Blood Sister: A thrilling and gritty crime drama (11 page)

The cop gave her a hard, intense look that said he could do whatever the hell he liked. He was a big bastard and used his bulk to loom over her, but she wasn’t scared of him. ‘Give it a rest for goodness sake.’

He turned the ticket over. ‘Come up from Mile End have you? What are you doing up here then?’

Tiffany scoffed loudly. ‘It’s a free country; I can go where I like. Listen boys, you ain’t got nothing, have you? Now let me go.’

Officer Crooked Nose let out a long-suffering sigh. ‘What we’ve got, young lady, is that we’ve just seen you emerge from a pub down the road – the Pied Piper. You know what kind of pub that is, don’t you?’

‘Yeah. It’s a butch girl and benders pub. So what?’’

‘We’d like to know what a young girl of your age is doing hanging around in a place like that?’ He was about to add that she might be vulnerable to corruption in there, but he’d already decided, in Tiffany’s case it might be a bit late to worry about that.

‘I’m . . .’ She hesitated; sometimes she forgot how old she was pretending to be. ‘Twenty-one. Yeah, twenty-one. I can go where I like. What’s your problem with gay people anyway? They ain’t doing no harm. Wind your watch up boys, it’s 1993.’

The cop reluctantly handed her ticket back. ‘Name and address.’

‘You ain’t getting it,’ Tiffany said with huge satisfaction. She drummed her fingers against the wall like this was all getting ever-so boring now.

Big Bastard looked smug like he had her handcuffed and bang to rights. ‘We’ll take you down West End Central, stick you in a cell and wait for you to be reported missing. I’m sure your parents will be very interested to find out where you go when you’re up West.’

Tiffany couldn’t resist laughing her head off. ‘Do me a favour. No one’s seen my Dad since I was in nappies and it’ll be weeks before my mum notices I’m gone.’ She knew the last was a lie; at least she had a mum who gave two hoots about her, unlike many of her mates down the graveyard. These two idiots were living in another time zone, where kids grew up in families of 2.4 children and Dad set off to work with a briefcase and a bowler hat and Mummy Dearest stopped at home wearing an apron and marigolds cooking chicken casserole for the rest of her life. A woman in an apron on The Devil? She would probably be gunned down for looking like a freak.

The two cops withdrew slightly to confer. Tiffany suddenly noticed that Man-donna was standing outside another bar down the road intently watching proceedings as he sucked on a fag. But when he realised that she’d clocked him, he flicked the ciggie and headed back to the Pied Piper. The strange thing was, Tiffany decided, he hadn’t looked at all put out that the cops had grabbed her.

She turned her gaze back on to the Bill. One of them was going through the motions of calling into base and asking if a girl of Tiffany’s age had been reported missing. But she knew they were doing it for form’s sake. She was in the clear. If they banged up every stray teen they found in the West End they’d need to build a block the size of Trafalgar Square.

‘Alright, sweetheart,’ Big Bastard said. He slapped his hands onto the wall, either side of her head, crowding her in. Up close he was a terrifying-looking man; the type, she suspected, who would slit your throat in a dark alley, no questions asked. ‘We’re letting you off with a warning this time. If we see you round here again, especially anywhere near that pub, we’re going to run you in. Do you understand? And we’ll be looking out for you.’

Tiffany sneered, ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah.’ The devil suddenly got into her, making her eyes twinkle with merriment. ‘Like I said, I’m twenty-one and if I want to go into that pub and tongue the life out of some girl there, ain’t dick you can do about it. Dick? No I don’t suppose me and my girl will need one of those.’

She smirked as she watched Big Bastard and Crooked Nose return to their cop-mobile. Tiffany laughed hard at them when she realised their plain clothes saloon had been given a ticket while they’d been giving her the third degree.

When they were gone, she returned to the pub and peered in through one of the windows. Behind the bar, her guy was having a serious convo on the phone. She guessed straightaway what had happened. There never had been a package for her to pick up and the local cops had been tipped off that a ‘vulnerable’ teen would be emerging from the pub, because someone wanted to see how she behaved under pressure. She assumed the person who’d ordered this charade was the gangster from Shadwell. Tiffany had been on the streets long enough to know how these things worked.

