Jizz-in-cornflakes-Audrey rose like Venus to the occasion and just replied, “Immensely,” before handing the reins back to regular-Audrey. “So go on. How am I making your job more difficultthis time? And why should it remotely be my problem?”
“Let me put it this way,” said Jennifer. “Remember when you told my entire cast of contestants that the show was rigged and that nobody who wasn’t either the maiden, the mother, or the crone had a wanker’s chance in hell of actually winning?”
Ah yes. Audreyhaddone that, hadn’t she? “I was just—”
“I don’t care what youthoughtyou were just. What you actuallyjustwas youjustgot in everybody’s heads and made moraleon set drop faster than the knickers of a strong, well-educated, independent woman who chooses to enjoy a very sexually active lifestyle.”
It didn’t take much to make Audrey feel guilty. And potentially ruining a teenage girl’s life was decidedlymuch. “I didn’t mean to.”
“And I’m sure that prick on Pudding Lane didn’t mean to start the Great Fire of London, but here we are. My fucking show is burning down and it’s your fucking fault and you’re fucking well going to be the one to fix it.”
“Are you sure I’m actually the right—”
“No, I’m not sure at all. I called up out of the blue because I missed your sexy voice and sunny disposition.”
“I just mean—”
“Get here. Now.”
It was late and, since she’d officially been kicked off the show, any contractual obligation Audrey might have had to Inveterate Productions, or toBake Expectations, or to Jennifer was basically over, bar the come-back-for-the-spinoff / don’t-talk-shit-about-us bits. “Look, I…”
“Lane.” Something not quite vulnerable but slightly less acerbic than usual crept into Jennifer’s tone. “Seriously. I need you.”
Audrey did not melt. Not even a little bit. Nor did any part of her brain start imagining those words being said in that voice in any context other than the totally appropriate and professional one they were currently being spoken in.
But she did get in her car very, very quickly.
* * *
It was well after ten when Audrey arrived at Patchley House. Shewas met in the carpark by an even-more-stressed-looking-than-normal Colin Thrimp.
“Thank goodness you’re here.” Without waiting he grabbed Audrey by the hand and started dragging her in the direction of the hotel. “Things have got very peculiar and we need you to talk to Doris.”
“Doris?” Audrey had, ultimately, not been super clear on what she was being invited down to do but she’d been working on the assumption that it was mostly about Alanis.
“Yes. She’s having a bit of an altercation with the manager and Jennifer insists—I mean, well, she insists…”
“That it’s all my fault and I need to sort it out immediately or she’ll do something unpleasant to a part of my body that a person in a position of authority shouldn’t be talking about?”
Colin Thrimp nodded.
Jennifer herself was in reception pacing a hole in the carpet. The manager was with her as, for reasons Audrey didn’t want to speculate about, was an irate woman in a dressing gown. Doris, however, was notably absent.
“Ah.” Jennifer greeted Audrey with all the warmth and enthusiasm of a shark with a chainsaw. “Audrey, so glad you could make it. Now perhaps you can explain to these fine people”—she indicated the manager and the woman Audrey had to assume was a guest—“how you managed to fuck me so hard that your strap-on ripped through the back of my uterus and wound up going up both of their arses.”
The manager, the guest, and Colin Thrimp all winced at various elements of the image, but Audrey just said, “Happy to, only I have no idea what’s going on.”
“There’s…” The guest sounded hesitant in the way people tended to be once Jennifer broke out the uterus talk. “There’s an old woman in my bedroom, and she won’t leave.”
“She’s saying she needs to think,” explained the manager. “And since she’s a contestant, I asked Jennifer to handle it, but she said, well…”
“That the interfering sack of chaos vomit responsible would be here soon enough, and that this was entirely on her,” finished Jennifer.
Normally Audrey tried to resist her instinct to build stories out of limited information. It was bad journalism and worse social interaction, but this time she had a pretty good idea what was going on. “Which room?” she asked.
“214,” the guest and the manager said at once. Then the manager followed up with, “But I’d really appreciate being told what’s happening.”
From Audrey’s perspective, he could appreciate it while walking, and so she set off for the lifts with the guest and the manager trailing after her. Jennifer Hallet and Colin Thrimp stayed behind. Audrey would have taken it as a sign of trust if she’d thought Jennifer capable of trusting anyone or anything.
