Living alone in a small, grubby bedsit in London was a far cry from her North-Eastern roots, but Samantha was now used to it. The solitude, the emptiness she felt coming home each night, the constant humming sound of traffic passing beneath her window twenty four hours a day.

Of necessity, she worked part time as a hostess in one of the many clip-joints around London's notorious Soho and twice a week as an escort. It felt as though she was on a never-ending treadmill, just getting by day to day. Having to listen to the lurid suggestions of her customers. Feeling their sweaty palms on her bare thigh night after night, forcing herself to smile at their weak and sometimes sordid jokes that only they felt hilariously funny. Until she met Alan.

This was the man who gave a meaning to her bleak existence, a reason to get out of her bed each day, a shining beacon of light at the end of the eternal darkness of the tunnel which was her life. The man she would love unconditionally. Until she drew her final breath.

Unfortunately, he was also the man who would be the unwitting cause of her eventual untimely death.