Connie is dead, Zeb is missing. I killed a person with a key, for Christ’s sake.

I know that really the key part of it is not important, but there seems to be some kind of irony in it.

Instead of locking the door, I opened Barrett’s doorway to the next life.

Forced. Laboured.

There is no key to life, just a key to death.

Better, but I won’t be writing slim volumes of poetry any time soon.

I feel sick deep in my stomach and there’s bile in my throat. Bile and tequila. I stop and spit in the drain, and as I hawk it up, bent over with my hand on a pole, I see a glint of streetlight on a gum wrapper and remember something.

Macey Barrett’s stiletto spinning like a cheerleader’s baton, burying itself in the ceiling.

The stiletto. It’s still there.

Shit.

Shit. Shite and bollocks.

What can I do about it? What should I do?

I straighten slowly, like a very old man, and actually admonish myself aloud.

‘Okay, Daniel. Think about this calmly.’

In the third person now? Christ, things are bad.

Unfortunately my calm thinking space is out of service at the moment. I try to swat aside the waves of grief and tequila fumes, but my brain is fogged and buzzing.

It should be fine.

So the stiletto is up there; it shouldn’t lead back to me unless there’s a spy-cam in the handle.

The way my luck’s been going . . .

I chuckle and spit one last time to restore my manhood after all those thoughts of irony.

Think this thing through.

Going back to the surgery would be a big mistake. Irish Mike could be keeping an eye on the place, and showing up would only put me on his radar.

What about Zeb?

I want to think something positive, I would kill for some kind of bright shining answer, but there’s nothing coming out of my brain but fog and sadness.

Connie, darlin’.

Zeb is dead.

Call him and find out. It’s a thought.

I block the ID on Barrett’s Prada cell and punch in Zeb’s number.

Couple of rings, then a man answers.

‘Yeah?’

Not Zeb. I can tell from a single syllable. Zeb’s got this asthma voice, all in the nose.

‘Dr Kronski?’ I ask, like it’s a professional call.

‘Who’s speaking?’ says the man.

‘You are,’ I say, and hang up. I should probably have invented some medical yarn and promised to call back later, but I can’t be bothered.

They’re answering his calls too. Whatever Macey Barrett was looking for, they haven’t found it yet, otherwise Zeb’s phone would be at the bottom of the reservoir, along with his body.

I shouldn’t have called. I don’t want any of this information; it’s funnelling me towards a choice.