Chapter Six Razor #2
Segregation wasn’t safety either. It was just a slower way of disappearing. Alone long enough, they’d decide I was unstable, unfit, expendable. And once you were marked like that, you never came back whole.
My family paid the price either way.
I opened my eyes again.
“I’m not meant to survive this. So who am I meant to behave for? Who benefits from me keeping my head down? Everyone’s better off out there without me. Especially Tristan. It’s all fucked.”
Christ. What had they given me in medical?
“The only thing I can do in here is be exactly who I am.” I clenched my jaw. “Remind them not to touch me. Not to test me. Same way they knew better on the outside.” I looked at him. “And without money or favours to buy that space, I’ve only got one way left.”
“Which is how?” Colin looked shit-scared.
I didn’t water it down for him. “With fucking blood.”
* * * *
Tristan
That night, after seeing Lennon, time slipped into hours.
And I slipped into Razor’s old shirt.
The one he’d given me months ago, back when our lives had first collided at the Velvet Lounge.
Back when none of this had yet unspooled.
It still smelt of him. And it was the only thing I had left that hadn’t been processed into paperwork.
I’d slept in it too, clinging to the warm familiarity when everything else had turned procedural and cold.
Though I don’t think I actually slept.
The night was measured in pages, footnotes, margins tightening and loosening as I stripped Razor back to what he had to be. A case. I worked until the screen blurred and the words lost shape, until I couldn’t tell whether I was sharpening the argument or sanding it down to nothing.
In the morning, I dressed. My own shirt, sadly. Suit. Coat. Gathered the papers into a neat stack, pretending to be calmer than I was. And when I left the flat, the city felt half-asleep still. Bins out, pavements wet, taxis ghosting past with no urgency.
Chambers was also quiet when I arrived. Early enough that parking was easy, which would have amused my father more than it amused me.
Parking was a luxury for members only. And my father had a membership going back decades, which passed to me.
One reason I should be thankful for the car.
I locked up and stood for a moment before going in, looking up at the stone frontage, the tall windows catching the grey morning light.
Then I got myself together and went in.
Inside, it was all polish and old paper.
The corridors were still, lights half-on, the building stretching itself awake.
I went straight to my room and set my papers down and kept working.
By the time the first footsteps sounded and doors opened, voices murmuring, the building filling with life, I’d rewritten the opening paragraph three times.
Imogen’s office sat further along the corridor, set apart without being showy. Bigger. Quieter. A room that had absorbed decades of authority and no longer needed to announce it. KCs didn’t sit among the rest of us; they orbited us. Close enough to command, distant enough to remain intact.
I kept my eye on it until I heard the soft, decisive, “Morning.”
Imogen swept past, shrugging off her scarf as she went, mid-thought and elsewhere.
This was it.
I gathered the papers, straightened my jacket, and followed her down the corridor. Whether it was professional suicide to try to catch her before eight in the morning, I didn’t know. But I also knew this: there was nothing more I could do without her.
I knocked once on her open door as she shrugged out of her coat.
She glanced up. “Tristan.”
“Do you have a moment?”
She moved a stack of files. “Do I ever?”
I exhaled. “Then I’ll rephrase. Could I have a moment?”
That got a glance. Dry. Appraising. “Very clever.” She held up two fingers. “Two minutes. I have a meeting.”
I stepped inside and closed the door. Which at least made her sit back, cocking her head in intrigue.
I handed her the papers. “I’ve reviewed a remand case fallen into limbo. Defendant currently without effective representation.”
She took the file and skimmed the first page. “Name.”
“Slade. Richard.”
She read more carefully, and the silence stretched, wreaking havoc with my nerves.
“This isn’t a skeleton.” She peered up at me.
“No. It’s a review note.”
“And you’re not on record.”
“No.”
She leant back, the page falling to her lap. “Why are you bringing this to me?”
“Because the basis for continued remand is weak. The defence team has stepped back quietly. And because the CPS are leaning on an investigation they haven’t charged.”
She raised an eyebrow. “This isn’t about you wanting to score a point before your father retires?” She waved a hand. “Hence, closing the door?”
“No.” I kept myself even despite my thudding heart. “This is a case that needs senior eyes. Yours. It’s enough to look at, at least. If you agree it warrants intervention.”