Thirteen

When Dee left the Alley Club early on her second day in the new job, she headed straight home to change out of her suit and into dull, casual clothes that made her look like a bit of a Doris. It wasn’t easy because she didn’t keep clothes like that in her stable, but eventually she found an old pair of slacks that she’d done some decorating in and a naff T-shirt she bought years back down Petticoat Lane Market (or The Lane as most people called it). In the bathroom, she scrubbed off all her Bobbi Brown and Fashion Fair face paint and roughed her hair up, so she looked like one of those washed-out housewife characters on
Jerry Springer
who really should have been barred from inflicting their cry-baby crap on anyone’s telly.

Before she left she stared dreamily at a ripped page from one of her mags, taped to the wall. It was a snap of a classic 1950s, two-seater Italian sports car: the Pirano FS. She closed her eyes, breathed deep and hard, and imagined herself in the driver’s seat, her long, smooth legs stretched out. She felt the sleek, soft leather seat heating up her hot, brown skin. Her hands gripped and glided around the steering wheel. The motherfucking speed blew her jet black hair into the breeze . . . Dee opened her eyes. This wasn’t just a car she was looking at; it was her two-finger salute to anyone who’d ever had the nerve to say that Dee Clark was only going to end up in one place: the gutter.

‘Pirano.’ The name of the car rolled soft, smooth and slow off her tongue; it came out of her mouth as ‘Peeee-rrran-oh.’ It sounded like a cocktail straight from heaven.

She almost bounced as she headed out, her confidence in her plans for John at an all-time high. But opening the door, she stopped dead in front of the person standing on the landing.

‘Hello, Dee,’ said her mum.

Jen was dead excited as she walked through the doors at Eastfield College on Whitechapel High Street, struggling with the large, black, zip folder that held her best fashion sketches. The building didn’t have the style or flare of the Whitechapel Library and Art Gallery, just down the road, but it didn’t need it; this was the place her dreams were going to be made. Well, that’s what her tutor William ‘call me Liam’ Gilbert told her anyway. He said that her work was exceptional and she was coming here in the evening so he could give her some additional tutoring, along with a select few other students. Plus, he said he could organise the month-long work placement she needed in a proper fashion outfit. She was going to take any extra help she could get, if it meant she’d make it in the fashion world and wave ‘bye-bye’ to The Devil.

When she entered the second floor art room she was surprised to see only Liam at his usual place behind the long desk at the front. He was one of those middle-aged men who tried to make himself look younger with gelled-back hair and a stud earring. The ‘Magnum’ ’tash totally spoiled the look but, hey, if the guy wanted to make a prize plonker out of himself that wasn’t her business; more important was what he could do to fast-track her fashion ambitions.

‘Where’s everyone else?’ she asked as she looked around the room.

Liam stood up, displaying low-riding, youthful, baggy jeans that were all wrong for his frame. ‘They couldn’t make it. But I’m not surprised. No commitment. Not like you, Jenny.’

She didn’t like him calling her Jenny but she was afraid to tell him because he might take it the wrong way. But his remark about her commitment perked Jen up even more. If there was one thing she had in spades it was commitment. From the age of ten she’d been committed to getting off that dump of an estate.

Liam smiled slowly, showing his slightly coffee-stained teeth. ‘I’m glad to see that you bought your portfolio. Bring it over here and you can take me through some of your sketches.’

Jen eagerly walked over to him and laid her portfolio on his desk. He stood very close to her, but she took no notice; she was too caught up in showing him her work. She unzipped the folder and set aside the small bag of pins. ‘I’ve got other portfolios at home, but this one I call my celeb collection,’ she gabbled away excitedly. She could feel his moist breath on her neck as she showed him the first sketch. ‘This one takes its inspiration from Courtney Love’s super-short baby doll dress.’ She shifted her finger and pointed. ‘I’ve changed it, so it’s not just plain buttons on the front, but military style buttons. Gives it a hard edge as well, if you wear the dress with Doc Martens.’

His hand, sporting his wedding ring, came to rest on the desk near her hip as he shifted himself behind her. ‘And this one,’ Jen continued as she flipped to another sketch, ‘is that Sharon Stone, showing-off-all-your-curves dress – the one she wore in
Basic Instinct
, you know where she . . .’ Jen’s face went pink.
The last thing I should be talking to my male tutor about is some woman flashing her fanny.

