I take off my jacket and hang it over my desk chair, then reach over to switch the machine on to make a coffee. Once I’ve got my cup, I take it across the room to the large green sofa in the corner. It’s fairly old but insanely comfortable, and I sigh in happiness as I ease into the soft surface. If a piece of furniture could talk, this one would tell tales of obscenely late nights working, snatched hours of sleep, and endless takeaways wolfed while sitting on here with my shoes off and files spread everywhere.

I’ve hardly had time to take a sip when there’s a knock, and the head of my chambers peeks around the door.

“I hear congratulations are in order,” she says, coming into the room.

Dressed in a tight-fitting navy dress and with her red hair shining, she’s the picture of organisation and neatness. Two traits that she possesses in full and that make her such an excellent head of chambers. It’s a job that requires levels of tact and diplomacy not seen since the days of the Medicis, which is, coincidently, why Jane is infinitely better suited for it. When she and I first set up the chambers, I’d been appalled by the responsibilities the job entailed.

I raise my cup at her. “There’s coffee in the pot.”

She throws herself into my desk chair and gives a lazy couple of spins, looking much like the girl I met at university before she got herself a husband, children, and a job that sends everyone grey. “Fuck that,” she says in her Yorkshire accent. “Let’s go and have lunch.”

I laugh. “Had enough, dearest?”

She rolls her eyes. “I’ve been here for five hours and haven’t even got to my work yet. Instead, I’ve dealt with the coffee supplier, told Brant off for leaving takeaway containers in his office, and argued with the electricity company.”

“A woman’s work is never done,” I say solemnly with my tongue in my cheek.

“Wanker.”

I laugh and stand up to grab my jacket. “Okay, lunch, yes. You’re paying, and I want the best piece of steak in London.”

“You would, you expensive Danish bastard.”

“I’m worth it,” I say truthfully and not at all modestly.