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Ice pooled into his veins when he saw Juniper’s reaction to her words: disbelief, quickly dissolving into disgust. He’d hoped she wouldn’t bring it up, but of course he couldn’t be so lucky. Of course his past was still there, waiting with jaws as sharp as the hellhound framed in front of him.

‘Not this year,’ he answered as politely as he could manage – which wasn’t very polite at all, but Sonya didn’t seem to notice.

‘That’s a shame. Just have your father give me a call if you change your mind.’ She patted him once more, and then swayed elegantly from the room with a high-pitched click of her heels.

Juniper’s silence was deafening. He dragged a hand through his knotted hair, finding them shaky again.

‘She works here?’ she asked, her voice dangerously low.

‘Yes. She’s a curator.’

Her nostrils flared. ‘And you just… turned down an internship? For the British fucking Museum?’

‘It was around the same time I dropped out of Elmington,’ he explained, and then realised that it probably didn’t sound any better. She couldn’t understand, not really. To her, these differences between them were a rift they’d never be able to breach. He was certain a part of her liked that: that, if she could find no other excuse to hate him, there was this to fall back on.

Little did she know he hated himself for the same reasons.

‘So you really just decided to throw every opportunity away, then,’ she snarled. He looked around, glad to find the crowd thinning as closing time approached. ‘It must be nice,to have the power to turn your nose up at chances like that, knowing another one will always come along.’

‘It wasn’t like that, Juni.’

‘Then what was it like?’ Her voice rose. ‘Do you know how lucky you are to have these things handed to you on a plate?’

He squeezed his eyes closed. She sounded just like his dad. Just like everything he’d come here to avoid. ‘Yes, I know.’

‘God, I’ll never understand you,’ she whispered then. He could barely look at her, barely look at anything. ‘I’m going to find Tilly. I’m ready to go home.’

‘No, don’t,’ he pleaded, but she was already skirting around the ceramics displays to leave. Panic gripped him, and for a moment, he couldn’t move at all. What was the point? He couldn’t tell her the truth.

Could he?

It took him about five seconds to decide that he at least wanted to try. That, if nothing else, it would save their project. He’d worked hard to soften her, to get her to trust him, and he couldn’t bear to go back to the way it had been before.

He hadn’t minded her hating him so much then, but now he knew what it meant to taste her, feel her, be inside of her, tear down her defences. He knew how she sounded when she was on the verge of climax, knew how her voice was so much lighter, quieter, when she felt safe.

He raced to catch up, dragging her away from visitors’ prying eyes with a hand around her arm. She soon fought him, slapping him away. ‘Stop. Just leave me alone, Aiden, for once.’

‘I wasn’t well last year!’ he blurted. He’d never said it out loud, never wanted to, but he’d do anything to stop her from looking at him like that. Like she had that first day of class. Like he wasn’t worth anything to her, and she’d be glad if she never saw him again.

Behind him, an entryway was bathed in darkness. He used her surprise to his advantage, guiding her inside with his confession still hanging over their heads. The room held seats and a projector screen for visitors to view videos and documentaries, but the footage had clearly ended, because now all that flashed inside the frame were oil paintings along with soft piano music and the museum’s logo floating from edge to edge.

When she said nothing, he forced himself to continue. ‘I struggled at Elmington. I nearly failed the entire course.’

‘Why?’ Juniper interrogated.

‘Because…’ He trailed off, unable to say the truth even now.Because I had a breakdown.

With the exception of his doctor, nobody knew about it. His dad still thought he was a pathetic, uncommitted dropout who took his support for granted. A spoilt kid who hadn’t lived up to his name. ‘I just did, okay? Like I said, I wasn’t well.’

It sounded weak even to him, but Juniper must have seen something else entirely, because she edged towards him with just a little less scorn. He wasn’t sure who initiated it, but suddenly, their fingers were intertwining in the strip of light between them.

He stroked her knuckle with his thumb, a show of his appreciation. He’d never needed her touch quite as much as here, now. ‘You always think the worst of me, don’t you?’

She shrugged. ‘Old habits.’

‘I’m sure you’ll hate to hear me say it, but I’m glad I dropped out. Glad I didn’t take the internship. I never would have ended up at RACA, otherwise. Never would have ended up here with you.’

‘Shut up.’ Juniper scoffed, but it lacked her usual commitment. He’d gotten through to her, at least in part. He was learning that her defences weren’t made of steel, but something more pliable, something that could be bent with the right amount of pressure. Something he would break down, eventually.