Laura knew there was no point pressing him further. They’d only go round and round in circles. She left his office with a slight sense of optimism that she was still needed, but one that was tempered somewhat by the niggling knowledge that she was sure Harry wasn’t telling her the whole truth. And Laura knew it was time to finally make the call to Coopers.

She felt nervous as she dialled the number she’d once rung so often and waited for the voice on the other end of the line. ‘Tess is on holiday,’ the marketing manager told her. ‘Can I leave a message and get her to call you back?’

Laura left her name, but the days passed and she didn’t hear back, and neither did she hear anything about Harry’s new opportunity. And the thought that there was more to it than Harry tried to make out continued to swell.

On Friday, when Mia was due to present her campaign concept to the Coopers team, Laura couldn’t get away from the fact with Mia buzzing around the office like it was the only thing everyone wanted to talk about. ‘I’m so nervous,’ Laura overheard her laughing to Bryony, ‘it takes me back to when I was at school.’

Laura didn’t think she sounded remotely as nervous as Bryony gushed that Mia was going to be amazing.

Laura’s fists were clenched as she hammered away on her keyboard, wishing she could block out the noise and stop her mind from wondering what the creatives looked like. She still hadn’t seen them. She had no idea what Mia had up her sleeve, but hadn’t the guts to ask. Instead Laura had tried keeping her head down, focusing on the clients she had left, none of which excited her much, while hoping that any day soon either Harry would announce they were meeting the potential new client or Mia would royally screw up.

Her dream career had become nothing more than a job that was paying the bills and keeping her away from her son, and as much as Laura was looking forward to the weekend ahead, she felt a considerable sense of lacking any other purpose than being a mother. And she knew she wasn’t doing a particularly good job of that.

Laura still hadn’t spoken to anyone from the Coopers team since she had been back, which was why, at two o’clock, wandering past the boardroom, she stopped short, her heart sinking to the depths of her stomach. She hadn’t for one minute expected that Mia had invited them to the offices. Always Laura would present to them at theirs, and yet there they were – the entire marketing team sitting together on the other side of the glass.