Page 183 of The Black Trilogy

I froze, hand on the doorknob, unable to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry. Just give me two minutes, would you? I’ll get my stuff and go.”

Rather than getting angry, he’d laid a huge paw on my shoulder. “You should have told me, child. We knew things were bad for you, but not this bad.”

I had a lump in my throat as I watched him clear out the room for me. When he told me I was expected for dinner each evening in the tiny one-bedroom flat he and Jackie shared above the gym, I could barely speak to say, “Thank you.”

Jimmy and Jackie turned into the closest thing to parents I ever had, and their patrons became my family. It was one of them, Donnie, who gave me the job at Silk.

“I’ve seen you dancing around while you clean, love,” he said to me. “If you’re interested in making a few quid extra, reckon I’d have a job for you.”

My first reaction had been, “No way,” but how else could I get enough money for university? There weren’t many jobs available to a person with no qualifications whatsoever, and even fewer that paid cash in hand, no questions asked.

Jimmy had been less than impressed when I told him my plan.

“You’re too good for that place, Amanda.”

“You gonna give me a pay rise?”

“Wish I could, but I can’t. It’s hard enough making ends meet in this place.”

“Then I’ve got to dance. I know you hate it, and I don’t like it either, but the money’s too good to turn down.”

“If anyone tries anything, they answer to me, you got that?”

“I got it. And Jimmy?” He looked down at me. “Thank you.”

Hundreds of pairs of eyes roaming over my body made my flesh crawl, but I put it out of my mind as I counted my cash each night. Donnie looked after me and made sure the bouncers did too, partly because Jimmy threatened to put him in an early grave if he didn’t but mostly because he was a decent guy who just happened to own a strip club.

I never did private dances or spent time alone with the customers. Any man who touched me got escorted from the premises in a headlock, usually after his instep had been introduced to my stiletto. I went to work, did my thing on stage, served a bunch of drinks, then got out of there as fast as humanly possible.

That fateful Friday night had been a quiet one at Silk. The local pubs were showing a big football match, and half of the regulars preferred to watch a bunch of overpaid boys running around a pitch rather than a bunch of underdressed girls dancing around a stage.

Tips were down, which meant I couldn’t pass up the chance to make a bit of extra cash, legal or not. Living on the streets did that to you—the lines between wrong and right got blurred, and you learned to survive by whatever means necessary.

So, when I saw a tall, well-dressed man emerging from the steps of Aldgate tube station right ahead of me, tucking his tube ticket into his wallet and placing it into his right-hand jacket pocket, my synapses fired at a thousand miles an hour and came up with a plan.

The guy turned right and walked towards me, and I kept my head down, watching him out of my peripheral vision. As he passed, I tripped over the edge of a paving slab and stumbled into him, grabbing onto his jacket to keep from falling.

He caught me easily, one hand on either side of my waist.

“Are you all right?”

His accent was American. A tourist, most likely, or a visiting businessman.

“Fine, thanks, just tripped,” I mumbled, acting embarrassed.

My smile was genuine—mission accomplished. He returned it, displaying a row of perfect white teeth as he set me back on my feet.

Just a simple mishap, right? I carried on my way, and he carried on his.

Except now I had his wallet.

CHAPTER 18

THE MAN’S FOOTSTEPS receded into the distance, and I resisted the urge to walk faster. Instead, I maintained the brisk-yet-casual pace expected of a woman out walking on her own at that late hour.

I must have been a couple of hundred yards down the road when a prickling of the hairs on the back of my neck told me something was wrong. The road curved to the right, and in the window of a clothes shop ahead of me, I saw the guy whose wallet I’d just liberated following me. Why had he turned around? He was close enough for me to see his eyes focused in my direction as his reflection floated eerily among the mannequins dressed up in evening wear.

My heart sped up as I considered my options.

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