‘You said it’s fucked up.’

He looks at her, his eyes the only thing she can see clearly in the dark. ‘Isn’t it?’

She drops her head, unable to argue with that. She’s tired. So tired of covering for her sister. Of taking on her crime as though Cathy killed Will herself. Tom releases her hand, but replaces it along the back of her seat.

‘Can I ask you one thing?’ she says.

‘Sure.’

‘If it was you – your sister calls you in the night. What would you do?’

Tom understands it isn’t a rhetorical question and stares straight ahead, thinking. ‘For someone I loved,’ he says.

‘Yes.’

His eyes slide to her and something implicit passes between them. ‘Yeah, I’d do it,’ he says. ‘I would do it.’

‘Well, then,’ Cathy says, spreading her hands in front of her and letting them fall into her lap. ‘That’s where I am.’

‘Yeah,’ Tom says sadly. ‘It’s just –’

‘What?’

Another car passes. The white noise of its engine, its headlights like a soundwave, reaching a crescendo as it arrives and leaves. ‘It’s just that I wish you hadn’t,’ Tom says simply.

‘Me too,’ Cathy says. And, for the first time, she realizes that that is true.

60.

Joe

Joe arrives home in a fury, mad at himself for snapping, for being scary, for losing control. Lydia is waiting for him in the hallway, looking more engaged than she has in weeks. Eyes bright, looking up at him. ‘I’ve been thinking,’ she says.

‘Have you now?’ he says. He isn’t in the mood for this. For more problems, for more things falling apart.

‘What?’ she says, the word more of a movement of her mouth than a sound.

‘I said, Have you now?’

‘I was going to talk to you properly,’ Lydia says, turning away from him. ‘About the … about Verona.’

‘Go on, then.’

‘Not while you’re like this.’

‘Like what?’ Joe says. He spreads his arms wide, then lets them fall to his sides.

She starts crying, make-up streaked underneath her eyes like a watercolour painting.

‘What’s going on?’ Joe says.

‘Don’t do this.’

‘What?’

‘Don’t be – don’t be nasty to me. Don’t be so … don’t be so confrontational.’

‘Ask me what you wanted to.’

‘Joe.’ She meets his eyes, and that’s when his head catches up with his heart.

‘What?’ he says. He’s half aware that his hand has flown to his chest, where it flits and trembles like a bird.

‘Did you pay him?’

‘Yes.’

Lydia nods. Joe has confirmed something more to her than the bribe. He has confirmed who he is. ‘I need to go for a bit,’ she says.

‘Go?’

‘I need to – this isn’t …’ She spreads her hands in a helpless gesture as she looks up at him. He thinks, suddenly, of how many days he’s spent in her company. Thousands. He knows those hands he’s staring at as well as his own. ‘It’s not –’

‘What?’ Joe barks.