Never Mind the Botox Read online

  ‘He’s a bloody waste of space,’ she declared loudly to no one in particular. ‘Claims he forgot that he was meant to be playing five-a-side football. What bollocks. I bet somebody just dropped out.’ She looked around at the assembled mass of amused faces and spotted Meredith.

  ‘Sorry! Hello, Meredith. Great to see you. Welcome to the team.’ Jackie raised her glass in a cursory toast. ‘Bet you don’t have this sort of trouble with your boyfriends,’ she added, unaware of how familiar she sounded compared to the conversation that had gone before.

  Meredith raised her eyebrows and grinned at Rupert, who rolled his eyes in mock horror. Lars looked impassively at Jackie.

  ‘Meredith was just telling us about her time in France.’

  ‘Sorry, don’t let me interrupt. I’ll calm down in a minute,’ said Jackie.

  ‘That’s okay. We were pretty much done anyway,’ said Meredith, keen to avoid the conversation going backwards. ‘Does your boyfriend play a lot of football?’

  ‘No, that’s the rubbish thing about it! You’d hope that I might be more important than some kick about with his mates, but it seems not.’

  ‘Men and sport,’ said Meredith. ‘A mystery I fear we’ll never truly understand.’

  Jackie laughed. ‘So true! What about you? Did you bring some lovely reliable man with you from France?’

  Meredith thought about Ryan. They had been in pretty much constant contact since her weekend in Chicago, but did that make him a boyfriend? He was thousands of miles away, and if she was being realistic, the most likely outcome was that things would just fizzle out between them.

  ‘No, I’m single at the moment, actually.’

  ‘Well, that won’t last long! Just look at this place – more men than you can shake a stick at,’ said Jackie, looking around the wine bar. Meredith had to agree with her. The place was brimming with prospects.

  As they stood drinking and chatting, Meredith had her first proper conversation with Alfred, who was marginally more approachable after two small beers. She established that he lived with his girlfriend, a computer programmer he’d met when they were both doing their PhDs in applied algebra, that he spoke five languages and that he loved old cars. That gave him nothing in common with Meredith, but to her surprise, she found him strangely captivating. He spoke with a quiet authority reserved for those with either great intelligence or knowledge, and Meredith suspected Alfred had both. She just needed to make sure she used them to best effect. If he could deliver some good leads then she was sure she could convert them into clients.

  As the evening wore on, the conversation and the music got louder. The small dance floor in the corner of the wine bar opened for business, and it didn’t take long to attract its first customers. The group at the next table became increasingly rowdy, dancing and swaying to the music, and eventually knocked a beer bottle off their table that splashed onto Meredith’s legs, narrowly missing her new briefcase. The man standing nearest to her instantly stopped dancing and grabbed the bottle from the floor.

  ‘God, I’m so sorry, getting a bit carried away,’ he said, smiling, his head slightly bowed in anticipation of the inevitable rebuke. Meredith couldn’t help but notice the muscular frame through the slightly damp white shirt that clung to his chest.

  ‘Are you very wet? Can I get you a cloth?’ He peered down at her legs.

  ‘No, don’t worry. It’s not that bad. I’ll live.’ Meredith picked up her briefcase and moved it onto a nearby chair.

  ‘Can I at least buy you a drink then? I’m Jamie, by the way.’ He held out his hand. He had dark collar-length hair and his eyes looked almost black in the dim light.

  ‘Meredith.’ She shook his hand. ‘And that’s okay, we’ve got plenty, thanks.’ She gestured at their table, which was crammed with bottles of wine and beer.

  ‘I’d be careful with that lot,’ said Jamie. ‘You might spill it on someone.’

  Meredith couldn’t help smiling at his cheek.

  ‘I’ll do my best.’

  ‘Do you work near here?’ Jamie asked.

  ‘Clinton Wahlberg, just round the corner.’

  ‘Yeah, I know it. Huge place. What do you do there?’

  ‘I’m a director in the healthcare team.’

  Jamie looked impressed. ‘Get you. I’m in IT. Big systems implementations mainly. Not quite as glamorous but it pays the bills.’

