A, B, C…

The workmanship was clean, intricate and masterful. With all the tattoos in here, it would have been easy to write it off as just another tramp stamp, but the longer Bailey looked at it, the more certain she became that it carried some sort of significance.

A.B.C.

The letters evidently formed some kind of acronym, but what did it stand for?

She snapped out of her trance, realising that she’d been staring at them a little too long. Thankfully they hadn’t noticed. She left the shower room, turning the letters over in her mind, analysing them like a cryptic crossword clue. If they contained an answer she was determined to find it.

Chapter 26

The soft pulse of dub emanated from the stereo, the air was thick with layers of marijuana smoke, and origami animals littered the cell.

Bailey stood in the doorway and surveyed the three stoners sitting slumped in the smoky gloom. After a few moments, Kay noticed her, squinting up at her with red-rimmed eyes through the grey miasma. There was a look of blankness, then slowly recognition seeped in.

‘It’s you again,’ she said. ‘The one with bad taste in Jean-Claude Van Damme films.’

Seema looked up. At the sight of Bailey, her face broke into a smile.

‘Got any more interesting film facts?’ she asked.

‘No,’ said Bailey. ‘But I do have some weed if you want a smoke.’

She pulled the ninety quid bag of weed out of her pocket and dangled it in front of her. Kay eyed it hungrily. Bailey tossed it onto the table and Kay scrambled sharply for it, pulled it open and took a deep sniff.

‘Mmm… sensimilla…’ She looked up at Bailey. ‘You arrived at exactly the right time. I was just about to skin up.’

She held up some rolling papers which had already been stuck together to form the basis of a joint. Shovelling a large pinch of Bailey’s weed into it, she added a few token strands of tobacco from a pouch of Golden Virginia, rolled it up, licked the gummed edges of the paper and sealed it into a tight cone-shaped joint which she then held up for the approval of the other two.

‘Seven out of ten,’ said Seema.

‘An eight surely?’ said Kay. ‘What do you think, Mel?’

‘Uh?’ Mel didn’t appear to be paying attention. She blinked and looked at them vacantly, scratching her frayed afro.

‘Forget it,’ said Kay, placing the joint in her mouth and sparking it up. She took a deep drag, then passed it to Seema, who took a drag and then passed it to Mel. Mel took a drag and held it up to Bailey.

Bailey looked at it. She couldn’t very well refuse it, seeing as she’d come here with a bag of weed to a cell full of people who spent most of their day smoking it. It would look odd, if not downright suspicious, if she didn’t partake of it too.