She stared at the scar. It compounded her growing sense that there was more to Bailey than met the eye. How did she get that scar? Sharon would find out sooner or later. Over the course of the long hours spent in the cell together, you found out virtually everything there was to know about your cellmate. And, who knew, there might even be something to gain out of it.

Sharon lay back down on her bunk, smiled like a shark and flexed her fingers, cracking her knuckles one by one.

‘So why are you in here?’ asked Bailey.

Sharon sighed. ‘I’m just too inquisitive for my own good.’

Bailey nodded and continued arranging her items on the bunk. Sharon continued to observe her. She could tell that Bailey was slightly ill at ease under her blatant scrutiny, but she didn’t care. She’d found that the longer you stared at people, the more you noticed those little cracks that revealed who they really were.

‘You know, Bailey, I’m glad to have your company to be honest.’ She paused for effect. ‘What with the murder and everything.’

Bailey froze. She turned to look at Sharon once more. ‘What murder?’

‘You haven’t heard about it? Silly me. Of course you haven’t. It’s your first day. Well, I didn’t see it or anything. But I heard all about it. Everyone’s talking about it. Really vicious. Lots of blood. Bits cut off. That kind of thing. They did a big cell search yesterday. Looking for the murder weapon. But I overheard them saying that they were also looking for…’ she dropped her voice to a conspiratorial whisper, ‘…a human body part.’

Bailey’s face screwed up in disgust and alarm. Sharon was enjoying shocking her on her first day. It gave her a pleasant sense of superiority.

‘Who got murdered?’ said Bailey.

‘Some girl. I never met her. Never even knew about her until she ended up dead.’

‘Who murdered her?’

That was a very good point, thought Sharon, frowning to herself. She hadn’t really thought about it up until now, and now she did think about it, it did somewhat bother her that whoever had done this was still around. Sharon wasn’t the type who scared easily, but there was something about this particular murder that kind of got to her.

‘I have no idea who did it,’ she said. ‘And I guess that means you want to be watching your back.’

Chapter 8

Night had fallen and Bailey lay awake on her bunk in the dimness listening to the sounds of the prison – muted sobbing, a distant clang, the gurgling of pipes, a solitary shout, the creak of springs as her cellmate shifted position on the bunk below.

She was knackered, but she couldn’t get to sleep as her buzzing mind was still processing her first day in prison.

The whole procedure had begun eleven hours earlier in the local Crown Court. She had been taken in handcuffs to a holding cell underneath the courtroom to make it seem as if she had just come directly from being sentenced. After spending three hours in the holding cell, she had been transferred to a prison van to be taken to HMP Foxbrook.