A Chance Encounter Rae Shaw (ebook reader with built in dictionary .txt) 📖

‘Wise man. I'm surprised, all that sounded easy.’ Julianna puffed out her cheeks. Eight years squandered because the previous solicitors had focused on the wrong city.

‘Oh, God, no. It took eight years because Reg is petrified. So was John because both of them know who Bill killed. It took lots of back and forth, firm reassurances, then a change of plans, and a new location.’

‘But Reg coughed up the information.’

‘He didn't want to. He was ready to walk out the door. I had to milk his sentimentality, which was obvious given his loyalty to Bill. You see, please don't tell Mark, but I convinced Reg that Bill would be hit, taken out, if he was released on bail or freed. Better in than out. Reg told us what had happened off the record; he would never say it in court. So we recorded him to be on the safe side.’

‘That is a possibility, about Bill's safety.’ Julianna suspected Bill had been kept safe in prison for a purpose. ‘He might decide to snitch, give up information, but not while he had a chance at getting out on appeal.’ Circumstances had changed, though.

‘Possibly. But my suspicions were right about Bill. He's guilty of murder, not manslaughter. He took out this big shot's cousin.’

‘He did?’ This was something new.

‘I plied Reg with beer. This cousin, the one who met Bill Clewer, was the negotiator. Bill's lot needed girls. Girls, meaning kids. These scumbags aren't fussy about age.’

Julianna knew this. ‘These scumbags have no names?’

‘They had aliases. It didn't help Bill’s case that he refused to give up any real names. According to Reg, from the moment the meeting was arranged, Bill intended to assassinate him. Reg tried to talk him out of it. Bill wouldn't say why; whether it was personal or something he had been told to do, but Reg thought that it had to do with it being young girls. Bill has a daughter, doesn't he?’

‘Yes,’ Julianna said quietly. A daughter who knew nothing about any of this. Nor Mark. More things to explain over a carefully crafted weekend of wine, sex and gentle soothing of his ruffled angst.

‘Reg doesn’t feel responsible for what Bill did; he was just the lookout. But now, he's worried again.’

‘Worried?’

‘I gather the murder caused a bit of a war amongst the syndicates. The big bad boss had to go into hiding abroad. He's back now, of course, and recruiting. Reg is keeping his head down.’

‘Don't blame him.’ Holland Park was a few streets away. She’d found out more than she’d expected.

‘He says they patrol the streets on bikes, these guys who work for him, picking up girls that way. The silly girls love the leathers, the tattoos. Boys, too, of course. They befriend them, make them their best mates and sweet talk them. It's grooming. Slow and leisurely, so as not to raise suspicions. Then, they encourage them to leave home, take them to houses and bring them men.’

‘Shit. Excuse me.’ Mark had mentioned bikers. But she couldn't remember the context of the conversation. It was one of those tiny snippets that passed between them when they ate together or chatted in bed. Life was full of them, things tossed around with little idea of their use until they came back later, stripped of detail.

Sophia laughed. ‘No, it's fine. I'm so used to the bad language. I have to roll it back when I'm with Luke. He's all upper crust. Jackson isn't. I think Jackson sees a different world because of Opportunitas. I like helping, especially the trafficked girls. They're the victims of this trafficker gang, this deliverer.’

Julianna's foot slipped off the brake and she nearly collided with the car in front. She curled fingers around the steering wheel.

‘Who?’ she said, too urgently.

Sophia's voice lost its sweetness. ‘John and Reg shit bricks every time they mentioned his name. The Deliverer.’ She chuckled, innocuously. ‘Ridiculous, like they’re talking about the Godfather. They've never met him, only go-betweens, and he uses lots of aliases, so he could be like a phantom.’

He wasn't a phantom. He existed. Julianna was sure of it and she scowled in full view of the mirror. Sophia leaned forward in her seat, poised to ask a question. Julianna turned the radio up, breaking one of those neatly written protocols she kept stuffed in the glove compartment, and Sophia shuffled back into the creaking leather and stared out of the window.

The whole business made her feel sick. Mark had to be told about the deliverer, the other criminal enterprise ruined by the Clewer family. She drew the car up outside of Hettie's house and glanced at the dashboard – half past four. She had to drive the women to Surrey, then bring the car back again. There was no point ringing Mark to arrange to meet him, his phone was out of action, and she still had to track down Ellen, find out what the girl knew.

Hettie dropped a bag into the boot without Julianna's assistance and slid into the seat next to Sophia. The two women air pecked each other's cheeks.

‘Luke will bring your present later. He's stuck in court and it's in his car,’ Sophia said.

‘Oh, no worries. Jackson has already gone ahead of me. I think he's cooking something special with the kids...’

Julianna tuned the chatter out. She tried hard not to worry about Mark and, in any case, what were the chances of something happening that specific evening? Weeks had gone by since Sophia had spoken to Reg and John.

She needed strong coffee, the kind that left the taste buds in no doubt they had been assaulted. Then maybe some sex with Mark to soothe his worries, and hers, then whisper into his ear how she had unravelled the knotted lines of his past and where they