From somewhere down the main road, sirens rose into the afternoon, and I felt Gavin tense beneath my hold as he heard them too.

“Did you call the police on me?” he gasped.

“I didn’t have to call them just now,” I told him evenly.

“They were already on their way.

They’ve had your voicemail for hours.

They were dispatched to this address before you ever stepped out of your car.”

“This was a setup,” he said, and there was something almost like awe in it, the dawning of a man who is realizing the ground he has been standing on was drawn on paper the whole time.

“Nobody set anything up, Gavin,” I said.