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Not Forgotten by Tanya H It was my habit to smoke my first cigarette of the day on my balcony overlooking the river. I called it my balcony because nobody else used it, but really it was the landing at the head of the fire escape that zig-zagged down the back of the old mill where I lived and worked. The murky waterway wasn't actually a river, but a canal, bounded on each side by old warehouses and factories. I didn't like to smoke in my room, though I wasn't really sure why not. While my room might have contained all my clothes, make up, jewellery, knick-knacks and mementos, it was not the sanctuary I thought a good bedroom should be. It was the place where I worked for one thing. Anyway, I didn't smoke in my bedroom, nor did I allow my clients to, if they smoked at all. Despite what went on there, I tried to keep it fresh, feminine and airy without the stench of sex or fat men. I worked to keep it from looking and smelling like what it actually was; as though I wasn't what I actually was. It wasn't a bad place to live, I suppose. As well as the bedroom, with a necessarily large bed with convenient posts at each corner, I had my own very small en-suite and what might have been called a box room. Not having any boxes, I had a relatively comfy chair in there, a soft blanket as that room wasn't heated, and the shelves on which I kept my precious books. Sometimes I would take my chair and a book onto my balcony, mostly I'd shut myself into my little library and read my way into different worlds or different lives. On that particular morning I stood in the early sunshine - it lanced down through the grimy warehouses and tower blocks and hit my balcony for about twenty minutes a day, if the clouds allowed - and enjoyed a cup of tea and a cigarette before breakfast. I treated myself to a bowl of low fat, high fibre cereal with skimmed milk and a glass of grapefruit juice, before getting my stuff together for my daily trip to the gym. En-route I stopped at the corner shop. I had a routine: every day I bought a newspaper and bottled water, every other day I bought a pack of cigarettes, a bar of chocolate and some crisps - my treats. Everything else I needed called for a tram ride into the city centre. Mrs Patel saw me as I opened the shop door. She scowled, called out something in a mysterious language and disappeared into the back. A minute later Mr Patel steered his belly to the space behind the counter and gave me his cheery smile. I'm not sure how Mrs Patel discovered my job, maybe the number of condoms I'd bought when I'd started, but as much as she wouldn't speak to or serve me, or let her children on the shop floor if I was in there, Mr Patel never judged or treated me any differently to any of his other customers. "Katarzyna! What a beautiful morning, sunshine since five AM, how blessed we are! You are looking lovelier than ever." Only two people used my full name, Mr Patel and Jason. Everybody else called me Kate or Katie. I liked the way Mr Patel said it. "Thank you, Mr Patel," I said and smiled back, "but you should have gone to Specsavers! It's barely seven in the morning, I'm not wearing any makeup and I was up late last night." He dismissed this with a wave of his hand. "Your loveliness cannot be touched by mere cosmetics, or your... late nights." He tutted. A couple of times a year he would try and persuade me to give up my work and find something more respectable. While I decided which chocolate and what flavour crisps I would treat myself to, Mr Patel had already laid a pack of cigarettes and a bottle of water, my favourite brands, on the counter. "You should give these up, my dear," he suggested again as I put the cigarettes into my handbag. "They are not good for you, they will make your lovely skin like this." He scratched his dirty fingernails down his stubbly cheek. "Smoking will not make me need to shave, Mr Patel, but thanks for your concern." I touched the back of his hand when he pushed my change towards me. It felt pathetic, but I thought he might be the closest thing to a friend I had. I had often thought to give up smoking; I was well aware of the health risks and I was usually too self conscious to smoke in front of anybody else (though sometimes Jason insisted). I'd used and abused much more addictive drugs than nicotine and left them behind me, but had never given up my cigarettes. Maybe it was too much of a routine, perhaps I needed to maintain one addiction in case I went back to the others, but mostly whenever I thought too long about who I was and what I did, or when I woke after my usual jittery sleep, the nicotine or simple rhythm of smoking calmed me - allowed me to go on. Saying my goodbyes, I was about to step back into the spring sunshine when a fresh poster on the notice board by the door stopped me dead in my tracks. Not Forgotten Martin James Fielding. Missing 5 Years. A picture of some young man, a few years younger than me - maybe his mid-twenties - looked out from the poster. He had a winning grin, big round eyes and floppy dark hair. I found myself thinking of how attractive he looked; the kind of lad who would sit down with a girl in an evening to watch a movie or play a game. Maybe they would go for long walks, through fields and across moors. They would have a dog to throw sticks for, and a cat to purr on a knee... "It has been five years since he went missing," said Mr Patel. I hadn't noticed him walking up to stand beside me. "Before you came, I think. He was from the other side of the city, a nice place, but they found his car just around the corner." "That's awful," I said, with the dreams of holding his hand while we walked along by a river softening and fading. "Did he have a family?" "A wife and a young daughter." I looked at the picture for a few moments, Mr Patel looked too, as though we were having a vigil for the poor man. Perhaps I was over- sentimentalising about this complete stranger; perhaps he'd run out on his wife and child, unable to cope with the demands of parenthood. Though he didn't look the sort, he looked pleasant, dependable... "He was a policeman," Mr Patel said. "I believe he got to close to something bigger than the life of one policeman." He looked through the door towards where I lived and worked. "There are big secrets around here." "His poor family," I whispered. 'All without him." "Why do you do what you do, Katarzyna?" Mr Patel said softly. He was offering me a paper tissue and only then did I realise there were tears running down my cheeks. "You aren't what you are." I mumbled some thanks, for the sentiment and the tissue, dried my face and walked off to the gym. The problem was I didn't really know who I was, or what I was. A woman - that was indisputable; a pretty one too, I'm not boasting but otherwise I wouldn't have make so much money for Jason. I turned heads when I walked down the street, even dressed demurely as I was now in a long, multi-coloured peasant skirt and a plain crew-neck top that hid the scars and bruises along my arms. My shining, red-blonde hair was tied back severely in a plait, and without makeup or jewellery I could have been any young woman hurrying along for an early morning walk. But I wasn't. I was a ghost without driving licence, bank cards, passport or identification at all. I didn't even know if Katarzyna Mynarska was my real name and I was probably not a citizen of the United Kingdom, maybe not even of the European Union. I was almost certainly an illegal immigrant. Perhaps I could have been trafficked into the country. Jason knew more than he told me. "I found you under a railway bridge, in Bradford," he'd told me, though once he'd said Wakefield and another time, Leeds. The way he looked at me when he said it might have meant he was teasing, but Jason was very hard to read. "But why bring me with you, here?" I'd asked. "You had