‘He shot Mario clean through the arm,’ the lawyer says. ‘The bullet shredded his triceps and chipped the bone. My client nearly bled to death in that stairwell. According to this affidavit from Dr Van Spreeuwel—’ he waves a document in the air ‘—Mario may never regain the use of his right hand.’

‘Lucky he’s left-handed.’

The mention of shredded triceps makes my stomach gurgle. It’s six pm. I’m hungry again. The lumberjack gives me a funny look.

The lawyer is humanising Bucetti by using his first name. Making Thistle seem incompetent by always referring to her as ‘Miss’ rather than ‘Agent’. He must be used to performing for juries rather than judges, who presumably don’t fall for those tricks.

‘If I hadn’t given him first aid, he’d be dead,’ Thistle says.

‘That could very well be true,’ the bald lawyer says. ‘But if you hadn’t hesitated, if you had fired earlier, what do you think—’

‘Objection,’ Thistle’s lawyer snaps. ‘Calls for speculation.’

‘Mrs Fletcher,’ the judge says, ‘please let Mr Simmons finish his questions before you decide whether to object to them.’

All eyes are on the action up the front, including mine—until I realise someone is watching me. A young white man, no eyebrows, dressed in a dark blue tracksuit. He’s on the other side of the courtroom. He doesn’t look away when I spot him. Instead, he holds up a piece of paper, angled so I can read the scribbled words: COME WITH US.

My heart is loud in my ears. I nod to the man in the tracksuit. Message received.

‘If you had fired sooner,’ Simmons is saying, ‘then Iuculano wouldn’t have had the chance to shoot your partner.’

There’s a pause. Someone sneezes in the front row, and Thistle flinches.

‘Mr Simmons,’ the judge says, ‘it’s late. Other cases are waiting to be heard. We’re all familiar with the basic facts of the case. Ask your question.’

‘Yes, Your Honour. Miss Thistle, do you regret not taking the shot earlier?’

The man in the tracksuit tucks his homemade sign into a satchel. Then he makes eye contact with another man—Asian American with spiky hair and an ear stud. The lumberjack seems to notice none of this. I try to work out if he could be with them—whoever they are. It felt like an accident, him running into me outside the courtroom. But experienced con men are used to manufacturing accidents.

No one moves. I guess they want me to go with them after the court session has concluded.

‘That would have been irresponsible,’ Thistle is saying. ‘I wasn’t sure the suspect had a gun. It could have been a phone or a wallet.’

Simmons picks up a photograph from his desk. He shows it to the judge, then to Thistle. ‘Does this look like a phone, or a wallet?’