She knuckled her eyes, stood at the kerb waiting to cross and glanced over at the chip shop. Then she had to blink hard. Was that Emily? Coming out of the chip shop? With a bulging bag of takeaway?
The green man flashed, giving her anger permission to cross the road. She ran up behind Emily, grabbed her hair and yanked it back.
‘You thieving bitch!’ she yelled. ‘What’re you doing with my mother?’
Emily staggered backwards. ‘Stop, let go. Ow! I’ll tell you, I will!’
Megan kept hold of her hair. ‘Go on then, you liar, you thief! Where’s my bag?’
‘The police have it,’ Emily said, her eyes slits as Megan tugged on her hair. ‘I got caught pinching the batteries. You’re hurting me!’
‘Shit! You mean they’ve got my passport, too?’ For a moment her anger turned to despair.
‘I’m sorry, all right? I shouldn’t have scaved your stuff, but there’s no way I’d have gotten a passport, and I just thought, you know, your . . .’ Emily trailed off. ‘Your mum’s frantic about you.’
‘How can I believe anything you tell me? I was your friend – I thought you were mine. You let me down badly, Emily. Really cut me up.’ Still, Megan loosened her grip.
In a flash, Emily spun around and pushed Megan so hard in the chest she stumbled backwards and hit the pavement.
Emily raced around the corner.
Megan pulled herself to her feet. Pain shot up her leg. Just what she needed, a twisted ankle. Furious and frustrated, she limped to the corner.
‘I could kill you, Emily!’ she yelled while hopping on one foot.
She leaned against a shop window and glared as Emily sprinted down the road, the chip shop bag swinging from her fist. Just before she reached the far corner, she disappeared into an alley.
Megan tried her foot again. ‘Ahh, damn!’
She limped along, pain in every step. Halfway to the alley, she heard a vehicle backfire. With a screech of wheels, a black car ragged it out of the same backstreet that Emily had gone into. The vehicle almost knocked down a couple of elderly pedestrians that were ambling towards her, and the old man rushed into the alley. The woman watched him for a moment, then turned to face the road, waved her hands over her head and yelled, ‘Police! Police! Somebody, call the police!’
Megan recognised trouble when she saw it. She about-turned and limped away as quickly as she could. Emily must have been caught nicking something again, and would be running in the other direction . . . Well, there was no point getting involved. Run away from trouble was Megan’s number one rule.
She jogged into the park, wondering where on earth she should sleep tonight. She couldn’t go to a shelter if her mum was looking for her and besides, she wanted to save her money. She thought of the place where they had slept two nights ago – if she returned to the dosshouse, she might catch Emily there and at least find a way to get her passport back. But first, she needed a torch.
*
At the pound shop, a woman with a bunch of keys stood at the door.
‘We’re closing, love.’
‘Please, just a torch, I’ll be quick. I really need it.’
‘Hurry up then.’ The woman blocked the shopper behind Megan.
Megan thought about the building as she raced up the shop aisle. She snatched a packet of baby wipes, a torch and, spotting a hammer with a packet of two-inch nails taped to the handle on the same shelf, she grabbed that too.
‘I hope you’re not a burglar,’ the checkout woman said, and laughed.
Megan shook her head rapidly, paid her three pounds and asked the shop assistant to swap her loose change for a five-pound note.
‘No problem, love,’ the woman said.
Megan hurried for food, from Pete’s Dogs, before sleeping in the abandoned office. One of her rules was not to spend more than half her daily earnings, so she had two pounds left for a meal. Before she left the shop, she slipped the five-pound note into her Ziploc bag which, in turn, she zipped into the leg pocket of her camouflage trousers.
At the hot dog van, a smart guy wearing a dark suit and a Burberry scarf was in conversation with Pete. Megan approached the opposite end of the counter.
‘Can I have two pounds’ worth of hot dog please, mister? It’s all I’ve got.’ She held out the coin.
‘You’re back, are you?’ Pete said. ‘Where’s your friend tonight?’
Megan lifted and dropped her shoulders.
‘No idea.’ She felt the two men’s eyes on her and shivered.
