He walked down the stairs into the house and down to the kitchen, stumbling a bit on the bottom steps. He thought hard about how to get out of this conversation. He wasn’t in the right state to be having it – he was bloody drunk again.

That’s it. Starting now, I’m never drinking again.

He grabbed a bottle of vodka and tipped it down the sink – he winced at the waste, but desperate times . . . He refilled it with water and carried it back up to the rooftop. He couldn’t just ignore them – he had to make Fiona understand that she could not tell a soul. And he needed his fucking shirt back on.

When he returned to the garden, Fiona and Shelby both stopped talking and pierced him with their eyes – Fiona’s dark and attentive, Shelby’s blue and triumphant. He looked around for his shirt, but it was gone. He sat down, feeling exposed.

‘Well, Mackerel?’ Shelby said. ‘Don’t you think I deserve to know more about this boogieman who’s destroyed my family?’

‘Alright,’ he said gruffly, folding his arms over his chest. Feeling ridiculous, he uncrossed them and intentionally put his hands behind his head. ‘Alright . . .’

He swigged from his ‘vodka’, feeling twitchy.

‘Here’s the truth, ladies. I know you’re trying to think of a way to stop him, but you can’t. That’s because it’s not just one person. The name Blackbeard gets passed down to whoever is the head of his drug syndicate. If Blackbeard gets arrested, or killed, his name lives on to inspire terror in the game. And, believe me, it works. There isn’t any halfway-serious drug operation in this country that isn’t afraid of Blackbeard.’

‘There has to be a way to stop him,’ said Fiona.

‘There is no way,’ said Mackerel angrily. ‘Okay, so Davey was keeping him out of Shacktown, but now that he’s gone, Davey’s crew is weak. Blackbeard is already making his move. There’s nothing any of us can do.’

‘And Blackbeard is definitely worse than Davey?’ said Fiona. ‘If they’re both drug dealers? No offence, Shelby.’

Shelby raised her glass in mocking acceptance.

What the fuck was going on? Why were they treating this like . . . like a bloody theatre show?

‘Are you fucking insane?’

He was really getting angry now. Straight people just didn’t understand how the underworld worked. And where the fuck was his shirt? He stood up, looking for it.

‘Look, Blackbeard handles more than drugs. He’s a human trafficker. He does weapons. And he kills anyone in his way. Anyone in his way – women, children. He doesn’t follow the code. Wherever he goes, bad things follow and good people disappear. He’ll be bad for all of Tasmania – fuck, he’ll be bad for Australia full-stop!’