Marcelo’s fingers squeaked against the leather arm of the chair as his grip tightened. He didn’t speak. He was letting me get it all out, seeing how much I knew. He didn’t want to come in early and fill in any blanks for me, in case he needed to call my bluff. It didn’t matter, I knew I was right.

‘Marcelo, you’re the one who set up Robert’s deal with Detective Humphreys, and you saw firsthand how that went wrong. Audrey had also told you about what the Sabres did to Jeremy when you helped finalise the legal side of his death. This meant you knew just how dangerous whatever Michael had could be for whoever had it.’ Most of the room didn’t know what I was referring to, but I was focused on speaking only to Marcelo. ‘When you saw Michael’s filthy hands, his ridiculous choice of vehicle, you suspected he’d dug something up. And you’d always suspected this had something to do with Rebecca McAuley. You didn’t know what Michael had, but you were worried that people were about to start dying for the same reason Robert did all those years ago. You wanted to get rid of whatever he had.’ I let that sink in. ‘But . . . you didn’t do it to cover your own tracks. You did it to protect Michael, didn’t you?’

Marcelo sunk deeper into his chair. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just wanted it to roll down the hill. I thought it would look like an accident,’ he admitted. ‘It was an old model, so I could get in with a coathanger through the window and lift the handbrake, but I didn’t have the keys to start the engine, so I poured some hot coffee under the wheels to melt the snow. I was interrupted by Crawford running up to get you lot out of the maintenance shed, so I had to leave it before I could push it down the slope.’

I heard Erin’s voice in my head – There’s some brown shit on the ground, maybe brake fluid – and remembered the empty coffee cup sitting on the lip of the rear door. ‘I didn’t think anyone would get in the back and jump around. I’m sorry about your hand. I swear, I was just trying to stop you from knowing what was really in there. Hell, I didn’t even know what it was! I was scared by the body on the slope that morning, and when you asked me about Humphreys, I knew something was coming. I wanted to be able to wash our hands of it, for whoever this was to feel their secret was hidden and safe. I just wanted it to end. I swear on my life.’

‘Or mine, as it would happen.’