‘Do you know, you really don’t want to cross us.’ He walks two steps towards Evan, getting right in his space, making sure his shoulders look big.

Evan says nothing, just looks at him, then steps back, just a tiny bit.

The veiled threat, the reference to what they’ve already done, the hint at physical violence, they come from nowhere. As forceful as a volcano erupting.

Evan stares at him, his expression both judgemental and frightened. ‘I await the other signatures,’ he says eventually. Joe nods up at the ceiling, even though nobody can see him except the God who witnessed the crime in Italy. Something about that omniscience comforts him. That somebody may have a wide view of all of this. Can see what he is doing, and why.

They walk into the reception, Frannie on some fashion website, no lunch-time patients waiting.

Outside, the rain has finally stopped, and the sky is a burnt-sienna. There’s a dust cloud. It’s been on the news this week, turning their skies peach and orange instead of blue. After the flooding caused by the rain, and now this, outside has a post-apocalyptic vibe, people stopping to take photographs, tapping the arm of the person they’re with and pointing. The sun is barely visible through it, a haze amid the dust.

Evan moves to walk out the front door, to buy a sandwich from next door, Joe guesses.

He’ll get Frannie and Cathy to sign now and … well, then Evan joins the fold. He joins the numbers of people forced to keep this secret. Extortion, bribery, fraud, threats. He’s in as deep as they are, then. None of them can see the sun clearly.

‘Clock’s ticking on those other signatories,’ says Evan, over his shoulder.

Evan turns back to Frannie. She is totally still, surrounded by those bloody Chinese waving cats in perpetual motion, just looking at him, eyes wide and sad.

57.

Cathy

‘Mum signed this?’ Cathy says. She stares at the document, then up at Joe. It’s ten minutes before Evan joins them at the first partnership meeting. They’re always at seven o’clock, every other Tuesday. Cathy likes the mundanity of them. The instant coffee, the quiet.

‘Glad you think so,’ Joe says, plucking it from Cathy’s grip. ‘I did.’

Cathy moves away from him in shock. ‘What?’ she says. She stares down at it. Of course. Of course he hasn’t told their mother. That is a poor copy of the signature that she knows so well. Like it’s been traced. The same shape, but that’s about it. A facsimile.

‘You can’t do that,’ she says softly. ‘She needs to know. And – Joe. I need to know too.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You’re doing stuff without telling me. We need to be transparent with each other.’

‘Is that a threat?’ he barks.

‘What?’

‘She wouldn’t sign it. What would we possibly say?’

‘You sold a fifth of the company for a quid,’ Cathy says. ‘That’s – isn’t that fraud? Selling things off at an undervalue? The taxman will look into it – HMRC … I …’