She read through for a bit, and I could see her interest piquing. “And where do you fit into this?”
“As junior. Under your supervision.”
She went back to the file. “So you’ve come to me with an unrepresented defendant on remand based on incomplete disclosure, an abandoned defence, and a CPS investigation that hasn’t crystallised.”
“Yes.”
“That’s not unusual.” She kept reading. “What is unusual is you thinking it’s mine.”
“I think it’s yours because it needs senior judgment. And because if it’s mishandled now, it won’t survive first contact with the Crown later.”
She tapped the file. “You said the defence stepped back quietly.”
“Yes.”
“Quietly, how?”
I chose my words with care. “No handover. No objection on record. No explanation that would survive scrutiny.”
“Fear?”
“Pressure.”
She studied me. “From whom?”
“Names that don’t need to be written to be understood.”
I didn’t need to say Lord Wolfe. She would see it eventually.
She tilted her neck. “And you think that pressure originates where?”
“Not with the evidence.”
Her mouth tightened. “Good. Because the moment you blame individuals without proof, you lose me.”
“I know. That’s why I haven’t. But this sort of case makes legal aid firms suddenly remember their insurance premiums.”
She leant back, tapping her steepled fingers over her lips. “And you’re satisfied that’s not because the evidence is overwhelming.”
“If it were, they’d have charged. They haven’t.”
She nodded once. “What is he charged with?”
“Supply. Intelligence-led. No physical evidence.”
“So what’s keeping him inside?”
“Speculation.” I shrugged. “And fear. The seriousness of something that hasn’t been charged yet.”
Her gaze sharpened. “You’re skating close to advocacy now.”
“I know. I’m not asking you to argue it. I’m asking you to look at it.”
Silence settled again. She turned the page back, re-reading what I’d written at three in the morning and tried not to remember writing.
“You’ve flagged disclosure gaps. What are they?”
“Phone extraction timelines that don’t align with recorded acquisition. CCTV referenced but not served. Witness statements summarised, not produced.”
“That’s thin.”
“It’s thin because it’s early.” I tried to keep calm, but the desperation was filtering out. She was testing me. I should have known she would. “Which is precisely why continued remand is dangerous.”
She looked up. “Dangerous to whom?”
“To him.” Then, because I knew better, I added, “And to the integrity of the case.”
That earned me a longer look. “You’re asking me to intervene before these settle. Before the Crown commit.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re prepared for them to respond by committing harder.”
“Yes.”
She closed the file partway, not ending the conversation, just narrowing it and her eyes. “This is the kind of case that gets ugly quietly.” She tapped her nail on the file. “Intelligence-led. No paper trail. Everyone assuming something else is coming.” She looked at me. “I don’t like those.”
“I’m aware.” My heart thumped, because that was the reason I liked working for her.
She leant forward. “So what aren’t you telling me?”
I could have danced around it. Delayed it. Found cleaner language and hoped it survived contact with daylight. But that kind of omission would rot everything it touched. I knew the rules. I’d built my career on knowing where the lines were and refusing to pretend otherwise.
So I didn’t hedge.
“I have prior personal involvement with the defendant. It would be declared. If that disqualifies me, I won’t argue.”
I held her gaze and waited.
Whatever happened next would be earned.
“How personal?” She tilted her neck.
“Brief. Consensual.” I paused, then forced the last word out. “Over.”
She kept her eyes on me for a beat longer, searching for something I refused to offer.
Then she looked back down at the papers.
I hated that word. Over. But I hadn’t seen him.
Hadn’t spoken to him. Whatever it had been, whatever it still felt like, it had ended the moment the door closed behind him.
Over was the only honest description I had.
The only one allowing this to move forward.
Even if it hurt.
“And I would prefer it remain confidential.” I bowed my head. “Between you and me. No one else was aware of it.”
She glanced at the file again. “I can see why.” Then she sighed. “Did you know who he was? Who he was associated with?”
Point of no return.
I couldn’t lie. If I did and she discovered it later, I wouldn’t just burn myself; I’d drag her with me.
And minimising it would be just as bad. Disingenuous.
A crack she’d spot immediately. But if I framed it emotionally, if I made it about love, she’d shut the file and Razor would remain exactly where he was, untouched by anything resembling a real defence.
