Chapter 1

1

JACK

London is life, especially in December when lights sparkle and the streets fill with Christmas shoppers.That’s what I grew up hearing from my grandparents, who met and married in this city.

Gran promised that wishes came true here at Christmas parties. All anyone had to do was turn in circles for one glittering evening, like she had at a ball where she met a handsome Horse Guard. She’d been waltzed off her feet and scored a diamond ring a week later, so I guess falling in love only takes seven days for some lucky people.

As for me? I don’t have a week spare for romance, and all I want for Christmas is a boss who isn’t a complete nightmare to keep track of.

I can’t believe I’ve lost Rex.

Again.

That’s why I turn in circles between Mayfair and Soho today, much to the ire of Christmas shoppers. I don’t spin to annoy them. Or in hopes of waltzing away with a handsome Horse Guard, even if Gran did teach me dance steps the big boys at school laughed at when I practiced twirling across the playground. Now I turn in slower circles to search for my employer as a bitter breeze makes me wish for the cloak Gramps used to wear when serving his Queen and country.

When my parents were rushed off their feet working retail each Christmas season, he’d make the time to wrap me in that thick, blue cloak and tell me to remember how it felt to be protected the next time the big boys laughed at me for dancing. Gramps promised that not only Horse Guards like him were brave. He said that me being myself was even braver, and that he’d always love me.

I wasn’t sure about that brave descriptor when I was little.

Almost two decades later, I’m no closer to believing. Take now as an example: I’m actually a little bit afraid I’ve broken the first rule in the personal assistant’s handbook by losing my boss when he should be on his way to his next meeting, and the first week in December on Bond Street is the worst time and place for that to happen.

I can’t see a thing for people.

Shit.

Where is he?

Honestly, I should know better than to take my eyes off the man even for a moment—Rex Heligan is always a nightmare this close to Christmas. I don’t mean he’s a Grinch or a Scrooge. You can save those descriptors for the banker Rex just lost his temper with in his last meeting. Timothy Smallbone is a textbook tightwad who hated Rex when they used to work together. In comparison, Rex is the definition of generous, even if he has bad habits, like ruining the line of his smart Savile Row suits by stuffing his pockets with dog treats.

I bet those treats are the reason he’s gone missing. Rex will have spotted a dog in a Christmas sweater and stopped to become its new best buddy.

Sleet stings my face as I turn one more time, still searching.

I can’t have lost him.

It really shouldn’t be possible; after all, we left that meeting together. Only now I’ve achieved a minor miracle by flagging down an unoccupied black cab, is Rex still beside me?

No, he bloody well isn’t.

“Rex?” I call out and get no answer, so I let out the kind of yell I’m pretty sure isn’t in any PA handbook. “Rex? You need to hurry!”

All I get in return are air-brake hisses from scarlet double-decker buses and Christmas carols booming from a department store’s open doorway, but the PA handbook does recommend persistence, so I don’t give up.

I crouch, and there he is.

Rex has found a dog and is busy giving a golden retriever a belly rub as if he has all the time in the world. In reality, he doesn’t have a spare second for getting hairy, so I get even more vocal.

“Rex Arthur Robert Heligan, leave that dog alone and get your arse into this cab, pronto.”

Does he hurry?

No, he bloody well doesn’t.

He takes his own sweet time to say goodbye to his new bestie, then ambles over, and I apologise, although not to Rex for unprofessionally swearing at him. Instead, I send up a silent sorry to the poor soul who will soon replace me.

His next PA will need stocks and shares in patience as well as their very own lint roller, like the one I whip out.

“You’re covered in hair, Rex. Covered!”

I tidy him up as the cab pulls off with us inside it. I also make another mental note for my replacement. They’ll need to keep a comb and extra-firm hair gel on hand as well as the number for an on-call barber. “Look at the state of your hair. It’s like you’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards. Honestly, why are you a nightmare? Why?”

