She mustered all of her strength to reach her hand upward towards him. He lifted his hand out to her. Their fingers brushed.

She didn’t have the strength to hold on.

Her arm flopped down to her side. Her eyes slid shut as everything else around her faded to nothingness.

Chapter One

Dani’s nerves slowly grew as she wound her car through the leafy streets of the Birmingham suburb of Moseley. The sun was only just beginning to make a lacklustre appearance as it poked over rooftops and its rays filtered through dense trees just showing the first signs of autumn colour. It was thirty minutes until the onset of the morning rush hour and the roads were still quiet. Dani turned onto Rose Hill and parked her car in one of the few available spots on the crammed road.

She turned off the engine then took a deep breath before she put her hand to the door. As she stepped out into the chilly morning air she caught a brief glimpse of her reflection in the side mirror. She grimaced at what she saw. The call had come in more than an hour before her alarm was due to go off. She’d had barely any time to get ready before leaving the apartment. Her well-laid plans for the morning had been well and truly sidelined, and the only option had been to throw on her clothes and tie her messy hair back before darting out.

With her hair pulled back tight across her head there was nothing she could do to hide the three-inch-long mark above her ear where her hair had refused to regrow, the lumpy patch of bare flesh right there for everyone else to see.

There was nothing she could do about that now. At least this way she wasn’t hiding, she guessed.

She walked briskly down the street. Beyond the jam-packed parked cars, covered in beads of early morning dew, two long rows of Edwardian semi-detached houses were packed tightly together. Some of the houses appeared downtrodden almost to the point of being beyond saving, their gardens unkempt and overgrown, some filled with all manner of rubbish. Many of the other houses though had clearly been treated with more respect, their original features carefully preserved, their small front gardens neat, lawns and bushes trimmed.

As Dani walked along the pavement she noticed the bumper-to-bumper cars reflected the diverse condition of the houses, with banged-up old Fords and Renaults and Rovers parked next to much newer and shinier BMWs and Mercedes. The street was a clash of character and background and culture and class, much like the entire confused neighbourhood, which sat somewhat awkwardly between some of the wealthiest but also some of the poorest areas of Britain’s second city.