Lessons in Love. Kate Lawson

can I help you?’ said a woman on the desk, whose expression suggested she could spot a Primark T-shirt and the wrong shoes in her sleep.

      ‘I’m meeting someone.’ The woman glanced down at her bookings list. ‘Jane Mills?’ Jane said

      Like open sesame or shazam the name had the most amazing effect. ‘Certainly, Miss Mills is already here,’ she said. As she spoke the woman’s smile warmed and she waved a boy in uniform over. ‘Could you take—I’m so sorry I didn’t catch your name?’

      ‘Mills, Jane Mills,’ Jane said quietly.

      The smile faltered. ‘Oh, so sorry, I thought you were here to see Jayne Mills.’

      Jane nodded and blushed although she wasn’t quite sure why. ‘I am. Same name, it’s all a bit confusing, sorry.’

      The smile snapped back. ‘Not at all. If you’d like to follow Terry, he’ll take you through. Miss Mills is in the bar.’ Jane did as she was told.

      ‘There you are,’ said a voice Jane recognised. Jayne Mills was on her feet before Jane was halfway across the room. She and a man in a suit were sitting at a table in a little bar area adjacent to the main dining room.

      ‘I thought you might have had second thoughts,’ Jayne said smiling broadly, catching firm hold of Jane’s hand. ‘Come and join us. Ray’s already broken out the champagne to celebrate me finally buggering off and leaving him in peace.’

      A waiter appeared with a third glass as Jayne made the introductions. ‘Jane, this is Ray Jacobson, my right-hand man. Ray, this is Jane—’

      Before anyone could come up with a definition of what Jane was, Ray clasped her hand in a firm presidential handshake. ‘Hello, Jane,’ he said warmly. ‘Nice to meet you. Welcome aboard. I hope you’ll be very happy with us. Jayne has just been telling me about you. We go back a long way, Jayne and I.’

      ‘Let’s not bother working out how long exactly,’ Jayne joked. Jane smiled and nodded as the waiter filled up her champagne glass.

      Ray was small—no more than five foot five or six, his broad shoulders giving the impression he was almost square. He looked as if he was in his fifties, hair thick and grey, combed back off strong features and a deeply tanned face. He wore a tight professional smile.

      ‘I thought we’d break you in gently. I’m not sure how much Jayne has told you about her organisation but I do most of the hands-on administration, turning Jayne’s bright ideas into reality and generally oiling the wheels of the corporate machine. We’ve never had anyone with us on the front line before but I’m sure we’ll both rise to the occasion. Jayne suggested you might be able to start Monday morning. Maybe you’d like to spend a few days in the office to get the feel of the place before you hit the road.’

      ‘Hit the road? But I thought it was Jayne who was hitting the road?’ said Jane, looking from face to face, panicking, realising that the champagne was already rippling through her bloodstream like quicksilver, rehydrating the previous day’s wrinkly dried-up alcohol molecules and that she hadn’t had any breakfast and that she had no idea at all exactly what it was she had signed up for.

      ‘True, but you’re off to see new suppliers,’ Ray was saying.

      ‘I am?’ Jane hissed.

      Jayne grinned and patted her arm. ‘Don’t look so worried. It’ll be fine. Come round to mine tomorrow morning. I’ll talk you through my diary and explain what I do.’ She giggled; obviously Jane wasn’t the only one affected by the champagne. ‘Actually, I suppose that as of now it’s what you do.’

      Ray smiled wolfishly ‘And then you can come and see me first thing on Monday morning and I’ll show you how we make order out of madam’s high-octane chaos.’

      Jayne laughed, Jane didn’t.

      When Jane got back home at around three thirty the house was quiet, the cats sound asleep in the sunny garden. She put her bag on the kitchen counter and plugged in the kettle. Lunch hadn’t been all that bad. And at least working for Jayne would give her something to tide her over until she worked out exactly what she wanted to do next.

      Picking up the local paper Jane turned to the situations vacant column, slipped off her shoes, padded through to the sitting room and settled down on the sofa. Sunlight filled the room. She thought she might just close her eyes for a few minutes, not long…

      When she opened them again it was almost nine. She yawned. No phone calls, no Lizzie, no Lucy, no Steve, no Mother. Maybe there was a God after all.

      ‘So, what do I have to do exactly?’ asked Jane the following morning, staring at the exquisite Apple G5 perched wirelessly on a slab of toning grey slate in Jayne’s office, upstairs in the house in the Close. There was a picture of a tropical beach hut on the edge of an azure sea as a screensaver…and a date from a digital camera on the bottom right-hand corner.

      Jayne slipped into the seat alongside her. ‘First of all, try not to look so worried. It will give you wrinkles. The company is like a cross between being a landlord, owning a farm and running a department store. I collect rent from people whose websites I host.’ Jayne clicked the mouse and the screensaver and straw huts dissolved into something altogether more work-ish. ‘At least my company does. I employ a posse of geeks to keep that up and running. Then there is the purchasing department, various call centres to handle the ordering, and then I have a few sites of my own.’ She clicked again. ‘Here we are.’ A pale cream page rolled across the computer screen with links to various companies. ‘We sell all kinds of things—last-minute trips, organic produce, meat, wine and cheese delivered to your door. There’s a catering company, kind of dial-a-decadent-dinner.com—your dinner party is just a mouse click away. Then there are flowers and plants. Animal sitting,’ she looked across at Augustus, who was currently curled up on the windowsill, sound asleep, ‘oh, and housekeeping. That’s how I first met Gary. He applied for a job. Two or three guys showed up, all with great references. I took Gary at face value, working out the mileage in having an inscrutable oriental housekeeper for hire. I hadn’t thought about him working for me. Anyway, as part of the interview I asked them all to cook me something. Comfort food after a long day, I said. Something that reminded them of home. I can’t remember what the others did, but they missed the point completely. And then Gary whipped up a plate of pie and mash.’ Jayne laughed. ‘He said, “Ever been to Southend?” as he slid this tray in front of me.’

      Jayne’s smile held. ‘And then he said, “And you want to get those shoes off, girl. I can see from here they’re killing you.” I hired him on the spot on a month’s trial; we’ve never looked back.’ Jayne paused and sighed. ‘All seems a long time ago now,’ she said. Jayne turned her attention back at the screen.

      ‘OK, right, well, there are a couple of property sites, mostly executive houses and apartments, dealing with people who’ve been relocated by their companies and don’t want the hassle of finding somewhere suitable either to rent or buy. We have a company that sorts out everything including the move, redirecting their post, setting up their utilities, the whole nine yards. Then there is an online furniture store and one that does really nice rugs, bed linen, and towels. Think of it as problem-solving for strangers.’

      Jane stared at her. ‘I thought you said this was simple.’

      ‘It is when it’s going all right. All the companies are more or less self-contained. Over the years it occurred to me that everything I have ever struggled with, everything that has been a total pain in the arse, is probably just as big a pain in the arse for other people, and so I set a company to sort it out, make life simpler and see how it worked. Some flew, some crashed and burned, some made money, some scraped by. Some were ahead of their time, some past their best-before date.’ Jayne grinned as she scrolled down the screen. ‘Oh, one thing you might be interested in…’ She clicked the mouse. ‘Here we are.’

      Jane read over her shoulder. ‘A dating agency?’

      Jayne nodded. ‘Uh-huh, men on tap.’

      ‘If