‘So, is she my nan?’ Georgie asked, knowing full well she wasn’t.

‘No, your nan’s dead, unfortunately.’

Harry smiled. ‘Grandad Jimmy says that you murdered our nan and went to prison, the same as our mum did.’

Seeing his father’s eyes begin to cloud over, Gary butted in. ‘What’s happened to that mutt of Joey’s, Dad? Is it still alive?’

‘Yeah,’ Eddie said, eyeballing his grandson with a look that could kill.

‘Don’t him and Dom take it out no more or what? They always used to have it with ’em, but I ain’t seen it lately,’ Gary asked. He knew he was talking a load of old bollocks, but a change of subject was desperately needed. Gary knew his dad well enough to know that Harry had been seconds away from getting a good wallop.

Eddie averted his eyes away from Harry and, much to Gary’s relief, chuckled. ‘The mutt spends a lot of its time in the neighbour’s house now, by all accounts. Apparently, the old girl that lives next door recently bought a male Westie and it was love at first sight. Joey said every time him and Dom try and take Madonna back indoors, she goes ballistic, tries to bite ’em and then howls all night.’

‘Who’s Madonna?’ Georgie asked. She briefly wondered if they were talking about the singer.

‘Your uncle’s Chihuahua,’ Ricky replied, smiling at her.

‘What’s one of them, then?’

About to explain the breed, Raymond’s intervention killed the conversation stone dead. ‘I don’t wanna worry you, lads, but I’m positive we’re being followed.’

Jed O’Hara had done a lot of thinking since Georgie and Harry had been kidnapped earlier. He had another child; one he knew nothing about and had never set eyes on. He didn’t even know what sex it was or its name, for Christ’s sake.

Frankie had been pregnant with their third child when she had stabbed him and got sent to prison. At the time, Jed had had every intention of trying to get custody of the baby once it was born, but Sammy’s murder, plus Frankie’s threats, had changed all that. In the end, Jed had been left with two choices. Number one was live, do a runner and keep Georgie and Harry for ever. Number two was risk getting murdered, locked up, and lose his kids for good.

The situation was a no brainer and since the night Jed had left Rainham, he’d blanked his then unborn child completely out of his mind. His parents had done the same and the child had never been mentioned since, but now Eddie Mitchell had tracked them down, Jed’s feelings had changed towards it.

‘Move over then, the van’s gone in the slow lane. You just nearly drove past it, you dinlo. What the fuck you doing?’ Billly shouted.