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  "You okay today? You came in pretty rushed."

  There was a sandwich packet in the bag dangling from her fingers. My eyes locked onto it through the thin plastic and I could feel myself start to salivate. My stomach was already trying to digest itself.

  "School stuff. It's nothing."

  I got kept late because I still hadn't put in my UCAS application and the career guidance counselor wouldn't take the bloody hint. At St Paul's Girls everybody went on to university. She said that if I wanted to go on a Gap Year, I should apply anyway and get my place deferred. She said that if trekking around South East Asia was something I was seriously considering then I should share my plan with her so she could help get it up to scratch.

  She made me sit down and write a personal statement, which meant I had no time to eat before the start of my shift.

  It was a miracle I managed not to laugh in her earnest little face.

  But I couldn't tell her I wasn't doing either of those things. It would break all of Pierce's rules. His reputation was the only reason I still had my place at one of the top private schools in the country. He couldn't be seen treating his stepdaughter badly, no matter what went on behind closed doors. Couldn't kick me out of my dead mother's house either. Even though, as he loved to remind me, I had no legal right to it at all. Mum had died without a will. And deep down I knew he had something to do with it.

  "Nothing, huh?"

  "Yeah, Cassie, nothing. Sooner I'm done with it the better."

  "Don't wish your life away, kid."

  Lately, that was all I did.

  She must have noticed how hard I was staring at the sandwich, because she held out half when she opened it up, and I bit into it with precisely zero decorum.

  "Christ Elizabeth. You're supposed to be a lady.

  I grinned at her around a mouthful of BLT. "Which idiot told you that?"

  A lady wouldn't do what I was planning. A lady wouldn't sit in wait and bide her time like some kind of sociopath, playing an act.

  The past three years I'd been as obedient at home as I could stomach to get ahold of whatever I could to take Pierce down. I grit my teeth through his flares of temper, knowing it had to have been one of those to cause Mum's fall. I had a plan to stack up everything I could against him, and I was taking what I could get from him while I got it all together.

  I was nearly there. The only thing holding me back was needing to take my final exams. I wanted to get out with good enough grades to give me a start somewhere on my own. Once they were over, all bets were off.

  Three years, nine months and two days ago, my stepfather got into an argument with my Mum, and that was the last time she ever said anything at all. If it took losing everything I had left, I wasn't going to let him get away with that. Revenge was a long time coming and I was more than ready to take it.

  CHAPTER 2

  Elizabeth

  It was late when I clocked off and the half sandwich I had shoved down my throat on break hadn't done much to make a dent in my appetite. But I had other things on my mind other than the hollowness of my stomach.

  Making sure Cassie didn't see me, I went around to the back of the kitchens after I had said goodbye. When I poked my head around the door of the office she was busy cashing up for the evening, a distinct frown on her face as she jabbed figures into the boxy computer on the paper-strewn desk.

  The door to the alley was open, same as usual, spewing steam and cooking smells out into the air. It was always like a furnace in there. I didn't know how the kitchen staff handled it.

  Right on time, Ben stepped out into the street, wiping the sweat off his forehead and taking out a packet of cigarettes. Refusal to vape ran in the family. He was Cassie's nephew. Her brother Mitch's son.

  He was an older guy, his body wasn't bad, because he was down at the gym helping his dad out on most of his days off. But there wasn't a thing about Ben that interested me. If he had more backbone, maybe I would have found him remotely attractive, but I just couldn't be interested in a guy who thought it was fine to stay exactly where he was, in the hole he found himself in.

  "Alright Ben."

  He looked up, cigarette between his lips, and he wiped his hand on his slightly grubby whites before he renewed the grip on his lighter and sparked a flame to light it.

  "Alright Lizzie." He squinted at me uneasily through a cloud of exhaled smoke from that first puff and I tried not to wrinkle my nose.

  Ben was somewhere close to thirty, or so I thought. He was a big, beefy guy who'd looked out for me since my first shift here. And just like Cassie and Mitch had, he'd taken me under his wing in a kind of big brother role.