‘Throw a Coke and a Mars in with it, Pete,’ the smart one said. ‘The kid looks starved.’
‘Thanks.’
Megan glanced in his direction but didn’t meet his eyes. Then she snatched up the food bag and ran down the alley towards the building.
CHAPTER 14
SOFIA
Athens, 1950.
I GREW UP IN THE baker’s care. He was like a father to me and I became very fond of him. Our lives were hard, with little more than work and sleep, yet they were happy days. He taught me everything there was to know about different grades of flour, the intoxicating smell of fresh yeast and its proving time, and the best baking temperature for a fine crust. By the time I was fifteen, I’d developed a skill for decorating pastries with nuts and icing, and even sat at his elbow, watching, while he did the accounts.
While the bakery would never make Mr Zacharia rich, the business was steady and reliable, unlike our country. Since the end of the World War II, there had been little improvement in Athens. Civil war raged between the government and the communist parties who, it was rumoured, were shipped out to several prison islands and often never heard of again.
One Saturday afternoon, when my fingers were as white and puckered as damp filo pastry after all the washing-up, Mr Zacharia gave me five drachmas and a dish of leftover buns. The money would buy a desperately needed pair of shoes – I’d been walking on cardboard and oilcloth for weeks. Hopefully there would be enough left for a pair of nylons and a suspender belt. Like any sixteen-year-old, I longed to dress like a woman.
The buns were favourites of mine, with chopped olives in the dough and a sprinkle of salty cheese toasted on the top. My mouth watered just looking at them.
‘Make sure you bring the bowl back tomorrow, Sofia. And make sure you’re here at one o’clock. We’ve all the Easter bread to bake tonight!’
I set out to my next job, cleaning El Greco’s taverna across the road before it opened for the evening. They paid me by providing a room in an old house nearby. The cook always left me something on a plate in the taverna’s kitchen, but I was so hungry at that moment my ribs hurt. I hurried into a side alley to eat one of the rolls before going any further. I should have looked where I was going, but I could hardly take my eyes off the food. In the dingy side street, I leaned my tired back against the wall and, with the bowl in the crook of one arm, I fed myself a roll.
The sudden yank on my shoulder sent the crockery crashing to the ground.
‘Oh my God, Mr Zacharia’s dish!’ I cried, swinging around to face the two ruffians whom I hadn’t noticed come out of a door to the side of me. ‘He’ll kill me! I’ll lose my job!’
Before I could bend to gather the pieces, the two men lifted me off my feet and bustled me into the apartment building.
‘Help! Help!’ I screamed, terrified of what they had in mind, kicking and struggling with all my might. They bundled me along a corridor and shoved me into a room.
‘Stand still!’ one of the rogues growled, and then delivered a swift slap to my cheek.
I tasted blood in my mouth and realised I had bitten the inside of my cheek. No one had struck me for years. I was so shocked, I could not speak and I trembled in terror. Then anger overtook me, and, without hesitating to think of the consequences, I bunched my fist and aimed for the blackguard’s nose. Pain exploded in my hand and shot up my arm. The other thug grabbed my hair, so I jerked my elbow back and hit something solid. He yelped. I mig
ht have got away if the first man, blood streaming down his face, hadn’t responded with a right hook to my jaw.
As the world rushed away, I caught sight of an elegant and bejewelled woman draped on a chaise longue, watching the proceedings.
*
When I regained consciousness, I found myself in a small room with a bed, a chair and a wardrobe. My first thought was to check my woman parts to make sure I hadn’t been violated while I was unconscious. Everything seemed normal. The only pain was in my face where I’d been struck.
I had to escape wherever I was and get back home. I scrambled to my feet and tugged at the locked door, fear, determination and panic going off inside me. I ran to the window, but found it barred too.
‘Let me out!’ I yelled, hammering on the door.
After a minute of shouting and banging, the woman I’d seen before came into the room.
‘Step back and sit on the bed,’ she said.
I tried to dash past her but instantly realised she wasn’t alone. The brute who had hit me was beside her. He lifted me and threw me on the bed, then stepped back to guard the door.
