"I'm sorry for your loss."

"Me bloody too, mate."

"Was it… intentional?"

"Nah, Malc just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Hercules was having one his hissy fits, storming through downtown Sydney flinging cars around and punching holes in buildings. His latest bumboy had given him the elbow, that's what I heard; ended their affair, so off Herc the Jerk goes, taking it out on property like he does, the great arse. Malc was working on the third floor of an office block on George Street, fixing a water cooler for a legal firm. A fucking Toyota ute came flying through the window. Killed him stone dead."

Barrington's face had gone a deeper, fiercer shade of red. His voice was a balled fist.

"'Act of god,' the police report said. 'Act of bastard' more like. Still, four lawyers died too, so it wasn't a complete disaster."

Around the table there were looks of sympathy, and of empathy. Sam could feel it as strongly as Barrington did: the rage, the pain, the sense of injustice and impotence. Ramsay was a clever man, just as she'd thought. He'd immediately guessed the common denominator that tied all twelve of them together. Although, if her hunch was correct, it wasn't the only common denominator.

"You lost somebody too, eh?" Barrington said to Ramsay. "That's it, isn't it? That's how you knew."

"My son. Ethan. He was seven years old. He would have turned twelve next month." Ramsay's tone was matter-of-fact, and Sam wondered how hard he'd worked to be able to keep it that way while talking about this subject.