" Lindsay hissed, her cheeks quickly reddening."One year Lindsay even came down and caught me, and she-" Janet said,before biting her lip as she saw a...look of not just embarrassment, butanger in her daughter's eyes. Janet suddenly remembered that whilemany teenagers' fathers would tease their children about havingdressed up as Santa in the past, few would tell them while wearing aknee-length sweater dress and opaque tights. "Umm... I'll just takethe presents and hand them out." Good idea,". "Miranda nodded. "I know," she explained with a wary sigh, "But she's cautious. Too many people in her life have caused her problems, and I guess the stress of running the Company just adds to that. A lot of clients try to take advantage of her because of her disability. They seem to think she's weak minded because of it, but she's used to putting them in their places. And as funny as it may sound, my Mother really didn't trust my Father when they first met either, so don't take it too. The markets are still depressed from January’s crash. Inflation is at 9%. Next year it’ll be 16%, then 24% the year after. And the oil price shock won’t do anything good. But unfortunately the Labour Party will get into government next February, so if we’re going to do this, it has to be now. You still want to go ahead?”“Unless you recommend otherwise, yes.”“Good. Now, Ed is coming round tomorrow morning to see you.”Uh oh. “Is he pissed off that I tried to drug his son?”He shook his head. “No.. It had the desired effect. My first thought was ‘Damn, this may not turn out to be what I’ve been expecting after all.’ But then I remembered that in my experience a prim and proper presentation is often there to hide a smoldering main course. Was that wishful thinking or not? I wasn’t sure. ‘Come in before you freeze your cojones off,’ she said. The casual and unexpected reference to my cojones didn’t go unnoticed. ‘Oh, they won’t freeze that fast,’ I tossed the double entendre.