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‘Maybe I was wrong.’ His throat rose and fell visibly as he swallowed. ‘I have to choose Sienna. She has to come first from now on.’

‘Please, Giles…’ Holly couldn’t tell him what kind of person Sienna really was. He wouldn’t believe her. Not now. She could feel it. And so, rather than speaking, she stepped forward and placed a hand on his chest. She had made the motion hundreds of times in their friendship, just like she’d held his hand hundreds of times or rested her head on his shoulder. But something about it felt different.

‘I don’t know what I’d do without you.’

‘What do you want me to say, Holly?’

She didn’t know. There wasn’t an answer she could give. They were incredibly close now, only inches apart, and her eyes tried to lock on his. But for some reason, they kept flickering down towards his lips. Why couldn’t she stop looking at his lips?

‘We’ll get through this,’ he said finally. ‘It’ll just take some time. I promise.’

‘I don’t think you can promise that,’ she whispered. ‘I think things have already changed. For both of us.’

There was a strange buzzing on the surface of her skin. A static-type feeling. Was Giles sensing it, too? By the way his pupils filled his irises as he looked at her, she had to believe he did.

‘Life has to move on at some point, Holly,’ he whispered.

‘I know. I know it does.’

She was moving onto her tiptoes, although she wasn’t exactly sure why.

‘I don’t know how I’d manage without you in my life, Holly.’ His voice was a breath so warm against her skin, she wanted to breathe it all in. She needed to.

‘You won’t ever have to find out. Like you said, we’ll get through this.’

‘We will?’

‘We will.’

Then, in a heartbeat, before Holly could work out what was happening, the space between them had closed entirely, and for the first time in a decade, Holly Berry and Giles Caverty were kissing.

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Holly couldn’t remember moving. She couldn’t remember putting her lips against his, but nor could she remember Giles putting his lips against hers. It was as if they had been drawn together and now that they were, it felt like the most natural thing in the world. Like this was how they were meant to be. She felt the hitch in her heart and the quickening of her breath as her hand reached up around the back of his neck. At the same time, he slid his hand around her waist, pulling her in closer. Every inch of her body was on fire. The static buzz now full-on sparks on her skin. How was this so easy? How did it feel so right? It made little sense, but at the same time, it did. She was kissing Giles. She was kissing her best friend Giles. Her best friend Giles, who was engaged to the horrific Sienna.

‘Stop!’ She jumped back away from him, her hands outstretched in front of her. ‘Sienna?—’

‘Oh my God,’ he said. ‘Why did you do that?’

‘What?’

Holly had meant to tell him about all the things Sienna had said. That was what she suddenly remembered. That, and the fact that he was an engaged man and there was no reason in the world that she should be kissing him regardless of how vile his fiancée was. He needed to know the truth, yet Giles’s hand was covering his mouth like he had just done the most hideous thing ever. And he had blamed her for it.

‘What the hell was that?’ Giles said.

‘That was… I think it was both of us,’ Holly said. ‘I think that we… I think that we…’

‘No.’ Giles was shaking his head as he paced back and forth across the room. ‘No. We can’t have done that. You shouldn’t have done that. We can’t. I love her. I love her, and I know I’m going to marry her. I know that. It was just… it was just some weird moment. You were angry, and I was angry, and?—’

‘You’re right, it was just an angry kiss,’ Holly said quickly.

‘Yes, yes, exactly,’ Giles agreed, striking the air with his hand. ‘It was just an angry kiss. Those happen, right? You were just angry and upset, and I was there. That’s all it was. I was just there.’ He brushed himself down, at the same time as trying to wipe his mouth, like he was attempting to erase any hint of a kiss from his lips. ‘I need to go. Yes, I should go. I need to go back to my fiancée.’

‘Giles, we…’ She paused. She wouldn’t be able to get through to him like this. She could tell.

‘Can we talk later?’ she asked, but there was no point. He had already turned around and was marching away from her.

A second later, the front door slammed shut.