Oh, he knew all the signs. They were dressed to kill – even just going up the local shops for a loaf of bread or their family allowance, they were half naked and plastered in make-up. Their lives revolved around a few mates in a similar position to them, their mums, and their mum's houses, and pulling a bloke, hopefully a live one.

They were accidents waiting to happen, and he liked to get them while they were still halfway decent. Within a few years, this girl would have produced another baby, maybe two and she would be relegated to being a booty call for the local no necks, giro blasters and tracksuit wearers. At the moment, though, he wanted her, and he was determined to have her.

He felt in his pockets and caressed his wad of cash. Every time he pulled it out to get a drink her eyes nearly popped out of her head. So far he knew her name was Charmaine, she had a baby girl of thirteen months and a flat within walking distance of the pub and the house where he lived with Jackie, and that her big dream was to go to Florida. She was already proving to be uncomplicated and without any kind of imagination at all, so there was no chance of her wanting long conversations or trying to impress him with her staggering intelligence.

He was on a roll when Jackie and the girls walked into the pub, and he sighed heavily as Charmaine took one look at Jackie, who was now standing beside him like his minder, and sensibly made her way to the other end of the bar in a state of extreme fright.

'Ain't you going to wish me happy birthday, then?'

Freddie smiled and said casually, as he tried to get the landlady's attention for a drink, 'No, Jackie, I ain't.'

Little Jimmy was watching a cartoon and eating a biscuit when Little Freddie finally rolled up at his nana's house. Jimmy Junior was terrified of his cousin because he was such a noisy and aggressive lad who seemed to take great delight in frightening him.

As soon as he came into the flat the atmosphere changed, and Maddie, who had hoped that Little Freddie wouldn't want to come and sit in with her and Jimmy Junior, was already feeling a nervous wreck.

Little Freddie was enjoying the effect he was creating. He loved the way people were scared of him and tried to get round him, to get in his good books. He was a handsome lad, though his features were marred by his surly and unhappy expression. He was also badly scarred since he had been stitched up many times, mainly over his refusal to feel any kind of danger, and because he had been in so many fights.

Now he looked at the little boy who he knew was hoping that he would not be nasty, and he smiled at him because his father had warned him that one more incident with Jimmy Junior and he would really take him in hand.

Little Freddie had realised that his father was wary of Big Jimmy, and that had been a learning curve. He had never imagined his father fearing anyone or anything. But he had realised a while back that it was Jimmy who ran everything and that even his father had to do what he was asked.

So he smiled at his little cousin and, giving his old nana a big hug, he sat down and watched the cartoons with a light heart and a calm exterior.

Like his father before him he was formulating a plan, and like his father before him, it needed serious plotting and serious intention. Unlike his father, though, he paid attention to the details.

Maggie looked around the pub and willed the clock to go faster. She hated this place now, though there had been a time when she had loved coming in here. It was still dirty, still had the same cloying smell of disinfectant and beer in the carpet and, more worrying, it still had the same people in the same seats as when she had first come in there all those years ago.

The place was like some kind of time warp.

Her mother and father were having the time of their lives, despite having sworn they'd leave early, and she envied them the carefree joviality they seemed to possess no matter what happened to them.

Jackie was pissed out of her brains, and Freddie was watching a skinny barmaid with too much make-up and greasy hair. The girls were all laughing and joking at the bar, and that young Dicky was looking at Rox as if he had just won the Rollover on the National Lottery.

Maggie felt a pang in her breast as she remembered that she had been like that once – carefree, young and madly in love. She sought out Jimmy with her eyes and saw him in earnest conversation with Dianna.

She was a beauty, was Dianna. As Maggie watched them talk, she heard Jackie's high-pitched voice as she started to abuse the young barmaid. She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again she saw Freddie being held back by Jimmy and her father, and the girls trying to help Jackie up off the filthy floor. Jackie had a bloody nose, and she felt an urge to cry at the complete abortion that constituted her life.

Instead she got up and walked to her sister and, taking her gently by the arm, she helped the drunken and bleeding woman into the toilets.

Freddie pushed Jimmy and Joseph away from him, waving his arms to let them know he was calmer and then he said loudly, 'Cabaret's over, let's get another drink.'

Everyone in the pub went back to what they were doing. This kind of occurrence was the norm, and broke up the sheer boredom that most of them felt for the majority of the time.

Rox and Dianna watched their mother as she limped into the toilet with Maggie and then saw their elder sister sneak out to the other bar. Dicky looked at Rox and made a face that told her he wanted to go, and go sooner rather than later.

She nodded in complete agreement. They had done their bit, and now they were free to leave and enjoy themselves at last.

Maggie had a headache and she knew it was going to be a blinder. As she stripped off her clothes, she glanced at herself in the full-length mirror on the dressing-room wall. She didn't have a mark on her, no one would ever believe she had given birth to a child. She knew this fact annoyed her sister Jackie no end, but it didn't bother her either way. Any pleasure she had ever garnered from her body was long gone.

Freddie had seen to that.

In her salons, she was complimented all day by women who wanted perfection and thought that she possessed it. If only they knew the truth of it. She saw her body as something corrupt, something disgusting and something that had been the vessel that had brought her and her family to this point.

She slipped a white silk nightie over her head. Seeing her reflection again she knew she looked lovely, and that Jimmy would take her and she would let him. It was easier than trying to make excuses not to make love.

She walked back into the bedroom and sat on the chaise longue that was supposed to have been used for romance, but was used for her to watch TV. Jimmy was putting the boy to bed, and she knew he was making up for not seeing him earlier and, as well, trying to make up for her complete lack of interest in the child.

She placed a hand softly on to her belly and rubbed it unconsciously.

She had never taken any precautions since the boy's birth and there had been nothing. This had only strengthened her belief that Jimmy was besotted with Freddie's child. And Jimmy Junior was by some strange quirk of nature a nice child, he was a dear little soul. But she knew that one day he would change. He would turn into his true self, and then Freddie Jackson would be living under her roof.

Maggie knew he still believed that Jimmy Junior was his child, and that he was pleased about it. She heard him telling Jimmy how much he looked like his father, and he would be looking at her as he said it. The two men looked so alike it was uncanny.