Her acquaintance Rose, who lives with her mother (who may also have been a prostitute in her youth) and has multiple children, is arrested by the vice squad when she was otherwise walking home and not actively seeking clients.

Louise, in her research, meets Griff, a lecturer on penal reform, who takes an interest in her cause, but in attempting to summarize its significance, shows himself to have no real knowledge of sex workers' lives.

After meeting Andrea, a London-based sex worker, at a business event where several regional prostitutes have been recruited, Sandra decides to decamp to London, making arrangements with Louise and a longtime friend, Winston, to look after her teenage son.

Sandra works an increasingly dour array of clients who treat her in hostile manners she never experienced in Birmingham, to the point where she angrily quits Mrs. T's employ, and in turn, Andrea cuts ties with her.

When she tries to go fully independent, corrupt vice police invade her apartment without warrant, plant drugs on the premises, and then demand all her money and free sexual services in order to avoid arrest.