Claudia Carroll 3 Book Bundle. Claudia Carroll

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       Chapter Eight

      His mam’s magic novenas to St Michael and St Joseph were answered and not long after, Jake got a letter from one of the many language schools where he’d applied to teach English as a foreign language, requesting – he thought he was seeing things – an interview. An actual interview. For a decent, respectable job and not driving taxis or flipping burgers or selling the Big Issue outside late night supermarkets like most of the ex-cons he knew.

      He called Eloise immediately and even though she was in her office and couldn’t really react, he swore he could hear the delighted triumph in her voice. ‘We’ll plan this all out later,’ she hissed down the phone.

      Planning, scheming, devising, taking total control, he’d learned, were Eloise’s favourite pastimes in the whole world. The woman was utterly wasted at the Post, he reckoned, she should have been head of the CIA – she’d have the place running effortlessly smoothly with one hand tied behind her back.

      True to her word, she popped into the flat late that night, on her way home.

      ‘Okay, we’ve just got one problem,’ she told him decisively, whamming her briefcase down on the tiny coffee table, whipping off her too-tight jacket and gratefully taking the glass of white wine Jake offered her.

      ‘You’ve only just got in the door! Would you ever relax and tell me a bit about your day first?’

      ‘Can’t Jake. This is too important for us … I mean, for you. Have you any idea the amount of prepping we’re going to have to do to get you ready in time? And while we’re on the subject, there’s something that’s been worrying me …’

      ‘You mean what to say if they ask what I’ve been doing for the past two years?’

      ‘No, no that’s not it,’ she interrupted. ‘At least, that’s not just it.’

      They’d been over and over the subject of how best to gloss over his past and Eloise had stressed time and again that any potential employer was bound to run background checks, even for a part-time job. So with that in mind, she advised Jake he’d no choice but to openly and honestly tell them the whole truth and nothing but. It was a huge gamble and they both knew it, but somehow she believed in him and genuinely hoped that his personality and passion for the job would sway things his way. Not to mention the fact that his score on his final TEFL exam was one of the highest in the country. Besides, from sitting on the far side of an interviewer’s desk, she claimed to know from bitter experience that an employer was always far more concerned about the potential future of the candidate sitting down in front of them, and considerably less about their past.

      ‘What’s up then?’

      ‘There’s no easy way to say this, and you’re not to take offence, but – it’s your appearance.’

      ‘What about it?’

      ‘Ehhhh … Jake, to date all I’ve ever seen you in is either a black or a blue T-shirt and the same pair of jeans day in day out. Two T-shirts does not a well-dressed interviewee make. Not good enough. There’s an awful lot riding on this, so you’ve got to give yourself the best shot possible.’

      ‘Ahh Christ, don’t say what I think you’re going to say.’

      ‘You need a suit. You need a whole new wardrobe, in fact.’

      ‘No way.’

      ‘Yes way.’

      ‘Suits are for bankers, developers who’ve gone bust and gay magicians on TV. The one and only time I was ever in a suit in my whole life, I was up in front of a judge in Circuit Court number six.’

      ‘Jake, СКАЧАТЬ