Page 67 of A Winter Kiss on Rochester Mews
They should have known, after the whole Christmas decorations debacle, that the power of being in charge would go to Nina’s head.
Although it was freezing, with frost glittering on the cobblestones and a bitter wind wrapping around them, they gathered in the mews the next morning to wave off a suitably embarrassed Verity (who’d insisted on coming in so she could go through the website orders protocol with Tom and Sam one last time) and Johnny as if they were going off to war, rather than taking the A1 to Lincolnshire. As Johnny’s car turned the corner in Rochester Street, Nina clapped her hands.
‘Right, you lot,’ she said rather belligerently. ‘I’m not paying you to stand around doing nothing. Back to work!’
‘Whatever!’ Sam shrugged this off while Tom looked down his nose (which was pink with cold) at his power-mad colleague.
‘Actually, Nina, I think you’ll find thatyoudon’t pay me at all,’ he pointed out.
‘I pay myself because I’m my own boss,’ Mattie said, which earned her a furious glare from Nina, but Mattie was already hurrying back to the tearooms. It was too cold to stay out there simply for the joy of annoying Nina.
Besides, it was toasty warm in the tearooms, the air thick with the scent of freshly brewing coffee and the cinnamon and gingerbread cupcakes that Mattie was baking. Because, yes, it seemed as if the ban on cupcakes was well and truly over – why should she deprive the world of her cupcakes because they reminded her of Steven’s perfidy? Mattie made great cupcakes and the world was a better place for them.
Also, at £4 per cupcake (which was not expensive for London) the mark-up on them was spectacular. No wonder Mattie was in such a good mood that she even pretended not to notice that Sophie and Cuthbert were wearing matching light-up Santa hats. ‘From the pound shop,’ Mattie heard Sophie tell a customer proudly.
Although Mattie had promised to check in on Happy Ever After, it was a promise that was hard to keep. The tearooms were frantic and when she’d popped in mid-morning with a plate of spiced buns, telling Nina they were free because she’d forgotten to add mixed peel to them, Nina had said, with a straight face, ‘Don’t bring me problems, Mattie. Bring me solutions.’
‘I’ll bring her a flea in her ear,’ Mattie had muttered to Tom as she left the shop.
‘It’s a hundred times worse for Sam and I than it is for you,’ Tom had whispered from his sentry duty at the Mistletoe Booth.
Mattie had fled through the anterooms to the sound of Nina shouting, ‘You’re not getting paid to chat, Tom!’
But by four o’clock, the tearooms were frantic in a more manageable way, and Mattie thought she should probably make sure that Tom and Sam hadn’t gone on strike over their impossible working conditions.
They hadn’t. Though Sam was mostly obscured by the large stack of books he was carrying. ‘Can’t stop. Post Office van is coming to collect the website orders in thirty minutes.’ Mattie lunged forward to steer him away from the baby reindeer, which he was about to fall over.
Nina was policing the Mistletoe Boothandtaking payment for books on her iPadandwasn’t looking quite so happy any more. Heavy was the head that wore the crown, or in this case a tinsel tiara.
‘Mattie!’ she cried forlornly. ‘Be a love and grab a handful of bookmarks, carrier bags and tote bags from the display unit nearest to the counter. They’re in the bottom drawer.’
For the next five minutes, Mattie bagged and bookmarked for a chastened and grateful Nina. ‘I thought being in charge would be fun. But it turns out that it’s the complete opposite of fun,’ she said. Then she banged on the booth. ‘Come on, you’ve been in there two minutes! Time’s up!’
Now wasn’t the time to point out that the Mistletoe Booth wasn’t really such a great idea. Mattie settled for a less controversial, ‘Where’s Tom?’
Nina groaned. ‘He’s in one of the anterooms, helping a customer. Been ages actually. Could you go and hurry him along?’
The bagging and bookmarking had died down so Mattie went through the Regency room into Historical, past Non-fiction and Foreign Language and in the tiny room that housed Happy Ever After’s sizeable stock of Erotica she found a man and woman, and Tom halfway up an ancient and rather rickety ladder, reaching books down from the top shelf.
Mattie didn’t want to startle Tom as he was perched so precariously with his hands full. Not just with several volumes of Erotica (why was Posy even selling the very unromanticCollected Works of the Marquis de Sade?) but with the woman who was ordering him about in a very high-handed manner.
‘No, dear,’ she drawled. ‘I don’t want a condensed version ofMy Secret Life. I want all seven volumes.’ She turned to her companion and arched one thin, impeccably shaped brow. ‘God, you just can’t get the staff these days.’
How rude, Mattie thought, glaring at the woman’s back. She was very striking. Tall and slim, all the better to showcase the tight black leather trousers and black leather jacket she was wearing, accessorised with a pair of heels so high that they’d even give Nina pause for thought. Her face was in profile, framed by a sleek, glossy, razor-sharp black bob.
She was actually much older than Mattie had thought. About the same age as Sandrine, who was in her late fifties and equally well preserved so that she could be early forties on a good day and in flattering light. Though Sandrine wasn’t one for skin-tight leather. Not that Mattie was judging.
‘Darling, I’m sorry this is such a bore,’ the woman cooed at her companion, who was tall and what Sophie would call ‘a fittie’. He was also head to toe in leather and when he turned to nuzzle the woman’s neck, Mattie could see that he was much younger than his girlfriend. He appeared younger than Mattie and she was going to be twenty-nine next birthday. But still, she wasn’t judging. Age was just a number and love didn’t ask for a date of birth before making its presence felt.
‘It is very boring,’ the young man agreed in a voice of studied disdain, as if showing any genuine emotion was too uncool for words. ‘What a dreary, sad little shop. All these romance novels.’ He shuddered and made it sound as if romance novels were somewhere between bin juice and flying ants on the scale of horrible things.
‘I suppose sad old spinsters and housewives have to get their jollies from somewhere.’ The woman barked out a laugh (and yes, now Mattie was judging her and finding her sadly wanting) then turned her attention back to Tom when he coughed nervously.
‘Um, well. Let me just … I could count …’ Tom didn’t seem able to speak in full sentences.
‘Come on! Spit it out. Some of us have proper jobs to get back to,’ the woman said.
‘We … we have got all seven volumes ofMy Secret Life,’ Tom said, his knuckles white as they clutched a pile of books. ‘Shall I get them down for you?’