Rex unbuttons his coat and makes himself comfortable in the seat opposite, completely unflustered. “Huffy, huffy, huffy, Jack.” He also digs in a pocket, dog treats scattering as he drags out a Santa hat that must have a bell hidden by its red and white fur. It tinkles as Rex is a nightmare for the third time in as many minutes, this time by turning down my resignation.

“I’ve thought long and hard about this. I can’t accept it.” He slides out his phone and opens his email to show the notice I sent him. “My answer is no.”

“Your answer? You do know that you don’t get to decide whether I stay or go, don’t you? I’ve already had offers from other partners at the bank.” I should be particularly proud of what I next share with him. Instead, I squeak, “And an interview soon for a spot at the New York office.”

Rex squints. “New York can be a dangerous place. There’s no need for you to relocate or move on to one of the other partners here in London. I know my work focus has shifted lately, but I’ll still have plenty of admin to keep you busy. How about you stay working for me, and I’ll try to be less boring?”

“How about no?”

Truthfully, Rex is far from boring. Working for him has stretched me, and, nightmare boss to keep track of or not, my heart sinks at the thought of not solving his future admin problems. Maybe that’s why this sounds grittier than usual. “I’m not the same PA you hired, Rex.” I bet we both remember the interview I stumbled through after my first job ended in disaster. “I’m not scared of my own shadow these days.” This slips out next. “And working for you has never been dull.”

“So why leave me at all?” Rex isn’t only a banker. He is also an earl who will inherit an island dukedom one day, complete with castle. That must be how he can arch an aristocratic eyebrow at the same time as asking, “And why is New York even on your short list? I thought you always said London was life.”

I did. In fact, I said exactly that first thing this morning, only not to Rex.

I actually typed life after finding the word London waiting on my phone when I woke up.

Don’t ask me why I still play a silly game of word association that used to involve three people but now only has two players. My response still holds true—London really is life, especially with Christmas just around the corner.

The crowds of shoppers our cab passes are proof. They’re all here to hunt for perfect presents. Or maybe they’re here to skate at one of the ice rinks that pop up each winter to do brisk, ankle-breaking business. Whatever the reason, these visitors really have come at the best time of year to see the city glitter, like Gran promised.

That’s what the streetlights do against a late afternoon grey sky when the cab reaches Regent Street. They sparkle, and Rex must notice me tilting my phone to sneak a quick photo to send her. He opens the window, not caring that sleet spatters him as I frame a shot I know will make her day.

Rex’s cut-glass tone softens with a hint of Cornish. “Okay, okay. I know I can’t actually stop you from leaving me, but look at you still taking photos like a tourist. Forget New York. Why not stay under London’s spell for longer and see what next year will bring?”

I shake my head.

I already know the problem the next year has in store for me, which is why I’m leaving Rex’s employment.

Besides, I also know that most of this city’s magic is superficial—these glittering lights are temporary, as are those holiday-season ice rinks which are too cramped to really skate in. My housemate Patrick’s middle brother told me so, and Calum straps on skates for his living, so he’d know. But the past version of me who grew up on a diet of Gran’s stories always wanted to spin in a costume as sparkly as this city was the night she found a hero to fall in love with.

Maybe Rex picks up on that. “Hold on. Is this sudden urge to move on because you’ve banged half of London but still haven’t found your Prince Charming?”

“I have not banged half of London.” I kissed a whole lot of frogs instead, although I’m not about to admit to never dipping a repeat toe into anyone’s pond water—to dating once, then hopping to the next lily pad all on my own. Rex is such a knight in shining armour, he’d dedicate his life to securing a happily ever after for me, only I don’t need saving from my single status. “Some of us are career-focussed, Rex. Kissing even more frogs across an even bigger pond isn’t my driver for considering New York over London.”

The only man I ever wanted to kiss twice doesn’t work in either city.

Rex tilts his head, his eyes narrowing. “Now that I think about it, you haven’t mentioned being wined and dined in ages. What’s up with that?”

“What’s up with you minding your own beeswax?” I sniff. “Maybe I’m leaving because of your very unprofessional interest in my love life.”

