The Duke's Affair

II

The weeks following the wedding were some of the worst of Lauren's life, her desperation highlighted by the fact that Emily had jetted off to the Seychelles for a two-week honeymoon.

She had lost her job, not through any fault of her own, but because the small company she had worked for had folded, and as a result she had no income and no money to pay the rent on her small room.

She felt disillusioned. She had scraped the money together to pay for her degree, fully expecting it to reap the rewards of full-time, lucrative employment. But it hadn't. The economy was bad and the job market was swimming with other graduates with qualifications just like hers. And to make matters worse she had no idea what she actually wanted to do; she had floated from job to job, waiting for something to grab her, waiting for that work that would touch her soul and make her feel the unmistakable call of: 'yes, this is what I want to do. This is what I need to do. I will give my life to it."

The job at MegaSportBet, a small business that offered instant gambling opportunities to punters via their mobile phones, was supposed to be a temporary measure. She had taken on a role as a receptionist-come-office-manager, which meant that most of her time had been spent fixing tea and coffee for the guys who had set up the company. She had fully expected to be able to leave to join a larger company, where career progression was more certain, within a few weeks.

Until last week she had been there nine months, and the pay was minimal. She had rented a room in a small flat in Kennington that she had found on gumtree.com. It was OK for the money, but nothing special. The paint was peeling throughout the flat and there was damp in the corner of her bedroom, making the wall bubble up in an unsightly manner. The place made her feel ill, but it was all she could afford, and in all the time she had lived there she had never once brought a guy home.

When Emily had visited she hadn't wanted to sit down. Not that she'd said as much, but Lauren could tell from the way her body closed up when she walked in the door. She had clutched her handbag tightly to her side and wrapped her arms about her. Protecting herself from poverty. Lauren almost laughed at the memory; but it was too painful. Emily had probably hailed a cab and breathed a sigh of relief when she had got back to George's huge flat in South Kensington, where the walls were painted in Farrow and Ball, a colour of understated and ambiguous hue with a name like 'Dimity', and all the furniture was from John Lewis.

After a lot of advertising and pleading status updates on facebook, Lauren had found someone to take over her lease. She was in the middle of packing her meagre belongings into cardboard boxes when the sound of her phone ringing made her jump.

"Hello?"

"Lauren, it's Emily! How are you?"

Lauren struggled to replicate Emily's enthusiasm, having been on the brink of tears only moments before, as she held up a pair of heels that had a hole in sole. She peered at them as she spoke into the phone which was camped between her shoulder and her chin. "I'm all right. How was the honeymoon?"

"So wonderful. I want to tell you all about it. How are you? How's the job?"

"It's..." The words choked up in Lauren's throat. She had been alone all day, and the tears welled up as soon as Emily began to ask questions. Lauren coughed in an attempt to stem the inevitable flow, but it didn't work.

She told Emily everything, tears streaming down her face. She dropped the shoes and fell back onto the bed, winding her hands into her bed sheets as she let her head fall into the pillow and closed her eyes, grateful to hear Emily's soothing voice on the other end of the phone.

"Where will you go?" asked Emily.

"Home. I can't afford to live in London anymore."

"To Essex? To live with your parents?" Emily's voice displayed her horror at the idea, and Lauren covered her eyes with one hand as she lay on her bed. She sobbed a response that made no sense and was little more than a stifled groan.