Legal High

Chapter 1 Joseph Richmond glanced up as his boss, the Honourable Margaret Fowey MP, shut the office door behind her with a bang loud enough to rattle the picture frame on the wall. Before he could enquire whether she had enjoyed a pleasant weekend, she slapped a memorandum down in front of him. Straightening it, he slid it closer and read about the appointment of the new under-secretary of state in the Home Office. Though Joseph was a mere speech-writer and aide, Margaret valued his opinions and would be expecting a comment. He pursed his lips and looked up. “It’s a bad idea.” “Precisely what I said.” She sat down heavily behind her desk. Her steel-grey hair wisped forward and she pushed it back with a sigh, her hands framing her face as she looked across the office. “I told the Prime Minister, I told him, if you want change, you have to go about it at a measured pace. There are some things that can’t be rushed, and this is one of them. Now I’m no bigot, but…” Her voice tailed off. “An Alpha loose in Parliament.” Joseph considered all the ways this could go wrong. “I can see why the PM thought it a good idea, but personally I believe it’s an error of judgement.” Margaret leaned back and spread both hands. “I told Tatton that, too. Wouldn’t listen, of course. I’m just an omega from a Cornish constituency, my opinion carries no weight. Doesn’t matter who my great-grandfather was. That’s all forgotten now, apparently. We have to pin a smile on our faces and welcome a f*****g Alpha into our midst.” She almost never swore. Joseph eyed her uncertainly, trying to gauge which direction her mood would blow. Perhaps coffee would soothe her. He got to his feet, but before he could make the offer of refreshments, she spun her swivel chair and slammed a fist on her desk. “Zachary ‘Call me Zac’ Hawkesford! f*****g Alpha bastard!” Joseph subsided into his seat. New emails flicked into his inbox. The draft of Margaret’s next speech lay half-edited in front of him. His pencil needed sharpening. A scattering of eraser detritus spoiled the shine of his desk. His fingers itched to tidy up, to get back to work, but Margaret was his boss and if she wanted to talk… “I still don’t understand how he got elected.” She turned to face him, her expression set into lines of discontent. “His constituents are ungrateful, the lot of them. Rashid did a fantastic job there. He might have been a member of the Opposition, but credit where credit’s due, he did a bloody good job in South Bridge. And when he inconveniently dies, this is how they reward him. Not by electing the obvious successor, but the outsider. The Alpha. The one candidate who shouldn’t have been allowed to stand in the first place!” “It is a democratic process,” Joseph said mildly. She shot him a look. “Yes, of course. But…” It was unnecessary for her to expand. Everyone knew the story. Alternately declared as a victory for Alpha rights or presented as evidence of society’s moral decline, Zachary Hawkesford had, against all odds, won a resounding majority in the previous month’s by-election for one of the capital’s most multicultural constituencies. Like everyone else, Joseph had followed the coverage on TV. Zac was handsome and charismatic, smiling at reporters as he fielded their questions, deflecting without giving offence those who tried to get too close. He had compassion by the bucketful, had a track record of charity work and social outreach, and when he spoke on issues affecting his electorate, it never seemed rehearsed. It was as if he understood the voters on an empathic level. Of course, that was impossible. It had to be a front. No Alpha could empathise; it was scientific fact. Once an Alpha had even a sniff of power, they became arrogant and narrow-minded, their decisions self-centred to the point where the consequences for others were disastrous. The electorate knew that. It was underlined in the manifestos distributed by the other candidates. And yet Zac had been returned as the MP for South Bridge with eighty-six percent of the votes. Two recounts had confirmed it. Joseph liked to think he gave everyone a fair chance. Even Alphas. But that was the thing: Zac had deliberately downplayed his Alphadom throughout the campaign. At times he’d presented almost as rationally as an omega. He’d suppressed that wild, uncontrollable side specifically to appeal to voters. To prove he wasn’t like other Alphas. But he was an Alpha, and the instinct governed by biology could not be denied. Sooner or later, Zac’s Alpha nature would erupt. “Alphas almost destroyed this country.” Margaret picked up the antique silver-framed photograph that took pride of place on her desk. “My great-grandfather was killed because of an Alpha-led government.” Joseph made a sympathetic sound. He knew this story well, too. Every morning on his way up to the office he passed the black granite plaque set into the wall of the main lobby, upon which was etched in stark white letters the names of the fifteen Members of Parliament killed in the last violent clash between an Alpha Prime Minister and an Alpha Leader of