Late Night Shopping

Reid Carmen

Description

'I loved her then, I love her now. Annie's back and she's better than ever! Fun, feel good and feisty - Annie Valentine is the woman you want to share a cocktail with!' Portia MacIntosh

Can she get her life back online?

Tired of being underestimated, Annie Valentine is determined to prove to everyone that she can make her life a success. Her job as a personal shopper is brilliant, but she’s now intent on setting up a shoe and handbag empire of her own. To get there, she’ll do anything and go anywhere - the handbag factories of Italy are calling!

But what started out as a fun after hours project is getting slightly out of hand. Because Annie is working around the clock to bag the perfect bargain, and her family life and relationship with adorable Ed is feeling the strain.

Annie knows she is getting in too deep, but the more she tries to pull back, the more risks she takes. Soon, everything Annie loves is on the line and perhaps the only way to have it all is to step into the real world again….

Fans of Sophie Kinsella, Lindsey Kelk and Paige Toon will love this laugh-out-loud romantic comedy from bestselling author Carmen Reid.

What readers are saying!

"If you love shopping as much as you love a great read, try this. Wonderful." Bestselling author, Katie Fforde

"Annie Valentine is a wonderful character - I want her to burst into my life and sort out my wardrobe for me!" Bestselling author, Jill Mansell

"You will enjoy getting to know Annie Valentine; laughing with her and crying with her. You may even fall in love with her . . . I have! A fantastic read!"⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ Reader review

"Fantastic read, couldn't put it down" ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ Reader review

"Can't wait to read the next one!"⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ Reader review

Sujets

• Mashups
• Wholesome
• Feminist
• Humorous
• Women
• Friendship
• Contemporary history
• Romantic Comedy
• General officer
• Woman
• Feminism
• The Women
• General
• Clean
• Contemporary
• Family Life
• Romance
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Boldwood Books
• Date de parution: 17 août 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781802805147
• Langue: English

Extrait

LATE NIGHT SHOPPING


CARMEN REID
CONTENTS



Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34


More from Carmen Reid

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Carmen Reid

Love Notes

About Boldwood Books
1



Annie at her desk:
Tailored dress (Victoria Beckham! Yes, but with a staff discount.)
Genius wide-topped ankle boots (Pucci, again staff discount)
Black hold-ups with lace top (Asda)
Sleek bronze reading glasses for ultra-private use only (Moschino)
Extreme bikini (Hollywood Waxing Co. – Owwwwwch)
Total est. cost: £1,280
‘This is your last and final call for boarding!’
‘Will you come to bed now? Please?’
Annie, still at her desk chair, eyes fixed on the screen in front of her shouted back, ‘Yeah, babes, I’m coming. I am coming this very second, promise.’
She didn’t make a move. This was the third time Ed had called but she wasn’t ready to go up just yet. Because there was no doubt that the hours between 10 p.m. and 12 p.m. were becoming the busiest for her online shop, Annie V’s Trading Station.
It wasn’t so surprising. What with ten-hour-a-day jobs, bum-numbingly long commutes, cooking dinner for the masses, cleaning, clearing up, and more cleaning, it was only after 10 p.m. that a girl could finally pour a glass of wine, chill out, log on and get down to some serious late night shopping.
In an age of multi-taskers, Annie Valentine still made most people look like slackers. For four long days a week, she worked hard as a personal shopper, image consultant and all-round makeover maven at The Store – the fabulous London fashion-forward destination – where everyone who wanted to know everything about what was so-hot-it-hurt, had to shop.
Should sleeves be tight this season or loose? Tight at the bottom, loose on top? Tight on top but loose at the bottom? Where should pockets be? High? Low? Obvious? Invisible?
Annie, who was at The Store from 10 a.m. until 9 p.m. so she could pack a full working week into four days, who read every important fashion magazine, who watched the runway shows on video, who ran hourly checks on fashion websites to be utterly informed, Annie was the woman with the answer to every fashion question.
Was the new Balenciaga swing jacket for you? Or the wasp-waisted Saint Laurent? Where could you get those Chie Miharas in a size 39? Should you go Missoni this season or embrace Proenza Schouler? Annie would let you know.
Not that a high fashion look was appropriate for every one of her clients, of course. But she could tell, at a glance, between the women who needed a serious yank into the current decade, and those who were looking for the whisper of insider information to put them just one step ahead of the fashionista crowd.
When Annie wasn’t at The Store or manning her virtual shop front, she was bowling round London in her big Mum-mobile, packed with boxes full of secondhand clothes, either on her way to see a client in need of an urgent wardrobe revamp, or on her way back, with a boot full of her clients’ cast-offs to sell on commission.
As word spread, the name and number of no-nonsense Annie was popping up on contact lists all over London. Been promoted? Going back to work after a break? Big zero birthday approaching? Friends would urge each other: ‘Give Annie a call.’
She could make her clients look smarter, more powerful, taller, younger, current and part of the game again. There were now a surprising number of women in the capital who couldn’t add so much as a belt or an earring to their wardrobes unless Annie had approved it.
Being so constantly in demand, Annie was always a woman in a hurry, never really happy unless she was doing two things at once: driving and talking on the mobile (hands-free, of course), or walking at speed in heels while haggling on the mobile and sipping a calorie-counted smoothie.
But despite Annie’s 110 per cent commitment to her many jobs, there was no forgetting the other key elements in her life. She devoted all her available non-working time to the care and attention of her two children and her one still-quite-new, live-in lover.
Her daughter, Lauren, was sixteen and increasingly complicated. She had dark hair, even darker moods and some days grumped about like an unlit firework, ready to explode with a bang and a shower of sparks at any moment.
Annie’s son, Owen, was eleven and seemed shy, sweet and sunny natured by comparison. He was musical, easy-going and very happy that the new man in his mother’s life was also his school music teacher.
Ed Leon – who Annie and her children had lived with for about a year now – had arrived on the scene with several very important assets, cunningly disguised. His curly tangle of unruly hair concealed surprisingly warm blue eyes. The worst tweedy and baggy charity shop wardrobe Annie had ever encountered covered an unexpectedly fit and muscular body. And Ed’s dingy, damp basement flat had turned out to be just one floor of the beautiful Georgian townhouse in oh-so-desirable north London that he had part-inherited.
As Annie had discovered slowly, Ed was a really very lovely man – funny, slightly younger, and utterly devoted to her… and he’d disguised that very well, too, until she’d finally found him out.
As a woman who could never resist a project, Annie had spent considerable time renovating both Ed and the townhouse. She had sold up her own beautiful home, raised an enormous mortgage and bought a share of the house, so they could all live there together.
The house had turned out to be slightly easier to renovate than Ed, who was strangely attached to his old clothes and outraged at the price tags on the things Annie wanted him to wear. The house had offered less resistance. It hadn’t blurted out things like: ‘You want to spend how much on re-flooring my bathroom in solid walnut? But I know where I could get a nice bit of lino for buttons!’ The house even seemed grateful for Annie’s devotion. Whenever she returned, she felt it welcome her in. The glossy wooden floorboards shone at her, the pale walls and satiny woodwork stood to attention; the repaired windows, new bathrooms and gleaming kitchen all seemed to sparkle for her.



