Page 62 of The Impossible Fortune (Thursday Murder Club Mysteries #5)

Joanna is buying a telecoms company in Brazil, while Paul marks essays.

She is on a Zoom call with a series of lawyers, business analysts, accountants.

It has, thus far, lasted for three and a half hours, because buying telecoms companies in Brazil is never as easy as you think it’s going to be.

She has muted herself, mainly because anything she has to say will make the meeting longer than it already is, but also so a room full of Brazilian lawyers can’t hear Paul loudly complaining about AI as he reads identical essay after identical essay.

Joanna steals a glance at her husband. How well does she really know him? She should just tell him about the call from the solicitor, shouldn’t she? Why won’t she? Scared she’ll see something in his eyes? A big lie, not a little lie?

The Brazilian woman, currently full screen, is saying, ‘The multiples don’t work for us. You’re applying European multiples to a much more elastic market, and the offer fails to take that into account …’

Joanna’s current offer is three hundred million. The Brazilians want five hundred million; they will, Joanna knows, settle at somewhere around three hundred and seventy million, but she will have to sit through several more hours of this before they do.

As has become her habit on long Zoom calls, Joanna also has the CCTV from The Compound open on her screen. Any movement catches her eye, but, as with the telecoms negotiations, there is rarely anything moving, just leaves blowing in the wind.

But if you have two boring things to do, why not do them both at once? What is she looking for? At first it was just something, anything, that might help explain Holly’s death. Now she feels a creeping terror that Paul’s face will appear.

As a man in a beanie hat starts talking about synergy, and Paul mutters something about émile Durkheim, Joanna gives the CCTV her full attention.

It’s a thankless task, even on fast forward.

She doesn’t know what she’s looking for, and, worse than that, she doesn’t know when she should be looking for it.

Paul gently shakes an essay in her direction. ‘Best mark in the class, and she didn’t even bother to show up to the lecture. What does that say about my lectures?’

Joanna laughs, and looks back at the CCTV.

Didn’t even bother to show up. That makes her think about Holly, and her annoyance that she couldn’t even show up for an old friend’s wedding.

Petty jealousies are all well and good, welcome even, in Joanna’s view, but come on.

They dated, sure, but people move on and, besides, Nick Silver was there too. She should have shown her face.

Joanna keeps fast forwarding, as, for a brief second, the face of a cat fills the Zoom screen. Might it be worth taking a look at the CCTV footage from the day of their wedding? Holly’s excuse was that she was working that day. Perhaps she was working at The Compound?

It’s a long shot, but it beats scrolling at random.