Total pages in book: 66
Estimated words: 63311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 317(@200wpm)___ 253(@250wpm)___ 211(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 317(@200wpm)___ 253(@250wpm)___ 211(@300wpm)
6
RAINE
Aweek later, I had regrets. Lots of them.
On a personal front…
It rained nonstop, my room always smelled like curry, and Ronan played the banjo. Brutal, right? The rain didn’t bother me, but it was steady enough that I needed an umbrella and I hadn’t quite worked out the art of collapsing the damn thing without taking someone’s eye out in a Tube station. As for the curry, I probably wouldn’t notice it in another week, which was alarming too. And the banjo…I had no words.
“Banjos are…nice,” Winnie hedged.
“Are they, though?”
He snickered. “They can be. I think. Maybe it’s an Irish thing.”
“No, it’s an annoying flatmate thing. He’s a nice guy, but I—” I frowned at the sound of something crinkling in the background. “What’s that noise?”
“Oh, I just opened a bag of ice. My freezer conked out on me at the worst possible time. I invited Max over for margaritas. We’re going to sit on the deck, sip tequila, and soak up the sun. Don’t be sad, but it’s seventy-five degrees and glorious outside.”
“I hate you.”
Winnie sighed. “I know, honey. But you love me too.”
I did. And I missed him and California and poolside margaritas and…my old life. Minus the drama.
I leaned on the pillow propped against the plain white wall and stared out my rain-streaked bedroom window, unseeing. “Did I make a mistake, Win?”
“No,” he replied automatically. “You’re having an adventure, expanding your horizons, and conquering the world. Honey, you’re in the U-fucking-K…home of the Spice Girls, Paddington Bear, and tea and crumpets. Go see the country, make some moolah, and have some damn fun. No moping.”
I twisted to look out the window and smooshed my nose on the glass, closing my eyes briefly. “I’m not moping. I’m just overwhelmed. Be honest, Win—did I make the right move, or did I overreact?”
“Both. That’s the same answer I’ve given you every time you’ve asked that question, by the way,” he snorted. “It was a wild and crazy, impulsive idea, but I’m proud of you for making it happen. Don’t let it be about your asshole, two-timing ex-lover, though. All that nonsense will be a distant memory next year. You’ll see.”
“Maybe…”
“Definitely. Now you have ten minutes till Max shows up, so tell me about the new job.”
I shrugged to the empty room and released a monster sigh. “It’s weird. I’m either bored out of my mind or barely treading water.”
I filled him in on my roller coaster of a week. I’d spent the first few days hanging out in Julia’s office, listening in on phone calls and trying to make myself as inconspicuous as possible without yawning. I knew nothing about finance and I’d had no idea what the fuck they were talking about, so it wasn’t as if I could add any words of wisdom.
I was leery of reminding Julia of my presence in case she changed her mind and decided to get rid of me. She’d been distracted with big boss meetings, and she didn’t seem to be in a hurry to introduce me to Horsham…or anyone.
But I could do this for two months. I could be the fly on the wall who got paid too much money to sit in a glass castle overlooking the Thames like a miscast fairy-tale hero. Even though it was boring as hell, a whole year of this meant money and more time away from LA and the scene of my crime. I needed space, and my bank account needed an infusion.
Three days into my lonely new venture, Julia had been called away to join the big boss in Paris. She’d hooked me up with dapper Darwin, a fabulous middle-aged man who wore bright ties, wing-tipped shoes, and called everyone “babes.” Poor Darwin was charged with training me for basic assistant duty, and after that, things had begun to look up.
Except Darwin’s world was the extreme opposite of listening in on phone calls.
On the surface, The Horsham Group was a well-oiled, sophisticated machine. No one rushed, stressed out, or got impatient or angry. They spoke in civil, even tones, and addressed each other as Mr. or Ms. They buzzed quietly in their delegated offices or in one of the many fishbowl conference rooms and used phrases like “horizontal integration” and “purchase price allocation.” But the real action was two floors below us.
It was like walking into a new world with a maze of cubicles and harried employees who spoke a mile a minute in more dialects than I’d ever heard in one place. They griped openly about office shit, like the arse who didn’t have the decency to make a fresh pot of coffee and the unacceptably slow lifts, a.k.a., elevators. Yeah…I was catching on.
Dapper Darwin managed whatever division of operations was in charge of phone etiquette, pipeline management, and spreadsheet distribution. Supposedly Julia had asked him to “teach” me the basics, and so far, I’d learned that the pipeline had nothing to do with steel, and “distribution” was a fancy way to say “Send that fucking email, stat.”