So I answered the only way that kept all of us standing.
“I knew he operated in a criminal world. I didn’t know the extent of his alleged involvement or the level of scrutiny already on him.
Once I understood that, I disengaged. Completely.
” I held her gaze, not rushing the next part.
“What I know now comes from the papers. Observation. Watching how the Crown has moved since his arrest. That knowledge is professional, not personal.”
She stared at me. Hard. Not weighing whether I was telling the truth but considering whether what I was offering was usable.
This was a risk. I knew that. A gamble.
But I also knew Imogen.
I knew the cases that drew her in. Not innocence-versus-guilt fairy tales, but imbalance.
Overreach. The state flexing where it shouldn’t because it could.
David and Goliath, dressed up as procedure.
And this had that in spades. It wasn’t about whether he was good or bad.
It was about whether the system was behaving itself.
That was what fed her.
“You understand,” she glanced down at the file again, “that if I take this on, I take control.”
“Yes.”
No hesitation. No bargaining.
That, at least, was something I could give her cleanly.
“You do nothing without instruction.”
“I won’t.”
“And if I think you’re compromised at any point—”
“You’ll remove me.”
“I don’t need you to care about him. I need you to dismantle him if necessary. Advise him to plead if that’s where it lands. To stand up in court and make submissions that hurt.”
“I understand.”
“Do you?” Her voice was level. “Because that’s where people like you fail. You argue for the man you know, not the case in front of you.”
I held her gaze. “If I couldn’t do that, I wouldn’t be here.”
A pause.
“And if I conclude you shouldn’t act?”
“Then I step back and I stay stepped back.”
She regarded me with the same stillness she reserved for witnesses who thought they were doing well.
“Let’s be clear.” She tapped the desk with her finger.
“This isn’t about whether you slept with him.
It’s about whether you still see him as a person you need to protect. Because those are not the same thing.”
“I understand the distinction.”
“Do you?” She let her chair fall forwards again. “When did it end?”
I hesitated for half a beat too long. “The night he was arrested.”
She pinched the bridge of her nose. “So it didn’t end by choice.”
“No.”
“But you haven’t seen him since?”
“No.”
“Spoken to him.”
“No.”
She nodded, absorbing it. “If you walk into that prison as counsel, what does he think you are there for?”
“I’ll tell him it’s to advise him. Represent his interests.”
“And if he thinks you’re there because you care?”
“That’s not something I can control. Only how I behave.”
She narrowed her eyes, testing me. “And how will you behave?”
“As junior counsel. Professionally. With boundaries.”
“Spell them out.”
I drew a breath. “No physical contact beyond what’s appropriate. No discussion outside the case. No promises I can’t keep. No reassurance that isn’t legally grounded.”
“And if he tries to blur that?”
“Then I shut it down.”
“And if you want to blur it?”
The question landed clean and brutal.
“Then I remove myself. Or you remove me.”
She studied my face, searching for cracks. For sentiment. For arrogance.
“Do you think you owe him something?”
“No.”
That, at least, was true. I didn’t owe him my love. Nor my care. Nothing. Even if I wanted to give all of it.
Claim all of it.
“The system owes him representation,” I said. “And I think I can assist you in providing it.”
Another pause.
“You will not be alone with him.” She widened her eyes. “At least not at first.”
“I wouldn’t expect to be.”
“You will not act as a conduit for comfort.”
“No.”
“You will not undermine advice I give, even if it costs him.”
“I won’t.”
“And if he asks why you’re really there?”
“I’ll tell him the truth. That he has counsel again. And I’m part of that team.”
She reached for the file and closed it properly this time.
“I’ll speak to a solicitor today. One who understands sensitivities. If they agree to take conduct, we proceed cautiously.”
Relief soared. Brief. Contained. I exhaled. Went to leave.
“And Tristan?”
I turned back.
She fixed me with a look stripping away whatever was left of my night’s exhaustion and opened her laptop. “If I take this case, you don’t get to be brave. You get to be precise.”
“I can do that.”
She peered over the screen. “We’ll see.”
I nodded.
“And you do not contact the defendant until I say so.”
“Understood.”
“This stays clean.” She tapped her screen. “Or it doesn’t happen at all.”