Agent Provocateur
Page 40
She picked up the towels and her bathrobe and hung them up in the bathroom. Then she collected her coat, her handbag and her helmet, and left her bedsit.
Virginia lived near Maida Vale, right address, wrong flat. Wrong because it wasn’t even a flat: it was a tiny studio apartment, which was called a studio because letting agents realised that ‘studio” sounded more romantic and inviting than “bedsit”, which is exactly what it was. Although technically it wasn’t, because it had its own bathroom.
When Virginia had moved to London two years ago, she had shared a house with four other people, strangers. It had felt like a student house because they were so messy. She hated it and lasted only two months before the dirt got too much for her. It was then that she decided she needed to live on her own and the ‘studio” was all she could afford. Renting a one-bedroom flat on her secretary’s salary was out of the question. “One day,” Virginia said to herself, as she did every day when she thought about her life.
As she walked down the street to where her scooter was parked the cold air blasted her. She smiled at it, as she did every day. Virginia loved her scooter, the freedom it gave her and the way she could get to work in a short time without suffering on the tube. It had been another sensible buy. She loved driving through London, with the wind in her face; it was the most invigorating way to begin the day.
She started it up and drove off into the quiet, dark streets. The roads were not busy and weaving in and out of the traffic encountered meant that she could get to work in no time at all. The drive to and from work was Virginia’s favourite part of the day.
The street that held her usual parking bay was deserted and she left her scooter in its usual place. She removed her helmet, put her lock on the wheels and took the four-minute walk to her office.
Her heart skipped a beat, as it always did, when she saw the building. Although not particularly big, it was old, grand and commanding. She felt it must be the most beautiful office building in London. The Seymour Forbes Hunt sign glistened in the grey air. She paused briefly, as she did every morning, and asked for an opportunity. Anyone who saw the professional-looking girl standing in front of an office sign mouthing, “Please give me a chance,” might have thought she was mad, but no one ever did.
Virginia loved SFH. It had been her first choice of bank to work at, and although she was unable to get the job she wanted, at least she had a job with the right company. Seymour Forbes Hunt was a British investment bank, and a British institution. She had read all about it before she left university. It had been founded in the late nineteenth century, and had remained a private partnership, shunning all attempts at takeover and flotation. The company was run by its twenty or so managing directors, who all owned part of it. Everyone who worked at SFH dreamt of becoming a managing director. Virginia just dreamt of being a salesperson.
Composing herself again, she pushed open the heavy doors, flashed her pass at the tired security guard and called the lift. Then she played the game she played daily: if the lift came in less than five seconds it would be a very good day; if it came in less than ten it would be an OK day; if it took longer it would be a horrible day. Thirty seconds later the lift arrived.
Virginia pushed the button for the fourth floor, the trading floor, her floor. She knew as she watched the other floors pass that this was definitely where she wanted to be, but in an entirely different job.
At twenty past six, she was at her desk. She was one of the first people on the floor and she liked this time. It gave her a chance to study the markets, watch the screens and feel that she was part of it – before Isabelle, her boss, came in and reminded her that she was nothing more than a secretary and destroyed a little bit more of Virginia’s hope.
***
Clara Hart was running late. Again. She cursed loudly as she surveyed the mess surrounding her, the knickers, socks and laddered tights that littered the floor. She grabbed the last pair of tights in the drawer and prayed that they were whole. Her prayers were answered. She went to the wardrobe and pulled out her last clean suit, a navy blue pinstripe skirt and jacket. She made a mental note to find her dry-cleaning tickets as she hauled herself into it. She pulled a brush through her long, matted blonde hair as, on cue, the buzzer went. She grabbed her coat and bag and ran to pick up the intercom. “Hello,” she said, knowing who it was.
“Taxi,” a gruff voice replied. Her chariot had arrived.
The driver looked familiar; he had probably taken her to work thousands of times, or taken her somewhere, she was never sure. As she settled into the back seat she pulled her trusty compact out of her Prada handbag and applied her makeup like an expert. Clara had never quite got the hang of public transport, as her taxi firm had observed. Once she had put on her face, she grabbed her purse from her bag, counted out the fare and, as the cab pulled up outside the office of Seymour Forbes Hunt, she was ready.
She winked at the cab driver as she walked away and he smiled. She knew she still had ‘the charm’. Clara had discovered ‘the charm’ at an early age: not the brightest child in the world, she had used it to get her through prep school, her strict boarding-school, finishing-school and eventually to her job in sales at SFH. It always got her what she wanted, and allowed her to break every rule in the book to do so.
It wasn’t that she wasn’t gorgeous, everyone thought she was. She had long blonde hair, pretty blue eyes, sweet lips and a figure to die for. But Clara knew how to make the most of her looks. She dressed to kill – skirts were always short, tops showed just a hint of cleavage: makeup emphasised her good points and hid the bad. Clara was an expert in making the most of what she’d got, and although she had more than most, she made herself desired by practically every man she met.
As she waited for the lift, she thought of Tim. What time had he left her bed? She didn’t remember him going, but she knew that at some point after she passed out, he would have slunk home to his wife. She also knew that he would already be in the office, at his desk, wearing his immaculate suit that would have been laid out for him by his immaculate wife.
Christ, if I was as organised as his wife, I’d make a much better mistress, Clara thought as she climbed into the lift, which would take her to begin her day.
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Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Extract from Pinstripes by Faith Bleasdale
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