TRAPPED by JACQUI ROSE Page A

Maggie May and her spoilt goon of a boyfriend ruining things.
    She needed to play things carefully. It was the easiest bit of money she’d made in a long time. The kid was no problem. Most of the times she just sat in her room holding onto her stuffed rabbit or she’d be colouring and cutting up endless pieces of paper.
    For a three year old she wasn’t any bother, but if she ever did become a bother, she wouldn’t hesitate to give Harley a hard slap. Hard enough to show her who’s boss, but soft enough for it not to show. One thing Gina wasn’t, was stupid.

CHAPTER TWELVE
    It was coming into the early hours of the morning and Johnny Taylor looked at his phone. The five texts on his mobile were still unopened, still sitting in his inbox. They were all from Maggie. He couldn’t bring himself to read them. He knew what they’d say. He wouldn’t blame her. But what was he supposed to do? It was complicated. In fact it was impossible. And now his father had been stabbed by Max, the situation had become hopeless.
    Sitting outside Whispers club in Old Compton Street , Johnny pulled his Armani jacket tightly around him. The night air was cool, which he was grateful for. Soho in the summer became oppressive. It was also clearing his head, but he could still feel the excess alcohol in his blood, and he sensed it wouldn’t take much for his head to start to ache again.
    Johnny continued to sit on the metal chair, enjoying the lights of Soho against the cloudless night sky, aware there was a huge city beyond the other side of the buildings, yet the intimacy of the area made him always feel there was no other place he’d rather be.
    He blew out a ring of smoke and slightly choked as it caught the back of his throat. He watched the crowds of people congregating outside the late night opening pubs, smoking their cigarettes, finishing off their beers. Standing around in short sleeved shirts and t-shirts. Feeling the chill of the air, but guarded against the full severity of the cool summer night by the warmth of the alcohol.
    It’d been a crazy twenty-four hours. First his father with Max. Then Maggie. The reason he’d gone on his bender in the first place. The woman he loved but was supposed to hate.
    If the circumstances had ever been likely to get better, if he’d ever been brave enough to try to broach the subject of their relationship with his parents, it definitely wasn’t going to happen now. There’d be all-out war. Once again he and Maggie would be stuck in the middle as they’d always been – and now Harley was stuck in the middle of it too.
    Thinking of his daughter made Johnny flinch. After Thelma, the ex-Tom from the sauna, had moved to be near her old man in Maidstone, it’d all gone tit over head. He’d been lucky to find someone like her in the first place and it would be impossible to find anyone to replace her. So then it’d become complicated, and Johnny Taylor didn’t like complicated. He wasn’t very good at it.
    All his life his parents had sorted everything out for him. He’d never needed to make any real decisions. Even when Harley was born he didn’t really need to worry, as Maggie had been happy to sort out all the day-to-day care of the baby, and he’d been happy to sort out the cash. Cash was the easy part. But difficult, complicated responsibility, he didn’t know how to do.
    The problem was Thelma had been perfect. She was like Mary Poppins, taking Harley all over London; to zoos, to parks, to museums. Making cakes, painting pictures and always making sure Harley was beautifully dressed. And his daughter had been happy. The only other person he’d ever seen shower so much love on a child was his own mother when he was a child.
    He’d been grateful to Thelma but Thelma had also been grateful to him. She’d gone from being shagged up the arse by strangers and giving ten pound blow jobs to being paid to spend her time going out on day trips in the company of his angelic little