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the girl and grabbed her arm, recognition mixed with puzzlement written over his face.

      ‘Chloe? Fuck me girl, you’ve changed. The last time …’

      ‘I know, I know, the last time you saw me I looked a flipping geek.’

      Alfie’s voice was warm, his eyes reflecting the same sentiment. ‘I wasn’t going to say that … you’ve just, well, grown up, that’s all.’

      Chloe-Jane beamed a smile. ‘Oh you mean these. I had them done last year, cost five bleeding grand.’ She pointed to her large breasts, proudly sticking out her chest even further which caught the leering attention of a male passer-by, who quickly averted his eyes once he saw the steely glare of Alfie.

      Alfie pulled her towards him before taking his jumper off.

      ‘No, I didn’t mean them.’

      Chloe-Jane giggled as Alfie handed her his top. ‘Oh Uncle Alfie, you’re so old-fashioned.’

      Alfie’s voice was firm. ‘Just put it on.’

      Chloe-Jane decided it was best to do as her Uncle Alfie said. She pouted, taking the jumper begrudgingly. She liked showing off her body. Liked men looking at her. It made a change.

      For so long she’d been the geeky kid in school, with second-hand clothes and second-hand care. Her mother hadn’t given a shit about her. She was either boozed-up or cracked-up.

      She’d lost count of the amount of times she’d gone into short-term foster homes which were a relief from the chaos of life with her mother. If it had been her choice she would’ve stayed with any one of the foster carers she’d been to, apart from the last ones. Chloe shuddered, remembering.

      As foster carers went they’d been okay, well at first anyway. The woman, a doctor, had been harmless, though it’d been clear to Chloe that she disapproved of her. Her husband had been a lawyer and Chloe had thought he was kind. He’d taken her places, bought her things, told her she was pretty and treated her like a father would treat a daughter. Not that she knew what that was like, she never even knew who her dad was and neither did her mum. All Chloe had ever known was a procession of her mum’s violent boyfriends.

      The man had even bought her a puppy whom she’d named Timmy, a cute white poodle. Then on her sixteenth birthday he’d given her the best present ever. He’d offered to buy her a boob job, and of course she’d jumped at the chance.

      The operation had gone well and she’d gone up to a double EE. At only sixteen, the girls at school had been riddled with jealousy as suddenly overnight Chloe was now the most popular one with the boys. It’d been the happiest time of her life – and then it’d happened. Something she should’ve seen coming.

      She’d been asleep when her foster father had woken her up. His hands and his mouth groping at her, pulling at her body and breasts as she tried to push him off. But he’d been too strong for her and after putting up a fight, Chloe finally was overpowered and the man had forced his erect penis into her. That was the night Chloe-Jane Jennings had lost her virginity.

      The next day, Chloe had packed her things and gone to sit in the offices of social services, but as she had turned sixteen, no one had wanted to listen to her – she was too old. She’d gone back to her mother’s but had only lasted a further eight months before her mother’s behaviour had become too much for her.

      She’d slept on friends’ floors for another eight months before deciding to come up to London and leave Essex behind once and for all. And it was only when she’d arrived in London she’d remembered her Uncle Alfie. Her mother’s half-brother. She’d only ever seen him twice in her life. But both times she remembered vividly because of his kindness. So where better to come and stay but with him? After all, he was family.

      ‘I hope you don’t mind me turning up like this, it’s just I ain’t got anywhere else to go. But I reckoned you wouldn’t mind me staying with you.’

      Alfie stared at her. He hadn’t seen this coming, and even if he had there was just no way it was happening.

      ‘When you say stay, what exactly do you mean?’

      ‘Like stay. Crash out at yours. It’d be only for a couple of nights.’

      Alfie began to shake his head. ‘I don’t think that’d be a good idea.’

      Chloe-Jane looked at Alfie. She had to play this delicately. She glanced at Alfie slyly. Lying came second nature to her, after all, she was her mother’s daughter. Chloe chose her words very carefully.

      ‘Well that’s what my mum said, but I said you weren’t like that. I said you were the sort of bloke who wouldn’t mind me just turning up out of the blue.’

      Alfie silently nodded. It was true. He was a generous, welcoming guy. He listened on as Chloe continued.

      ‘I don’t know why Emmie thinks you’re ’orrible. She don’t know how lucky she is. If I had a dad like you, I’d …’

      Alfie smarted at hearing the name of his daughter. The idea that Emmie thought he was horrible killed him.

      ‘When did Emmie say that?’

      Chloe shrugged her shoulders, knowing it wasn’t true. In fact she hadn’t spoken to her cousin in years. She’d heard her mum speak to Janine – Alfie’s ex and Emmie’s mother – on the phone and retell all the ins and outs of what happened, but besides that she really didn’t know anything about Emmie.

      ‘Anyhow, I best be getting on, Uncle Alfie. I gotta find meself somewhere else to stay. Sorry for troubling you.’

      ‘No! Wait! Did your mum really call me a wanker?’

      Chloe shook her head and a look of relief passed over Alfie’s face, though it was only short-lived. ‘No, she actually called you a cunt.’

      Alfie’s face reddened.

      ‘Anyway Uncle Alfie, I really got to go.’

      ‘Maybe … maybe it’d be alright for a couple of nights.’

      ‘Really?’

      It was Alfie’s turn to shrug. ‘I guess … but I mean a couple.’

      Chloe squealed with delight as Alfie led her back to his flat. Well what could he do? After all, she was family. And family stuck together, no what matter what. The only problem was, Chloe was trouble. Alfie could smell it a mile away.

       4

      The scream echoed through the building and out onto the street as if it were a gush of air, causing the late-night passers-by to stop and wonder what they’d just heard, before hurrying quickly away.

      Inside one of the darkened rooms of the six-storey building Chang Lee owned in Gerrard Street, Chinatown, Mr Lee stood behind the two-way mirror. The building’s ground and first floor housed a restaurant run by some of Chang Lee’s men, with the higher floors used for late-night illegal gambling, and the basement where he was now, for moments like this.

      Chang watched his second-in-command, Lin, screw the pliers into the cheek of Sarp.

      ‘Open up. I said, open up!’ Lin shouted loudly, his eyes dancing in excitement as he began to extract the teeth of the man whose face already poured with blood.

      Mr Lee looked on calmly, not showing a hint of emotion, watching whilst a patch of urine spread further across the tormented man’s bloodstained underwear. He’d seen enough.

      ‘Stop!’ The one-word well-spoken order from Lee had Lin immediately breaking off from the pain they were inflicting on the man. Lin exhaled heavily, out of breath from all the physical exertion.

      Mr Lee came out from behind the mirror, walking over to the man who lay crumpled on the stone floor like a heap

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