‘Oh, I know,’ he whispered by her ear. Jen inched slightly forward. She hadn’t realised he was that close to her. It made her feel kinda uncomfortable; probably just wanted to get a better view of her work. ‘Anyway,’ she continued, but her voice slightly shook. ‘I added a zip down the middle.’

‘Very inventive, Jenny. Very intense.’ Bloody hell his voice was practically down her ear hole. Why was he talking so soft and breathless like he’d been running for the number 25 bus and missed it? ‘Makes it so much easier for a man to zip the dress down from the front and take it off.’

Hang on a minute . . . That’s when she felt him lean into her and rub . . . No way. Her mind wouldn’t let her take it in. He couldn’t be rubbing his rock-hard dick against her bum? Yuk! WTF.

She froze, her heart thundering in her chest. ‘Mister Gilbert, what the effing hell are you doing?’

Instead of moving away he pressed deeper into her, his breathing more ragged and hoarse. She tried to wriggle free, but he clamped his arm around her middle and slammed her tight to him. She fought but he wouldn’t let her go. She could smell the nasty sweat coming off him, mixed with Old Spice and garlic.

‘Come on, Jenny, let’s not play silly buggers here.’ His tongue licked her neck as his fingers dug into her arm. ‘You knew that we would be on our own. You’re up for it as much as I am—’

‘Piss off am I up for it,’ she spat, wriggling but only succeeding in rubbing herself deeper against his hard-on. She started feeling scared, the sweat breaking out on her forehead. What if he raped her and she couldn’t stop him? People would probably say she was asking for it; what did she expect, meeting a fella on his own?

Stuff what other people thought. Jen gritted her teeth. ‘You better get your filthy knob and mitts off me mister or I’m . . .’

He let her go, which surprised her. But she didn’t hang around to find out why as she gathered up her portfolio. ‘I could make things happen for you, Jennifer,’ he coaxed softly; her hand shook as she zipped her portfolio shut. ‘I know people in the fashion world, from the West End to East London. I know a place that will be more than eager to take a girl like you for your work placement. With a click of my fingers’ – he did just that – ‘I could open up a whole new world for you.’

Instead of fleeing she stopped as his words sank in.

A whole new world.

‘It’s all waiting for you, my sweet girl.’ His tone was low and seductive. ‘All you’ve got to do is come and take it.’ He unzipped his jeans and his erect cock sprang free.

Jen stared at
it
, revulsion pulsing through her, then back at him. This man could make or break her. All she had to do . . .

Jen made her decision. ‘If I do it this once you’ll help me?’

‘Of course I will.’ He smirked. ‘Now come here and get on your knees and get that pretty mouth of yours ready for what it’s been begging for weeks to do.’

Jen carefully placed her portfolio down and slowly stepped towards him, her breath catching deep in her throat. One of her hands was tightened into a fist. She smiled shyly. ‘A girl likes to feel what she’s getting.’

He leaned his head back and sighed as her hands reached towards him. In one quick move Jen violently yanked his zip up. As the metal caught into his skin he jumped in the air and let out a noise that didn’t sound human. Jen opened her hand and stabbed one of her pins into his drooping willy. His scream was piercing this time as he dropped to his knees.

‘You perv,’ she spat at him. ‘I might be desperate to get out of Mile End, but I ain’t that desperate. I feel sorry for your wife.’ And with that she grabbed up her work.

‘No one will believe a girl like you, you know,’ he yelled at her, ‘so don’t even think about going to the college authorities. Who are they going to believe? A poverty-stricken girl like you or a respectable lecturer like me?’

Jen didn’t wait around to hear anymore. By the time she got to Aldgate East tube she was softly crying. He was right, no one would take her word over his. A girl from The Devil? You must be joking. There was no way she was coming back to this college. But what was going to happen to her dream? Of making it off the Essex Lane Estate? As the district line train pulled away, Jen sat tight and devastated in a seat, a single sentence twisting around her head to the rhythm of the train.

A girl like you.

A girl like you.

Fourteen

‘What are you doing here?’ Dee asked her mum with attitude. ‘We agreed to meet on Friday.’

She’d only recently met her mum for the first time and still wasn’t sure whether she liked her. How do you like the woman who dumped you as a kid and then got on with the rest of her life? But she’d been the one to hunt her mum down, not the other way around, so she couldn’t exactly slam the door in her face.