  He fended off the cat calls and whoops the other chefs sometimes started up with in my direction. Not that I needed the help. Out in the bar I didn't cross paths with them so often, but when we did it was pretty clear that I could hold my own. I wasn't like the other waitresses, ready with a laugh and a blush when they tried something.

  And he liked me enough to do what I asked, even when it wasn't remotely sensible. Sometimes I worried he thought I owed him more than friendship.

  "Did you get it?" I asked.

  He gave me a long, hard look and I knew he was thinking of ways to tell me that what I was after wasn't the right course. "Lizzie…"

  "I told you not to call me that." I didn't like the idea of him thinking we were all that close, because I didn't want to lead him on. "It's Elizabeth or Liz if you really must. Did you get it for me?"

  "Begging your pardon for being friendly." He shook his head, and for a minute I regretted being so sharp. The big dumb idiot looked nearly wounded.

  "Ben, please. I'm sorry. Did you get it for me or not?"

  "Course I did. Do anything for you, I would."

  With a heavy sigh, he walked past me, over to the large rectangular wheelie bins and pushed the blue one away from the wall a little. I watched him crouch down and pick up one of those thin sports bags slung on strings. The way it hung taut told me whatever was inside was heavy.

  I pulled the neck of the bag open when he handed it over to me and took out a bundle of old toweling.

  Ben looked anxious. He kept glancing over his shoulder as though he was expecting a police raid at any minute. How anyone could ever think he was really capable of robbery, I had no idea.

  "You don't need to get it out here. Come on, seriously. What are you playing at?"

  I only just managed not to roll my eyes and I unraveled the towel despite him. I wanted to see what my hard earned money had gotten me, his neuroticism wasn't going to get in the way of that.

  The weight of the revolver when it fell into my waiting palm was more than I'd expected. It was deeply, seriously cold and there was a deadly heft to the thing even though it was stubby and small. I tilted it to see the Smith and Wesson logo on the side, and a rough patch where what I guessed was the serial number had been filed off.

  Ben let out an irritated huff and he glanced nervously towards the door. I swear I had more balls than he did. "Elizabeth…"

  "What?"

  "If the cops get wind of this…"

  Ignoring his warning tone, I took hold of the gun with both hands, raising it high to squint through the sights.

  "Tell them, did you? Relax. It's not like some Community Support Officers about to wander round the corner."

  "Christ almighty. Stop larking about. Put it away before someone sees."

  A minute longer and he might have wet himself.

  I shook my head, and lowered the gun. His nerves weren't going to take much more. It was duly disappointing to see him act like this, but not exactly a surprise. I'd been badgering him about this gun for months.

  "Calm down. Don't get your knickers in a twist. No one's going to come around the corner at this time of night. It's only you and me still here from the hotel."

  "You don't know that. Anyone could turn the corner."

  I really did roll my eyes then and I couldn't stop myself from letting ou
t a heavy sigh. "Fine." Taking pity on him, I re-wrapped it in the towel before dropping it into the flimsy gym bag. "Thanks again, by the way. This is perfect. You got bullets too, right?"

  I didn't want the lecture I could feel brewing, and I was trying to head it off by hurrying him up so I could make myself scarce.

  Someone like Ben thought if you kept your head down and got on with the job life was going to turn around one day. It was why he was stuck one level above pot boy, and there was no way he was going any further while they kept recruiting people who were less nice than him. Less of a walk over.

  He was too kind. Too willing to do anything for anybody. It was why he'd done a stretch in prison. To keep his mate out of jail because he had a baby on the way and Ben thought he could handle it. I have no doubt he could. But I had no respect for him as a man. Sometimes you had to do something. You couldn't just stand there and keep taking it day after day, year after year. I had no concept of how he did that without a plan to move on, or go up the ranks or get into a better situation.

