Seeing time was getting on, Jessica urged the kids to finish their breakfast. Living in the lanes meant they needed a lift to and from school and she didn’t want them to be late again. ‘Come on, hurry up. You’ve got your exams soon and you don’t want to fail them,’ Jessica said sternly.

Frankie and Joey smirked at one another as they followed their mum out to the car. Little did she know, neither of them had any intention of spending their day studying for their exams. Joey and Frankie hated school and going through the school gates wasn’t on their agenda.

Driving up the M1, Eddie was deep in thought. Ronny had just rung him, shouting and bawling and, for the second time that week, Ed had bitten his tongue.

No one, including Eddie, knew exactly what had happened to Ronny. Ed had apparently been owed a lot of money by a Scottish geezer called Jake Souness. ‘I’m gonna fucking blow his brains out,’ Ronny had drunkenly bragged one day.

Eddie had told his brother to stay away from Jake. ‘Leave it to me. Souness is no fucking mug – he’s heavy material. I’ll have a word with Dad. He’ll know how to play it,’ Ed warned him.

As silly as arseholes, Ronny had ignored Eddie’s advice and gone to see Jake Souness alone. He had been found half dead two days later and had no recollection of what had actually happened. All he had said was that Jake had poured neat bottles of vodka down his throat, forcing him to drink it. ‘I don’t remember anything after that. My next memory is waking up, being in agony and not being able to walk,’ Ronny said.

Harry Mitchell had come out of retirement to get revenge for his son. He had tortured Jake Souness for three days and, when Jake’s body could take no more, he had chopped his head off while he was still alive.

Eddie had been with his father that day and Jake Souness’s screams would live with him forever.

‘Take the next junction, Ed,’ Raymond said, snapping Ed out of his daydream.

Eddie was heading towards a gypsy camp on the outskirts of Birmingham. Dickie Pearce had taken the right piss out of him. Fifteen grand, Eddie had lent him and the cunt had done a runner with it. Finding Dickie Pearce hadn’t been easy. Eddie would never have lent him the cash in the first place if he had known he had links with the travelling community. Eddie thought Dickie was just your average guy, and he’d been shocked to find out that the piss-taking bastard was, in fact, a plastic pikey.

‘Answer that,’ Eddie ordered Raymond as his phone rang.

‘It’s your dad. Says it’s urgent,’ Raymond told him.