Page 30 of The Cottage in the Highlands

I pulled up, a feeling of terror seeping into my veins. “There’s no beauty editor? What do you mean? Are you saying it’s just me?”

Orion fiddled with her frilly boiler-suit collar. “I’m sure we’ll get round to appointing a new one eventually.”

A sense of foreboding rose up. “A new one? So, what happened to the previous beauty editor?”

Orion’s dark-grey eyes shifted from left to right like a creepy painting in a haunted house. “It’s complicated. She and Athena had an exchange of opinions and she decided to move on.”

My feeling of growing dread increased. “How long ago was that?”

Orion twitched her nose in recollection. “A few weeks maybe.”

She started to move off again at a sharper pace.

“But why hasn’t my new boss been appointed? Has the job been advertised? Have you tried to headhunt someone?”

Orion squirmed in her platform trainers.

“What’s going on, Orion?”

“It takes time to make these appointments,” she answered, not convincing herself or me. “I’m sure it will be filled at some point.”

I could feel my worry escalating. It sounded to me like nobody wanted the post or as soon as the prospective candidates found out who they would be working for, they changed their minds about wanting the job.

A thought pinged into my mind. Pictures of a panicky-looking Orion during my interview, summoning Athena to speak to her. “Is that why my interview was interrupted? Why you came in looking all flustered that day? Was it because the previous beauty writer quit?”

Orion looked sheepish. “Maybe.”

Ah. The muddled, confused haze in my head was beginning to lift. So, had I been offered the vacancy of beauty writer simply because Athena was so desperate to fill the post?

This unsavoury conclusion clung to me. Not exactly a confidence booster.

I gave myself a mental shake. “And this new investigative reporter who’s starting today…?” I allowed the question to hang there between us.

Orion stuffed one hand into her cream boiler-suit pocket. “What about her?”

“Do you know who she is?”

Orion hesitated. “Her name is Kerry Wicks.”

I searched my mind to see if I knew her name from another title. It didn’t seem familiar. “I don’t know of her. What newspaper or magazine was she on before?”

Orion shuffled. “All these questions!” When I arched my brows at her, she sighed. “I’m not sure where she was working.”

That didn’t ring true. Surely, as Athena’s PA, Orion would have all the details about a new recruit?

I shot questioning stares from my desk across at Orion. In the end, she muttered something before suddenly striding back towards me and giving a discreet tug at my sleeve, indicating for me to follow her.

No sooner had we taken a few paces back up the corridor than Orion hauled me into the doorway of an empty meeting room. “Shit, Leonie.”

Her kohl-lined eyes did that shifting thing again to make sure the coast was clear. “You’re going to find out sooner or later anyway.”

“Find out what?”

She stared past my shoulder for a moment. “This is for your ears only just now, ok?”

“Sure. What is it?”

Orion shuffled as she stood there. She looked agonised. “Kerry Wicks… the new investigative reporter… well, it turns out that she is Athena’s niece.”