  He thought everything would turn out sunshine and rainbows if I just kept waiting a bit longer. But I was done having everyone else dictate the terms of my life. I wanted to take back control and this seemed like the best way.

  He dug deep in his pocket and pulled out a box of bullets. "Thanks Ben."

  "I really… I definitely think you should think this through again, though Liz." For a minute I thought he wasn't going to hand them over. I was prepared to take them off him if I had to.

  Shaking my head, I slung the bag onto my back. "Don't give me that. If you really thought that you wouldn't have gotten it for me."

  Ben looked exasperated.

  "You would have gotten it somewhere else, though wouldn't you? You know this ain't a good choice."

  "No? What am I supposed to do, Ben? Just sit back, do nothing. Carry on letting him get away with it. He got off scott free for what happened to Mum and that's the only reason I've stayed where I am. Well, it's ending now. Just as soon as I finish my last exam, it's over."

  Ben flinched. "Why don't you just go to the cops? They'd help. You could tell them what he's done."

  I let out a laugh. "You're telling me to go to the cops? They stitched you up for something you didn't even do. You're an idiot, Ben."

  "Fuck you too, Liz."

  I swallowed hard, shook my head. "Shit, okay. I'm sorry. But I've seen what he does, Ben. He's too well connected. He'd get himself the best lawyer he could afford and they'd spin some story about me being vindictive, making it all up. I know how he works. I've seen how he lies. He gets people to believe him. That's what he does every day. It's his job."

  His shoulders sagged and he thrust the small box into my hands. "Just try not to get yourself caught, yeah? Dad'll bollock me if he finds out what your planning."

  I patted him on the shoulder, barely believing that out of the two of us, he was the one that needed telling how to handle his parents, even though he was over a decade older. He really needed to break away. "So don't tell him."

  "Yeah. That's all well and good until you turn up on the six o'clock news, ain't it?" He squinted at me, taking another drag of his cigarette and I watched it burn down close to his yellowed fingers. "You even know how to use that thing?"

  I gave him a long look of my own, turning on my heel to look back at him over my shoulder as I started out of the alleyway, towards my bus stop. "I'm sure'll figure it out. Don't you worry yourself Ben. I'll be just fine."

  Maxim

  The Chelsea townhouse came into focus when I adjusted the camera, and I tested the hook up to the screen. For all his talk about secrecy, Sutherland wasn't very security-minded at all.

  I was glad. If he was, I wouldn't have been able to follow Elizabeth as she walked around the house, flattening herself out of view to avoid bumping into Pierce on the landing, and scurrying up and down the stairs like a thief in her own home.

  Her behavior had confused me before I'd figured out what was going on.

  She was wealthy. Or her parents had been. By right she should have the same dim, horsey look that the rest of the Chelsea Elite inhabited. But she was different. I'd known that since I first set eyes on her from across the street.

  She'd come in out of the rain, and kicked her shoes off, clutching them in one hand as she bounced on the balls of her feet, compact and powerful. Running up the stairs, she stripped off her wet clothes like some kind of otherworldly nymph, and I halfway fell in love with her before she’d even reached the landing.

  I knew I shouldn't have watched, but I couldn't take my eyes off her.

  Wet clothes revealed a taut stomach and long, muscled limbs. Her perfectly rounded breasts were small enough to fit in the palms of my hands, tipped by dark, inviting areolas and perked nipples begged to be kissed and sucked. I was transfixed, right from that moment, horrified with myself that I couldn't look away, and I was getting hard watching this girl who was barely a woman strip down to her bright white underwear, thinking about how well I could warm her up.

  She might have been young, but there was nothing childlike about her. A woman she was, through and through. I had no doubt of that, not once.

  I'd seen a hundred other women technically more beautiful than she was. In my job, I dealt with so many sophisticated socialites who thought they could impress me with slow-batted eyelashes and absent boyfriends or husbands, so many women with short skirts and a willingness to use the length of their legs and the size of their breasts to get what they could out of me. But not one of them made me want them the way I wanted her.

