Wages of Sin by J. M. Gregson Read Free Book Online

couldn’t see that the world wouldn’t be any the worse for what he’d done. The streets were rid of another trollop. Another bitch who took money for it, from men who couldn’t get it any other way. He repeated the phrases he had used on himself through every night since Friday.
    There were a lot of them about, nowadays, flaunting their breasts and their legs and their crotches at men they could lead astray. Taking money for it. Hitching up their skirts and taking down their knickers to make money! You couldn’t get more guilty than that, could you? Women like that deserved everything that came to them! The world was well rid of women like that.
    He found he had got quite excited about it. Sexually excited; he had an erection, which he couldn’t use. Well, not really use. He fell again to thinking about his last view of that white, dead face, so mobile during its last brief struggle for life, so still and cold in death as he had carried her into that shed. It seemed important to him that he should recall every fall of her hair, every detail of the unlined features.

Five
    J oe Johnson looked like a criminal, to most people who came across him.
    The police know that criminals come in all shapes and sizes, that the biggest villains often look the most innocent and straightforward people: that is part of their equipment. But the public have some fairly straightforward ideas about what they usually call a ‘jailbird’. Such a man – female criminals are much less sharply etched in the public mind – usually has flat features, short, straight hair, minor scars about his visage, and narrow eyes.
    Joe Johnson had all of these. He also had unusual irises in those eyes. They were grey, but the remarkable thing about them was that they seemed completely dead. Watchful, even sharply observant, but dead to all emotion. It was not just that they concealed his feelings; with a little practice, most people can do that, though the writers of fiction do not acknowledge it. It was rather that these eyes gave the impression that no emotions at all took place behind them. It was very unnerving to the people who received most attention from those grey eyes.
    And on this Tuesday morning, several people found themselves under that intense scrutiny. When he was making a tour of his business interests, Johnson didn’t spare his employees. They were left in no doubt of what he required.
    Among other things, Joe Johnson was a successful pimp. Living off immoral earnings, the law called it, but the law was usually stumbling along well behind Joe Johnson. You needed witnesses to bring a court case. But the people who might have put Johnson behind bars were not willing to testify in court about the things he did. He had people who made sure of that. Fear was a powerful weapon, the best of all tools for men who made their money as Johnson did.
    He was bigger than this now: he didn’t need to go round collecting his money. Most of the time, he sent one of his minions out to do that. But he liked to keep himself in touch; hands-on management, they called it. Besides, he enjoyed frightening the women who worked for him.
    There was quite a lot of money due to him after the weekend’s activities. Sally Aspin had the notes ready for him. ‘Ninety-four pounds,’ she said, trying to keep the nervousness out of her voice.
    â€˜It’s not enough.’
    â€˜It’s right, Mr Johnson. It’s half of what I took, honest it is.’
    He looked at her steadily, letting the distaste creep slowly into the flat features. ‘Then you’re not taking enough, are you? Simple as that.’
    She was thirty-eight, looking five years older in the morning light. She had the blonde hair and buxom figure that men usually found attractive. But she was running to seed a little now. Her heavy breasts were sagging somewhat, even in the best, expensive bra she kept for her work on the streets. He was