From Paris With Love This Christmas. Jules Wake
the hell do you know about that? It was lunch.’
‘Jungle drums. You’re fresh meat round here. A lunch date is a considerable coup in someone’s campaign. She’s on a mission, that one. You want to watch yourself.’
Jason clapped him on the arm. ‘If you want the truth, I did it more to get out of the house on Sunday and away from her royal highness. I’m not about to get myself ensnared. Claire’s a nice enough girl but one lunch doesn’t make an engagement. I like her. I’m happy enough to take it slowly and if it goes anywhere, fine. I’m not in and out of girls’ knickers like some I could mention. ’
Will gave him a good natured punch on the arm. ‘Mate, I can’t help it if I’m a babe-magnet. They can’t get enough of me.’
After lunch Will walked back across the cobbled courtyard with him.
‘I love this smell.’
Jason agreed. One of the best smells in the world. Finest Kentish hops boiling in the large copper kettle. ‘I know what you mean.’
They laughed together. As far as most people were concerned, the smell of hops boiling up was pretty disgusting but Jason knew that to them both it signified a whole world of dreams and ambition.
‘Want a hand this afternoon?’ Will had the face of an eager schoolboy; it would have been cruel to turn him down.
‘You can’t keep away. Like having your own train set.’
‘Man this is way better than a train set. Who’d have thought eh? One minute I’m mashing your face in the scrum, the next we’re building a brewing empire.’
‘Empire’s pushing it a bit. Although the Chamber of Commerce have said there’s been some interest from a distributor in France.’
Will laughed. ‘Cool if you got one in Germany. Coals to Cologne.’
‘Apparently the French are going ape for boutique beers. We did win that award.’
‘Yeah we could do with winning another award.’ For all his effete, floppy haired, public schoolboy looks, Will had an extremely astute business brain.
‘I’m doing my best.’
‘You’re doing fine mate. Our second year, five awards. An international gong. Distribution is on the up and we’re almost solvent.’
Jason raised his eyebrows.
‘Almost, I said.’
‘As long as we don’t want to eat as well.’
‘Mate, you know I’ll loan you anything you need.’
‘I’m fine. Just need to be careful. Hopefully this week when I go up to the Lakes I can secure another deal. Keep going like that and in another year those tanks will be paid off. That’ll lighten the load.’ He paused and pulled a face. ‘Providing Stacey doesn’t start up again.’
‘I can’t believe that bitch. She sponges off you for three years. Then expects to get a cut of your flat sale. Your flat, man!’
‘I think she’s given up now.’
‘I should bloody hope so. Cheeky bitch. So when do you head off and when are you back?’
‘I’ll leave tomorrow, back Thursday, so I wouldn’t mind some help today. It’s going to be a late one. There was a leak in one of the bags. I’ve had to send Ben in the Land Rover to get some more barley. If you can pitch in for a couple of hours that would be great.’
‘I can help out until opening time and then it depends whether Michelle deigns to turn up or not.’
‘Still having problems with her?’
It was unlike Will to put up with that sort of thing from one of his waitresses. The blond ponytail might lull people into the false assumption that his real job was organising a summer music festival, but his was a tight ship. People came from miles around to eat at The Salisbury Arms. The pub itself had won several big food awards and Will had worked in some serious kitchens, with the celebrity chef burns on his arms to prove it.
‘Yeah, if she drops a shift again. I’m going have to sack her. I was hoping to hang on for a couple of weeks to get through Christmas. We’ve got a lot of big dos on. I might have to get you and Ben to pitch in.’
Jason snorted. ‘In your dreams. What went wrong? I thought she was the best waitress you’d ever had.’
‘I might have, er,’ despite being nearly thirty, Will pulled his aw-shucks I’m-so-innocent-face.
‘You didn’t.’ Will had a dreadful habit of being led by his libido. ‘I thought we talked about this.’
‘Come on Jay, she’s hot.’
‘She works for you.’
‘It was late in the evening.’ He launched into the Ed Sheeran song, doing a more than a passable falsetto impersonation.
‘You’re a dick sometimes.’
‘She was all over me, man. And no, I didn’t make any promises.’
‘You’re still a dick.’
‘I know, part of my charm.’
‘Being a dickhead is not a charm in anyone’s book.’
‘Must be my suave good looks then.’
Jason gave up at that point.
‘This week is all under control. Ben knows what he’s got to do. Once the mash is on it’s a question of maintaining the temperature. Ask him every day how it’s going. He’ll soon tell you if there’s a problem.’
‘Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. I don’t know why I keep you around.’
Jason thumped his arm. ‘Because, apart from giving you advice on your love life, which you clearly ignore, me and the bank own fifty per cent of those gorgeous silver tanks. You and the bank own the other fifty per cent, but you don’t know what the fuck to do with them.’
‘OK.’ Will conceded. ‘You stick to the brewery side and I’ll run the pub.’
Go me, thought Siena giving herself a little fist pump as she stood outside the entrance of the Hotel Enigma. She’d successfully negotiated not one but two buses, although how was she to know that five pound notes weren’t acceptable currency on a bus?
‘Hi. Good morning. You here for the training for the canvassing job?’
Siena nodded.
‘Welcome to Johnson Home Improvements. Name please?’
‘Siena.’
He ran a finger down a typed list.
‘Ah yes, Siena. I’ve seen your name on here somewhere. Like the film star Sienna Miller. No relative then?’
‘No,’ she shook her head a little bemused by the question, ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Ah, found you. Siena Browne-Martin.’
‘It’s Browne-Martin,’ she pronounced the tin as tan, ‘it’s French.’
‘Right, whatever. We’re all equals here.’ He peeled off a label and held it out to her.
‘It’s Siena with one ‘n’.’
He shrugged. ‘It’ll do for today.’ He continued to hold out the label.
Siena took it and held it between two fingers, looking down while she tried to decide where to put it.
‘If you could wear the badge, then the trainer knows your name.’
‘Right, it’s … this top is … Gucci. Dry clean only. Do you know what adhesive they use on the labels? Is it