  She had a purity about her, somehow, beneath her rugged, tomboy looks. As I watched her, I saw the delicate core of her that she kept hidden.

  Bundled into a fluffy robe that had the logo of the hotel she worked at embroidered on the front pocket, with her short hair and her muscled arms, was the only woman who made me forget the rest of the world existed.

  I would have crossed the street and broken down the door just to go upstairs and towel her feet dry, and worshipped them forever, if it hadn't been for Valentin in my ear.

  The first time I saw him hit her, I thought I'd let my eyes slip, and my subconscious had made it up, just because he was a boring, tiresome git, and sometimes, late at night, on high alert, my mind made up all kinds of things.

  She barely flinched, just carried on like nothing had happened, packed up what she was doing and left the room.

  The only reason I didn't shoot him right then and there, square in the middle of the forehead, was because I questioned whether it had actually happened.

  Sometimes she made it easy to miss the blows because she didn't react at all, and I hated to think how many hours that level of self-control had taken her to achieve.

  Three weeks in, I was unhealthily obsessed, and I didn't care. She was the reason I was still here, even though Sutherland was going to carry on with his predictable routine and give me nothing new and I should have been pushing on with the publisher's office instead. But I couldn't leave her alone with him.

  As close to the window as I dared, I scanned the darkened street with my binos, waiting impatiently for her to appear, irritated by the sound of the microwave behind me. I hated when she was out of my sight, and that was most of the time when I was trailing Sutherland.

  But there she was. Right on time.

  The microwave pinged.

  I juggled the hot plastic tray my dinner came in down onto the upturned crate I'd been using as a table. Jabbing at the skin of melted cheese with the tiny plastic spork the supermarket called cutlery, I took a seat on the decorators' step stool, wary of the way it creaked under me and adjusted the angle of the screen of the laptop for a better view.

  This place was all plasterboard, plastic sheeting and exposed wiring, stuck somewhere between the first and second fix. Valentin had links with the firm who had the contract on the building. The owners were friends of his, although the paperwork didn't say so.

  It
meant I had all the time I needed here, right opposite Pierce Sutherland's home, and an ability to come and go during the day without arousing suspicion, as long as I banged around enough and played the radio loud. Outside business hours I had to be more stealthy. So candlelight it was.

  You couldn't get much more romantic than that, even though the cuisine was lacking.

  I snarled down at the lasagne. The packet said it was the luxury range. I was unconvinced there was a great deal of difference between one dogmeat lasagne and the next. This one came in family size, and it was going to put more of a dent in my appetite than the child-sized portion that was supposed to be a calorie appropriate meal size. Not for a man with my metabolism it bloody well wasn't.

  Across the street, the kitchen light flickered on, and Elizabeth moved into view across the screen. It had taken some gymnastics to get the camera at the right angle to peer into the basement window of the kitchen, and I'd never admit I did it just for this.

  It had become a habit to wait for her to get in from her shift at the hotel bar I knew she worked at, and set my dinner out at the same time she had her's.

  First she'd pour a glass of water from the tap and nearly down it, before filling it again right up to the brim. Then she'd take a plate down from the cupboard, and pick up a fork. Sometimes she’d microwave something.

  Tonight she had a takeout box.

  "You have a good day?" I asked her, knowing she couldn't hear. It was a bad habit to fall into, but I'd started it weeks before.

  There were no microphones, no voice receivers . I hadn't been able to get in to bug the house - too busy tailing Sutherland. That was going to be the next step, but to do it right, I needed a far better locksmith than me, and an entire team to scour the place, plant bugs and leave it looking entirely undisturbed in the small window of time we could guarantee. Either that, or we needed someone with a key who could come and go at will, and do it piecemeal.

  Until then, I only had eyes on the building, eyes on her, even though I wanted far more than that. One day soon, I was going to make my approach and get it, but before then, I could imagine I was talking to her at least.