Canada Square (Love in London #3) Read Online Free PDF Page A

moves forward, and he pushes himself off the wall, leaning across to give the barista his order. Picking up my carton, I take a final sip, feeling the tell-tale rush of air through the straw when the last of the milk has gone. While Caro and her sidekick continue to ooh and ahh over my boss and his friend, I look down at the half of cookie that remains on the plate, wondering exactly what I've done wrong.
    If things don't improve it's going to be a miserable nine months.
     
    * * *
     
    Callum is in client meetings all afternoon, and I spend the hours working my way through a huge pile of receipts that he shoved at me before he left. He clearly hasn't done his expenses for months, and I try not to fume at the fact that he expects me to sort them out. If I'm being honest it's nice to have something to do rather than plodding my way through more online training courses, but I'm not going to let him know.
    It's amazing what you can discover from a few printed pieces of paper. Callum stays at expensive hotels, but he rarely spends more than £20 on dinner. He prefers sushi to steak, and like me he has a sweet tooth, indulging in midnight snacks of cookies and cakes.
    He has an old car—an MGB according to the expenses system—that guzzles gas, and he prefers driving to taking the train when he goes on UK trips. He seems to spend a lot of time in Scotland, and from a few more receipts I deduce it's mostly in Edinburgh. But he must have a house or a friend he stays with there, because none of his hotel receipts are for Edinburgh, only dinner and sundries.
    By four, I've managed to reconcile his expenses and black Amex card, and send his receipts to accounts for processing. For the final hour and a half I turn my attention to the company intranet, looking at organisation charts and photographs, trying to work out who's who. I recognise Callum's friend from lunch straight away as Jonathan Cooper, Senior Partner in Financial Consulting.
    I close my computer down at 5:29 p.m. Callum still hasn't come back, and I hesitate, unsure of the etiquette for leaving the office without asking the boss first. After our dodgy start, I don't want to make things any worse than they already are, but I have a yoga class in an hour’s time, and I really don’t want to miss it. I can already feel my back aching from sitting down all day. Unless I stretch it out, I know from experience I'll pay for it tomorrow.
    Eventually I stop prevaricating and scribble a note for Callum, leaving it on his desk. It's 5:45 p.m. by the time I leave the building, and there's a huge crowd at the entrance to Canary Wharf underground station where everyone’s trying to clamber on to the escalators. I join the throng, letting it swallow me whole as the tide of people surges forward.
    Half an hour later I run into the sports hall and head for the changing rooms at the back of the building. I quickly shed my office clothes and tug on my yoga pants and a crop top, feeling my back twinge again as I pull it over my head.
    When I was fourteen I was diagnosed with scoliosis. My spine had a curve in it that made me lopsided and a little off-balance. Though it isn't always obvious when I'm dressed, if you look carefully you can see that one of my hips is curvier than the other, and my left shoulder droops down. I've come to terms with it now, but back when I was a teenager I was devastated, especially when I had to wear a plastic back brace for eighteen months. Looking back, I think I lost all my confidence then. Maybe that's part of the reason I’ve let Luke treat me like a doormat for so long.
    “You made it!” My best friend, Ellie, grins up at me from her yoga mat. “I wasn't sure you would. How was your first day?”
    I unroll my mat and place it beside hers. We've been coming to this class for the past six years. My specialist suggested yoga as a way to keep my back limber and fluid, and I've been doing it ever since.
    “It was...” I screw up my face, trying to hit