Dora’s chest felt tight all of a sudden. She glanced down at the sleeping baby, then back at Donny.

‘So I’m still in danger.’

‘You know you are. Frank Pargeter don’t make idle threats.’

‘What . . . but I’ve got a baby, Donny. What should I do?’

Donny straightened. ‘You? You don’t have to do nothing, Dora. All you got to do to be safe is stick with me.’

Dora let out a shrill laugh. Donny Maguire, keep her safe?

Dora glanced around her. ‘We can’t stay on here.’

‘Why not?’

‘What, live together? That’s not respectable. We can’t do that.’

‘It’s what we’ve been doing since the trial started.’

‘Yes, but . . . I’ve been sleeping in here with Angel, you’ve been in the bedroom. And I only agreed to this arrangement because I had nowhere else to go, and Frank was still at large.’

‘You still got nowhere else to go, Dora. Your family hate your guts. And Frank might be banged up, but the threat from him isn’t over. He’ll get you if he can. You can rely on that.’

Dora stared at him in horror. He was right. She couldn’t go home, she could never do that. Dad wouldn’t have that – what, her with a bastard baby? He’d die of shame, wouldn’t be able to hold his head up anywhere: a daughter of his, a fallen woman. She couldn’t even go to Lil’s, for damned sure her sister wouldn’t want her there. She couldn’t go back to Aunt Min’s, that ship had sailed. She had no money left, none of Dickie and Frank’s gifts. Everything was gone.

All she had to rely on was a man who hated her. She looked at him and realized that all she had done in her life was stumble from one disaster to the next. She had been a virtual prisoner with Frank, living in a gilded cage until she’d told him about the baby and he’d turned on her like the predator he truly was.

Now, she was in the same situation again, reliant on a man for everything. Her only way out was the streets, and she couldn’t go down that route, not with a baby. She was stuck. Yes, trapped. Donny Maguire had control of her. And Dora had a horrible suspicion that this was what he’d wanted, right from the start.

Donny went to the door of the little room. ‘Come on, we’re going out. The girl will look after the baby a bit longer, she don’t mind.’

‘We’ve only just got back,’ Dora complained. After the nightmare of court, all she wanted was to be quiet, alone with Angel. She thought of Frank being handed a life sentence then being led down to the cells. That look in his eyes. The words he’d mouthed to her across the courtroom. She shuddered.

‘We’re going out,’ Donny said, his jaw tight, his eyes holding hers. ‘I’ve got something to show you.’

‘All right,’ she sighed. She had to keep him sweet. She had no other choice.