‘And have you reached that verdict unanimously?’

‘Yes.’

I stare as we wait.

They recite all the counts. Murder. Preventing the lawful burial of a body. Criminal damage. Perverting the course of justice. Conspiracy to bribe. Misappropriation of corporate assets. Fraud. Murder again.

‘On count one: murder. How do you find the defendant, guilty or not guilty?’

‘Not guilty.’

Joe’s head drops.

He is found guilty of preventing the lawful burial of a body, criminal damage, of perverting the course of justice, of bribery and the fraud charges. He is found not guilty of the second murder charge.

They are instead replaced with reckless driving and manslaughter by reason of loss of control.

‘A family man,’ the judge says. ‘You were driven to the edge of sanity by trying to cover up your first crime. What you did was unforgivable, hostile and violent, but it wasn’t murder.’

The judge doesn’t know it, but he is speaking exactly the truth.

Joe’s shoulders have dropped. He’s looking directly up at me.

I see my older brother, in all of his guises. The first flash of that temper I saw when he was eleven and somebody fouled him on the football pitch. What a good, incisive vet he was, logically making his way down differential diagnoses, trying a, trying b, trying c, noticing things other people didn’t notice. That dog was licking its lips. That cat was holding its head tilted slightly to the right. Always calm in the veterinary theatre. We have had to pretend to be estranged. So that everybody would believe my evidence. The evidence that brought his charges down.

‘Please remain standing for sentencing,’ the judge says to Joe. I stand. I can’t bear to watch. I walk out of the public gallery, shuffling past my parents. I open the door to the foyer and let it close softly shut behind me.

Epilogue

It’s summer again. Cathy is in Birmingham city centre, sitting on a blanket that Tom thoughtfully brought along with him. They’re in St Philip’s Square. He’s brought strawberries and wine; she’s brought six doughnuts. ‘A mixed picnic,’ Tom says with a laugh. ‘But a good one.’

He takes a strawberry and holds it up to the light. His hair has grown in in the past few weeks. He’s forgotten to shave it, and his head is covered in a kind of babyish fuzz which Cathy finds adorable.

He deheads the strawberry and pushes it into her mouth. Cathy feels the rough texture of the seeds, the sweet bite as the flesh resists, then yields beneath her teeth.

She lies back, her head in his lap, sunglasses on, an arm across her forehead to stop her burning across her hairline. ‘Good day?’ she says dozily to him.

‘Sure,’ Tom says easily, lying back against her. A blade of grass tickles her ear. Clouds pass above them as they lie there, relaxed in the hazy summer sun, not speaking, not needing to.