good teeth and you were still achingly pretty, even with what you'd been doing to yourself." Makes him sound like a bit of philanthropist, doesn't it? Taking junkies in off the street. He owned me now. Every so often he would make the point, just to remind me. The gym was owned by one of Jason's lieutenants, an up and coming member of Manchester's underworld. I got free membership; no questions asked, no membership card, no records. I'd had an induction by a very handsome personal trainer who wouldn't look me in the eye, or even the chest, as though I was the queen of some tyrannical state whose King would have made him a eunuch if ever he thought I'd been disrespected. "Why do you do so much?" Jason asked, when he'd once took the trouble to come and watch me. I swam, did boxercise, running, rowing, weights and Pilates there. Not only was I curved and feminine, but lean and quick. I did self-defence classes and knew how to hurt people - not that anybody would have dared try anything on with one of Jason's women. "I'm thirty this year," I said. "You won't let me have my rooms if I'm fat and flabby, will you?" That had made him smile; he'd kissed my cheek, but not denied the allegation. But I didn't feel myself on that morning. There was no rhythm in me on the treadmill, no balance or energy for the weights, no stillness for pilates. I kept seeing the face of Martin James Fielding: I couldn't stop wondering about his wife and his daughter - had they reconciled themselves to their husband and father never coming home? Worse than that, the more the morning went on, the more I was sure I had seen him in Jason's club. How many thousands of people had come through the doors since he'd been missing, though? Why was I so sure I had seen him and so sure I had seen him at the bar in one of the private rooms having a drink with Jason? He was in his office when I got back. The building was open, a couple of cleaners were sharing some gossip by the loading bay where draymen were rolling barrels of lager from the back of a curtain-sided lorry. Jason never locked up. There were no cameras around the building, no alarms. He only had bouncers because the police insisted as part of his licence, but there was never any trouble. Nobody tried it on in Jason's place. "Would you like a drink, Katarzyna?" he said as I tried to whisper silently past. "That would be nice, thank you." He would not have asked if he had not wanted me to have a drink with him. I spun in the passageway, my skirt fanning out around me, and went back to the office, arranged myself gracefully on a low chair while he made tea from his private stock of Earl Grey. "Why am I a whore?" I asked. "Everybody must be something," he said swirling leaves and hot water in the teapot. Jason was neither old nor young, tall or short. His dark skin gave him a smooth, Mediterranean look, his hair was black and cut short. He was always well shaved. Jason's quiet, smooth voice lacked any noticeable accent and contrasted with many of the men he did business with. He was never ostentatious or flashy, always well dressed whether in a suit or jeans. I could never really think of him as my pimp, he was much more than that. What had he been to Martin Fielding? "Why do you ask?" he added. "It's not a respectable job." "You think I don't respect you?" "You own me." He smiled and poured tea into a Manchester City mug then dropped in a slice of lemon. "Are you not happy here? With your books and music? Your friends?" "My friends are whores too." "You're not defined by your profession, Katarzyna. None of you are." "What would happen if I said I wanted to stop?" "I would prefer it if you didn't. I'm fond of you." He said it softly, but the words were more than just that. The threat hung between us for a second until he said, "Besides, what would you do?" "Aren't I a good barmaid?" "One of the best, but you might find it hard to find work while awaiting deportation." I sipped my tea. It was exquisite. "I keep wondering who I am." He raised his eyebrows, so I continued. "Why do I read in English? I've tried reading Polish, and Russian, I tried to learn, but I couldn't get my head around either." "We've talked about this before, Katarzyna." Apparently the brain was a complex thing - especially with all the drugs and combinations of drugs I'd been abusing and the fact that I had been in a coma for several days after Jason found me. "Was I worth it? All the effort you took to clean me up and make me like this?" "You were a sound investment." He offered me a cigarette from a lacquered box from his wide desk then lit it for me. I blew smoke at the ceiling. Not having had one since the balcony this morning, I realised I probably needed the hit. It felt like I was blowing my tension away with the smoke, as though I'd never seen that picture of Martin. And he was right, where would I go? What would I do? It was likely I'd end up working on my back again wherever I went - before or after being deported. Being a prostitute was what I knew. "How could I make you happier?" he asked when my cigarette was mostly ash. "I don't need anything else, Jason." "I have a gift for you." Normally a gift for me would be a gown, some designer shoes, jewellery or fine perfume. Once I'd been given a trip to Edinburgh, on my own, to see the Christmas fair. Occasionally he would give me a book, leather bound by some classical author, though he must have known I liked romances, thrillers and fantasy with wizards, dragons and magic. This time my gift was in a small, brown envelope. "When I took you in, Katarzyna, of your few possessions this is all I kept." The envelope was sealed. I teased it open with my manicured nails and inside I found half of a photograph. It was a little girl, on a beach. She looked about six years old and wore grubby pink leggings and a striped T-shirt with a Disney princess on it. Her hair was tangled and strawberry blonde and she was turned to one side and looking up, probably to the person on the missing side of the picture. "It's you," said Jason. I stared until my eyes ached. Her face was a little blurred, as though the shutter had snapped the image just as she was turning, but the hair was the right colour, she was fair skinned like me. Who was the adult she was looking at? My mother, father? Maybe an older sister or brother. My throat closed up and I wondered if I might cry in front of him. I wasn't sure how he'd react to that. "Thank you," I muttered. I slipped the picture back in the envelope and put it carefully into my handbag for studying later. "Jason, if I asked you, would you help me find them?" "No." He didn't even pause to think about it. "Why do you think you were under that railway bridge selling yourself and filling your body with heroin?" I just stared at the floor. I didn't know that woman, or what she had done; what she had gone through. "You weren't there because you were having a lovely time with your family, girl. Somebody hurt you and the people who should have protected you didn't. That's why you'd run away from them. It happens all the time. You're one of the lucky ones." I suppose I was lucky - lucky to be a high-class prostitute at the beck and call of a wealthy criminal. "Thank you," I repeated. "You're welcome. Now, about tonight..." This was why he had made me a drink. "You will be eye-catching and irresistible tonight." "A special customer?" "Very. He will in the club, by special invitation. Dress appropriately, I will point him out. Seduce and bed him, then bring him to me." Jason knew I'd fuck this man for him and the special customer would never know he'd been with a whore - maybe not even after Jason had sprung whatever trap was planned for this particular person. I wondered for a moment what he might have done, but didn't take the thoughts further than that. It was better not to know. After all, Jason owned me - I was his whore, no matter how