Page 20 of The Riviera House Swap

‘Thank you.’

‘No problem,’ Jemima smiled graciously, having won the battle. ‘And we’ll see you fresh and bright and back in the office afterwards, ready to fully commit to the company once more.’

Nina nodded, unable to say anything.

Then she went back to her desk and sat there for a stunned moment. Was she really so weak? Was she so easily swayed? Or had she been sensible?

MONTH’S LEAVE

Pros:

Get to go to France for a month!

Can still hand notice in afterwards, if I want

Less stressful – job to come back to

Will be paid for at least half the holiday

Nothing wrong with being ‘safe’

Cons:

Have to return to THE FIRM

Jemima may have an ulterior motive

I wanted to be IMPULSIVE, but this is PLAYING it SAFE

On paper, it seemed like the ideal solution.

Only deep inside, she felt a dragging sense of disappointment.

Her phone beeped in her bag and she lifted it out. It was Rory. His message read:

We’ve had an offer on the house!

She sent him a thumbs up – which she knew he would find annoying. It looked like, whatever she wanted, things were going to change significantly.

She sighed and booted her computer into life. She could think about the Jemima stuff later. Maybe email her from France and renege on the deal. For now, she’d at least bought the time she needed to make a start.

She typed in,month-long let in Cagnes-sur-Merand began to scroll through the various sites. She’d get something booked as soon as possible before her sensible chip disrupted any more of her plans.

11

It took two days to thrash out the details on the house sale with Rory and their buyers. They had accepted the offer, which was for the full asking price. But Nina had pushed for a provisional moving date no sooner than in two months’ time (‘but surely we don’t want them to change their minds!’ Rory had protested. She’d pointed out that he already had somewhere else to live, and said she wanted the stability of knowing where she’d be living in next two months’ time – conveniently failing to mention her parents had said she could stay as long as she wanted).

She had an ulterior motive for wanting to push the move date back as far as possible, although she hadn’t shared that with Rory. The last two evenings had been spent online searching for accommodation in France and she’d found the perfect place. Only it wasn’t a rental as much as the opportunity for a house swap – a guy right in the centre of Cagnes-sur-Mer had listed his home on a holiday swap site and it looked adorable. His write-up explained that he wanted to improve his English and was particularly interested in exploring places with a rich history.With the Roman ruins practically a stone’s throw from her house, it couldn’t be more perfect.

She’d quickly emailed him, explaining her circumstances (at least, some of them) and that she wanted to travel as soon as possible and had been thrilled to receive an almost immediate response. He owned his own garage and said he could leave his staff in charge and come whenever she wanted. He seemed almost too excited at the prospect of spending a month in a three-bed terrace in St Albans, and she hoped her photos of the house hadn’t proven too well angled, that he hadn’t got the impression she lived in a modern, well-finished property rather than the slightly shabby-interior-that-could-do-with-a-lick-of-paint Victorian cottage she’d shared with her errant husband for a decade.

Still, she hadn’t lied. And there were probably a few cobwebs and scruffy corners in his house too, she reasoned. It was the location that was important in this instance, for both of them. He’d confided that although his day job was as a mechanic, his real passion was history; he’d enrolled in a degree course online. Staying in St Albans with its Roman history and its proximity to London would be ideal.

She and Rory had thought about going on a site like this before to nab a cheap holiday, but it had always felt a little too personal – letting a stranger stay in your home when you weren’t there. What if they went through your knicker drawer, or logged in to your PC and discovered all your dark secrets? (Even though the darkest secret they’d shared was the amount of diet coke they ordered weekly from Tesco, against their better judgement)

But now, with Rory’s stuff gone, the house had started to feel more generic, less personal. And it didn’t seem to matter any more whether she kept her privacy. She would get her boxing up done early, would lock various things in her closet, including her underwear, more from embarrassment at the ragged state ofit than anything else, and she was taking the shoebox with her. Anything else, her guest was welcome to.

She emailed Jemima to check that it was OK to schedule her trip in for next week and having received a reluctantof course(how Jemima managed to get her emails to be so passive-aggressive, she’d never know), Nina went on and confirmed everything with her soon-to-be host. Then, once she’d completed her set hours, she picked up the phone, thought better of it, and instead hopped in her car to head around Bess’s.

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