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‘Oh,’ Lucy says, gathering herself off the floor, still keeping one eye on my new Spanish friend.

‘Turns out they were just fishermen. They didn’t want us to get caught in their nets and scare the fish away.

Lovely fellas actually. Meg’s getting some massive prawns from them but I think her tits got those for us.

God, we were bloody worried about you. Grace is sobbing. We thought you’d drowned.’

I see Carlos laughing but he must also be clocking Lucy’s strong London tones as she embraces me tightly. ‘So, are you all from France then?’ he asks .

Beth and Lucy look at me. Did I knock my head? Did I possibly swallow too much seawater?

I try to silence them with my eyes. ‘Yes. We’re all from Nice. But Beth and Lucy spent a lot of time growing up in London,’ I explain. Beth looks like she’s smelt a really bad fart but I can see that Lucy gets the assignment. Lucy was made for assignments like this.

‘Oh, bien s?r. But j’habite à Nice. Je m’appelle Lucy.’ That would perhaps sound more convincing if it didn’t sound like she was reciting it for an exam.

Carlos casts his eye between the three of us before landing on my gaze again. I don’t know how to continue this, how to keep talking to him to see where it goes. I can tell from the way they’re looking at me, at Carlos and at each other that the cousins also realise they’ve interrupted something.

‘We have your clothes if you want to swap…’ Beth says, holding up my dress and lacy knickers.

Carlos looks away. ‘Or you know, to protect your modesty, maybe just keep what you have on for now. I feel I’ve seen far too much of you this evening.’

‘Likewise…’

Beth’s jaw drops, Lucy can’t hide the massive smile on her face. I glare over at them when Carlos’ back is turned.

‘Well, maybe I can return the T-shirt to you tomorrow. I can wash it first,’ I tell him. ‘And repay you…’

‘For?’ asks Lucy.

‘His kindness,’ I say firmly, killing off her assumptions.

In the corner of my eye, I see Beth elbow Lucy hard in the ribs.

Please don’t laugh, please keep this going.

For me. ‘Look, Carlos, we’re staying in a villa in Santa Posa.

Maybe come and see us tomorrow, come and get your shirt and have some brunch with us.

A thank you for looking after our cousin,’ Beth suggests.

Lucy nods. ‘A très bien idea, Beth. Where’s your phone, Carlos?’ she asks. He holds it aloft and she takes it from his hands, holding it up to his face to unlock it. ‘I’m putting a pin in your maps. Come for midday. Bring some swimmers. Comprendez?’

‘Oui,’ he says, an eyebrow raised.

Lucy’s phone rings. ‘Zut alors, it’s Meg,’ she exclaims as she goes to answer it. ‘It’s fine, we found her, she’s OK. I’d actually argue she’s more than OK.’ I feel my cheeks redden. ‘A taxi? Yeah, we’ll come find you.’ She hangs up. ‘We have to go. See you tomorrow, Carlos.’

He waves, smiling. Beth and Lucy start walking away while I linger, unsure what it is I want to do. I think I want to stay. ‘Tomorrow?’

‘Tomorrow? Why not?’ he replies.

I laugh. Exactly. Why not? Why not have a drink with a good-looking man who’s bought you bunyols and has dreamy blue eyes.

Take a chance on him, Suzie. Let go. Just remember your name is Aurelie.

I lean over and kiss him on the cheek, putting a hand to his arm.

His lips are perilously close to mine, his skin is warm, inviting.

Kiss him. But instead I stand there, that energy between us clear, almost intoxicating.

‘Merci beaucoup,’ I mutter.

‘De nada.’

He smiles as I turn and catch up with my cousins, looking up, asking myself why all the stars in that clear midnight sky suddenly seem to be winking at me.

Charlie

‘Hola, me llamo Carlos,’ I say into the mirror, unconvincingly. Max watches from the balcony and laughs.

‘?Dónde está la biblioteca, Carlos?’

‘Up your arse, I believe.’

Max laughs as he bites into a croissant he stole from the breakfast buffet.

He’s better now and I’d like to think it was my story of having found a naked woman at the beach that brought him back from the dead.

A beautiful naked French woman. But then, like I always do, I complicated the situation by telling her my name was Carlos and now I’m about to have brunch with her whole family.

She didn’t really go into who would be at the villa.

Just the cousins? There could be dozens of them.

Europeans usually have very large families.

‘So explain to me the moped?’ Max asks, as he packs his bag. Today, like the adult teenagers they are, the stags are off to a water park to bomb it down the slides. I’ve been given a bye as long as I join them for dinner afterwards in Magaluf at an all-you-can-eat ribs and steak place.

