Claudia Carroll 3 Book Bundle. Claudia Carroll

a bit of time alone together, won’t you?’

      I’m only half-listening to her though.

      ‘And another thing, he’s dating that slapper we saw him with in the Green yesterday.’

      ‘Oh shit, you’re kidding me.’

      ‘When do I ever?’

      ‘You know what?’ she says to the soundtrack of Lily bashing out Twinkle Twinkle Little Star on the piano in the background. ‘I’m quite psychic. Saw this coming a mile off.’

      ‘Saw what exactly coming?’

      ‘Well, you’ve gone and done all the heavy lifting on him, haven’t you?’

      ‘Explain?’

      ‘You’ve gone and found this rough diamond and sanded him down and moulded a perfect gentleman out of clay: you’ve groomed him and prepped him and all for what? So some other girl can just step in and have all the benefit? I don’t know what he was like when you first met him, but to look at him now, you’d think, that guy can have anyone he wants. He’s perfect. Handsome, lovely, kind, polite, intelligent. And you’re the one who made it all happen. I often think the same about me and Darren, you know. I’ve spent years honing and sanding down his rough edges and if we ever break up, what’ll happen? The next girl that comes along will get all the benefit of all my long years of patiently grafting and nagging and he’ll be married to her within a year. Seen it happen a thousand times.’

      ‘Helen love, just so you know, men aren’t always the answer.’

      ‘Then why do we always end up talking about them?’

      ‘And another thing; don’t forget that Sir Gavin’s wife insists on being addressed as Lady Hume.’

      ‘Ah get off the stage, please tell me you’re having a laugh.’

      ‘When do you ever see me joking?’

      ‘You’re seriously telling me that I have to call her your ladyship?’

      ‘Yup. Won’t answer to anything else these days. Unless she happens to have a few drinks in her, in which case you may be invited to call her by her Christian name.’

      ‘Where does she think she’s living anyway? Versailles? Late eighteenth century?’

      ‘Jake, just do as I ask, please.’

      ‘Out of curiosity, what’s her real name anyway?’

      ‘You ready for this? Shania.’

      Okay now I actually have to hold the phone away from my ear, he’s guffawing that hard.

      ‘Sorry,’ he all but snorts, ‘just getting a mental picture of the reaction Lady Shania Hume the Fourth, or whatever she calls herself, would get if she started giving herself airs and graces round where I come from.’

      ‘Well, in that case, you’ll love this. She’s inner-city born and bred and if you’re to believe the rumour mill, worked in Burdock’s chipper there for years. Became a model, worked her way up, met Sir Gavin when he was just a humble hack, and never looked back. During the Celtic Tiger years, her proudest boast was that the highlights in her hair matched her car.’

      ‘Piss off.’

      ‘Jake! Language like that in front of the T. Rexes and I will personally murder you!’

      ‘I know, I know. Will you chill out, for feck’s sake?’

      ‘Course now she’s all in with the Kildare horsey set and to see her swanning around the place, you’d nearly swear she was reared in a stately home and related to the Middletons. She’s even changed her accent too and now she sounds posher than one of the Mitford sisters, by way of the Queen.’

      I can almost hear the sound of his eyes rolling.

      ‘Well if she worked in a chipper, she and I’ll have lots in common then. We can spend a happy afternoon sharing stories about queuing up for butter vouchers. Or better yet, I can tell her that she looks a bit familiar, then ask her does the phrase “Can I have two curry chips and a batter burger with a tin of Fanta to go?” mean anything to her.’

      ‘Very droll. Oh and don’t forget Ruth O’Connell, you remember Ruth? Pinched face, permanently disappointed look about her?’

      ‘The Northern editor, yeah I remember her. Looks at men like she’s either going to kiss them or kneecap them.’

      I half smile. But then, Jake has this innate knack of immediately paring people right down to their basic, elemental truth.

      ‘Anyway, the woman is capable of ferreting a juicy story out of a large lump of lard. So just be on your guard round her, that’s all I’m saying.’

      Course that’s the least of my worries, but I say no more. And then my stomach does a flip worthy of the Cirque du Soleil even just thinking about how much else could go wrong. It’s like a whole kaleidoscope of worries about this whole shagging weekend is now unfolding, almost sickening me.

      Now you know me, I’ve planned out as much as it’s possible to without actually handing out a scheduled timetable to Jake. The Saturday is an afternoon get-together, followed by a posh nosh-up that night with speeches, the whole works. But then the Sunday morning is ‘free time’. Or decoded, four or five hours for the lads to arse around a golf course and talk shop. So, Sunday morning it is, then.

      I’ve thought it all through; I have a plan. I’m going to take Jake out for a walk over the grounds after breakfast and when we find a nice, peaceful spot, miles from any distractions or unwanted interruptions, I’ll tell him then. Everything, the whole works.

      Sunday morning it is, for better or for worse.

      ‘Eloise, listen,’ Jake cuts across my stream of worrying, taking me out of my own head and back to our phone call. ‘Stop your fretting, would you? We’ve been over this time and again. You’ve prepped me inside and out and we can do no more. I know who everyone is and I’ve enough titbits about the lot of them to last me if we were all going off on a luxury cruise liner for three long months, never mind just for one lousy weekend. I know what to say and more importantly, what not to say. So will you just relax, for Christ’s sake? The point has come where you’re going to have to relinquish control and learn to trust me.’

      Relinquish, I think absently. Must be his new word for the day.

      ‘I do trust you. You just have no idea what you’re letting yourself in for, that’s all. Oh and one more thing …’

      ‘Ah here, what now?’

      ‘Robbie Turner …’

      ‘Yeah, yeah, political guy, I’ll know him by the shock of white hair, you’ve already drilled it into me …’

      ‘If I could just finish my sentence – I was going to say his wife is Adele and she’s lovely, very warm and friendly.’

      ‘Safe for me to be myself around, in other words. That what you mean?’

      ‘Be warned though, she’s no fan of mine. Blames me hugely for the fact that she and her kids rarely see Robbie, because the hours he has to work are so mental.’

      ‘Ah, Eloise. You mean you never cut the guy a bit of slack?’

      ‘Believe me, I’ve been trying to, but you don’t realise what being a foreign editor involves. The sheer number of man hours you’ve got to put in and then you’ve got to factor in the time difference if you’re covering a breaking story from Washington.’

      ‘Don’t worry, I get it. Because the whole world will come to an end if you’re not all chained to your desks for at least eighteen hours a day.’

      ‘I’m just saying, Adele’s no fan of mine, so be warned.’

      ‘Eloise, short of you sending me mailshots of everyone with their CV attached,