Rex tilts his head the other way as the cab swings by Piccadilly Circus, and that bell on his hat tinkles, seeming to laugh at me. So does his next teasing question. “Who mentioned love, Jack? All I’m saying is that you might be more relaxed if you had a lunch-break assignation or two.” Now those aristocratic eyebrows waggle. “Let me find someone who shares your stationery obsession.” He straightens up, suddenly a man on a mission. “Yes, leave it to me. Forget New York or moving on to a new job here. Stay on my payroll, and I’ll find someone with a lovely big hole punch for you.”

“I’m not obsessed with stationery.”

That’s a lie.

This isn’t.

“And I’m not obsessed with the size of anyone’s hole punch, thank you.” I fix him with a prim look and channel my other housemate, who loves to rage against unfairness. “That’s actually very sizeist. And as for you hooking me up, you do know this is why I keep HR on speed dial, don’t you?”

This back-and-forth banter will either surprise whoever takes over from me or have Rex up before an employment tribunal, but I’m used to his recently increased interest in my love life. It’s one that comes from a good place. A kind one . Since Rex got married, he’s all about happy endings.

As for me, my first boss in this city taught me how quickly unwanted interest can make a workplace hostile, but here’s the true beauty of London—she’s big enough that I haven’t crossed paths with Lito Dixon even once since I quit working for him. My second boss is entirely different, always willing to go into battle for me, like now.

“Wait a bloody minute.” Rex squints across the space between us. “That’s your I’m thinking about a syphilitic dick face. Is that the real reason why you’re leaving me? Because that slimy photographer you used to work for is sniffing around again?”

“Who, Lito? He isn’t a photographer.” I make my voice as pompous as I remember my first boss sounding. “He’s the director of a prestigious, award-winning photographic agency.”

Rex snorts. “Prestigious, my arse. But did we just drive past him?” He scans the crowds of Christmas shoppers as our cab crawls through traffic. “Want me to ask the driver to stop? I’ll throw a snowball at his weepy willy for you.”

“I can throw my own snowballs just fine. Besides, it’s sleeting, Rex, not snowing.”

“Well, I’m sure I can find something to hurl at his diseased knackers.” He grabs a discarded newspaper. “Or I could shove this sideways all the way up his rec?—”

“No need.” I smooth the angry feathers Rex is always so quick to ruffle for me. “I didn’t see Lito Dixon, and I’m not leaving because of him.” Or maybe I am, if only tangentially.

Even thinking about why is messy, but I’m a PA, paid to make lives neat and tidy for important people, so I keep going. “Plus, we don’t have time to stop.” I distract Rex with some juicy financial gossip. “But I did hear through the PA grapevine that Lito’s agency is seriously close to folding.”

“Good.” Rex lets that tight roll of newspaper unfurl, his ruffled feathers settling, bless him. “Couldn’t happen to a more deserving arsehole.”

Both of my housemates would agree with Rex, although one of them would hesitate before wishing ill on anybody. That’s Patrick, who looks just like his ice hockey-playing middle brother but is actually as soft as butter. He proves that daily by chalking positive affirmations like I am braver than I know on our kitchen blackboard. Sebastian is a different matter. Yes, he’s all about justice, but don’t go thinking that makes him gentle. He’d crowdsource the cash for a guillotine if that meant he got to see Lito’s head roll.

I’m going to miss both of them.

And Rex.

And London, even with Lito in it, if I do get a New York offer and decide to take it, but leaving once my notice period ends is the only way I can think of to stop history repeating. Or at least it’s one sure way to snuff out a ridiculous case of pining.

Not over Lito.

Ugh.

He was the one who couldn’t take no for an answer, not me.

It’s someone else who makes my heart clench, then pitter-patter. But, to steal a trope from Gran’s favourite rom-coms, my interest is unrequited—and unnoticed, I hope to everything holy.

My secret crush is happily loved up with a high-profile boyfriend, and, if wishing that weren’t the case wasn’t already pathetic, next year will bring a change to Rex’s work situation that means I’d have to see said crush daily, and…

I can’t risk making someone else feel as suffocated as I used to.

