Kit said mournfully, ‘Some of us have been on a break since the beginning of the year, even though we didn’t want to be.’
‘Ah well, by this time tomorrow you’ll be back home in London.’ Lainey gave his arm a reassuring squeeze. ‘More beautiful boys than you can shake a stick at.’
‘Actually, I wasn’t planning on shaking a stick at them,’ said Kit.
Biddy had driven them this morning to the Gare d’Orléans. She’d pressed a packed lunch on them to keep them going during the long and tedious journey home. Thirty minutes after boarding the train to Paris, Lainey had finished hers.
‘You’re an animal.’ Kit shook his head in disbelief.
‘I can’t help it. Travelling makes me hungry.’ She licked her fingers, brushed baguette crumbs off the front of her sleeveless black top, and neatly folded the paper bags that had contained her food. ‘I don’t understand how you can not eat yours.’
‘Easy. Because six hours from now, I’ll still have mine to look forward to. And you’ll be hungry again.’
‘I’m pretty sure in six hours’ time I’ll have bought some more food.’ Lainey’s phone beeped with a message. She read it and groaned.
‘Problem?’
‘It’s from my dad. He didn’t want to say anything yesterday, and of course I can still stay at his place for a while if I really want to, but his girlfriend’s kids are in the bedrooms, so I’d have to sleep on the sofa, and the boys like to come downstairs at six in the morning to play games on the Xbox before school. So if I’d rather find somewhere else, they’d completely understand.’
Kit grimaced. ‘Bummer.’
‘Pretty much.’ She’d only met the two boys once, last Christmas; they were friendly enough, but incredibly loud.
‘My mum wouldn’t mind you staying with us for a bit, if you’re desperate.’
Lainey smiled at him. ‘I bet your mum’s as lovely as you are.’
‘Well, nearly. I mean it, though. You’d be welcome. She’ll try and feed you up too.’
‘That sounds wonderful.’
‘Not really,’ said Kit. ‘She’s a shocking cook.’
Lainey intermittently dozed and daydreamed for a while, her head resting against the cool glass of the window. She loved her dad and knew he loved her too, but their lives had diverged following the death of her mum from gastric cancer eight years ago. ‘I don’t want you wasting your life here, thinking you have to look after me,’ he’d said, knowing she wanted to travel and work abroad. ‘Get yourself out there and see something of the world, love.’ So she’d gone ahead and done exactly that. It had felt a bit strange to see her dad moving on, rebuilding his life with a series of girlfriends who were the opposite of her mum. He seemed happy, and of course she was glad about that, but her bedroom had long gone, and with her jobs providing live-in accommodation, it had meant fewer visits to see him and no longer any actual place of her own to call home.
Oh well, never mind, it would happen one day. The dream she’d harboured for years was to save as much money as she could, find a tumbledown property – close to the sea perhaps – and do it up herself, then open it as a bijou but perfect B&B.
Which might be a tad unrealistic, but everyone was allowed to have a dream, weren’t they? Her own business, something that could gradually be built up and expanded, making use of the knowledge she’d gained whilst working for other people in the hotel and leisure industries. Caring for her mum during those difficult teenage years might have decimated her school exams and put paid to any plans for university, but Lainey knew she had a good brain, her cooking skills were excellent and she certainly wasn’t afraid of hard work. She just needed to get enough money together first. And who was to say that twenty years from now, she wouldn’t be running her own boutique hotel?
Anyway, it was nice to be offered a temporary place to stay by Kit’s mum, and there was always her own Granny Ivy, who would be glad to put her up if she were really stuck. But her grandmother was hosting friends from Canada for the next month, which meant her cottage was full. Lainey knew that what she really needed was to find something more permanent for herself, and a job to go with it.
Reaching Paris at last, they carted their cases on the Métro to Bercy in the 12th arrondissement, then boarded the coach that would, nine hours from now, deposit them at Victoria coach station in central London.
Right, time to take another look at the jobs website she’d bookmarked earlier. Hooray for the magic of Wi-Fi.
For the next hour, Lainey pored over the many and varied vacancies advertised online. Next to her, Kit finally unwrapped his packed lunch and began to eat.
‘Look, there’s a parrot up there in that tree!’ She pointed out of the window.
Kit said equably, ‘There could be a pterodactyl out there and I still wouldn’t look if it meant taking my eyes off my food. Not while I’m sitting next to you, anyway.’
Lainey blew him a kiss – he knew her so well – and turned her attention back to the situations vacant, preferably with living accommodation included. There was a crisply worded ad for a housekeeping assistant required to join an existing team on a private Highland estate in Sutherland. A hard-working gardener was needed for a large country house in North Wales . . . hmm, gardening definitely wasn’t her forte. A companion was required for an elderly lady in Kensington; that might be promising . . . Oh, fluency in German essential. The only German she knew was ‘Sprechen Sie Englisch?’Which probably wouldn’t get her the job.
‘You’re sighing,’ Kit remarked ten minutes later. ‘You sound like a walrus.’
Well, thanks!
‘They should add video clips to these adverts so you can see what kind of a situation you’d be getting yourself into. There’s one here for a mother’s help. It says you have to be calm and efficient, and look after four small boys who are rambunctious but adorable.’ Lainey pulled a face. ‘Does that mean they’re actually obnoxious monsters, completely out of control? A bit of secret camera work would come in handy.’
But when she emailed the agency, they replied within minutes to say the job was no longer available.
The next ad required someone to work as a cleaner and companion for an elderly ex-academic gentleman who lived in Durham. The successful candidate, it stated, must have plenty of patience and a thick skin, and be capable of engaging in prolonged periods of vigorous political debate.
Maybe not.
Then again, who was to say that any of these people would even want to employ her? To be on the safe side, she should probably be applying for every job on the list to see if anyone was remotely interested.
As soon as she started reading the next ad, however, she knew that this was the job she wanted.
Just typical.
‘Oh God, why did I even read this one?’ Puffing out her cheeks in exasperation, she passed the phone over to Kit. ‘It’s perfect.’
When he’d finished reading, Kit said, ‘Sounds great. Go for it.’
Lainey knew it was nothing but a fantasy, but she really felt as if she could picture the house by the sea and the woman who had placed the ad. She took back her phone and said, ‘I can’t. They’re advertising for a couple.’