  ‘My job’s not glamorous,’ said Meredith.

  ‘Looks pretty glamorous to me,’ said Jamie, raising his eyebrows at her.

  ‘Shut up,’ laughed Meredith, secretly flattered by his implied compliment. He was quite the charmer.

  ‘Are you out with work?’

  ‘Yes, team drinks night.’

  ‘Sorry, I’m disturbing you,’ said Jamie, taking a step backwards.

  ‘No, no, that’s okay. It’s all very informal,’ said Meredith.

  As they stood chatting, out of the corner of her eye Meredith noticed her colleagues exchange knowing glances. Her immediate instinct was to stop talking to Jamie and rejoin the group, but then again, why should she? Getting out and about, meeting new people, expanding her contact base, that was all part of her plan. Let them talk. She wasn’t doing any harm.

  ‘I could really do with some water. It’s boiling in here,’ said Meredith, fanning her face.

  ‘Me too,’ said Jamie, flapping his shirt away from his chest to let in some air.

  ‘Double waters all round it is, then,’ said Meredith, grinning, and they made their way over to the bar. While they were getting their drinks, Meredith’s phone rang. It was Ryan. She didn’t answer it, and when her phone stopped ringing, she switched it off.

  The next morning, Meredith woke up early, feeling tired and a bit hazy round the edges. She didn’t normally drink that much, especially during the week, so she could really feel that she’d had a few glasses of wine. She lay in bed, rubbing her forehead and thinking about the previous evening. She’d ended up chatting and dancing with Jamie for most of the evening. Although none of them had said anything, she was sure that her colleagues had been a bit surprised that she hadn’t spent more time getting to know them. It had been team drinks night, after all. Maybe that hadn’t been the best start. Nothing had happened with Jamie, other than some harmless flirting, but they wouldn’t know that. He had asked for her number and, to her mounting shame, Meredith had deliberately given him the wrong one. Although he seemed like a really nice guy and she’d enjoyed his company, she didn’t feel ready for a relationship. The confidence that she’d felt with Ryan just hadn’t been there last night. Perhaps the time she had spent chatting to Ryan online before they actually met had been more important than she’d realised.

  Meredith got slowly out of bed, made herself a cup of coffee and got ready for work, opting for a simple black jersey dress and knee-length suede boots. She picked up her coat and handbag and looked around for her briefcase. She couldn’t see it anywhere. Then it suddenly dawned on her: she’d left it in the wine bar, on the chair where she had moved it after she’d got a beer soaking. And it had her work laptop in it. Meredith sunk down onto the sofa, her head in her hands. No! How could she have been so stupid?

  She knew that she was meant to phone Clinton Wahlberg’s IT help desk straight away and report the laptop missing. But maybe she could just go back to the bar first? Meredith looked at her watch. It was seven thirty-five a.m. There was no way that the bar would be open before eleven a.m. and she didn’t dare leave it that long. She had no choice but to ring the office. Shit! What a start.

  Meredith grabbed her phone out of her bag and turned it on. Just as she was dialling the switchboard, it beeped with a text message. It was from Alfred and was typically short and to the point.

  I have your briefcase. Alfred

  Meredith held her hands together and looked at the ceiling.

  ‘Thank you God,’ she mouthed.

  She then rang Alfred.

  ‘Alfred? It’s Meredith. I’ve just
picked up your text saying you’ve got my briefcase. Thank you, thank you so much. I was just about to call the IT help desk.’

  ‘That’s okay,’ said Alfred without much emotion in his voice. ‘You left it on the chair near where we were drinking. I was pretty sure it was yours, but I did look inside just to be sure. I hope that was alright?’

  ‘Of course it was alright,’ said Meredith. She couldn’t think of anything very exciting in the case.

  ‘You do know that it’s a disciplinary matter to leave your laptop in a public place?’ Meredith could hear the tone of disbelief in his voice that she’d managed to be so careless.

  ‘Yes, of course I do. I moved it out of the way as it was getting splashed with drinks, and then completely forgot about it.’ Meredith winced at the probable thought now going through Alfred’s head: that she’d been too busy flirting and dancing.

