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‘Of course. We’ve all been there, you mustn’t beat yourself up about it,’ said Claire. ‘Plus, let’s be real here, he isverycute.’

I groaned. ‘I know, but developing actual feelings for him was a huge mistake.’

‘So what? Making mistakes is a normal part of life.’

‘I don’t usually, that’s the thing.’

Claire reached out to touch my arm. ‘You’re being too hard on yourself. I mean, how bad was it? Did you sleep with him, or something?’ she asked and then out of nowhere I felt Theo behind me. I could sense him, weirdly, and then there was the scent that trailed subtly after him and followed him everywhere, wood and amber and crackling fires.

‘Hey,’ he said, his breath tickling the back of my neck.

‘Hello,’ I said, flushing beetroot red. Had he heard any of that?

‘Hope I haven’t interrupted anything . . .?’ he asked, looking at Claire and then back at me again. I made space for him to join us. Did he know we’d been talking about him?

‘Course not,’ I said.

I couldn’t even look at Claire, but out of the corner of myeye I could see her trying not to crack up. This was not, in my opinion, a laughing matter.

‘Everything all right, Claire?’ asked Theo, probably wondering why her shoulders were shaking and why she had her nose buried in her drink.

‘Mmmmn,’ she said, looking up. ‘Sorry. Just hoovering up my wine after that horrendous couples therapy session. Brutal, or what?’

Theo laughed hollowly. ‘That’s a nice way of putting it.’

‘Are you . . . you know, OK?’ I asked tentatively, not wanting to bring it all flooding back if he was trying desperately to forget about it.

He nodded. ‘You?’

‘Oh, I’m fine,’ I said dismissively. This wasn’t about me. I’d only shared that stuff about my mum to help him out, so it hadn’t really had any affect on me at all. I mean, I had a bit of a tension headache between my eyebrows, but that was probably more to do with the book stuff looming over my head.

‘I wondered whether you fancied a late-night writing session by the pool this evening?’ Theo asked me. ‘Only I’ve noticed you do tend to work quite late. I can hear you tapping on your keys sometimes, when I wake up in the middle of the night. I can never believe you’re still up.’

‘Ah. Well, 3 a.m. tends to be optimum writing time for me. Nobody else is awake so they can’t disturb me, can they? I can get on with some work without any distractions.’

Claire was watching with interest. ‘A late-night writing session sounds very romantic,’ she said.

I narrowed my eyes at her, but she was clearly enjoying playing devil’s advocate.

‘Sounds like just the thing to get your creative juices flowing,’ she added with a smirk.

‘So what do you say?’ asked Theo, seemingly oblivious to Claire’s not-very-subtle innuendo. ‘Shall we get our word count up? Grab a table by the pool?’

‘Sure,’ I said, thinking it wouldn’t hurt. The sooner we could send Carla our chapters, the better. If she liked them, it would mean this whole dreadful set-up had been worth it. ‘Let me pop up to my room to grab a jumper. The temperature will probably drop in a bit.’

‘Good idea,’ he said. ‘Let’s meet down here in twenty minutes?’

Claire looked on, impressed. ‘This feels like progress, guys. Maybe that group therapy session did you both more good than you realise.’

‘No, it did not!’ I insisted, looking nervously at Theo. I didn’t want to set him off again. But I couldn’t stop thinking about what Claire had said – that maybe I did need to talk about what had happened in order to move on. But how would I even start a conversation like that with Theo? And when would ever be a good time?

Chapter Seventeen

We were the only two people out by the pool that evening. When I’d arrived, Theo had been there already, a bottle of red and two glasses waiting for us on the table. His laptop was out, plus a notebook, a pen and a cup of coffee.

‘Need the caffeine, do you?’ I teased, sitting down opposite him, the chair legs scraping on the marble-like flagstones of the pool surround as I made myself comfortable. This could be a long old night.

‘Some of us need a bit of medicinal assistance if we’re required to work past 7 p.m.,’ he declared.