Okay, I was out for a few days, best intentions and all that…but there was just sooo much to do. I got to work with an awesome team of stage managers at Wembley to pull this off;

Which was amazing 😜 …and afterwards I was pretty much just tired. Very tired. But here we are, chapter 7….

She took a bus from Peckham to Victoria and then, feeling a little melancholy she decided to walk the rest of the way, up past Buckingham palace and through Green Park to Mayfair. Mayfair was a maze of snobbery and posh cars that Nadine had never understood. It took her a good half hour, despite the GPS on her phone, to find The Mills.

The Mills was just as fancy as the nondescript name suggested; a ten floor sky rise growing out of the facade of an original Victorian Maisonette. The entrance was warmly lit with wine red carpets and tastefully placed white trees slathered with enough fairy lights to guide the Christmas spirit in to land from several galaxies over, and probably blind everyone else.

Nadine however was feeling much less than in the Christmas spirit after she had straightened up her clothes and marched inside to the concierge, who had smartly turned her away.

“Mr Adams does not accept visitors before 4pm on winter days,”

“But its Sunday,” Nadine argued with surprise.

His snobbery barely held him back from shrugging his shoulders at her.

“Mr Ad–”

“Yeah I get it,” she turned and walked away.

When she returned – at 5pm so she could now be classed as ‘fashionably late’ – Mr Adams was waiting for her at the doors of the elevator when they opened on the tenth floor. He had her purse in his hand.

“Miss Nadine Morrison,” he said, handing her the wallet.

Nadine blushed, she didn’t remember much of the night before, and she certainly didn’t remember spending time with anyone this…attractive.

Mr Adams arched one eyebrow at her reaction.

She hadn’t even opened her mouth yet, or stepped out of the elevator, and she was already making a scene. Uncomfortable to say the least. But then again, he was right at the door, so to step out would have been awkward.

At that moment someone below called the lift, and the doors began to slide shut.

Nadine didn’t move, she was too embarrassed. Her purse was still in her open hand. The doors were almost closed before he slipped into the elevator, fast as lightning.

“You move quick,” she said, after more awkward silence as the lift descended. It was a casual comment, and it sounded silly. She stared at the closed doors, only glancing at Mr Adams once out of the corner of her eye. His long ashy brown hair was tied back in a loose bun. He was wearing one of those short sleeved loose t-shirts with a wide open neck that unashamedly showed off the defined cut of the muscles in his arms and where the lines from his neck intersected with his sculpted collar bones. He was staring at her too, though more blatantly, with cool grey eyes.

He shrugged in reply to her comment, though the shrug seemed exaggerated.

“It would have been rude not to see you down, given that you have come all this way for an empty purse,” he replied suggestively.

A little frown rippled across Nadine’s face, “Well I don’t know how old you are, but to someone like me, ID is still fairly valuable.”

He nodded, “Especially when you are the type to imbibe so much alcohol.”

“Wow, that was direct.” She glared straight at him. She could be direct too. “Clearly you only gave me a ride home out of pity or disgust.” The elevator doors opened on the ground floor.

Nadine stepped out and turned to face him at the entrance of the elevator, preventing him from stepped out of it, should he have wished to. “Well, thank you Mr Adams – whatever your name is – but I need neither your pity nor your disgust. Thank you for holding onto my purse, and thank you for the excellent ride home.” She turned away. “And I hope someone coins your lovely car,” she muttered under her breath as she stormed toward the glass doors of the reception. They opened, and the wind gusted in before they swung shut with fervour behind her as she marched away down the street, stuffing her purse in her pocket as she went.