Geek Girl (Geek Girl, #1)(53)

“May I speak to Annabel Manners, please?” I ask sweetly, taking the fur hat off and making myself look as small and vulnerable as physically possible.

The receptionist reluctantly puts down her magazine. “Do you have an appointment?”

“Yes.” I widen my eyes to make my face a vision of innocence. “Gosh, that’s a nice ponytail you have. Did you do it yourself?” And when she turns round to try and look at it, I lean over the desk and quickly scan the schedule. “My name is Roberta Adams,” I say as she turns back.

She frowns at the list. “Bit young to have your own lawyer, aren’t you?”

“I’m suing my parents,” I say calmly.

Her expression immediately clears. “Oooh, I thought about doing that too. Let me know how much money you get. Go straight up.”

And she buzzes me through before I get a chance to change my mind.



This building has always scared me. When I was young, I refused to come in alone when Annabel was working late because I thought it was haunted.

“It’s not haunted,” Dad said when I told him. “Haunted buildings are full of souls with no bodies, Harriet. A lawyer’s office is full of bodies with no souls. There’s a big difference.”

And then he’d laughed until Annabel put salt in his wine glass.

Even the lift feels like some sort of creepy horror-movie glass coffin. When I finally get to Annabel’s office, I can see through the window that she has her head down and is writing some kind of report.

“Ahem,” I say softly.

“Roberta,” she says without looking up. “Take a seat. I’ve been going through the file and I think getting custody of the guinea pig isn’t going to be a problem.”

I take a seat despite not being Roberta and squirm. I’ve just realised that Roberta is a real person and not just a name on a sheet, and she might actually turn up too. Annabel writes a few more things down and then glances up. She fixes me with a long stare, while I try desperately to activate the dimples in my cheeks.

“Well, Roberta,” she says eventually. “Can I just say that you have grown a lot younger in the three weeks since I saw you last. Being away from your husband is clearly doing wonders for your complexion.”

“Annabel—”

“And,” she says, looking at my head, “that’s a great improvement on your last hairstyle. Although as your last hairstyle was a purple rinse, that’s not necessarily saying much.”

“Annabel, I—”

She looks at the hat in my hand. “I thought for a moment perhaps you had brought the guinea pig with you, but I’m relieved to see that’s not the case. I would suggest, however, making sure that whatever that is, is definitely dead. It looks like it might bite.”

“Annabel—”

Annabel leans forward and presses a button on her phone. “Audrey? When the other Roberta Adams turns up, please keep her in reception until I alert you otherwise. And for future reference, none of my clients are schoolgirls. Thank you.”

And then she leans back in her chair and looks at me in silence.





fter what feels like forever, I finally manage to say, “Hello, Annabel.”

“Hello, Harriet.”

“How are you?” This seems like a good conversation opener. Actually, I think this is the only conversation opener. I don’t know how she is at all.

“Sleeping on the floor of my office, which is never ideal, but apart from that I’m just dandy, thank you.”

I stare at her stomach. It doesn’t look any different, but I can’t stop staring. It’s amazing really. A few days ago it was a stomach containing strawberry jam and now it contains a person. I’m actually really excited, even though it does mean that every minute I’ve spent in the last five years researching famous only children on the internet was a total waste of my time. “So it’s true?” I ask. “What you wrote?”

“That I am gravid, parous, fecund, enceinte, teeming with child?”

“Umm.” I think Annabel’s thesaurus is bigger than mine. “Yes?”

“Absolutely. I’m gestating like nobody’s business.”

“Wow.” I’m so overwhelmed with this information. I don’t know anything about babies: it’s a massive hole in my general knowledge base. I’m going to have to go home and do some research.

“Does your father know?”

“No, you told me not to tell him.”

“Quite right. The man should learn to turn a Post-it over now and then.”

It feels like something tight in my chest is finally starting to unravel; as if everything from the last week is starting to melt. Why didn’t I just come to Annabel in the beginning? Why did I tell her I was OK when I wasn’t?

“Annabel,” I say, folding my arms round my knees. “Can I ask you a question?”

“As long as it’s not about bodily functions. I’m not going to start discussing disgusting things just because I’m pregnant.”

“It’s not about bodily functions.” Then I close my eyes and say in a rush: “Do you hate me?”

Annabel raises an eyebrow. “No,” she says after the longest pause that has ever existed in the history of the world. “I don’t hate you, Harriet.”