‘I’m very sorry,’ Cormac says, his voice different. ‘I should introduce myself.’ His accent is gone, replaced with something stuffy, upper-middle-class Australian. I think of the last thing he said to me, For now, don’t tell anyone about me. I don’t want anyone to get hurt. Gabe is there on the La-Z-Boy and Evan sits at the table. They’re all smiling, all putting on a show for the guest, July’s boyfriend. Cormac is Hudson. Why did I never see a photo of him, why didn’t I insist on meeting him earlier? He doesn’t send selfies, July had told me. Then, when I was out, he dropped her home, met Gabe. He is striding towards me, his stubble is gone, his hair is slicked back, his smiling eyes have something else in them now. They have a secret shared between us. I don’t want anyone to get hurt. The message burns hot in my mind: it was a threat.

‘Hi, Mrs Scott, I’ve been dying to meet you.’ He holds out his hand, and I take it. I feel his grip tighten and I can barely keep from wincing. The silence in the room is loud in my ears, the white noise of rushing water.

‘Mum!’ It’s July.

‘Hi, Hudson.’ I find my voice eventually. My rictus smile hurts. ‘Nice to finally meet you, too.’

Then he is retreating back to the couch and I’m dropping my bag by the door. I cross the room, take Gabe’s glass of wine and drain half of it in one mouthful. I notice July has a glass, too, and Cormac. I lean against the table thinking for a moment, running through all the conversations we had. It’s almost impossible for someone to totally conceal their true nature from a psychologist, so there must have been clues. He was acting, and he has put in a lot of work for this, but why? Now he is here, he must have a plan.

‘So Gabe was just talking about the night of the fire. July told me about it, but I didn’t realise it was so bad,’ Cormac says, again in that genteel, soft-edged accent. ‘There truly are some horrible people in the world, aren’t there? I’m just glad they caught the guy.’

‘That’s right,’ I say.