fond of me he might say he was. No money would change hands when my duties were done, whenever that might be. I was never given the money directly anyway - I got mine every week in cash direct from Jason's hands like other prostitutes did. He never had less than five, never more than ten. There were six of us at the moment, but I had been here the longest. Sometimes I wondered what that meant. I'd learnt early on not to ask what had happened to the girls who'd been here when I started. He took my mug and ashtray when I had done and gestured elegantly towards his desk. I didn't need to be asked twice. I even smiled at him as I bent over and pressed my breasts against his blotter. He lifted my skirt and pulled aside my panties very gently, his fingers were warm. As he preferred, we were both silent while he fucked me. He left his office door open, but the day staff and even the drayman who walked past knew better than to comment while he reminded me of my place. *** Jason's club has many parts, from the Palatial Office he rarely uses on the top floor, to the bedrooms one floor down where me and the other girls live, and work, with a mixture of bars, a restaurant, conference rooms, lounges and function rooms on the next two floors below. Underneath them is the basement and that's where the nightclub is. The whole place is an old tobacco warehouse and I hate to imagine how much it cost to transform. I'm not much of a clubber, in fact I don't contribute much to the night time economy - going out to bars and clubs, not Jason's, just felt like being at work. Even so, I quite like Jason's basement club; it's relatively exclusive, his bouncers are well paid and know who to let in, Jason got in some really good designers and for all its size the way they created different levels, angles and spaces gave it an intimate feel. After a long, hot shower I chose an outfit to reflect the location and Jason's instructions; a stretchy, hot pink mini dress that left one shoulder bare, showed off much of my breasts and covered me from just below the lace tops of the sheer black hold-ups I smoothed over my legs. Contrasting with the gleaming black nylon were very tall stilettos, which matched my bright dress perfectly. I brushed my hair back into a pony tail, to swing around me as I danced, and spent some time darkening my eyes with kohl and mascara, added a few sparkles to my cheeks and painted my lips a rich, rose pink. With some understated jewellery I was exactly what Jason had in mind for whatever scheme was underway. It was not always like this. I was often expected to dress like some kind of street corner hooker for Jason's people. I would strut and teeter in 'fuck-me' shoes, ripped nylons and indecent micro-skirts for blustering, posturing males covered in heavy chains and tattoos. I had dressed as some kind of stereotyped schoolgirl in pleated skirt, white cotton panties and knee socks while a Chief Constable caned me. I'd wound myself around a polished steel pole wearing only stockings and heels for a group of Japanese business men who I'd then sucked off, one after the other until my jaw ached and I was drooling cum. I'd been tied on my back, naked across a table for a charity night, open to be fucked or fingered or groped by whichever of the men there wanted me. I'd had wine bottles, chocolate bars, candles, breadsticks, cocktail stirrers, cigars, pool queues, cucumbers and bananas put inside me. I'd fucked several men's arses with while wearing strap-on dildos, and one man's wife. I'd been photographed and filmed performing and I knew how to turn my body like a porn actress so the camera always got a good view of my body and the man fucking me. Most of the time they did not realise they were being recorded until they found themselves having a frank talk with Jason a few days later. I'd been a lesbian, I'd lost count of partners for group sex. I even took clients to my room for sex where the only thing Jason gained was the money they paid to fuck me, like an ordinary whore and not a part of Jason's influence through the city. The only thing Jason had drawn the line at was a Liverpool gangster who'd wanted his Doberman to mount me. He'd given Emma, one of the newer girls, that job instead. I suppose that showed how fond he was of me. Emma was on duty in one of the other bars that night. I found her at a ground floor staff entrance sneaking a cigarette when I went for one of my own. She was slender, with a boyish figure and thick, curling brown hair that never seemed to stay in a style for very long. She was an orphan of drugs, like me, but I think she was English - her accent was very neutral. We'd never spent much time together, I'd always thought of her as vacant and sleepy and I didn't know what Jason saw in her, though she was popular amongst many of the regulars. When she waved hello something about the way the light caught her face, or the way a lock of hair tumbled around her face at that moment made me stop and stare. "Something wrong, Kate?" she murmured in her dreamy way. I shook my head. The moment passed. "I thought there was an eyelash on your cheek." She brushed her cheek anyway and we didn't speak until she went back to work. I watched her go for as long as I dared, but for that moment I had thought I'd seen Martin James Fielding as a pretty young whore in a tight black dress and silver heels. Martin Fielding had been in a meeting with Jason, I was certain now. The thought of phoning the number I'd seen on that poster in Mr Patel's shop gave me a thrill of fear, for if Jason found out he would kill me... but he would have to find out first. Maybe my phone call, surely I could do that without giving myself away, might be the lead giving some closure to that wife and daughter on the other side of the city. I owed them that much, for the sake of my own lost family. Whether or not my name was Katarzyna Mynarska, surely there were parents somewhere in the world who would want to know where I was. If somebody had a little bit of information that might lead them to me, surely I wouldn't want that information keeping back. For now, though, I had work to do. The club was heaving, bass making the air solid with noise, floor shaking, presses of people around the bars. I made my way to one of the entrances, where I found the head doorman, George the Giant, leaning against a pillar sipping mineral water. "Looking good, Kate," he said, leaning close so I could hear him. "If only there was a staff discount scheme." Despite being a vast expanse of bone and muscle barely held together by a properly tailored suit, George was a gentle man whom I found attractive enough to have considered as a lover. He was happily devoted to his wife, almost as tall as him, and anyway Jason wouldn't have liked that. I couldn't remember ever having had sex with anybody where there was any emotion involved; maybe I had in my forgotten life. "It would make us both feel awkward afterwards," I shouted back. "True. Shall I show you your target?" It was a slim, dark haired and tanned man in hid mid-twenties. He had big, brown eyes that widened appreciatively when I edged in beside him as he was waiting to be served at the main bar. 