The Life and Times Of Erin Wilson

A year later, the girl marked by her postcode had learned to blend in, not to stand out, was working at an antique shop on Rochester's Banks, the grimy end of the high street opposite the railway station. It was a dusty, cluttered wonderland of forgotten things, and at its center was the old man, Mr. Abernathy, the owner. He was a relic himself, a man whose pomposity was matched only by his wandering hands. Erin was a bit overweight by then, but comfortable in her own skin in a way she hadn't been at school. Her body was a tool, a presence, and she was learning to use it. The old man's pinches and taps, the casual, proprietary brushes against her backside as she squeezed past him in the narrow aisles, were just background noise. She endured it because she needed the money, but more than that, she endured it because she was observing. She was learning the shape of his greed, the measure of his arrogance.

For two years, she played the part of the biddable, slightly dim-witted girl. She dusted and polished, arranged ornaments, and served the few customers who wandered in. She learned the difference between a Georgian mahogany sideboard and a Victorian reproduction. She learned to spot the fakes and to value the genuine articles. Mr. Abernathy saw her as little more than a pair of helpful hands and a convenient target, and paid her little mind beyond her daily tasks. It was a mistake he would come to regret. By the time she was eighteen, her diligence and apparent lack of ambition earned her a promotion of sorts. He began entrusting her with more responsibility, including the daily cashing up and, eventually, access to the shop's ledgers. It was during one of Abernathy's extended "business" lunches at the pub that she found it.

It wasn't in the main ledger. That was a carefully constructed fiction of modest but steady profits. It was hidden away in a locked drawer of his roll-top desk, the key to which he 'accidentally' left on the counter one day. Inside was a small, black leather-bound book. The entries were terse, coded, but Erin had a mind like a trap. Cross-referencing them with the main accounts, she deciphered the shop's secret life. Antiques didn't keep it afloat. It was the Lord family. The name was infamous in the Medway towns. They owned boxing gyms and scrapyards, and their reputation for ruthlessness was legendary. Abernathy wasn't just doing their books; he was laundering their money. And the black ledger showed something else, something far more stupid and far more dangerous. He was skimming from the crooks, siphoning off a little here, a little there, hiding it in a personal account he thought no one knew about.

A cold, slow smile spread across Erin's face. This was not Steven Johnson, crying over a few stolen packs of cigarettes. This was a game played with sharks. And she had just found the chum in the water. Her mind didn't just race; it soared. She made meticulous copies of the relevant pages, her handwriting a perfect imitation of Abernathy's spidery scrawl. She even made a few audio recordings on a small cassette player she 'borrowed' from the shop, capturing Abernathy's drunken boasts to his cronies at the pub about how he was putting one over on the Lords. Her insurance policy was complete.

A week later, she walked into the Chatham boxing gym. The air hung thick with sweat, leather, and cheap disinfectant. The rhythmic thud of gloves on bags and the sharp crack of a speed ball formed a percussive backdrop to the fighters' grunts and shouts. In the corner, talking to a young man with tape wrapped around his hands, was Bob Lord himself. He was a mountain of a man, his face a roadmap of old fights and hard living. He looked up as she approached, his eyes small and dark, taking in her sturdy frame and plain face with dismissive contempt.

" Yeah? What do you want, girlie?" he grunted, his voice a low growl.

" Mr. Lord," she said, her voice steady, betraying none of the adrenaline coursing through her. "I've got some information about your business with Mr. Abernathy at the antique shop. Information you might find very interesting."

He stared at her for a long moment, then jerked his head towards a door at the back. "In my office."

The office was as spartan as the gym was chaotic. A metal desk, two chairs, and a filing cabinet.A few posters of fight meets. He sat behind the desk, gesturing for her to take the other chair. She didn't sit. She stood, set her handbag on the desk, and pulled out the copied ledger pages. She laid them out in front of him, one by one, explaining the discrepancies, the skimming, the hidden accounts. She didn't rush. She let the numbers tell the story. Bob Lord said nothing, his face an unreadable mask, but his eyes never left the pages.

When she was done, she leaned forward, her hands flat on the desk. "He's been stealing from you for years, Mr. Lord. And he's not very smart about it."

He finally looked up at her, his expression unreadable. "So, what do you want? Money?"

Erin laughed, a short, sharp sound. "Money is temporary. I want the shop. The business. I want you to give me a no-interest loan to buy him out. Six months. If I can't pay it back, I'll work for you. No questions asked."

Lord leaned back, a flicker of something like amusement in his eyes. "And why shouldn't I just get rid of you? Take the information and... solve the problem?"

"Because," Erin said, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, "the originals, and the tapes, are with a solicitor. With instructions that if I don't contact him by a certain time every day, they go straight to your friends at the Serious Crime Squad. And not just about the money laundering. About the other things too." She was bluffing about the 'other things', but it was a calculated risk.

Bob Lord stared at her, then threw his head back and roared with laughter. It was a deep, rumbling sound that seemed to shake the building's foundations. He looked at her, not with contempt anymore, but with a grudging, calculating respect. He saw past the overweight teenager to the sharp, ruthless mind within. He saw a kindred spirit.

"You've got balls, girlie," he said, his grin revealing a gold tooth. "Alright. You've got a deal." He held out a massive, calloused hand. "And just so you know, I like people who've got balls."

Erin shook his hand, her grip firm. "The name's Erin," she said. "And Mr. Lord, I've got more than balls. I've got everything."