  ‘Anyway, I’ve put it in your office,’ said Alfred.

  ‘Are you in already? Don’t you ever sleep?’

  ‘Too many people like you giving me things to do,’ said Alfred without a hint of irony.

  Meredith immediately felt like apologising, but resisted. They all worked hard. It came with the territory.

  ‘I’ll be in shortly; let’s catch up then. And thank you, Alfred. I am grateful.’ He deserved that much at least.

  Hanging up, Meredith slumped back on the sofa with relief. Wow, that had been a close call. She didn’t really care what Alfred thought of her, but Nick would not have been impressed if she’d lost her laptop in week one.

  She arrived at the office an hour later. She went up in the lift and was crossing the open-plan area near her office when she was greeted by a low-key ‘Mexican shiver’, like an icy wind was following her, from a group of analysts and associates in her team who sat there in a long row. Meredith was pretty sure that they meant for her to see it. They clearly took the team drinks far more seriously than she’d thought. Even so, it did seem a bit of an extreme reaction to the fact that she hadn’t talked to them much. She walked past them, pretending not to notice, her head in the air.

  When Meredith got to her office, her briefcase was sitting on her chair. Thank God for Alfred! She opened it and surveyed the contents. Much to her relief, everything seemed to be there. She took out her laptop, and as she did her final bill from the Beau Street Group fluttered out onto the floor. Damn, something else she’d forgotten. She stuck a note on her computer screen to remind herself to pay it and then stuffed the bill back into her briefcase.

  Putting the frosty reception to the back of her mind, she got stuck into the analysis that Alfred had painstakingly prepared for her, making lists of companies in the healthcare sector that she would approach. She classified them into groups: willing buyers, willing sellers, forced sellers in financial difficulty, companies changing strategic direction, and so on. She surveyed the list. There had to be a deal in there somewhere. Sometimes she felt more like a dating agency than a banker. Did they have the same interests? Did they tick the same boxes? Could she find a love match? She needed some companies to fall in love with each other, and soon.

  Meredith carefully searched the Clinton Wahlberg contacts database, which told her who else in the bank already knew someone at each company, and jotted down some names. She picked up the phone and started calling. After several hours of leaving messages and pacing around her office, she had a couple of warmish leads. A private hospital group in Germany was expanding fast and looking for other businesses to buy, and a UK-based medical laboratory business that provided testing and screening services was struggling following a string of legal claims and could be open to a takeover approach. Not the most impressive list she’d ever seen, but at least it was a start.

  Meredith got up from her chair and looked at the others in her team, who were chatting and busying themselves in the area outside her office. No one had even said good morning to her yet. This place was turning out to be tougher than she’d thought.

  Chapter 5

  After lunch, Meredith rang Ryan. At least he would be keen to talk to her.

  ‘Sorry I missed your call last night. I was at a client dinner,’ she lied.

  ‘No worries. Was just ringing to see how you were. It was nothing urgent.’ Ryan sounded cheery and upbeat as usual. ‘And I’m thinking of coming over.’

  Meredith was surprised. ‘When?’

  ‘Maybe as early as next week. I’ve managed to convince Lawson that we need to expand more quickly and that we should start looking at businesses in Europe.’ Lawson Green was the CEO of the Equinox Practise and Ryan’s boss.

  ‘And he agrees with you?’

  ‘Let’s just say he’s happy for me to look into it. I told him that I’ve got a first-class investment bank lined up to help me with the search. And that means I have a good reason to take a few trips on expenses. Pretty smart, huh!’

  ‘Very cunning!’ Meredith was excited at the thought of a few days with Ryan. ‘I think we need to investigate the market very thoroughly, don’t you? Make sure all your possible options are explored.’

  Ryan laughed at her innuendo. ‘Yes, very thoroughly indeed. Can you recommend a hotel? Somewhere decent, since Equinox is paying.’

  ‘Absolutely. I’ll email you some options. And can you let me know when you’ve booked your flights? I’ll make us some dinner reservations. I’ll need to work during the day, though; things are pretty full on here.’