'Just here for the eye-candy or looking for something a bit more physical?' I said, leaning in to be heard. He just looked like an ordinary guy, well turned out but not flashy; I couldn't see any jewellery or tattoos at all. Fighting down an urge to look over my shoulder, to see George the Giant and be sure I was with the right guy, I gave him my best smile. George would already have made some discreet sign if I'd got the wrong target. A momentary flash of concern swept his face, soon gone as I lent forward to let him see down the front of my dress. Bingo! He took in a good look at my boobs. "You're very forward,' he said, looking into my eyes. "Listen, I'm not going to drag you into the toilets to fuck you," I said warmly, with a giggle at the end. "At least, not straight away. We can dance and have a drink and a little small talk first.' "Wow! They promised me a great night time in here and they weren't kidding!' I shrugged nonchalantly. "You're a good looking guy, I'm feeling hot... what's not to like?" "I'm supposed to getting some drinks for my mates." "I don't fancy being shared around." Turning away slightly, I scanned some of the people close by, feigning a little disinterest. When he touched my bare arm lightly I knew I had him. "Dancing with you would be more fun.'" There was a boyish eagerness in his face that made him doubly attractive. For a moment I was light on my feet, ready to turn away and leave him there. Whatever he had done to attract Jason's attention, my part in his entrapment made my last drink feel a little queasy. He didn't seem anything like the self- important politicians, policemen or criminals I was usually sent after. The rebellion died in a heartbeat. I was too professional, too much Jason's whore for that. I looked him in the eye. "Show me," I commanded and he followed me onto the dance floor, so eager and already lost. His name was Nick. *** There was a nearby office, close enough to still feel the bass, which was set aside for me and my target on nights like this. Nick laughed when I led him, perhaps thinking he had been lucky enough to be picked out by the bold, sexy woman who wanted her quickie somewhere better than the toilets or canal side. I did lock the door, even though I knew nobody would have dared disturb me in there. The sex was surprisingly good. As an experienced member of my profession I knew how to flatter a man's ego by making him feel that he was taking me to a place where the earth moved, but with him there were moments were I expressed genuine, pleasured surprise at his sex. Afterwards when I had sucked and fucked him a variety of positions - on the desk, the office chair, carpet and against the door - I pulled my panties back on, rearranged my dress over my boobs and waited until he looked respectable before I suggested a quiet drink somewhere a bit more special, just to finish the night. The special place, as briefed, was Jason's Palatial Office right on the top of the building; the one he never used for day to day running, just when something important was on the go. Why this Nick justified opening the place up was beyond me, but like a good whore I didn't ask indiscreet questions. "Does your Dad own this place or something?" Nick said as I led him in. He whistled appreciatively as I closed the door behind us. The barman raised an eyebrow at that. I'd never asked what the Palatial Office had been in the building's warehousing days, but it must have been mostly unrecognisable from then. Panoramic windows had been cut into three of the walls which gave spectacular views over the city by day or night, unless the clouds were very low. On clear days I could look longingly at the Peak District's crags and moors, but tonight the sparkling kaleidoscope of Manchester's millions of lights spread out for our pleasure, strobe lights showed another jet lifting from the airport and the Manchester Eye rose from it all gloriously. Inside was soft mood lighting across Jason's Big Desk, the conference tables, easy chairs and loungers. There was an air of warm, opulent comfort about the room. At the back wall was a small bar where Jason was masquerading as barman. It was not a place I came to very often. Jason liked to fuck me here, he liked me stripped to stockings and heels, facing one of the windows while he took me from behind, enjoying watching the city he exerted influence over as much as the sex. I'd been involved in group sex up here, more discreet encounters, some humiliation and once or twice I'd had to put on a smart suit and play PA to a proper meeting. "God, no! But I know a few people here. This is Jason, the best barman in the place. Jason, this is Nick, Nick, this is Jason." "What can I get you both?" Jason asked coolly. "Red wine," I replied, hopping onto a bar stool and patting the one beside me. Nick took the hint very quickly, getting an eyeful of my stocking tops when my dress rode up. Jason pushed two large glasses towards us then followed it with an ornate glass ash tray. It was my turn to take the hint and I reached into my handbag for cigarettes and lighter. I offered one to Nick and he looked surprised. "You can't smoke in here!" "Jason?" "Who would know?" Jason was watching Nick carefully, but I still couldn't decide why this inoffensive lad should be subject to all this attention from Jason himself. "No thanks, I don't," said Nick. He took a sip of his wine, but he was starting to look a little unfocussed around the eyes, one of his shoulders was drooping. I lit mine, took a deep drag and blew smoke at the ceiling. Nick took another sip, he was watching me vaguely. Maybe he was wondering where this was going as well. "Sure?" I offered him my cigarette, there was a little lipstick on the tip. For a moment he just stared, then he reached out tentatively and took it from me. He held it uncertainly, then put it to his lips and sucked. He only coughed a little, his eyes clouded slightly and he blinked furiously, maybe from the unaccustomed smoke. It's hard to remember what we talked about after that, for I was getting a little tired. We drank some more wine and he took to my cigarettes contentedly. I found myself yawning and as the yawn started I caught Jason's expression and I thought I'd made some error, but he turned back to Nick. Jason was a hard man to read, but there seemed to be a faint air of satisfaction about him tonight. I reached over and brushed hair back from Nick's face. Maybe it was the wine I'd had, but he was an exceptionally good looking man, almost feminine in the way his face was structured. His lips looked soft and kissable right then. "Are you ready for another fuck?" I said, with a giggle. I caressed his hair again. I hadn't noticed it being so long, maybe it had been tied back before we'd fucked so energetically. He placed his hand on my thigh, boldly edging his fingers above a lace stocking top. "You are something very special, Katie," he murmured, his speech was a little slurred. "You make me feel special, my beautiful boy," I said, giggling again. My head felt very light, like I was drunk, though I had been professionally careful to moderate my drinking. He kissed me back, hard and deep. Then his hands ran up the outside of my thighs, pushing up my dress, forcing it out from under me before he lifted it up and away from my body. Obligingly I raised my arms for him and he tossed my dress onto a nearby sofa. Keeping my arms raised and moving them sinuously like a dancer I pushed my bared breasts towards him, uncrossed my legs and parted them slightly. Nick licked his lips, eyes fixed on my stiff nipples. Nodding his approval, he unfastened the top couple of his shirt buttons then smoothly lifted it off to throw it atop my crumpled dress. His chest gleamed under the soft light, smooth and hairless. His nipples were hard like mine, almost brown under the gentle lighting. I brushed the tips of my nails down his chest, circling his nipples then brushing my thumbs over them. They were lovely and he gasped from the contact so I slipped down from my stool, pushed his legs apart to stand between them and gently nipped his left nipple between my teeth. That made him gasp again so I swapped nipple and bit the other one. I sucked and nibbled it, ran my tongue around it while he stroked my hair and moaned my name. He was so beautiful, I could hardly believe it - nothing like the men I was usually with, or the women, for that matter. He responded to my suckling by stroking my back, my arms and face while I imagined his nipple swelling into my mouth, the flesh felt softer around it. Strangely enough, I thought of the