The Chic Boutique On Baker Street. Rachel Dove

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      ‘Amanda,’ he said, glaring back at Angela, who shrugged and sat down. ‘This isn’t what you think, I promise.’

      Amanda felt as though she would pass out any moment. All those nights, working to make him look good, doing his work, waiting for him to pick her up for dates that never happened. The memories came like stab wounds, thick and fast, realisation dripping like blood from her new wounds. She shook her head slowly, trying to get her brain to connect to her mouth.

      She swooped down, picked up what was left of the file and threw it to Marcus.

      ‘All done,’ she said and she fled.

      Marcus chased her to the elevators, calling her name, but thankfully the steel doors closed on him just as he reached them. Amanda pressed a shaky finger to the lobby button and sank down to the floor, head in her hands. Her phone buzzed in her bag, and, on automatic pilot, she pulled it out.

      ‘Perry,’ she said, her words barely flopping for freedom from her numb lips.

      ‘Amanda,’ the prim voice said crisply. ‘Mummy here, any news for me?’

      Amanda stared at the walls of the lift as they took her to the ground floor.

      ‘No, Mother, nothing to report. I’ll call you later.’

      Clicking off the call before her mother could ask her another question, she threw the phone into her bag, and peeled herself off the floor, quickly rearranging her clothes and hair before the lift doors pinged. Making her way across the marbled floors of the reception area, she smiled goodnight at the security guards and pushed through the front doors, gulping greedily at the fresh night air before hailing a taxi.

      Two days later, she had been called into Stokes’ office and fired. Gross negligence, they had stated. Amanda had barely taken it in, and before she even thought to ask what she had done, she was standing outside the same doors, a box full of trinkets heavy in her arms.

      It was all a colossal mess, and now she was unemployed to boot. She should have been looking for another job, another firm to work for, before the gossip really spread, but she couldn’t bring herself to apply anywhere else. What was the point? Her reputation was tarnished—bungling a million pound account did that for your career. The years of hard work and sacrifice would mean nothing. She was the girl who cocked up the huge contract and, now, that’s all she would ever be.

      She rubbed her gritty eyes, puffy, sore and still caked in last night’s mascara, and gingerly reached over. She rolled her fingers over the touch pad and the laptop sprang to life. Squinting at the screen, she refreshed her email inbox. Whilst she had been sleeping, her new life had been forming around her, and when she opened the reply from the estate agent, she smiled to herself. Time to disappear.

      The little Eden she had sunk her life savings into was thankfully not a disappointment, despite the sale being unseen.

      There was an exterior entrance on the street, and a staircase within the shop too, which made her feel very safe and self-contained, master of her own realm. She could pretty much spend her life at work and home, all within a few steps. After all the commuting and fast walks in teetering heels, barrelling down corridors and storming into court, it was an appealing thought to Amanda.

      Opening the door, she flicked on the light and sighed. After long days of working to make the shop interior what she had envisioned, she had barely made a dent on her new home and it showed. Boxes surrounded the chintzy sofa she had bought from eBay, a buy she intended to upcycle with some new covers, and which at present looked like something from her gran’s house. Stepping over them, she passed a dilapidated end table and spied her smartphone. In the city, her phone had been permanently glued to her hand, never leaving her side for longer than a bath. The more time she did without it, the less she missed it, and the people who used it to contact her. Well, maybe her thoughts lingered on one, but she wouldn’t allow herself to dwell on that now. Opening the wooden drawer in the front of the table, she scooped up the phone and shoved it in, dusting down her hands as she walked away. Last night’s DVD title filled the television screen with colour as it sprang to life. She pressed ‘play’ and Pride and Prejudice began playing again, the embroidered garments flowing across the screen as the title music sounded. She walked to the open-plan kitchen, opened the fridge and pulled out a microwave Thai meal and the remnants of the bottle of rosé from the night before. Spying the washed glass on the draining board, she filled it up and took a swift glug, smiling as the cold chill of the wine hit the back of her throat, warming her through. She sat down on the breakfast bar stool, running her fingers along the bandage on her foot. She pursed her lips as she thought of the disastrous encounter, and the feeling that she hadn’t been able to shake all afternoon. She had heard him next door, banging about most of the afternoon. He was obviously an arse. Obviously. She just felt sorry for the dogs he had been looking after. She could see him being a dog man though, all jeans, jumpers and ruddy cheeks, skipping over mountain and dale with man’s best friend. Her face drew into a frown as she sipped at her wine. Tracy was the polar opposite of him, all mean scowls, and out-there fashion sense. Not a couple you would put together immediately, if at all. She ran her free palm along the side of the cool glass. In fact, they were pretty much the last people she would put together in a relationship. Not that she cared, of course, and his unkind words had stung. What did he know about her business? Did he really think she hadn’t done a little bit of research before she started? Fair enough, she had sold her London life and skipped town in a heartbroken knee-jerk reaction, but he didn’t know that, and it wasn’t like she hadn’t thought about doing it before.

      She had the bookmark, the ideas, she had a plan. What she didn’t need was the sexy—Sexy? No!—annoying business owner next door causing problems and making her the village pariah. In her last job, she would have taken him on, told him exactly what she thought of him, dragged an apology out of him, but he had rattled her, and the feeling was not familiar or welcome. She resolved to ignore him and his girlfriend, let them get on with it. Plus, they had a regular supply of fresh dog poop at their disposal. Sometimes, a girl has to pick her battles.

      She sipped at her drink and rose when the microwave pinged. After setting her food out on a plate, she took both to the couch and wrapped herself up with a blanket left on the arm from last night. As Lizzie Bennet navigated singledom on the screen, Amanda pondered her own fresh start. If her city friends could see her now, huddled under a blanket in a box fort, watching Austen and getting into a tizzy over the first man under seventy she had met this month. Pathetic. And anyway, not only was she over men forever, but Ben wasn’t single, he was an opinionated git and his girlfriend owned next door. And one thing was for sure, for the sake of her sanity and her bank balance, Amanda’s new life had to work. No, she would stick to Mr Darcy. She would get through this week, spend her nights under this blanket of denial, and then, come the weekend, she would sort her new home, and her new life, out for good. And she wouldn’t think about Ben again. She drank a toast to Darcy, smiling through a mouthful of pad thai.

      ‘Just me and thee, Darcy!’ she said, in a voice that held more conviction than she felt. Sighing, she took another glug and wondered yet again how life could change so quickly, and how she was ever going to adjust.

      Ben Evans was arm deep in work. Mr Jenkins’ prize cow, Gwendolen, to be exact. The poor animal was having a breech delivery. Ben could see the calf’s feet pointing up, and Gwendolen was in distress. Not as much distress as Alf was in though. Alf Jenkins, one of the local steadfast farmers in Westfield, was leaning against the head gate, feet shuffling from one to the other. His ever-present roll-up was hanging from his tight lips, and his knuckles were as white as the white plastic apron encasing Ben’s body. Ben looked out from the cow’s behind, giving Alf a quick flash of his pearly whites.

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