‘Never heard of them,’ sniffed Karin, but she was secretly pleased. A small, unknown agency would give her Summer for peanuts, just to ingratiate themselves with a fashion house. It could save Karin thousands and, if Dan was going to champion her as he was suggesting, this girl could be the next big face – and Karenza would have her first.
‘I wonder what she’d be like brunette?’
Karin snatched up her phone. ‘Jane? Can you send the model back up?’ she asked the receptionist. As they waited for Summer to come back up, Karin opened her desk drawer, removing a pair of scissors which she gave to Kirsty.
‘Can you just cut me some of your hair?’
‘What?’ replied Kirsty, startled.
‘Your hair. I need it,’ said Karin tartly, her eyes locking with Kirsty’s. ‘Come on, it’s important. Just two or three inches will be fine. It will grow back, for goodness’ sake.’
Kirsty gingerly snipped at the bottom of her brown bob and handed the segment of hair to Karin.
As Summer came back into the room, Karin walked purposefully towards her. ‘I want you to go to Joel at Real Hairdressing,’ said Karin, handing Summer the brunette locks. ‘Tell him I sent you and tell him to make your hair that colour. When he’s done it – and not before – come back here and maybe we can start trying on some swimsuits.’
Kirsty and Dan looked at each other and smiled.
14
Jilly was worried. After that snake Richard had gone off with the office floozie and Erin had moved out of his apartment, Jilly had fully expected her granddaughter to return to Cornwall immediately. After all, she had no home, no boyfriend, some job answering telephones twelve hours a day; what on earth could be keeping her in London?
‘I just don’t understand it, lovey,’ she said down the phone line. ‘London’s expensive, it’s lonely. Why don’t you come home?’
Erin had to admit Jilly had a point. She’d been in London six weeks and here she was, living in a single room in a Bayswater hotel costing her a hundred pounds a night. She hadn’t any friends to stay with after she’d left Richard’s – she could hardly have asked Adam to put her up for a few days while she found somewhere new to live – and working so hard at the Midas Corporation, there seemed neither the time nor the opportunity to make any new friends. It wasn’t quite the glamorous life either of them had imagined for her; then again, there was something about Midas that made her fizz with excitement, and it wasn’t just her £70,000 pay-packet. She wasn’t quite ready to leave just yet.
‘When you spent four years at university getting a Russian degree, it wasn’t to spend your life making somebody else’s travel arrangements, was it?’ said Jilly. ‘Come home. Finish your novel. That’s you’ve always wanted, isn’t it?’
Erin felt an enormous rush of guilt at the mention of her novel. Jilly could almost read her mind; Erin hadn’t written a word since she had been in London. But she’d started another career now and she couldn’t very well admit defeat so soon and go running home just because Richard was such a rat.
‘Let me give it a week,’ said Erin. ‘This hotel arrangement is purely temporary. If I haven’t got settled in a week, we can talk again.’ She put down the receiver and resolved that she had to find somewhere immediately, if not sooner.
‘Now the next property I’m going to show you is really special,’ said the estate agent with an encouraging smile. Erin groaned inwardly. It was the fourth flat in as many days that this estate agent had shown her. He had kept phoning her up at work, promising her he could find her something amazing, but everything he had shown her so far seemed decidedly overpriced or poky.
Perhaps this flat would be the one, Erin thought hopefully, as they pulled up outside a huge Victorian building in a shady street in Canonbury, the prettiest part of Islington. It certainly looked good from the outside, with rich, honey-coloured brickwork and large well-tended flowerpots sitting on the wide windowsills.
‘Incredible isn’t it?’ smiled Ryan Hall, the agent. It’s her who’s incredible, he thought. I’ve got to close the deal on this one. Ryan had been desperately seeking out impressive properties all week, just so he could see Erin again.
‘It used to be an old cotton factory,’ he said, striding up the path. ‘Lay derelict for years until it was redeveloped a few years ago.’ He jangled the key in the lock and gently touched Erin’s shoulder to guide her in.
‘I’d live here if I could afford it,’ said Ryan, hoping she’d get the hint and invite him around. ‘A girl like you deserves a place like this.’
As they walked inside, Erin nodded in agreement. There was a large lobby with a marble floor and an old-fashioned grille-front lift – a relic from the building’s industrial days. She had always dreamed of living in a place like this. Erin crossed her fingers as they rode up to the second floor. Please be nice, she whispered, please be nice. She desperately needed to find somewhere to call her own or she’d be back on that Port Merryn clifftop before the end of the month.
‘Our agency looks after the entire building,’ continued Ryan as he opened the door to apartment eleven. ‘I’ve only been with Thomson Bailey three months but my boss tells me that apartments in this building hardly ever become available. Once you’re here, you don’t want to leave.’
For once, Erin thought Ryan Hall might be telling the truth. It wasn’t a huge space, a corridor painted soft sage green with high ceilings and curly cornices led into a big living space already kitted out with squashy cream sofas and billowing velvet drapes. There was a small open-plan kitchen, a bathroom with just enough space for a shower, and a large bedroom with a sleigh bed and – she gasped – French doors which led out to a tiny balcony.
‘It’s fantastic,’ smiled Erin, unable to hide her glee. ‘You should have shown me this place first.’
‘Then I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of your company all week,’ smiled Ryan Hall honestly.
‘How much did you say this one was?’ she asked.
‘Five hundred a week,’ said Ryan, flicking a piece of fluff from his shoulder.
Erin felt her heart clank to the ground. It was almost twice what she had been planning on playing; over half of her salary after tax.
Just then, Ryan’s mobile began to ring furiously. ‘Make yourself comfortable and think about it,’ he whispered.