first breast I had ever kissed just then - it had belonged to a city councillor, with a husband and children, who loved tall women in catsuits and stiletto heeled boots. My hands were busy with his belt, his flies and them pushing down his trousers. I let his nipple fall from my mouth to unfasten his shoes, pull of his socks then trousers and pants. My thong ended up on the floor beside them leaving me naked but for my stockings and heels. His cock felt amazing, hard and throbbing despite everything I'd already done - it was still a little sticky to the touch and there was just a smear of my lipstick showing on the shaft as I bent to kiss it. For a moment I looked up. He looked radiant, eyes closed, lips parted. Under the office's soft lighting he looked darker and his hair fell glossy and black and waved around his shoulders. I wondered vaguely why his nipples were so wide and so brown, before another giggle rose from me. I was really drunk, Jason would be cross. For some reason the thought of that made me giggle some more. Then his hands rested on the back of my head and firmly encouraged me down towards his twitching cock. It looked surprisingly pale against his sleek, dark thighs, but I kissed it some more, licked its purple tip to make him gasp and sigh. I ran my tongue and lips up and down the shaft, tasting myself on him, caressing his balls and then, in one swift movement, I sucked him deep into my mouth. Nick gave a high pitched cry as his cock head touched the back of my throat. Fighting down the reflex to get rid of it, I swallowed and felt him slide into my throat. His hips were thrusting at me now, his hands still on the back of his head. All I could hear was the sound of my heart and his shrill cries as I deep-throated him. I couldn't tolerate it for long, other girls were much better than I was, and I almost retched as I pulled back slightly. A man likes it when a woman looks up at them from under her lashes while she sucks his cock, so I did just that for him. The effort was wasted, for Nick's head was thrown back. His chest was heaving as he sucked air into it, but it wasn't that which almost put me off my blow job. His skin was a mixture of brown and white, like a piebald horse - dark across his chest and shoulders, white over his belly and arms. But the dark was spreading, like ink spilled across a page, spreading out from the breasts growing from his chest. They were already bigger than mine, beautiful with wide, dark nipples. My vision blurred a little, the room felt like it was rocking, maybe the whole building was rolling like a ship on the sea. Then I felt hands on my hips, encouraging me to lift them and bend forward. Letting Nick fall from my mouth I turned to see Jason, naked and standing behind me. Without caring that I was full of another man's cum, he pushed himself deep into my pussy. Nick's hands pulled insistently at my head. "Stop teasing," he murmured, "Katie, don't stop." His voice was soft and light. Easier to close my eyes and deliver the perfect blow job, like the one I'd already given him, like the hundreds I'd done before and not think about the person, concentrate on the cock in my mouth, that balls in my hand. I didn't need to hear his breathing grow faster to know what was about to happen. I felt his thighs tense beside me, his hips rocked more urgently and the pressure of his fingers through my hair went beyond sensuality. At my rear, Jason fucked me slowly but steadily with long, smooth strokes; perhaps he was worried about upsetting my rhythm, but I don't think Nick had even noticed that he was now part of the threesome. A shrill, female scream preceded a final buck of the hips, hands clamping on my skull and slick fluid pulsing into my mouth. None of this was new, he was still gentler than most, but as I gulped down Nick's cum I sensed something different. The fluid was slicker and thinner. It tasted different; sweeter, more musky, lighter - not as salt. I was hardly a lesbian, but I knew how to make a woman cum with my mouth and Nick's cum made me think of all the wet labia I had explored with my tongue. Dazed, my mind woolly and unfocussed, I almost spat his cock out, rocking back onto Jason's thrust to see a very clear droplet ooze from Nick's cock and slowly stretch out and drip to the floor. Then I looked beyond the cock. Were it not for the fact that the thighs I was between and the cock I had sucked were atop the same bar stool Nick had been sitting upon I might have though that some trick had been played on me. My eyes were filled with curves; round hips, defined waist, full, buoyant breasts and a gorgeous face mostly covered with gleaming, ebony skin. Only his, her, arms and legs below the knee were still white and even those patches were diminishing fast. The cock had turned brown too and the fine fair hair above it had turned into glossy black curls. The balls in my hand felt like they were squirming in their sack and I snatched my hand away just as the scrotum started shrinking, tightening and smoothing until there was just a smooth layer of skin with no sign any testicles had been there. With a faint grunt Jason pushed himself deep and emptied himself into my vagina. When I turned to look, as he finished the last thrust inside me, he was staring hard at what Nick had become. "I think you should have a cigarette, Katarzyna," he said softly. "Nick?" I whispered. My tongue felt too big for my mouth and the taste of cunt was suddenly nauseating. "Smoke. You will feel better." Above me, the woman that had been Nick gave a long, satisfied sigh and I looked to her again, fascinated and repulsed at the same time. Her cock went limp and my hands dropped to my lap. It dwindled as I watched while the smooth place where her scrotum had been folded and then split. In only a few seconds the cock had all but gone and the woman dropped her hand to her changing groin, her fingers spread the swelling lips and I saw how pink she was inside. Standing too quickly, the room spun; I wobbled on my stilettos and would have fallen had Jason not steadied my elbow. I was trembling so much I could hardly hold the cigarette he offered me. He had to light it or I might have set fire to my hair. But he was right, as usual, the smoke calmed me. I held it inside, closed my eyes and then blew a long streamer. I yawned again, my eyes were suddenly very heavy. He passed me my dress and bade me lay along one of the sofas close by. Once I'd finished the cigarette I lit another and watched fascinated, a little aroused, as Jason passionately, energetically, almost brutally, fucked the woman I'd known as a man. *** "What do you imagine you saw last night?" he asked me at lunchtime the next day. He'd taken me out to a small, Mexican restaurant a mile or two from the warehouse. I wore a modest, flared, knee length dress in royal blue he'd picked out, nude court shoes and matching stockings. My hair was down and I wasn't wearing any make up but for a little dark pink lipstick. He was in his usual suit, crisp shirt and precisely knotted tie. I had asked myself that many times since I'd woken, about ten o'clock, feeling refreshed despite the relatively late night. Jason watched me intently and, as always, I couldn't lie to him. "What will happen to her?" "You and the other girls are working so hard, I needed another prostitute.' "But..." My protest tailed away. "Why?" "It amuses me to do that with a person susceptible to it. I spotted him several weeks ago." I took a deep breath, my body craved a cigarette. "How?" "Not important right now. The important thing is, Katarzyna, what do I do now that you know?" Chills ran over my skin, goosebumps lifted and my mouth became too dry to swallow. Tears pricked my eyes. My right leg trembled so violently a stattaco rattle came from my heel on the polished floor. So this was what had happened to the girls who's been before me. Once they knew