‘I need to keep up the pretence that I’m Spanish. If I show up in a taxi or hire car, it will look suss,’ I explain.

‘Instead you’ll just look like a pizza delivery boy,’ he jokes.

I scrunch my face at the insult and he watches as I try to style my hair. In this heat, it doesn’t seem to be playing ball. I also don’t know what look I’m going for. I take off my T-shirt and try a white linen short-sleeved number.

‘How fit was she?’

‘She was very pretty.’ I sigh. Her eyes were bright, the sort that looked sweet, kind but alive. Given how much I saw of her, I keep going back to her eyes, a kiss on the cheek, feeling the warmth of her breath against my skin.

‘Charlie boy has a crush.’

‘Piss off. Make sure you pack your sunscreen and some arm bands,’ I retort.

‘Make sure you pack some johnnies,’ he jokes.

I throw a T-shirt at him, but there was something there last night that I can’t quite get out of my mind.

I’ve been rational and put it down to being on holiday, the unique way in which we met, the heat, the different location…

But last night, did I think about what it would be like to kiss her?

I did. I may have thought about more. That’s not me at all.

Charlie is sensible, he’s respectful, he’s never had sex on the beach before because one of his pet peeves when he was little was washing sand out of his trunks.

But I guess you can meet someone and the spark can be strong, they fill some space in your mind, and then they are all you can think about, your mind wandering to what could happen…

I look at myself in the mirror. Aurelie.

All I can see is her wearing my T-shirt, stood on the rocks, seawater dripping off the edges of her hair, the curve of her lower thighs.

Stop it, Charlie. Get a grip. You don’t even know her last name.

In theory, I had different visions of the moped and how I might look arriving at the villa on it.

I thought about a few buttons undone, sunglasses on, riding along a coastal road, the sun on my face, looking really fucking sexy.

Instead, I realise all that hair styling was for nothing.

I will have helmet hair, I’m sweating balls and Spanish drivers are a mix of lawless angry Mallorcans and hire car drivers trying to remember to drive on the right side of the road.

And goats. No one told me there would be goats.

So by the time I arrive at the massive wooden gates of this villa, I’m wondering if I should just turn around.

Anxiety is already high with the very vague plans we’ve made and I’m not sure if any illusions that I planted yesterday of being a cool and capable Mallorcan are now evaporating with the giant sweat patch that is my back.

I hover over my scooter as I look down at the map on my phone.

Is this it? I peer through the slats in the gate.

This is not a party palace hotel by the beach, this is a sophisticated villa and it’s huge.

I mean, she is French. She was likely to be far too classy for some bar on the beach specialising in fishbowl cocktails.

The gate suddenly slides back and I stand there, desperately trying to tousle my hair.

‘Are you Carlos?’ a woman says as she approaches me, dressed head to toe in white. Shit, not cousins. It’s a cult. She lowers her sunglasses. ‘Je m’appelle Emma. Enchantée.’

‘Enchanté,’ I reply politely. ‘Is Aurelie here? You must be one of her cousins?’

‘I am,’ she says, scanning my outfit, smiling broadly.

‘This place is incroyable. Are you renting? Do you own it?’

Emma pauses as I crane my neck to the roof admiring the stone architecture, peering around to see the azure calm of the pool.

‘It belongs to Aurelie’s father’s family. He is in champagne,’ a voice interrupts.

I recognise this cousin from last night – Beth – but today she wears a vest top and patterned trousers.

She comes over to greet me. ‘We are French, we do the double kiss,’ she tells me, putting a hand to my shoulder.

She looks at me, scanning my face. ‘This may sound strange, but have we met before this?’

‘Before last night?’ I ask her.

‘You just look like someone I may have met, possibly? I’m terrible with names,’ she says.

I shake my head. Is she suspicious? She knows, doesn’t she? Have I not made my accent thick enough?

‘AURELIE!’ The moment is interrupted by a shrill voice inside the villa. We all turn to look at it. ‘THE SEAMAN IS HERE!’ a voice booms from inside. My eyes open widely as I wipe sweat from my brow. I am the what?

Emma closes her eyes. ‘You’ll have to forgive my sister. She has a terrible command of the English language.’

Lucy – the one who wrestled me to the ground – suddenly appears on the drive, her eyes on the moped. She skips excitedly along the hot stone towards me.

‘Too much,’ Emma says out of the side of her mouth, thinking I didn’t hear that.

‘Je ne sais pas what you may mean? ?Hola, Carlos!’ she says, pulling a basket bag over her shoulder .