  ‘Oh, come on, surely you can take a couple of days off? I thought you were pretty much your own boss?’

  ‘I am in terms of managing my diary, but I’ve got a set of targets as long as your arm that I really need to start delivering on.’ Meredith could only imagine what the team would think of her if she swanned off for a few days’ holiday so soon after starting, and before she’d really achieved anything.

  ‘Please, Meredith. I want to spend as much time with you as I can. Maybe just Monday – could you at least swing Monday off?’

  Meredith hesitated. She loved it that Ryan was so desperate to see her.

  ‘Look, I’ll see what I can do. Perhaps I can say I’ve got a day of meetings.’

  ‘Yes, good idea. Very important meetings, the sort where you can’t be disturbed for hours…’

  Meredith laughed. ‘You’re impossible. Alright, look, you book your flights and I’ll work out a plan to show you what London has to offer. ’

  ‘I’m not one of those boys from the backwater with no passport. I have been to London before, you know!’ Ryan exclaimed.

  ‘Not with me, though. I’ll show you a whole side of London you never even knew existed,’ said Meredith, grinning.

  ‘I bet you will,’ said Ryan. ‘That’s why I’m coming!’

  He emailed later that day with his flight plans. He was arriving on Sunday and, at Meredith’s suggestion, was staying at The Brook Hotel near Mayfair. Meredith rang Daisy in excitement.

  ‘Why’s he coming?’ Daisy asked when she heard the news.

  ‘He’s spun his boss some line about looking for businesses to buy in Europe. Gives him a good reason to be here,’ Meredith explained.

  ‘So if he’s not really looking at businesses to buy, what will he be doing?’

  ‘What do you think? Just spending time with me, of course. I’m planning to show him the sights. Got any good restaurant suggestions? I’d like to take him somewhere a bit different, somewhere off the beaten track.’

  ‘Why don’t you try that new Lebanese restaurant near the gallery?’ Daisy suggested. ‘It’s got great reviews and plenty of quiet corners for you to hide in.’

  Meredith nodded. ‘Good idea. I’ll put it on the list.’

  She spent the next couple of days working feverishly to get as much of her company analysis complete as possible and strategically walking the floors to make sure her team noticed the long hours she was working. She emailed Nick to say that she couldn’t make the regular Monday team meeting as she had a ‘potentially exciting client meeting’, an
d left Alfred with a huge list of things to do for when she was back in.

  Meredith had offered to meet Ryan at Heathrow Airport, but by the time she got there she was a bundle of nerves. She found the arrivals hall and took up position next to a bored-looking taxi driver holding a white name board. Her stomach turned cartwheels as she watched the steady stream of people pour out of the arrival doors. Would she still feel the same when she saw him? It had been several weeks since her trip to Chicago and it was already a bit of a distant memory. But when Ryan casually sauntered out through the doors, all the memories quickly came flooding back. He was dressed in black jeans and a red and white baseball jacket, and looked every inch as gorgeous as when she had last seen him. It didn’t look like the flight had bothered him much either. Meredith thought about all the times she had dragged herself off long-haul flights, feeling grey and bleary-eyed. But Ryan’s eyes were bright and sparking and he had the over-the-top bounce in his step that, in her experience, only Americans could get away with. He picked Meredith up and whirled her around.

  ‘You look fabulous!’ he declared, kissing the top of her head as she spun.

  ‘Stop, people are looking!’ said Meredith, feeling distinctly uncomfortable with such a public display of affection.

  Ryan stopped spinning and hugged her tightly against him. He leant down and kissed her on the lips, gently at first and then passionately, until people did start to look. Meredith finally pulled away from him.

  ‘Well, hello to you too,’ she said, smiling.

  ‘Damn, this girl’s hot,’ shouted Ryan to the assembled mass of waiting people, who responded with a chorus of sniggers and raised eyebrows.

  Meredith punched Ryan on the arm. ‘Will you calm down!’

  ‘Why? Am I embarrassing you?’

  ‘Yes! Now shall we go, before someone calls airport security.’

  Ryan grinned, grabbed Meredith’s hand and picked up his bag with the other.