The Alibi: A gripping crime thriller full of secrets, lies and revenge

‘Do you mean the actress?’ I said.

‘Yep, although as you know that’s not her only claim to fame. As well as being a former TV soap star she was also the ex-wife of a well-known London gangster.’

‘Christ,’ I blurted. ‘Danny Shapiro.’

‘That’s right,’ Grant said, as though he’d scored a point. ‘Danny fucking Shapiro – the villain with the film-star looks who took over a huge criminal empire after his notorious father got banged up.’

I felt a surge of adrenalin. Grant wasn’t far wrong in saying the story was huge. Danny Shapiro was one of the country’s highest-profile criminals. His gang operated south of the Thames and was involved in drug trafficking, prostitution, extortion, money laundering, and even kidnapping. He and Megan Fuller had been tabloid fodder throughout their three-year marriage which had ended in divorce fourteen months ago.

‘Megan was found stabbed to death at her home in Balham earlier this morning,’ Grant said. ‘We had a tip from a paramedic who attended. So we’ve got the jump on everyone else.’

I was suddenly oblivious to the ache in my head as my mind filled with a flood of questions that I doubted Grant would know the answers to. I was certain the story would have created a buzz in the newsroom. The headline writers would already be focused on the paper’s early edition front page, and the online team were probably about to publish something on the website. Then it’d be out there, leading to a full-blown media firestorm.

‘So do you still want me to pass the story on to one of your colleagues?’ Grant said. ‘Only I can’t piss around. We need to move on this.’

From where I stood in the kitchen I could see Rosie at the table in the adjoining dining room. She was busy drawing pictures on a pad with big colourful crayons. My mother sat next to her, but her eyes were on me and her brow was scrunched up in a frown. I could tell she knew what was coming.

I felt my resolve dissipate and the guilt rear up inside me again as I turned away from them and said into the phone, ‘Okay, give me the details and Megan Fuller’s address. I’ll get right on it.’

‘That’s my girl,’ Grant said. ‘I knew you wouldn’t disappoint me.’

2 (#uf942eda3-e977-5074-b14a-aa72d077b558)

Ethan Cain

The girl had said she was 18, but Ethan Cain wasn’t sure he believed her. She looked younger. Much younger.

It hadn’t stopped him spending the night with her, though. She was mature enough to know exactly how to please him.

Even if she was underage there was no danger of anyone in authority ever finding out. The girl would be too scared to let slip that she’d been shagged by a 34-year-old man at his flat in Wandsworth.

She was still asleep on the bed and she hadn’t stirred when he’d got up just now to have a piss. It didn’t surprise him. Last night she’d consumed copious amounts of vodka and had sniffed at least five lines of coke. So she’d probably be comatose for a while yet.

But that was okay because he wasn’t in a hurry to get shot of her. It was Saturday and he didn’t have to go to work. Besides, he was already aroused at the prospect of fucking her again, maybe a couple of times this morning if he could manage it.

After emerging from the en-suite bathroom, Cain sat naked in the armchair next to the bed and lit his first cigarette of the day. It was always the best, the most satisfying, and he savoured the acrid warmth that filled his throat.

He knew he wasn’t a pretty sight. He looked far better with clothes on. At least they concealed his paunch and the man boobs that had begun sprouting up after he’d stopped working out. He wasn’t grossly overweight, just bigger and softer than he wanted to be.

The girl, on the other hand, looked good enough to eat. The duvet had been pushed aside to reveal her lying spread-eagled on her back. It was all he could do not to get back on the bed and feast on her bare flesh.

She had lush black hair, small pert tits, and skin as smooth as porcelain. It struck him that she was a picture of innocence. This made him smile because she was far from innocent.

Ania Kolak – if that was her real name – was among the thousands of Eastern European sex workers who had poured into London in recent years. She was Polish and had told him that she hoped one day to embark on a career as an actress.

He’d heard it all before. Most of them believed that selling their bodies was a means to an end and that after a few years they’d have enough money saved to be able to fulfil their dreams. But in most cases that never happened. Instead they ended up as drug addicts or pathetic zombies drained of every last drop of self-respect.

Not that he gave a toss. As far as he was concerned it served them right. They didn’t deserve his or anyone else’s pity.

He did have some sympathy for those who were forced into sex slavery, though. Their plight was indeed tragic. But all the women and girls he’d been with had clearly become prostitutes out of choice. Many of them had told him they actually enjoyed being on the game. It meant they had enough cash to live well in one of the world’s most expensive cities.