too much, or grew too old they were replaced and... His had touched mine across the table. I almost flinched away, couldn't bear to look at him, wondering who would do it. George the Giant? Please let it be quick. "I thought you might like to do some different work for me," he said softly. He squeezed my hand gently, but his face was unreadable. I managed another breath. Then one more. My foot stopped shaking. "She won't remember, will she? Last night... Nick? She won't remember what happened to her, to him?" Jason shook his head. "Her name's Layla now." "What about me? Is that why I don't remember?" My voice nearly cracked as I said it. Was that why I had imagined Emma to be Martin Fielding? "Katarzyna, you came to me the way I said." Jason pushed the sleeve of my dress up to my elbow, baring the puckered, scarred skin telling the world of my past heroin addiction. The restaurant was quiet, only another three tables were occupied, but I was still horribly self- conscious of the scars and what they said about me. "But why?" He released my arm and I hurriedly pulled the sleeve back down. "I already answered that." It amused him. What kind of man was he, to be able to do that? I'd always been afraid of him, but now the fear was deeper. "I've shocked you. Maybe I've shown you too much." I didn't know what to say to that so I just stared at the table, wondering what it was that he wanted from me. "Would you like a different job? Still working for me?" "No more whoring?" "Not so regularly, infrequently. You're a talented woman, I'd hate to waste all of those talents." I tried to see if there was any mockery in his face, but I still couldn't read anything from him expression and though his eyes watched me carefully, they didn't give anything away. "That would be good." "Then we'll discuss it further next week. For now, I think you need a holiday. Where would you like to go?" Holidays were things normal people did: people with lives and families and freedom. "I'd like to go somewhere you haven't been," I said. "Why would you say that?" I sipped some wine before I answered. "So I can have something new to tell you, maybe to interest you. Something to share with you." His eyes never left mine for what felt like an age after that, until I crumbled and looked to my near empty plate. He touched my hand again. "You're a very interesting lady, Katarzyna." *** The following week I travelled first class to London. I had expensive luggage with good clothes inside and in my hand bag were documents and bank cards in the name of Miss Katherine Miller. A chauffeur met me at Euston and drove me effortlessly to Paddington where I boarded the sleeper train to Penzance. Have you even been on a sleeper service? I don't think I could recall anything happier - tucking myself into the clean, soft bunk and drifting to sleep while the train rocked and rumbled around me. The empty sands alongside the railway line leading to Penzance entranced me. I stared at St Michael's Mount and the freedom to wander over there if I felt like it. I had a whole week to myself, I could go where I needed to, do as I pleased. After a short wait, I took a much smaller and plainer train around another magical bay and finally found myself in the cool, early morning air at St Ives. A taxi was there to meet me and though it wasn't anything like the limousine that had whisked me through London, I liked its ordinariness much better. The hotel it took me to was grand and white, with rolling gardens, palm trees and views across more gorgeous beaches and the Atlantic Ocean. The wonder of it made me giddy and I must have stood for fifteen minutes on the patio outside the hotel, with the Atlantic wind whipping my skirt and hair around me, before I finally went inside. That wind had left my hair a fine tangle, my cheeks red and tears around my eyes, but I was grinning happily as a pretty receptionist checked me in and arranged for my bags to be taken up to my suite. There were flowers and wine waiting for me there, chocolates too. Huge French doors led to a balcony that me and only me could use to gaze across the ocean, like I was the last woman in the world. The bathroom was bigger than my space in Manchester, the bed bigger than anything I'd slept in before. But I wasn't there to sleep. I didn't even bother to unpack, just grabbed a jacket and hurried back down to the lobby and started walking. I had no plan, not idea of what to do or where to go. I let my fancy direct me along this street or down that alley. I stopped for a mug of tea and bacon sandwich full of brown sauce in a tiny cafe near the railway station, I browsed shop windows and touched knick knacks and souvenirs in many of the shops making their livings from the tourists that would fill the town as the holiday season picked up, and after a few hours found myself on the edge of the sand looking out to sea. After a few minutes I slipped off my shoes, reached under my skirt and wriggled off my tights without flashing my panties. The cool, damp sand oozing between my toes made me giggle. The contrast between beach and my finely pedicured, purple toe nails made me laugh. Faster and faster I walked, then broke into a run lifting my skirt to free my legs, cold air making fire in my lungs, hair streaming behind me, running and running across the sands until I splashed into the sea and gasped with its chill. From nowhere came an image of Nick, sprawled in that chair while a whore sucked his cock and his skin went brown and his body went woman. A moan escaped me, I shivered with a cold splash that had nothing to do with the sea I paddled in. Where was he now? Forgetting his old life? Learning his new life as Jason's prostitute? Was he my replacement so I could go and do something less disgusting for him? I needed a cigarette. Wavelets lapped around my ankles and I tried to remember when my last cigarette had been. Manchester? London? There were some in my handbag, slung over my shoulder and muscle memory had one in my lips and the lighter poised below before I really knew what was happened. I could smell the tobacco, my body needed it, but the thought of drawing the smoke inside, of displacing that clean Cornish air made me feel a little ill. So I spat it out and watched the ocean turn the white paper brown and make the whole thing into mush. Quickly I stepped away, before any of it could wash onto my skin. Only the thought of making more of a mess prevented me from throwing the rest of the packet after it. Instead I took my lighter, a heavy one given as a gift by an elderly client, and threw it as far as I could - an offering to the ever hungry ocean lapping around my ankles. As I saw it plop into a wave I thought that I could follow it, just to keep walking out into he sea until my clothes were sodden and the water's cold stole the life from my limbs, of opening my mouth, lungs, belly, my soul to the Atlantic and letting carry all of me away. I even looked around, to see if I was being watched or if I could carry out my drowning without being disturbed. I took a step, then another. The next wave broke over my knees and now the lowest few inches of my skirt hung limp and sodden around my pale legs. What about Emma? Martin Fielding? I was sure that whatever had been done to Nick, the same had happened to her, to him. Because it amused Jason to make a woman from a man and then having her crouch for that Doberman while the tears ran down her cheeks and cruel men laughed. "Hellooo?" a woman called, somewhere over my left shoulder. I twitched, like I had been caught doing something naughty. Turning, I saw a grey haired woman with glasses and white teeth in a perfect smile walking towards me. I guessed her to be somewhere in her fifties, thin and tall, with Harry Potter glasses and a rangy walk. She wore loose trousers, walking boots and a patchwork poncho. There was a small dog with wiry, brown hair