a fish truck beside Jules, a driver Aristide had only met this morning. Chido was hidden amongst the mussels and twitching crates of pollock.

Aristide hadn’t driven a van in decades. He had never broken someone out of jail. It was much more expedient to buy people’s freedom with money and favors, and less likely to see him locked up in turn.

It wasn’t jail, he reminded himself, idling behind the fish truck in a narrow alley waiting for their target to come by. It was just a kind of carjacking. He’d done that. Back in the foggy moors of his past, yes, but he’d absolutely stolen a car out from under its driver.

This time, all he had to do was provide cover. Park the box van behind his conspirators to partially block them from sight while they got the job done. He wasn’t even carrying a gun. Better not to be found with one, if it came to that. Which it wouldn’t.

None of it would be his responsibility. Which meant none of it would be under his control. He didn’t know whose dirty laundry he was hauling. Didn’t know where Chido and Tabby had found Jules, or where they’d gotten the vans. He felt like he’d pushed a sled down a hill, hopped in, and was now at the mercy of the landscape.

He did not like that this feeling had become familiar.