Not when I can still remember my stomach twisting before work every morning.

I won’t do that to him.

Rex nudges my knee. “Who the hell are you thinking about now?”

He studies me the same way Gramps used to after bad days at school, so I raise my chin and aim for a diversion. “Maybe I’m thinking about global markets. About interest rate fluctuations. How about you do the same?”

He pulls a face that I’d tell him looked constipated if I didn’t spot something else out of the cab window, and here goes my heart all over again. This time, it clenches as we pass a troop of mounted Horse Guards. They trot on glossy chargers, each Guard wearing a plumed helmet, and I can’t help a smile the window reflects as wistful.

Gramps would know how to sort out this fucking stupid knot I’ve tied myself into.

I wish he was still here to ask how.

Rex must notice my smile turn watery. He searches out the window for a reason to cheer me up—when he isn’t being nightmarish, he really is the best boss.

“A-ha!” He must have spotted the same Horse Guards. “If it’s a man in uniform you’re holding out for, I do have some old contacts.” His eyebrow waggle is comedic, and I have to stifle a snort. I also have to stifle preemptively missing this to-and-fro of care dressed as banter, this assessing of each other’s mood as easily as breathing, which isn’t in any PA handbook but…

It’s magic.

I order myself to get it together only to fail right away, this time by unprofessionally whispering, “Of course you have regimental contacts. Office scuttlebutt is that you shagged most of the Hyde Park Barracks when you were single.”

“I couldn’t possibly confirm that.” His smile flashes, the handsome devil. “A gentleman never kisses and tells.”

“A gentleman?” I don’t hold in my next snort, and his laughter only makes me doubt the decision he brings up again.

“Joking aside, Jack, are you absolutely certain about leaving me? We could talk about increasing your pay.”

“You already gave me a raise.”

Cash isn’t my problem. It’s a person.

Rex makes another offer. “Then how about a change in job title?”

“To what? I only have an admin certificate.” I give him another reason as our cab heads for Hackney, which isn’t a usual destination for a private banker, but is a good example of what else prompted me to give Rex my notice. “I’m moving on because you are too, aren’t you?”

He nods, if slowly.

I nod back much faster.

“You’ve been scaling back your banking workload all year, ready to make your final big move back to Cornwall, and not only because you miss the dogs, right?” I don’t wait for his answer. We both know what really caused his switch in direction: The shipwrecking seas around his family’s island have become a shortcut for traffickers. Rex and his grandfather set up a foundation to stop children from being swallowed by those wicked waters, and that foundation has grown beyond a part-time operation needing one lifeboat, a single helicopter, and helpers on a piecemeal rota.

Here’s what really made me extend some urgent new-job feelers.

“You’re about to restructure the foundation.”

He nods again, silent and watchful, but not sorry.

“I drew up the organisational chart, Rex. And I proofread the restructuring papers. That means I know if I stay on as your PA, I will end up with two bosses instead of one at some point next year. And I’d have to leave London anyway. Because we’ve trialled me trying to organise you remotely, and what was the result?”

He huffs before muttering, “A shit show.”

“What kind of shit show, Rex?”

He huffs even harder. “An unmitigated one.”

“That’s right. And why was that?”

He’s so similar to his grandfather that it could be Arthur Heligan who rumbles, “Because I can’t be trusted to read my emails.”

That’s only the tip of a Rex-shaped admin-nightmare iceberg. The moment he’s in pilot mode, swooping to the rescue in his helicopter or steering his lifeboat to save small souls from sinking, the world of finance stops existing for him. We both know it. I hit him with another truth bomb while we’re being honest because, setting aside my own no-more-pining reasons for moving on, he needs to hear this.

“Rex, leaving London was your decision. You chose this, not me.”

“Because I thought you’d come with me.” He dips his head, the bell on his Santa hat somehow tinkling sadly. “I shouldn’t have assumed that for you, I know that, but I do have to go home, Jack.” He fixes me with a raw look. “Pops needs me on Kara-Enys.”