trotting along at her heels. "I saw you running along the sand," she called, waving a hand along the beach as though I'd forgotten. "I don't think I've ever seen anybody looking so happy." That version of me seemed a long way away now. "I haven't paddled for a long time," I said, thinking of that half picture of me on a beach somewhere. She stopped a couple of metres away, with the waves almost lapping her boots, and smiled. There were crinkles of smile lines crowding her bright eyes and it occurred to me that, for all her age, she was incredibly beautiful. The breeze stirred the fine, silver wisps straying from her plait. Her dog cautiously sniffed at the water, it was watching me too, but daren't try the sea. "I'm Joy," she said, through her smile, as though she were personification of the emotion. What would I be? Misery? Guilt? How about Anger? "Katie," I said. Joy held out her hand, so confidently that I couldn't do anything but turn from the empty Atlantic to shake it. With gentle pressure she encouraged me out of the waves. I thought for a moment she was going to embrace me. Had she recognised what I'd been thinking about? "Your lovely skirt is soaked," she said, and she even looked gorgeous with regret. "I wasn't really thinking of it," I said helplessly. "You looked wonderful when you were running," she said. "Like a dog that's been let off its lead for the first time in ages, or the cows when they get out of the winter shed into a spring pasture. You should see them, Katie, running through the clover kicking their hooves with joy!" "I'm a city girl," I replied with a shrug. "I live over there," she explained, with a wave towards the town. "I'm a photographer, and artist - the light is wonderful here. I have a gallery, sell a few pictures, and a tea shop, sell lots of cake. My daughter helps with that, and her daughter at weekends - she's still at primary school, you see. Would you like some cake and a cup of tea?' First, she asked if she could photograph me, in my soggy clothes, staring across the horizon with the wind lifting my hair. I was about to say no, thinking of the levels of deceit in my false name and forged documents, which were protecting my real, likely false, name and my owner. So I did as she asked, but when I had heard the shutter click once or twice, I turned to her and, scooping hair from my face, I found my most dazzling smile. Remember, the whore in me knew how to make my face act for the pleasure of my client, but at that moment I knew with the clarity of a sunrise what I was going to do with my life. I think some of that came through with my smile and the tiny act of defiance that bared my face for a stranger's camera. Joy snapped a few more images, and I stepped back into the sea so my poor hem drowned again, then lifted it clear so she could capture the drops that sparkled from it back to the ocean. She let the camera fall and clapped her skinny hand over her mouth. "My goodness, Katie. Did I have you all wrong!" I ate lemon drizzle cake with an ornate cake fork and drank dark, Yorkshire tea from a delicate china cup in Joy's quirky tea shop. While admiring her photographs on the wall I wondered how it was that I, the lowest of women, should feel so content wriggling my bare, sandy toes on her tiles while my stained skirt dried. Somehow it seemed more unreal than the sophisticated opulence of the hotel suite I returned to later in the day. My dreams were dark that night, and every night I was away from Manchester. They must have been flashbacks to a life before Jason, for in one needles were piercing my veins so a cool rush of smack could flow into my consciousness. There were always indistinct, dark faces around me as I was pricked and stabbed, until my arms bled and despite the heroin I wept and begged them to stop. Only during the last night of nightmares did one of those faces look up and in the softest, most compassionate voice tell me it would soon be over. I couldn't understand why it would be gentle George the Giant, my almost friend, who should be marking my arms so. "You woke up screaming," Joy said in the small hours of that last night, when moonlight shone through the skylights in her bedroom and showed me tangled in the sweaty ruin of her bed. The eerie light made her loose hair shine like platinum and her skin seem almost translucent. It was so soft, so pliable I'd worried about tearing her when I had first let my fingers run over her body. Her fingers were gentle on my brow, smoothing my hair and soothing my cheek. For the next few heartbeats my whole sorry, sordid life crowded my mouth and I almost told her what I was. I choked the revelation back, not being able to bear the thought of disgust creasing her loveliness, of her looking away from me with revulsion - or worse, pity. Instead I turned my back, pulled the covers to my chin and sobbed. Joy settled herself behind me, her bony arms encircled me. She cupped my breasts and pulled me close as though she could absorb my weeping, but there were too many years of it for that. She'd always tried to tease some of my life from me, over the last few days when I had forsaken my upmarket hotel for fish and chips, more cake, bike rides, train rides, walks, ice creams and helping out in the tea shop. It might not have been the bars in Jason's place, but the principles were the same. I'd tried to keep my scars from her, even when she'd taken my pictures, but it was hard to keep a blouse on in your lover's bed and she'd run her fingers, then her lips along the old old needle marks. Maybe that simple acceptance had prompted George the Giant's face in my dreams that night, to remind me that I wasn't fit to be loved. "Will I see you again, Katie?" she asked on the station platform that evening. The sleeper train was close to departing, but there was no excitement in it any more. If I could have thought of any possible way in which I could say yes I would have, but if Jason thought I had formed an emotional bond with a person out of his control he might have killed her and that was worse than the thought of never seeing her again. But I couldn't. Nor could I lie to her and make some vague promise about keeping in touch. "Don't be defined by the past," she said quietly, touching my arm through my jacket. "I won't be," I promised, kissed her cheek and turned to board the train. When I peeped through the window, a few minutes later, she had gone. Every turn of the wheels took me closer to Jason and even when I lay in my bunk listening to the night passing by outside, I rehearsed how I would do what I must do and eventually fell asleep with his face pressing my thoughts. Which may have been why I dreamt about him - a vivid dream of pin sharp detail with Jason and I alone in the Palatial Office right at the top of the building, he on one side of the bar and me on a tall stool on the other side. I dreamt he offered me a cigarette, which not unusual, but my reluctance to accept it was. But my refusal was not met with anger, as I would have expected, but empathy and honey-tongued persuasion until I did take one. It made me cough at first, like I was new to the art of smoking, though not for long as I was soon managing the cigarettes like a pro. I felt warm and content, flattered that one such as Jason should have honoured me with this intimate meeting. When I took the cigarette from my lips I saw scarlet was smeared on the filter and I was surprised, for it could only have got there if I was wearing lipstick. Jason watched me closely, a faint smile on his face. Returning his smile, my thoughts turned appropriately dreamy though I may have frowned at the sudden pressure on my shirt as it grew tight over my chest. And did it look right, even in the fuzzy state I was being lulled into? Stress creases radiated from the buttons and was that the outline of a red, lace bra just visible through my white shirt? Breasts? Impossible. A