the Opposition. As every schoolchild knew, following this national tragedy an Act was passed decreeing that no Alpha could accept a major office in Parliament. A private member’s bill to prohibit any Alpha from taking a seat in the House of Commons was rejected as too draconian. Nevertheless, the message remained clear: Alphas were no longer welcome in the corridors of power. Another email dropped into his inbox, this one flashing yellow as a mark of its importance. Joseph fidgeted with the urge to read it. Work was piling up. He didn’t mean to be insensitive, but he’d heard Margaret’s complaints several times before and there wasn’t a lot he could do about it. This stuff was history. Recent history, but still. Unchangeable. Immutable. Fixed as fact. “We should never have allowed Alphas back into government,” Margaret continued, as if it had been her decision. In reality, she’d only been a child when an Alpha next took their seat in Parliament, almost half a century after the Act was made law. In the years following, there’d been a slow but steady trickle of Alpha MPs returning to the Commons. Then the Opposition came into power, and with them their charismatic leader. He’d been registered at birth as a beta, but his mother had been Alpha and as he’d grown older, his character had changed to match his mother’s domineering personality. As Prime Minister he’d tricked the country into war, committing troops and resources to a costly, heartbreaking conflict. In the aftermath, he was stripped of office and the handful of Alphas of all parties who’d been elected to the back benches were ousted by his successor. In more recent times, power had swung back to where it belonged—with the Centre Right. Led by Oliver Tatton, the government was now clasped firmly but fairly within the grasp of the omegas. Sensible, rational omegas, with a reasonable scattering of betas to provide the verve and excitement—the term was relative—the public expected of their politicians. Zachary Hawkesford was the first Alpha admitted into Parliament in thirteen years. He was the first Alpha promoted to a junior ministerial position in almost a century. Either distinction was more than enough to cause resentment and mistrust. “Did Tatton have to make Hawkesford so conspicuous?” Margaret returned the photograph of her great-grandfather to its usual place, her voice rising with her temper. “He’s only been here two months. Giving him a ministerial position is asking for trouble. As for asking me to work with him on the legal high bill…I won’t do it. I simply won’t hold out the hand of forgiveness, no matter what Tatton wants. It’s—it’s cruelty, that’s what it is. Expecting me to forget what happened and move on. It’s not right.” Herbert Fowey had been the Shadow Business Secretary. His post-mortem report—the original was displayed right there in the office—made for gruesome reading. Joseph had perused it on a number of occasions. It would make any sensible omega develop a fear of Alphas. He cleared his throat. “Would you like a cup of coffee?” She snorted at his attempt to change the subject. “I don’t think coffee’s going to help, do you?” “I noticed a bottle of sauvignon blanc in the kitchen.” He tossed the information out casually. “I think it belongs to the honourable member for Bulston, who as we know departed on a week-long trip to foreign climes on Saturday.” He paused; gave her a beatific smile. “I took the liberty of chilling it. Just in case.” Margaret laughed. “You’re a wicked boy, Joseph Richmond.” She rolled back her chair and got up, all trace of despondency vanished into eagerness. “I’ll fetch it. Field my calls, will you? I may be some time.” She left the office with a spring in her step. He waited, listening to the solid sound of her low-heeled shoes on the thin carpet of the corridor. A second urgent email flashed into his inbox, but rather than return to work, Joseph opened a new screen, called up the Parliamentary personnel website, and typed in a name. The font was as bold as mockery: Zachary Hawkesford, MP. Joseph skimmed the brief biographical details. Male, thirty-four years old. On his release from voluntary military service, Zac had trained as a solicitor. For the past seven years he’d served as an associate at a well-respected law firm in the city, where the majority of his cases were pro bono. Marital status: Single. Hierarchical biology: Alpha. A photograph accompanied the text. A head-and-shoulders shot of the MP for South Bridge. Neat, regular features drawn with surprising delicacy: a sharp nose, thick brows; dark, intense eyes and a mouth with a sensuous lower lip. His hair was a black so dark it ran with saturations of magpie-blue; he wore it dishevelled, with an almost casual disregard for style. His broad shoulders stretched a sober dark blue suit, the shirt beneath snowy white. A lighter blue tie was knotted at his throat. Zac was smiling for the camera, but behind his eyes lay the suggestion of another expression. Perhaps the madness associated with being an in-rut Alpha. Or perhaps the wariness that came from being judged too soon.