On the way out of Charlie’s she’d seen Alfie going in, but she’d felt too humiliated to go and say hello. She hadn’t wanted to admit to him that yet again she had nowhere to go. But perhaps the main reason she hadn’t gone up to Alfie was because she hadn’t known what, if anything, Ma had told him about her involvement in taking the baby. The last thing she wanted was Alfie being angry with her. Taking Mia had never been about Alfie; it had always been about Franny, but now it had turned into one big mess.

The only good news she’d had recently was she’d heard a rumour that Charlie was in hospital; though whether that was true or not she wasn’t sure. The rumour mill of Soho had a way of exaggerating things but if he was, she certainly wasn’t going to take him a bunch of flowers.

‘Oi, Shannon, hurry up, you’ve got a client.’

Shannon glanced at Laura, a tall skinny blonde behind the desk whose body looked out of proportion due to her enormously large breasts. Shannon gave a small smile then looked at the monitor watching a small, stocky, well-built man walking up the stairs.

Sullenly, Shannon said, ‘Who is he?’

‘Just another perv who likes them young. He’s only been coming a little while but he’s not keen on me – he thinks I’m too old for him. He’ll probably go for you … It’s your lucky day, darlin’ … Don’t look like that, money’s money.’

Shannon shuddered. She could feel her eyes beginning to prick with tears and it was stupid because she’d lost count of the amount of men she’d slept with over the years and she’d certainly lost count of the number of blow jobs she’d given. She couldn’t even remember when she’d first lost her virginity, though she knew it was somewhere between the ages of seven and eight.

She had thought that getting a job in the sauna – which was situated behind Tottenham Court Road in a grimy, upstairs flat – would mean that there was a chance she could work behind the reception area making bookings; something she’d always dreamt about, or even cleaning the rooms; she wouldn’t have minded that either. But it turned out apart from the owner having already told her that was never going to happen, the clients were even worse than they had been at Charlie’s, and although she’d been there less than a day, she already hated it.

‘What’s he like?’