Free Highland Fling by Katie Fforde Page A

work, but she rejected the idea. He probably wouldn’t be bothered at all. After this job was over, Jenny resolved to dump him, whether she needed his business or not. Without him, she would have to work harder to build up her client base, but there was more to life than money. (She waved her thoughts of a place of her own a reluctant goodbye.)
    ‘What would you like to see?’ asked Miss McIntyre, possibly wondering why Jenny had gone silent.
    ‘All the books, and the spreadsheets. And’ – for a moment she considered admitting to her need for caffeine, but lost her nerve – ‘please could you show me where I could get a cup of coffee, later?’

Chapter Five

    It did not take Jenny’s postgraduate course in basic accounting to see that the company was not making a profit, nor was it difficult to see why. They were spending far too much on materials and selling finished items far too cheaply. They had financed this expense with a massive loan from M. R. Grant-Dempsey and his syndicate. With this they rented machinery, the payments for which were more than what was coming in most months.
    Jenny felt a little warmer towards her capitalist client. He didn’t need to have sent her to know what the problem was, and he could have just forced Dalmain’s into liquidation without the courtesy of a personal visit from her. Perhaps he did want her to find a way forward for the company, although, if so, why didn’t he say?
    A little late in the day, she started to wonder about her client. In the eighteen months she had worked for him, he hadn’t done any obvious (to her, anyway) asset stripping. But she knew he had an office somewhere in Europe, and kept her for his UK business. It was possible that the European office dealt with his really shady deals.
    She chewed her pen, then realised it wasn’t hers and put it down quickly. If M. R. Grant-Dempsey had anoffice already, why did he use her? The whole point of virtual assistants from the client’s point of view was that you could have the services of an office and secretary, but not the overheads. Of course, it might have been difficult to send someone from Central Europe to do what she was doing, and if he was abroad he couldn’t do it himself. She just had a nagging suspicion that she might have been there as a gesture to correct behaviour when, really, he meant to asset-strip all along. Otherwise, why had he invested in a company that was going nowhere good?
    Jenny had been scrutinising the computer screen all morning, trying to find something positive and she had a headache. She was rubbing her forehead with her palms when Miss McIntyre came in. Jenny looked up and saw that although she was holding a cup of coffee, it was not a peace offering.
    She put it down firmly. ‘Well, Miss Porter, have you managed to pin the blame on anyone?’
    Jenny found Miss McIntyre’s hostility intensely irritating and unhelpful. Making allowances for the older woman’s position, she dredged up her last drop of human kindness and forced a smile. ‘Please call me Jenny, or Genevieve, if you prefer. If we are going to work together it would help if …’ She’d been about to add ‘if you weren’t so openly unfriendly,’ but realised that, of course, she couldn’t.
    Miss McIntyre wasn’t so squeamish. ‘I prefer to keep a proper distance between us. I’m sorry, but I’m quite incapable of trying to ingratiate myself with someone who is jeopardising not only my job, but the jobs of many others, people with families to support.’
    Jenny took a breath, too angry to count to ten, buttrying for some control. ‘Miss McIntyre, I am not asking you to be my friend, I am only asking for a little co-operation. I’m not entirely stupid. I know perfectly well how communities are affected when the main employer goes. But it would be a lot easier for me to find something constructive to say about this company if I had someone to answer a few questions! For example – why do you appear to