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His dad sighed, his gaze on the spinner as it whirled on the end of his thumb. ‘I’ll speak to her.’
‘No, Dad. You’re going to tell her to get her own place. Today. Anyway, Char just rang—’
‘Don’t call her that.’
‘Things have gone tits up with Marcus, so she’s coming to live here for a bit.’
‘What?’
‘She needs Elyse’s room.’
He shook his head. ‘There’s more than enough space here for everyone.’ Dropping the spinner, he picked the poppet back up. ‘Does your mum know?’
‘She’s talking to her now.’
‘Okay, good. Good.’ Kevin stared off into the middle distance, the only sound in the room the rhythmic pop-pop-pop as he played with his toy.
‘Dad—’
‘I know what you need,’ his father interrupted, leaping to his feet and going to a pile of boxes. ‘These arrived yesterday and I forgot to show them to you.’ Opening the top of one, he pulled out a folded white t-shirt and threw it at his son. ‘This’ll cheer you up.’
James opened it out, coming face-to-face with an aubergine emoji being struck by lightning.
‘Got a great deal on them. Thought we could give them to punters at the festival.’
James stared at the ridiculous logo, printed on cotton so cheap and thin he could practically see through it.
‘Why couldn’t you have spent the money on something useful?’ he growled. ‘Like a budget for decent staff?’
‘You’ll make it work, son.’ Kevin rummaged in the box and pulled out another couple of t-shirts. ‘Give these to Lady Foxbrooke and that Max bloke. They’ll love them.’
‘No, they—’
‘Morning Kev!’ trilled Elyse as she entered the room. ‘Ooh, aren’t the t-shirts great, James?’
He threw the one in his hand back at his dad, gave him a pointed look and left the room, slamming the door like a petulant teenager.
‘Boss-man!’ Max called out as James locked the door to the main house behind him.
James nodded in reply as he strode up the corridor.
The corners of Max’s mouth turned down, his eyebrows drew together, and his head dropped to the side in a pastiche of concern. ‘Everything okay, buddy?’
‘Fine. What’s up?’
‘I’ve got the shortlist of candidates for you.’
The Spice Girls started playing from his office at the end of the corridor.
‘Good. Let’s go through them now.’
Following Max into the room, James took a seat at an empty desk and a pile of CVs were placed in front of him. These were for the key positions, the people who would report directly to him and Estelle, and oversee areas of the festival, from stages to logistics. At least half of them should have come with the company when his father bought it, so now James was starting from scratch.
His mood was already soured by Elyse and his father, plus his sister’s situation, so it didn’t take much to tip him over the edge.
‘What the fuck is this?’ he asked, dropping the papers to the desk.
‘The candidates?’
