“We tie her up, we inject her, we take the money, and we leave,” he whispered.

Her door opened easily. She was snoring, greedy and undisturbed by the yellow streetlight that seeped from the window like an infection. The air around her smelled off, like sour milk. She was turned towards us, her mouth slack, her cheek squashed against her pillow, her thin curls stuck to her forehead. I felt all my hatred and all my love as I stared down at her. She started to stir. I smiled. Her puffed eyelids parted, lazy at first and then, when she saw me standing smiling above her, they opened wide.

“Grace, what are you . . .” She tried to sit up, but Tony was quick, he pushed her down, half lifting himself onto her bed, pinning her arms above her. She screamed my name and I punched the gag into her mouth. Tony shouted, “Now!” and I watched her face crease with horror when she saw the syringe. I felt warm, knowing she knew what was about to happen. I had become her and she was me. She knew the pleasure in my power and I knew her fear. All this passed between us without words. I wanted the moment to stretch out, to solidify so it would last forever, but Tony shouted again, “Now!”

She started bucking beneath him. I aimed the needle for her arm, started to push, but she thrashed and the syringe leapt out of my hand, falling to the floor behind me.

Tony swore. She looked like she was going to erupt beneath him. All my senses surged. I knew the lamp was there. I yanked it out of the socket and my arm dropped under its weight. Tony watched. It took him a moment to understand as she squirmed, grotesque between his knees. He loosened his grip and she rose up beneath him like a cresting wave, making him fall back. But I already had the lamp above my head. I paused. I wanted her to see me, above her like this. She looked at me in a way I’ve never seen before, like I was a stranger to her, a person in my own right. Her eyes were wide with surprise, and then I catapulted my arms forward. The curled, iron foot of the lamp landed between her eyes. Behind the gag, she made a dull, sucking sound. Her clawing arms dropped as her strength started to fall away, like a battery finally dying. She fell back onto her pillow, her eyes so wide I could see their roundness as they spun in their sockets. Blood started to roll down her forehead from a wound I couldn’t see.

Behind me Tony started mewling like a kitten.

“Christ. What have you done? We have to go. We have to go right now,” he said as more blood seeped, warm and rich, from her head. I felt a flash of anger. He was weak, this man who had let my brother drown. I didn’t want him there for that moment, that pure, perfect moment that was just between Mum and me.