She had glanced at her grandson and it had been as if a bolt had been shot through her heart. From his first breath he had been to her like a young god, and the strength of her emotions concerning him had frightened her. She loved him with a passion that she had not believed she was capable of. He ate at her like a cancer, and when his mother had been nursing him she had felt an almost murderous rage that the child had not been born to her. She had convinced herself that if he had, Mick would have treated her properly, would have been proud of the child she had produced. She wasn't taunting him as he thought when she showed him her grandsons, she was trying to make him see what might have been. She had produced a child after all, he had not, and that bastard had ridden her hard for many years in the hope of making her pregnant and the more disappointed he had become, the worse her life had become. He had seen to that, blaming her for her barrenness, and begrudging the few shillings he had to provide for a child who, through no fault of her own, reminded him of his own shortcomings.

Like Mick, Annie was a person with a chip on her shoulder bigger than the San Andreas fault. They both resented Lil because she had fallen into a wonderful life and there was nothing they could do to control it. Annie lived on her son-in-law's largesse and she was sensible enough to know that if it had been left to him, she would have been aimed out of the front door without a second's thought and with his boot in her arse.

This was how these two people had ended up back together again; no one else wanted them, and that knowledge guaranteed that they would have to stick together. But for now, Annie had the upper hand and she relished it because she was shrewd enough to know that circumstances could change overnight. Lil had proved the truth of that old chestnut, as they both knew to their detriment.

Mick Diamond looked around his stepdaughter's lovely home and marvelled at what a pair of tits and a nice smile could accomplish. Women had it easy really, he was convinced of that. His treatment of his own wife was, as always, forgotten when he came here. All he saw was the benefits that Lily's comely figure had accrued and the way she had spurned the man who had given her not only his name but her respectability. God was good though; he knew that without a doubt his time would come with her. Lily Brodie would eventually fall from grace and when she did, he would be waiting.

Brodie might be the big man now, but things changed and always when people least expected it. Death crept up, illness, all manner of things were waiting to jump out and tear a lump out of the arse of people who thought they were immune to the trials and tribulations of real life.

Brodie would eventually get his collar felt or his stomach shot out like Billy Spot; it was the way of their world and patience would reward him, he was sure. And he had patience, he had it in abundance.

Chapter Four

James Curtis had run a bookies in Ilford High Street for over twenty years and, even though betting had only been legal for some of that time, people still referred to him as Jamie the Book. The shop he owned had once sold haberdashery, but it had in fact been a front for the bets, a nice little earner in its own way. On weekends he would be seen paying out in the pubs around East London and Essex with a smile and his self-deprecating wit. He was a funny man and people liked him; he always paid out without a murmur of discontent. You won fair and square with Jamie and people trusted him. He weighed you out with a grin, a joke and a story about how hard-up you had made him. People liked that, it made the win feel extra special.

He was sitting now behind the polished walnut counter, perched precariously as always on his high leather stool, the usual cigarette dangling from his thick lips, working out the odds and taking only the serious bets himself. His balding head was glistening with sweat and his shirt sleeves were rolled up showing his heavily tattooed arms. The door opened and a young man with short blond hair and a sawn-off shotgun nonchalantly strolled in and, taking aim, shot Jamie the Book in the chest.

The regular punters watched in shock as the man they liked and respected was lifted bodily off his stool before landing heavily against his office door, blood pouring from his nose and mouth.

The short-haired man then walked out of the shop without uttering a word. The punters picked up the pieces of paper with their bets written neatly down and hastily beat their retreat. The two girls who worked there were left screaming their heads off in terror, their noise guaranteeing the presence of Old Bill at some point and thereby saving them the job of making the call themselves.

That was how come the police had arrived with no back-up and, as luck would have it, no witnesses. The two girls had by that time decided between themselves to say that they had been in the back making tea when it had all gone down.

No one actually realised for a long time that no money had been taken, so it was not technically a robbery as such. It was murder.

It was this fact that made everyone involved so nervous.

Jamie was liked; he was honest, in his game you had to be. People did not like losing money at the best of times, especially through their own foolishness, let alone because someone had had them over. A bet was a personal thing, it was a wager made in good faith and the punter was more than aware that the wager could go either way; they would win and then pat themselves on the back for their cleverness or they would lose and the bookies patted themselves on the back. The bookies, as everyone knew, did the majority of the back-patting.

Most of the clients were betting for a sporting chance and a bit of excitement, a few of the punters were professional gamblers and they, by their very nature, were suspicious, greedy and notoriously bad losers.

Because of this, the betting industry was a very small world. Because of the professional punters, people like Jamie had to rely on the backing of the Brodies and the Williamses of the world. They needed a back-up more than anyone else. A big loss could make the mildest of men capable of extreme violence. The loss of a week's wages and the knowledge that a family were now unable to eat could turn the quietest of men into a rampaging lunatic. The thought of Pat or the Williams brothers was what guaranteed that this would only be a passing fancy. No one who bet was willing to take on the big boys. Jamie was good anyway, he was always a fair man and understood the devastation that his line of business depended on. He was well liked by punters, even the serious ones respected him. He would only take a big bet if he knew the punter was genuinely up for it.

The bets were the straightest of all dodgy dealings really, by their very nature, trust was important to keep the punters coming back. In fact, a good bookie would offer a regular punter a half a point more than the going price, would make it worth people's while to bet in their shops, as opposed to someone else's. The winners were paid out with a smile and a cheery wave, after all, the money would be winging its way back to him soon anyway.

So, as there were no big races on, no big bets had been placed, and no money removed from the premises, the reason for Jamie's shooting was already being speculated on by all and sundry. The fact Old Bill had wandered in without any kind of haste added to the mystery. Something was happening, but what, no one seemed to know.

Terry Williams was twenty-three and looked like his brothers had at his age. All brawn and no real brain. But he was an amiable lad with a kind heart and his first serious girlfriend.