I don’t blame him for wanting to be closer to his grandfather. I would have spent more time with my own if I’d known a clock was ticking faster than expected. And I don’t blame Rex for wanting to go home to an island that always looks like a jewel in jade-green waters. It’s where he comes alive. Where he thrives. And last, but definitely not least, it’s where his husband is waiting for him.

Of course he’d rather be with his family instead of in this city that only sparkles like a jewel at Christmas.

I give him another partial explanation. “Rex, I’d either need to be based on the island with you or at the foundation’s rehab centre.” That’s where my potential second boss helps children through their trauma with play therapy. “And what use would I be there?”

I lean forward to close a different gap that has surely and steadily widened since Rex made his career-change decision. “You won’t need a finance-focussed PA like me.” I pull out the lint roller that usually smartens his suits. Today he’s missing his jacket, and I tidy a sweatshirt I was surprised Rex chose to wear to a banking meeting with someone as stuffy as Timothy Smallbone. Now I run my lint roller over the logo of his foundation.

Safe Harbour.

That’s what Heligans provide, and I guess Rex wore it to prompt Smallbone to hurry up and hand over a promised donation from the bank he works for these days. Safe Harbour is also why Rex is here in Hackney to check on the progress of some of his shipwreck survivors, which is why I straighten his Santa hat until its bell lets out a happier tinkle. “You need people on your new charitable wavelength.”

“But you are on my wavelength.” He comes up with examples. “You thought to arrange this visit for me, didn’t you? Carved out the time so I could catch up with some of our kids.” His voice drops. “I didn’t think I’d have the scope to fit in seeing them, but you made it happen. You , Jack. It’s always you who knows what to prioritise for me.”

“I don’t know where you think flattery will get you.”

I keep my gaze fixed out the window. Usually, nothing makes me happier than solving his problems before he knows he has them. Today, everything is topsy-turvy, like him plucking the twin of his own Santa hat from another pocket. He leans forward to pop it onto my head and murmurs, “I’d hate to lose you.” Then he pulls out the big guns. “And I’m pretty sure Pops would miss you even more.”

I freeze at this mention of his grandfather. Arthur is the very last person I want to hear my news from anyone else. “You haven’t told him my plans, have you?” Telling Patrick and Sebastian was hard enough this morning. Even now, I can still see Patrick’s chalk snapping midway through a new affirmation, and Sebastian’s cheeks bulging before what-the-fucking a spray of toast crumbs across our breakfast table.

Maybe I still have some of those crumbs on me—Rex reverses our usual roles by making sure I’m neat and tidy. He straightens my scarf, his movements slow and careful. So is his eye contact. “No, of course I haven’t told Pops. You said you wanted to do it yourself. I haven’t told a soul, but maybe bear this in mind.” He really has the sweetest smile for a cutthroat banker. “You don’t have to tell him at all, Jack. Or leave. I can be flexible. Yes. That’s what I’ll do.”

“You’ll do what?”

“I’ll be flexible by keeping an admin office here in town. You can work from my study in the Kensington house, just as long as you stay on to organise us.”

“Us? But I don’t organise anything for Arthur.” The duke is scarily self-sufficient for someone almost in his eighties, plus me working from here is unlikely to make Rex pay any more attention to his email inbox.

“No,” Rex says. “I don’t mean that Pops needs your PA talents.”

I don’t need to ask who else does.

Rex gestures out of the sleet-streaked window at a figure waiting in a distant doorway.

Even from the far end of this street, I recognise who has come all the way from Cornwall to meet us. I’d know those wide shoulders anywhere. My flatmate Patrick has a similar broad set. His brother Calum has another. This set belongs to the oldest of the three brothers, and to someone who will be my boss in the new year if I stay on Rex’s payroll.

They also belong to someone I almost kissed once before he made it clear we couldn’t be anything more than friends. Tell that to feelings that surge to the surface each morning when we play a text-based game of word association.

Reece Trelawney.

This morning, he typed London, and this city is life to me, but if I don’t want to end up as bad as Lito Dixon, leaving is my only option.