* * *
‘Ms Annie Valentine!’ Ed’s voice called from the bedroom again. ‘This is your last and final call for boarding!’
‘Five minutes, babes!’ Then, because she knew just why he was so keen to have her beside him, she added, ‘Start without me! I’ll jump right in. Honest!’
Her bids had been timed to close just a few minutes apart from each other all the way up until midnight, when the shop would finally shut for the night after the sale of this evening’s three prized items: a beautiful tan Mulberry handbag, thigh-high designer leather boots and a slinky, floor-length, faux fur coat.
One of Annie’s clients wanted to sell on these luxury items, so she could quietly stash a little money away in a bank account because when your finances were so totally controlled by your husband, it was good to feel there were some emergency funds in a nameless Swiss bank account. And Annie was trusted enough to look after transactions like this because she often got very close to the women she dressed. They took her into their confidence and shared all sorts of secrets with her.
She scrolled down the list of items she’d sold online today. It was very eclectic: from high-end boots bags to high-street labels.
‘ANNIE!!!’
Ed was probably naked, hair damp from the shower, lying on the duvet and waiting for her with his very welcoming body: squarish and muscular but just the right side of fleshy, not at all hard and buff. Ed was strong but soft and Annie loved to tangle up with him. Shower-fresh and hungry and so very into her. It made her smile just thinking of him but…
Ping! A bid was upped.
Late August was the last chance to sell summer clothes for a decent price. Already everyone with the slightest interest in fashion was eyeing up cashmere coats, chunky knitwear, dark leather bags, boots and big-ticket items.
Looking round this small room that she used as an office, Annie acknowledged that she still had too many summer things left to sell from the back of her clients’ wardrobes. They were usually items that hadn’t been worn for years: pristine linen suits, or skirts with killer waistbands, which had been too tight the day they were bought, let alone two babies later; or evening dresses, thin and insubstantial, haunting the back of the cupboard for season after season. Unworn and unloved but held on to because they’d cost too much.
The clock hit twelve and the faux fur coat went for £342, the boots for £875 and the limited-edition bag, an astonishing £2,450. Many very wealthy, well-connected women knew where to find Annie’s virtual boutique.
And, 15 per cent of £3,667 made it worth sitting at the screen, typing up blurb, and spending entire mornings at the post office, busy as a mail order company.
‘You should have your own business,’ her customers often told her. ‘You could be the next Miuccia Prada. Or Oliver Bonas!’
Just before she closed up, Annie flicked over to the other website open on her browser: the one with all the excellent advice about setting up your own company.
She’d read the helpful hints, rules and encouragement through many times. But much as she dreamed of going into business properly, Annie wasn’t quite ready yet. Maybe because, although she suspected her future was in handbags or shoes, she hadn’t yet found exactly the right opportunity. But she was looking ha