knock brought me back to myself, on the rocking train, in my warm and cosy bunk and the carriage snaked and rattled through some junction or other. I stared at the veneer above me trying to capture who I was, where and what I was. The knock was repeated. "Morning, madame. Your table's ready for breakfast." I thanked him, slumped back onto the pillow and tried to decide what was real and what was not; what I had been against what I was. "It was a dream," I whispered as I washed. "Only a dream," I reaffirmed as I stepped into a dress and zipped it close around my figure. Just a dream sparked by what I had seen happening to Layla, for I had been a junkie sucking cocks for heroin under a railway bridge: not a man. "Katie!" George the Giant was pleased to see me, putting his paper down and coming to shake my hand as I walked back into the club early that afternoon. I had stopped for lunch in a city centre cafe, to strengthen myself. "How was sunny Cornwall?" His face was lively with a warm smile. Had he really stuck needle after needle into my arms? "Wonderful, really really good. Highly recommended, you should take the kids and wife down there." "She only likes Blackpool." He spread his hands. "God knows I've tried, but even Skegness is too exotic for her. Boss said that when you've freshened up, he's upstairs. Right upstairs, got a job for you. A nicer job." Perfect. But I had something for George. "I forgive you," I said, and stretched up on tiptoe to kiss his stubbled cheek. He frowned. "I know what you did to me." "No you don't," but he didn't sound sure. "'It's okay." I kissed him again and then his arms went around me, pulled me so tight I worried for my breathing. "We'll talk," I promised when I broke free, but his face looked troubled as I headed for the lifts. In my rooms I showered, dried my body carefully and over nothing more than a pair of white hold-ups, so sheer you could hardly see I was wearing them, I eased myself into a plum coloured dress close fitting enough it might have been painted on. Adding silver stilettos and no more make up than some eyeliner and mascara, not even a dab of perfume I took myself to Jason. He was alone, barefoot under dress trousers and a black satin shirt. He didn't turn until I stood beside him and offered his favourite cocktail. He didn't speak until he tasted it. "You look well." "It was a lovely holiday, thank you. I loved the sleeper train and the hotel and the beaches and wild seas." He watched me without blinking for a few seconds, I looked away over the city. "Perhaps you're too wild for this place, Katarzyna." Perhaps he was too, for I was not in my dress for very long. He approved of my choice of underwear, let me keep my heels and stockings as he made love to me slowly and carefully at first, teasing me, bringing me to the edge of orgasm and letting it slip away. Then he was harder, faster, almost brutal in the way he fucked me. By the time he finally allowed his own orgasm, deep in my anus, we were both gleaming with sweat and I felt like I was glowing. I cleaned him, and myself, where we needed cleaning and slipping off my heels I walked to the bar to bring him what I knew he liked after vigorous sex - fresh oranges. Draping myself on the couch beside him, I peeled the first with a super sharp knife he kept for slicing fruit and offered a segment to his lips. "I'll miss you, Kat," he said sleepily after chewing the segment. I kissed away some of the juice from his chin, then his chest. "Where am I going?" "Newcastle. I have a hotel there that needs a manageress." "Will you come and see me?" I whispered and fed him another orange segment. Perhaps I was tempted, just for a moment. Then I slipped the fruit knife between his ribs and pushed harder to pierce his heart. Here my plan stopped. I had no idea what was going to happen. He seized my hand with the knife in it, squeezed it so hard for a moment I grunted with the pressure. The partially chewed orange slipped from his slackening mouth and the pressure decreased. It was the first time I'd ever seen surprise on his face. He started to deflate, slumping into the couch and tears trickled down my cheeks. "Martin," he whispered and there was blood with the name, it dripped onto his chest. "I could have made you back." I sat and watched him, crying silently, for five, maybe ten minutes until I was sure he was dead. Part of me had imagined that he would have some power over death and that a world of pain would follow his mocking response to my attempt on his life. But, when he had bled out into his chest, he was nothing but a corpse. *** For the last fifteen years I have waited for the repercussions to find me. Not the police, they would never have found the interest to look for Jason's murderer - no doubt many of their senior ranks were pleased he'd gone. I'd expected the knife at my throat waking me from my sleep, the blow to my skull and bag over my head followed by... well I'll let your imagination fill the blanks like mine did. Fifteen years of loneliness resulting from the fearful expectation of the horrible exploitation of anybody I was close to. I'd had some cash put away and I used that to get away from Manchester to Edinburgh. After a couple of weeks keeping my head down, changing my appearance and watching the newspapers, I presented myself to Police Scotland as a victim of people trafficking, sexual exploitation and prostitution. The needle tracks on my arms helped convince them, as well as my knowledge of how organised prostitution worked. I told them I'd been trafficked to Liverpool and my knowledge of Jason's former associates there helped my credibility. Allowing them to take fingerprint and DNA samples was a risk, but I had not found a single mention of Jason's death in any of the news media sources. There had been an increase in gang related deaths in the North West, a number of arsons and some kidnappings, but nothing about the power vacuum that caused them. I felt some guilt for those events, for the people who were horribly affected by them; I was guilty too for leaving Emma, Layla and the other girls to face up the fighting over Jason's empire. The checks of my fingerprints and DNA against various UK and international databases apparently came up with no trace, for after a few months in various shelters and refuges I was given an official identity for the first time since I had stopped being Martin Fielding. I was able to go out and make my own way. It was tempting to go and find the woman who had once been my wife and the girl who had been my daughter, but I talked myself out of that. What use would I be to them? They wouldn't know me and had nothing but half a photograph to remind me of them - my life before Jason remains utterly blank. I don't even dream about him any more. I have been a waitress, librarian, shelf-stacker, cleaner, shop assistant, call-taker, barista - anything where I could come and go, be anonymous, quiet, wary. At present I work for a charity doing outreach work for the desperate, addicted woman who work on the streets. My days of beautiful clothes, immaculate nails and perfect hair have long gone, I don't have the money most weeks. I keep myself trim and fit - so I can fight if I need to - but I'm not the person I was, nobody from then would recognise me now. I rent a small house and share it with a cat and a work colleague, also a former prostitute, with a scathing opinion of men. Sometimes when the mood takes us we sleep together, but she is the closest thing to emotional intimacy I've known since I murdered Jason. My only regret - apart from leaving Emma and Layla - is Joy, for I never had the courage to implicate her in what I'd done by going back. I think I could have been happy serving tea and cake in her lovely shop. I often ask myself if it was worth it. There's no real way of knowing, not without exposing my past, but I really hope so.