The Bedroom Assignment

‘I bet there are. Hundreds of them. I hate spiders.’

‘Don’t worry, you won’t be working in here. This is restricted territory. Jay’s PA lives here. You don’t get in without a visa.’ She waved the note Suze had given Zoe to bring. ‘Ah, here she is.’

For a moment Zoe wondered wildly if she were actually talking about a ten foot Swiss cheese plant. But then another tall blonde appeared from behind it. She was carrying a tiny trowel, with a gold handle, and had a pile of smart maroon laminated brochures stuffed precariously under her arm. She looked distracted.

‘Hello, Isabel,’ she said to Blonde Mark I, scattering brochures.

Ho. So they don’t like each other. Zoe was good at interpreting tones of voice. She bent and gathered up the fallen brochures.

‘Hi, Poppy,’ said Blonde Mark I coldly. ‘This is the girl from the agency I called you about. Zoe Brown. I’ve done the paperwork, but you’ll know where Jay wants her to work.’

It was sweet enough. But so was poison, thought Zoe. Dislike was clearly mutual.

She sighed. She hated office wars. It was tough enough being a temp anyway, without having to work out departmental battle lines.

She said hastily, ‘They said something about a research project? But I can file and do word processing as well.’

The blonde called Poppy looked taken aback. Isabel smiled maliciously.

‘Your call,’ she said. ‘I don’t know a thing about it. Suze at the temp agency said Jay rang through to her himself.’

‘Then we’ll ask Jay.’

Isabel went into exaggerated surprise. ‘He in yet?’

‘Er—no.’

Isabel grinned. ‘Been to stay with the gardener bird, has he?’

Poppy narrowed perfectly made-up eyes at her adversary. The Battle of the Blondes, thought Zoe. She moved carefully out of range.

‘I’m not discussing Jay’s private life with you, Isabel Percy, so you can stop fishing. If you don’t know what to do with her, you can leave Zoe here with me. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of work to do.’

Isabel recognised defeat. She shrugged and turned to Zoe.

‘Sorry about that. If you need to talk, you know where I am. Human Resources, second floor.’

‘Thank you,’ said Zoe in a neutral voice. Rule One, when joining a new office, was be polite to everyone.

‘Jay will tell you everything you need to know,’ said Poppy quickly.

‘It’s still kind of you,’ Zoe told Isabel. ‘I appreciate it.’ Rule Two was don’t take sides.

Isabel raised a hand in farewell. ‘Good luck. Don’t get eaten by the spiders. See you around.’

She went.

The hard look went out of Poopy’s face. She went back to faintly worried, which Zoe suspected was her habitual expression.

‘Suze didn’t say anything else about where you’d be working?’ Poppy asked. ‘Like research into what, for instance?’

Zoe shook her head. ‘But I could start with Mr Christopher,’ she said, mindful of Isabel Percy’s advice. ‘I obviously ought to know more about him and this agency than I do.’

‘Of course.’ Poppy looked relieved. She dived round a curtain of leaves so fat they looked as if they ate people. Had eaten several recently, in fact. Zoe followed, taking care not to brush against the plant in case it had teeth.

Behind it there was an oasis of relative normality.

‘Wow,’ said Zoe, forgetting Rule Three, never comment adversely on the working environment, ‘a real desk. Drawers and a leg at each corner and everything.’

Poppy was rummaging through a pile of papers that leaned like the Tower of Pisa, but at that she looked up and grinned.

‘Don’t let the trendiness in the main office fool you. Culp and Christopher is as good as it gets. The trick desks are just for fun. Ah, here it is.’

She fished out a battered A4 folder. Zoe put the brochures she had harvested down on the desk and accepted it.

‘Now, where are you going to sit? Probably not the boardroom; you never know who’s going to use it. Um—what about Jay’s waiting area?’

Zoe nodded obediently and settled into carved oak chair that looked at least four centuries out of step with the rest of the decor. She resisted the temptation to put her feet on a carved chest of similar design that served as a coffee table.