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It had the potential to be a mutually beneficial relationship—once Nick had actually built those relationships.
He started off at the sheep farm that Joel had mentioned was right behind his cottage. There were a few cottages on Church Street so it wasn’t immediately obvious which one belonged to Joel anyway, and the man himself wasn’t wandering around to give Nick a clue. He told himself that didn’t matter anyway, and made his way back to the farm house where Mr. Livingstone happily referred Nick’s questions to his smart-as-a-whip wife.
Mrs. Livingstone was a short, compact woman of sixty with an attitude that told Nick she was in charge of the business and a physique that told him she was just as adept at sheep herding as her husband, despite her claims that she had nothing to do with the farm. They had two Border Collies sleeping next to the hearth in the kitchen, who submitted to Nick’s gentle inspection with surprising good humour.
Since both dogs were known vet-biters, Mrs. Livingstone was more than happy with Nick’s offer of visiting them at home if they had any issues with Bonnie and Clyde in the future. He found that nervous animals were far more comfortable with vets if they didn’t have to go into sterile, scary environments for visits.
That meant one family could be ticked off his charm-offensive list.
Technically, Joel was allowed to work from home. He had a little office space set up in the corner of his living room that caught the morning sun and it was pretty comfortable, looking out of the window over the village.
He’d bought a real Christmas tree from the market down the road and decorated it with a bunch of baubles he’d found in his granny’s attic. It felt good to put her decorations out again, like she was still a little part of this Christmas. Joel had a feeling he’d do it again next year, too.
The tree, and the lights, and the stocking over the fireplace made the cottage feel more like home than it had since he’d moved in, almost six months ago.
But working from home wasn’t his favourite thing to do. Joel much preferred being in the city, with people to talk to and colleagues to bounce ideas around with. He’d lived in the Canongate area of Edinburgh in a shared flat for a few years, until he’d inherited the cottage, and he missed being so close to everything. He could drive into the city in no time at all, but it wasn’t the same as being just walking distance from the hustle and bustle.
All this was why he had dragged his sorry, hungover self off of Nick’s sofa early in the morning before Nick got up, went home to shower and change, then headed into the office in Edinburgh’s New Town.
Milly was the only one in the office when he arrived, nursing an enormous mug of coffee.
“There’s more in the pot,” she said in way of a greeting.
“Thank the baby Jesus and all the wise men.”
Milly’s laughter followed him back to the kitchen.
Joel retrieved his mug from the back of the dishwasher, filled it with coffee and a generous helping of milk, and made a bowl of cereal to go with the coffee.
The perks of working in a small office often outweighed the negatives. Joel actually liked the people he worked with, which was a revelation after working in a string of low-paid, part-time jobs when he was a student. Even the couple who owned the business were cool—involved enough to show they cared, while distant enough to not step on the toes of the experts they’d hired.
Joel though that if he had his own business one day, he’d like to strike a similar balance.
“Next year, we’re not doing the Christmas party on a Thursday night,” Joel said as he booted up his laptop, idly brushing off excess glitter. They’d gone all out with the office decorations and he had a feeling he’d still be finding glitter in his stuff come Easter.
“Next year I’m not going to drink.”
Joel snorted into his cornflakes. “Yeah, right.”
“I’m serious. I went through, like, four bottles of prosecco last night. Then Icycled, overcobblestones,to get in this morning. Thank fuck it’s so cold out there, it stopped me from hurling into a gutter.”
“Stay classy, Milly.”
“Yeah, yeah. You got home okay?”
He debated telling her exactly what had happened:Single Bellsto scraped palms, Bastet the cat and chocolate brown eyes behind tortoiseshell glasses, but something stopped him. Milly wouldn’t make fun of him—their whole job was romance, after all.
But today was their last day in the office before the Christmas holidays, and even though they weren’t really expected to get much work done, he didn’t feel like spending the whole day gossiping. He just had to answer some emails and send a report across to the boss, which would take him all of twenty minutes.
“Yeah,” he said lightly. “I got home fine.”
As he expected, it was a quiet day with his colleagues filing in in drips and drabs with varying degrees of hangover. Joel took a tiny amount of vindictive pleasure that some people looked very much worse than he did—he was pretty sure Celeste was still wearing last night’s eye makeup, and he knew she’d gone home with Tom from accounts, even if he did turn up ten minutes after she did.
For a group of people who worked in the matchmaking business, they apparently thought their colleagues were blind as well as stupid.
Joel stored that little bit of gossip away for later.
The office manager kicked them out just after lunch, and Joel headed down to Princes Street to get the last of his Christmas shopping done. He’d already bought earrings and a book for his mum, a jumper for his dad, and ordered a luxury food hamper for his nan and granddad because that was easier than trying to figure out what they wanted. His brother was still at university, so Joel was planning to buy him booze, and a lot of it, since that was what he’d appreciate the most.