‘I am Magdalena,’ the woman said. ‘The madam of this house.’
Her face had the uniform colour of thick pancake and her eyes were rimmed with blackened lashes. She wore long sparkling earrings, and so much perfume it overwhelmed me. Her evening dress made me wonder how long I had been unconscious.
Then her words sunk in. Madam? I had heard of these women. They supplied girls for the rich and the not-so-rich. Girls for unmentionable activities.
‘Madam, I hope you don’t think I’m a poutana!’ I cried, balking as I said the awful word for prostitute.
‘Of course not. I can see by your clothes you are a girl of class,’ she said mockingly, her eyes travelling down the simple smock a charitable customer of Mr Zacharia’s had given me.
‘I am a girl of class, Madam, and I’ll thank you to tell your thugs to treat me with respect and allow me to continue home!’ I said, with all the bravery I could muster.
‘Ha! Are you a virgin?’
Shocked, I stared at her for a moment before I replied, ‘That’s none of your business!’
‘You’re wrong, doll, it’s exactly my business. If you are, then there’s five hundred drachmas for you if you please one of my gentlemen friends.’
Stunned by such an unthinkable amount of money, and by the irreparable cost, I hesitated – then quickly recovered myself.
‘Madam, I am daughter to the famous singer Alexa Bambaki. I don’t need your money, and I will thank you not to suggest such a thing.’
Her jaw dropped. ‘Alexa Bambaki? Then you really are a treasure! Can you sing like your mother, doll?’
‘I practise with her every day.’
‘Ha!’ she said again. ‘Alexa Bambaki’s dead, blown to bits in the theatre. You’re a liar!’
Her words wounded me, but then my spirit rose and I raised my voice in anger.
‘My mother lives on in my heart!’ I thumped myself in the chest. I was not a child anymore. The years since my family’s death had taught me to be strong. ‘And she’ll be looking down on you in disgust, right now, Madam, for abusing her daughter this way. Be sure to understand, you will die a very horrible death if she sees you treating me with less than the greatest respect!’
For a second, her face warped. She glanced at the ceiling, the pink rouge on her cheeks changing into bright red blotches.
She crossed herself, then kissed her fingertips.
‘Show me, then! Let me hear you sing. I’ve been thinking of providing entertainment other than the basics I offer.’
‘I will not! I’ve just finished work. I’m tired. This is not the condition in which to sing. The voice is a fragile thing. Let me go home and sleep, and tomorrow I’ll return and sing for you if the wages you offer are fair and you guarantee your thugs will not lay a finger on me.’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘You won’t come back! I’m not stupid. You’ll have to sleep here.’
‘I am the daughter of Alexa Bambaki, and if I say I will come back, then I will.’
She folded her arms under her bosom and shook her shoulders.
‘Madam, I work at the bakery for Mr Zacharia. You can always find me there.’
Her eyes narrowed and she stared at me for a moment. ‘What does he pay you?’
I panicked, wondering if I should lie. ‘Fifty drachmas a week,’ I said, grossly exaggerating.
She rubbed her fingers over her mouth as she thought, then frowned at her red fingertips.
‘Mm, all right then. If you’re good enough, I’ll think about it. But you had better come back or I’ll send these two after you.’
My jaw throbbed and hurt so much I felt my eyes close. I must be late for the taverna. I could lose my job, and my room, if it wasn’t cleaned before opening time. I nodded once, and then Magdalena nodded for her thug to move aside.
I hurried back into the street, passing a man with his collar up and trilby down on my way out.
*
With only forty-five minutes to opening time, I flew around El Greco’s, first with a broom, then a mop. In the kitchen, I groaned at the stack of plates and pans, but the warm soapy water helped to loosen my bruised knuckles. Thirty minutes later, the owner and staff arrived.
‘I’m a bit behind,’ I explained. ‘Sorry, it won’t happen again.’ I pointed at my red and swollen jaw. ‘I was attacked on my way here.’
I winced when the boss lifted my chin. ‘Who did this to you?’ he asked, aghast. ‘We should call the police!’
