Page 3 of Full Service

Silence stretched out again for eternity. “Fine,” my mum said. “But you can either pay rent or get out.”

“Fine.” I said. I had made up my mind on that front the second she said it. “Am I done?”

“For now,” Mum said.

I got up and left the room, closing the door as quietly as possible behind me. I ran up the stairs into my pretty messy bedroom. I grabbed a few pairs of pants and socks, some t-shirts and a couple of pairs of jeans and stuffed them in a hold-all bag. I was sure my grandparents wouldn’t mind me staying.

I was still glowing internally from Hywel’s praise, even if everyone else was against me. That one person didn’t hate me or judge me for what I’d done was enough. That it was a man I fancied was ten times as good.

I walked back down the stairs with hold-all in hand. I was ready to storm into the living room just so I could make a dramatic exit from the house for the last time, but then I heard Hywel speak and stopped for a second.

“Not everyone is good enough for University,” he said. I felt my heart sink into my stomach. “You know as well as I that Gruff was always going to do it. Mac though? You can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.”

Rather than the dramatic exit I had planned, I just turned away from the living room, walked down the hallway and slipped out of the front door. I had no idea where I was going. But I was going anywhere buthere. My heart was in a million tiny pieces but I faced the outside with a brave smile. I’d prove him wrong. I’d prove them all wrong.

Chapter One

Hywel

10 Years Later - December 1st

I love youmeant a lot less when you were fucking a business partner, it seemed. Or, at least that’s what I told myself as I packed up all my things under my partner and his new beau’s watchful eyes.

“Want your jockstrap back, Brian?” I asked. He rolled his eyes, so I pinged it back across the room at him. It missed, but I could still pretend to be satisfied. I zipped the big bag up and hoisted it over my shoulder. Thankfully, he hadn’t literally taken the shirt off my back but he had taken a couple out of my wardrobe and hoped I wouldn’t notice.

I tugged at one Armani sleeve. “I’ll have my lawyers contact you,” I said.

“Don’t bother, it’s all above board. You over-invested in a company. So did I. It’s just unfortunate that you lost out.”

“And were you diluted down to the same as me?” I asked. Once again, I just got an eye-roll and a half smile.

I gave one last glare before walking out of the apartment we had shared for coming up to a year. I waited until I was in the lift down to the bottom floor before letting myself give out a guttural scream that came out sounding more like a sob.

It had all started earlier in the day with a call from my financial advisor. “See, the thing is…he’s diluted you by quite a lot. Like, a lot.”

Brian and I had come up through the same investment company and had gained a reputation as shrewd employees with business brains and cut-throat attitudes. We seemed like a natural fit to spin off our own ventures, and almost as an aside, to fall into bed with one another.

One penthouse apartment, three goldfish and a lot of great sex later, I was on cloud nine. And in what now seemed to be a colossal lapse in judgement, I had let Brian take over the finances, to invest my money into a new start up that he genuinely had thought might change the world. Hundreds of thousands of pounds I’d saved up for my own business investments down the drain.

I had stormed home to confront him and found him balls-deep in a man who couldn’t be any older than 18. I had started packing up before he’d even pulled his cock out of the unfortunate bugger’s arse.

I needed space. But I had nowhere to go. I could get a hotel, but that wouldn’t last me long here in London. I had a few thousand pounds in my personal account, if Brian hadn’t already accessed and drained that too, and I had my car to sleep in. But I’d be caught dead before I was caught sleeping in my car after a decade of success in London. There was no way I could go from corporate giant to street bum at the age of 32.

The lift opened to the underground car park, and I did my best to hold it together as I walked to the car. It was a beauty, but even now had started to feel like a millstone around my neck. The Aston Martin DB5 had been my 30thbirthday present to myself, a celebration of all my years of City success with a beautiful burgundy paint job and brown leather seats. Now theamount of money I had in my bank account might just about pay for a couple of months of insurance on it.

I threw my bags into the boot of the car, got in and slumped myself over the steering wheel. After what could have been seconds or minutes of wallowing, my phone buzzed in my pocket. Without looking, I picked up.

“If you’re calling me to take the jockstrap, you can fucking keep it. And the goldfish, though I seem to recall it only ever being me who remembered to feed them.”

“I’d really rather not.” The voice on the other end of the phone wasn’t Brian, but my financial advisor Michael. I could hear him holding back a laugh.

“Sorry, Mike. Long day.”

“I’m well aware,” he said. He paused, waiting for me to ask the question I was so afraid to ask.

Finally, I mustered up the courage. “What’s the damage?”

“Well, you’ve been diluted from ten percent to something like zero point four.”

---