“All right,” Gary said.

“He showed me a video of Casey killing a cat.”

Gary stared for a few moments, not really sure what to say. It was almost like he was waiting for a punchline. “Are you sure?”

“It was two minutes of her violently butchering a British Shorthair with a trowel. I’m sure.”

Gary closed his eyes. He saw Casey on the wedding day. Despite his concerns, Gary had gone as his best man and had a fantastic time. As she and Scott were standing at the altar, he truly believed it for a little while; they were going to work. They were too in love not to work.

“We need that video,” Gary said.

“But how? Markus threw me out when I asked for it.”

“I don’t care how. But we need to get our hands on it. We can’t let this happen. Scott said something last night, about not wanting me involved. But fuck that. I have to be. We need that video. We need to make her stop.”

Lauren sat up. “I want that too. But how?”

“I don’t know. But there has to be a way. I won’t let this lunatic ruin him. That man saved my life, saved my goddamn life, and now she’s, she’s…” Gary trailed off, picking at the desk, splinters biting into his thumb. “I can’t let it happen.”

“Scott saved your life?”

“He’s never mentioned it?”

“Until recently, we didn’t talk about personal stuff.”

“It was when we were in university. We were in our second year, so that makes us nineteen, twenty. Anyway, we were at a club and I got chatting to a girl. Things were going well, I thought. We were hitting it off. She asked me if I could go across the street and get her some cigarettes. Weird request, I thought, but screw it… Not to be blunt–”

“But you thought you were going to fuck her.”

Gary laughed. “Yeah, pretty much.”

Lauren smirked. “And then what happened?”

“It turned out she was luring me outside so her friends could jump me. I’d withdrawn three hundred in cash for the night, like a moron, and I was also flashing it around… like an even bigger moron. I should’ve given them the money, but I was drunk and pissed off and I swung on one of the bastards. That was a mistake. There were five of them, and they started kicking the shit out of me. I thought I was going to die. My hip and my leg still give me trouble from it. One of them kicked me so hard I was sure I’d never walk again.”

Lauren covered her mouth.

Gary continued, feeling a violent shudder inside of him, even now; he’d taken on a kind of monotone voice, the way he always did when he told this story. “A crowd had gathered, but nobody was getting involved. These were proper nutcases. One of them kept screaming that he had a knife. Everybody was drunk and scared. Then I blacked out. Scott told me later the bloke shouting about the knife had taken a running start and kicked me in the head.