Silly question, Graeme thinks. Nothing makes it harder for Catherine to hurt anyone.

Catherine and Penny get out of the car, Catherine holding her jaw as if in great pain, but cracking some kind of a joke, because Penny’s laughing in a scandalised way. She leans down and speaks to the driver, tapping her wrist, presumably saying she’ll call her when they’re done. Graeme catches the words, ‘…and small fries please.’

Tut, tut, thinks Graeme with a slow smile, they both ought to be coming in with Catherine. But it bodes very well that they aren’t. The driver waves and drives out of the car park, crunching the gears as she exits.

Catherine looks in his direction, and Graeme raises his eyebrows, but Catherine gives an infinitesimally tiny shake of her head when Penny isn’t looking. They’ve agreed that Graeme will only get out of the van if needed. Less chance of being spotted on CCTV.

Catherine and Penny begin to stroll across the car park. The only other pedestrians in sight are an old lady tottering out of the surgery entrance with a Zimmer frame and her carer, or daughter, opening the door for her.

Catherine’s almost level with the space that Graeme has parked in. Graeme, in the driver’s seat, pretends to be scrolling through his phone with one hand, but he keeps his eye firmly on them, and his other hand, out of sight, grips the heavy motorcycle chain that is his current weapon of choice. Go on babes, he urges silently. We’re so close. Get on with it, or I will.

Violence ignites in his belly, raw and hungry like the craving of a recently reformed smoker when someone lights up next to them. For a moment he forgets who he’s meant to be saving the rage for, and he wants to jump out of the van and stave in Penny’s skull, imagining her dull-brown curls all matted, the blood pooling out around her…

Just as the two women are level with the van’s bonnet, Catherine crouches down. ‘Stone in my shoe,’ Graeme hears her say.

Graeme forces the ball of anger down, loosens his grip on the chain, starts the van engine and leans across to open the passenger door. This is the sign.

Penny is waiting, still chatting away, while Catherine pokes around inside her shoe. Then, instead of straightening up in the normal way, she pushes herself away from the ground with the energy of a swimmer doing a racing dive off the side of a pool, her clenched fist swinging forcefully upwards and straight into the underside of Penny’s jaw, a flawless uppercut.