It still amazed him how much some of them earned. The high-class escorts who worked the West End often raked in thousands of pounds in a single night. Ania wasn’t in that league, not yet anyway, and her fee for an entire night was five hundred pounds. Cain was just glad he didn’t have to pay her and the others out of his own pocket. He would never have been able to afford it.

As it was he was lucky. The girls and drugs were the perks he enjoyed for being on Danny Shapiro’s payroll. Danny, like his father before him, ran the biggest prostitution racket this side of the Thames. But it was only part of his empire, an empire that stretched across the whole of south London.

He was without doubt the shrewdest villain in the capital and the most feared. Even the Russians, who controlled the West End, and the Albanians, who ran most of north London, knew better than to try to muscle in on his territory. They did attempt it a couple of years ago and quickly came to regret it. Two of their top people were shot dead outside their homes in Kensington, and one of the casinos they operated up west was set on fire.

It was widely accepted that Danny was just as ruthless as his old man, Callum Shapiro, who was doing a twenty-five-year stretch for a raft of convictions including murder.

Cain’s relationship with Danny was purely professional. He didn’t actually like the man, let alone trust him. But the arrangement they had was mutually beneficial. And to be fair Danny had always treated him with a modicum of respect – unlike Frankie Bishop, Danny’s second-in-command and the gang’s most brutal enforcer.

Bishop, a career criminal, had earned his ferocious reputation on the south coast where he was groomed by a gangster named Joe Strickland. He’d managed the security arrangements at Strickland’s pubs and clubs in and around Southampton. One night he attacked a punter who ended up with a fractured skull and ruptured spleen. For that he went down for three years. While in prison he met a couple of Danny’s lads and they urged him to move to London if he wanted to see more action and more money. So after his release he dropped in on Danny and offered his services, and Danny jumped at the chance to take him on.

It was Bishop who handed Cain his monthly cash retainer and supplied the girls and drugs. But dealing with him was never a pleasant experience. In the underworld he was known as ‘The Nutter’ because it was obvious to everyone that he was a grade-A psychopath. Still, Cain reckoned it was a small price to pay to indulge his passions for drugs, gambling, and sweet young things like Ania.

She was still out cold, her chest rising and falling with every breath. It occurred to him that he ought to take one of his little blue pills so that he could make the most of her before she left. It would take at least thirty minutes to kick in so he decided to wash it down with a cup of tea.

He crushed what was left of his fag in the ashtray on the floor and rummaged in the bedside drawer for a pill.

In the kitchen he opened the blinds and reached for the kettle to fill it with water. That was when he noticed his mobile phone on the worktop next to the sink.

As soon as he picked it up he saw that he had two unopened text messages and three missed calls.

‘Shit.’

At some point last night he’d put the phone on silent and had forgotten to take it off. It had been careless of him. Downright stupid.

He checked the times of the messages and the calls. They had all come in during the past hour, which was a relief. He would say he was asleep in bed and hadn’t heard it ringing.

It wasn’t until he phoned the office that he discovered why they were anxious to reach him. It was bad news.

He wasn’t going to have a day off, after all. And there would be no time for even a morning quickie with Ania.

Cain didn’t know what to make of it. Megan Fuller had been murdered in her own home in Balham.

Jesus.

He had never met the woman but he knew all about her. She’d appeared in a soap that had aired on the BBC for about five years, playing the glamorous wife of a cantankerous factory owner. In real life she’d been married to Danny Shapiro, and by all accounts it had been a tumultuous relationship.

The word on the street was that she’d fallen on hard times since the Beeb dropped her from the soap over a year ago as part of a character shake-up. She’d been struggling to find other work ever since and had recently been threatening to write a tell-all book about her life.

Danny was among a number of people who were apparently not happy about it. He feared she might reveal a bit too much about their life together in order to secure a lucrative publishing contract.

As Cain stood under the shower, he realised that Danny would most likely be in the frame for her murder because the book thing meant that he had a motive. If so, then things could get tricky. He thought about phoning Danny to find out what he knew, if anything. But he decided against it. Maybe later when he had a better idea about what was going on.

After the shower, he towelled himself dry and had another go at waking Ania. She hadn’t responded to the first attempt, but this time her eyes flickered open and she looked up at him.

‘I said get your arse out of bed and get dressed,’ he told her. ‘Something’s come up and I have to go out.’