Chapter 1

Day 1

I'm sitting on the train going to London. This is the first day when I will not have a 'place of work' to go to. The 'why' of that is simple, it's the result of an £89M lottery win. Yes that's right — eighty nine million, seven hundred and sixty two thousand, six hundred and twenty two pounds and forty two pence. And in the UK you can claim it anonymously, it's all tax free.

And so I handed in my resignation and went home and told my wife. Err ... No. I went home and told my wife I had been offered another job. A job that involved a lot of international travel, some of which I would be taking her on, but also involved long hours. Twelve hours a day for four days and then four days off. And the pay is three times what I am getting now.

The bit about the pay pleased her. Why didn't I tell her about the win? Well, if I had told her, she would have spent, given away or have been conned out of the lot within five years. My wife is worse than useless with money. She spends like a drunken sailor on payday and believes every sob story and con that she hears. So, I will provide her with money to spend, travel to the places she wants to go and expensive, shiny beads and trinkets for presents.

And, finally, if we were together all of the time I would leave her within a month, I would have too. The other choice would be to kill her, or myself. But one of us would have to go. She is too dependent, or wants to be, tries to be, dependant on whoever she is with at the time.

So it's Day 1 and I'm 'off to work' at my 'new place'. Except that I haven't yet got a new place and I am not sure where to look for a new place. Ah well, it will be something for me to do.

Note to self — change season ticket to first class with all of the bits & pieces.

Note to self — buy a notebook so that I can write down all of these notes to self.

London Saint Pancras International station never looked so lovely. It is a fabulous place, a magnificent building and has just gone through a major, though sensitive and sensible, refurbishment to accept the Eurostar train services. I had never had time to have a look round before, so today I did. I had a coffee on the upper concourse and looked at the 'Champagne Bar'. Billed as the longest in Europe, it is a fairly small BAR with a long seating area. Personally I think they're cheating.

Getting bored, I moved out of the station and, just across the Euston Road, I saw a wonderful sign, 'Fully Serviced Offices to let'. I crossed the road and entered. At the reception desk I asked about letting an office. The receptionist was helpful and called down one of their admin / sales people straight away.

Two hours later and I now have an office and a company phone number. The phone is serviced by the receptionist as if she were my company's own receptionist. I asked how she did that and, once explained, it was simple and quite obvious. The office letting company has a series of phone numbers (one of which is now 'mine') which all enter their exchange. The name of the company whose number has been called is displayed to the operator together with a script for that company. I called my new number from my mobile and she showed me the resulting display. Asking me a set of questions from a help sheet on her desk, she changed a few things to suit me and my company, entering my name and the company name obviously, and then I went for lunch. After all, I have put in nearly three hours of hard graft and we tycoons need to recharge our batteries.

Out of the office and turn right. I had seen some cheap cafes down here when I was crossing the road from the station but before I got into one, I saw something else I wanted, Gray's Inn Road. Gray's Inn Road is home to hundreds of solicitors (the legal kind not the other kind although there are also loads of those in the area.) It took me ten minutes and a hundred yards of walking before I found what I really wanted, an obviously new, 'I'm a Solicitor' sign.

Walking in, I introduced myself and asked to see 'The Man'. The man was actually a young lady named Sasha, fresh out of university and with enough 'Daddy's Money' to launch her legal career with a practice in Gray's Inn Road.

I sat and told Sasha what I wanted, a company to be legally established, and she told me I could either buy one 'off the shelf' or I could create a new one. An off the shelf model was cheap and quick. So I got one. But I had to have the existing name of the company. I could be 'Shield Brooke Investment Associates' (which I now was), Trading as Insert the company name I really wanted here. So I also asked her to start work on setting up a new company, one just for me. This took ninety minutes and I was now very hungry. A nearby pub offered food so I partook of a very nice Shepherd's pie.

Lunch over, it was back to the office for some planning.

The rest of the day was taken up in planning what I wanted to do next. There were a number of points I had to get sorted out.

My money.

What am I going to DO?

How am I going to do it?

Where am I going to do it?

These four simple headings expanded into five closely written A4 pages of notes. The first thing I decided was to get some help. A temp from an agency would do to start with. I could sort out something more permanent later.

Day 2

The train again, I had hoped to get to the station early so I could change my ticket. But I like my bed too much to get up especially early. The six-forty two is early enough.

Today I picked up a coffee from Costa on the way to my office. It feels so good to say that, 'on the way to my office'.

Item one on my 'to do' list was get a temp. One of the things in the desk drawer was a local business directory. A quick glance through and I noticed a national temp agency listed, its address was just down the street. I called and asked for a temp. I wanted someone flexible for both hours and tasks, had to be reliable and a self starter. They said that they had the ideal person actually in the office and would send her straight over. That was at quarter to nine.

It was quarter to twelve when she walked in. She sat, without an invitation, and started her speech immediately.

"I don't make tea or coffee and I don't do shopping. I don't take stuff to the dry cleaners, nor pick it up either. I don't take post to the post office and I don't do cleaning."

As she drew a breath I interrupted. "And you don't work here."

The look of shock on her face was wonderful. Just who did this idiot think she was?

"Don't you know who I AM?" she demanded as if I was a simpleton.

"No," I said coldly, "and I don't much care who you think that you are."

"You HAVE to take me. My Daddy will make you."

"Well, Miss," it took the greatest amount of patience to maintain my calm, "you know where I work, just tell your Daddy to come here and see me."

I stared at her for over a minute. It was obvious that she had never been treated like this before. I wondered how her other employers had put up with her.

"Now please get out before I have security remove you."

"But ... But..." she stammered.

"NOW!" I slammed my hand down on the desk. The loud bang startled her but got her moving.

Sobbing, she left.

I phoned the agency so as to have my say before she returned and told her version of the affair. They were very surprised that I said she had turned up only ten minutes before as she really had been in their office when I called, and she had left straight away to come to me. Their office was within a hundred yards of mine.

After dealing with the 'Princess' I decided that I needed a bit more protection. After all I was a man and would be alone in an office with a female. It would be my word against hers should any type of allegation be made. I called reception and asked if I could speak to someone from security.

Apparently what I wanted wasn't all that unusual in this type of short-let offices. He showed me the cameras and microphones which were already fitted into the walls and ceilings and he also showed me that each was unconnected before he connected them. He then showed me the website on which I could view and listen to the recordings. The recordings were on a digital device so I could watch what was currently happening and pause or rewind the video as I needed to.

I called the agency again and asked for another temp, they said they would send someone round.

Within ten minutes Julie arrived.

I explained to Julie that I didn't really know yet what I wanted her to do, what her responsibilities would be. I wanted her to be flexible, have a little give and take. She agreed and hung up her coat.

Julie would make tea.

Day 5

What she would not do was turn up on time or stay until the end. Her hours were nine to five with an hour for lunch. She turned up between ten and eleven and left by four. When she handed me her timesheet it was made out for the full day, not the times that she had actually worked. I refused to sign, telling her that she hadn't worked those hours so I wouldn't pay her for them. She laughed at me.