‘A couple of ruffians. I’d rather not make trouble. I have to get the cleaning finished before we open.’
He shook his head, sighing, but left the kitchen to let me get on with the job.
As I scrubbed the pans, my mind was elsewhere.
What would I sing for Madam Magdalena? Did I really want the job? What about Mr Zacharia? How would he manage without me?
‘Go home and get some sleep, Sofia,’ the boss said, as I dried the last pan. ‘And mind you don’t get yourself into any more trouble!’
I didn’t need telling twice. I picked up the plate of giant beans that the cook had left and shovelled them into my mouth. I had to be back at the bakery in six hours’ time.
*
My little room contained hardly more than a bed and table. I poured some water into a bowl, soaked a cloth and held it to my throbbing jaw. Too tired to do anything, I lay on the bed, exhaustion making my limbs heavy and my head light.
It seemed I had only just closed my eyes when a hammering on the door woke me.
‘Sofia! Sofia!’ Mr Zacharia boomed.
I struggled off the bed, unbolted the door and snapped the light on.
‘Oh, God! What time is it?’
‘It’s 1.30. Get down to the bakery! We’ve got the Easter bread to bake before dawn!’ he yelled, clearly angry. Then he stopped and stared at me. ‘What the hell happened to you?’
‘A couple of ruffians got me.’ I put my hand to my face. It hurt and I could feel it was swollen. ‘And before you ask, no, I don’t have time for the police. I don’t have time to sleep, or eat, or wash. I’m exhausted, Mr Zacharia.’
He glanced around the room. ‘You work seven days a week for this room? You must be mad!’
‘What am I supposed to do? I couldn’t go on sleeping in the shop, could I?’ Weary to my bones, I sighed. ‘Come on, let’s get the Easter bread going.’
While we walked towards the bakery, I told him everything that had happened since I had left him at midday. In the back of the shop, Mr Zacharia was silent until I was hacking off half-kilos of dough for him to knead.
‘Right, I’ve made a decision,’ he said, standing straight and rolling his shoulders like a prize fighter. ‘I’m coming with you to see this Madam Magdalena. You can take the job on a month’s trial, so long as it only involves singing. If it doesn’t work out, you’re back with me, right?’
�
�But how will you manage for a month without help?’
‘That’s not your problem. Now, how much did you say I paid you?’
The rest of my face reddened to match my jaw. ‘Fifty drachmas a week . . .’
He blinked at me. ‘Good thinking,’ he said, after a moment. ‘And as I provide your clothing . . .’
I stared at him, then his face broke into a wide grin and we both laughed, me wincing and holding my jaw.
CHAPTER 15
ZOË
Manchester, present day.
WHERE THE HELL WAS EMILY?
The girl had been gone for twenty minutes. Zoë paced the room.
Twenty-five minutes . . . A car backfired outside and made her jump. There was a screech of tyres. She tried to see down to the road, but the street behind the hotel was too narrow.
Thirty minutes . . . She put her coat on. The chipshop queue couldn’t be that long.
Shit!
Emily wasn’t coming back. What a fool she’d been!
What should she do? She had to act before the urge to fudge things kicked in; she had to face the consequences of her unprofessionalism. Phone Colin. No, phone Don first, tell him what had happened. Don always knew what to do. She was ashamed that she had fallen for Emily’s ‘trust me’ face. As Zoë punched the phone buttons, she was furious.
‘Don, she’s done a runner.’
‘What?’
‘I got custody of the kid that stole Megan’s bag and now she’s scarpered. Tell me what to do, please.’
‘When did it happen?’
‘Just now – well, less than an hour ago.’
‘Call the police, do it right away. I’ll call you back in thirty minutes. Don’t wait, just do it, Zoë.’
Zoë was never great in a crisis. She liked to be prepared, to write lists, to have a plan. It was a relief to be told what to do. She dialled 999, asked for the police, then told them what had happened. Glaring at the hotel room door as she spoke, Zoë still held onto the hope that Emily would return with a plausible explanation. The police told her to go to the station. She called a taxi.
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