only slipped out for an eleven oâclock appointment.â
âSo what?â Magenta said impatiently. âHeâs got a damn nerve.â She was still looking round, trying to take everything in. She could understand Quinn wanting to live the sixties in order to give the campaign that final fizz of authenticityâhadnât she done the same thing herself? But didnât he know there was such a thing as going too far? âNancy, whatâs been going on here?â
âThe usual?â Following her glance, Nancy gazed around the office.
âThe usual,â Magenta repeated grimly. âIs it usual to remove the computers?â
âThe what?â
âOkay, so Quinnâs got you playing his game,â Magenta said. âI can understand that you donât want to lose your jobâIâm just thinking of all the expense involved in putting this right againââ She had already reasoned that the reorganisation of the office would have been fairly easy if Quinn had copied the layout from the old photographs on the wall, but there were other things she couldnât account for. There was a different feel to the place, never mind the look, which was dated, a little drab and definitely not the right environment to encouragecutting-edge design work. She thought it boring, not to mention inhospitable. There were different phones too, but it was the ergonomically unhelpful furniture that really concerned herâand single glazing? Had Quinn gone mad? Never mind the expense, what about condensation? Cold? If people were uncomfortable at work, productivity would suffer. Didnât Quinn know anything?
And there was a different smell tooâ¦
Cigarette smoke?
âNancy!â Magenta exclaimed with increased urgency.
âAre you all right, Magenta?â Glancing round, Nancy grabbed a chair and tried to press Magenta into it.
âIâm fine.â She was anything but fine. What had happened here? Had Quinn got people in to dress the offices like a sixties stage-set? And how was it possible she had slept through those changes? But it wasnât just the noise element that concerned her; these changes were too thorough, too perfect, too convincingâ¦
Magentaâs throat dried. This wasnât some office team-building exercise. This was reality. This was reality for Nancy and for all the people here. It was Magenta who was out of sync. She must have fallen down the rabbit hole, like Alice, while sheâd been asleep and landed in the sixties. And now the shock of being trapped inside a dream was only exceeded by her dread of meeting Quinn. From what sheâd gathered, he was just the sort of man who would slot right into the sixties, where men ruled. Quinn obviously thought they did.
Magenta took a few steadying breaths while Nancy looked on anxiously. Magentaâs heart was pounding uncontrollably, but whatever had happened she would have to manage it.
She looked as much a part of the sixties as everyone else in the office, Magenta reassured herself, with her carefully made-up face, perfect hair and vintage cream wool dress. Though you could have bounced bullets off her underwear, it did outline her shape to the point where her breasts wereoutrageously prominent. That, believe it or not, was the fashion. It could best be described as âsex in your faceâ. No wonder Jackson had commented; she should have known better than to dress like this, but had done so innocently. Back in the real world, it had made her feel sexyâand after the encounter with the biker she had wanted to prove to herself that she still could feel that way. Now she realised drawing attention to herself in a sixties office was asking for trouble.
But, on the plus side, she had been researching the era for quite some time, so even locked into this bizarre dream she wasnât entirely out on a limb. She could even accept and be a little reassured by the fact that the