Author's Note: This story includes a degree of male/female sex. It also includes a lot of unholy acts which some people may find disturbing. Please accept my apologies in advance and read on, bearing in mind that the battle of good against evil is relentless.
And that good will always prevail.
I hope.
*****
Prologue
The Thames was by no means the biggest river in the world but, as it snaked its way through London, it was majestic, wide and strong. It was also a good way to get rid of things. For countless centuries it had been used as the city's main drain. How many billions of chamber pots had been emptied into it, how many tens of millions of tons of industrial waste?
One more piece of garbage wouldn't go amiss.
The unremarkable panel van was nearing its destination. For a while it travelled parallel to the river at a distance of maybe a hundred yards. Then it took a left into what could only be described as an alley between boarded-up buildings. Moving slowly it headed towards the water, its occupants silent.
The alleyway was in an undesirable part of town. A mile or so away real estate was ranked amongst the most expensive in the world. Here there wasn't a price because nobody wanted to buy.
Under the tyres the road surface changed as smooth tarmac gave way to old cobbles. And they were very old, nothing like the smart ones found in touristy areas. No, these were uneven and out of line. A lot of them had been crushed or crumbled, some were missing altogether.
The driver grimaced as he steered the van through heaps of trash, trying to avoid the larger potholes. The Mayor might very well claim otherwise, but it was hard to believe that any repairs had been made here since the Luftwaffe paid their last overnight visit, sixty-odd years ago.
'Your turn,' he said as he pulled up and killed the lights. As if his accomplice didn't know whose turn it was.
For perhaps ten minutes they sat there in the van, doing and saying nothing, listening to the tick of the cooling engine. They were parked in the very end of the alley. The cobbles continued for ten yards but on an incline, leading down and into the river itself. Once upon a time the locals would have used that incline to launch some shitty little boat. But not nowadays; nowadays nobody ever came here.
The loneliness of the place was why they were there, obviously.
Unromantic as he was, the driver admired the moonlight on the water. This was a wide stretch on a bend. The opposite bank had to be two hundred yards away. Chances of being observed from over there were zero.
And the silence was deafening. Not that a city the size of London could ever be silent at any time of day or night. Even now, after two in the morning, there was a buzz in the air. It was tricky to describe but there nevertheless: the intangible background sound of millions of people rutting, fighting, singing and even sleeping.
Yes, it was intangible but as much there as the sun and the tides.
Talking about tides . . .
Chances of being observed from north of the river were zero too. There was a locked-up timber yard to their right and fuck all to their left, apart from exposed waste land. And even the hardiest of rough-sleepers shunned that waste land. The wind coming off the river was bitter, whatever the time of year.
Nobody in his right mind would pass a thousand sheltered doorways to doss there.
Not with any prospect of surviving the night, anyway.
'Okay,' he finally said, 'let's do it.'
While his accomplice quietly opened the back of the van the driver covered the alleyway. CCTV round these parts was non-existent. The only way they could get caught in the act was by the unlikely event of someone coming down the cobbles. And he wasn't about to let that happen, unlikely or not.
Behind him he could sense his accomplice hefting the garbage onto his shoulder and fireman's lifting it down to the moonlit Thames.
It was two minutes of a job, no more.
Lack of CCTV, lack of witnesses, a seriously strong undertow . . .
What could possibly go wrong?
Chapter One
(Friday 28th May 2010)
Mary Rose Archer grinned at herself in the mirror. She was aged twenty-nine and still had the face of a mischievous sixteen-year-old. The rest of her wasn't bad, either. That awful red hair she'd had as a child had become a Titian auburn that most girls would die for. Her eyes were as green as jade and her figure . . .
Well, her figure was that of a twenty-year-old.
'So give it back,' she said aloud, laughing along with her reflection.
As if she would! She worked very hard to keep her body beautiful; very hard indeed. And her efforts paid off. She could favourably compare the results against just about everyone she ever met.
Apart from Hev, of course, and she was a sneaky cheat. Okay, she exercised, but eating and drinking all the wrong things made no difference to her. By rights she should be spotty and fat, but not her. Oh no, she was perfect in every way. It wasn't fair. Nobody should be allowed to go out and about looking even half as sexy as Hev.
Well, not unless they were as readily available as she was.
Briefly toying with the idea of a hint of eye-shadow Mary Rose passed. Unlike most redheads her skin tanned easily. And she worked as hard on her tan as she did on her body. Winter, spring, summer or fall, makeup was wasted on her.
Besides, she didn't want to seem like a tart, did she?
Not on the night of her very first orgy.
And wasn't Hev going to be agog about that when she found out?
Tomorrow, she promised herself. I'll phone tomorrow to make her jealous as heck.
Mary Rose giggled. She was an up-and-coming lawyer with an office "in the City", working some quite crazy hours and playing hard in her free time to compensate. Leastways that was the theory. In reality she hadn't been getting a lot of free time.
Come to that, she hadn't been getting a lot of sex either. Most of her recent "playing" had been of the solitary variety.
And she was usually too tired even for that!
But not tonight; tonight she was as rested and ready as ever. She'd had an early night last night and, after a relatively stress-free morning, she'd taken the afternoon off and treated herself to a massage, manicure, pedicure and sauna.
Indulgent or not, she'd certainly readied herself for the pleasures to come.
A whole night mixing with a crowd of strangers on a no inhibitions, no regrets sort of a basis. Wasn't that utterly wicked!
Still giggling, she examined herself for nerves. Okay, so she was fluttery inside, but with anticipation, not apprehension. No, make that lots and lots of anticipation. Youthful appearance aside, she was a big girl now; she knew everything that went on behind closed doors. Why shouldn't she be thrilled at the prospect?
