‘I’m not on Facebook,’ Gabriela said, as if this settled matters, and they fell into an awkward silence, the three of them standing in front of the table.

‘OK,’ Pierre said after a moment, giving his best smile. ‘Well, Gabriela, it was lovely to see you again.’

His cheeks felt cold against hers as they kissed twice, farewell.

‘Ivan—’

She felt him look back at her as the men shook hands and by the time they sat down again their table was cast deep in shadow.

‘Who was that?’ Ivan asked as the waiter arrived with their drinks.

‘Just an old friend,’ she said. ‘From when I was studying here. We dated for a while.’

He raised his eyebrow.

‘It was nothing,’ she added, raising her glass to her lips to obscure her face as best she could. ‘He was an idiot.’

‘Why did he think you had children?’

The bubbles rushed up through her nose and she tried to mask a choking sound. ‘I’ve no idea. His sister made friends with an old friend of mine, and it sounds like she got confused.’

‘There’s a lot I don’t know about you,’ Ivan said.

‘I could say the same of you,’ she replied, turning the tables. ‘I don’t even know where you grew up. Were you born in Moscow?’

‘No,’ he said after a moment. ‘Kuybyshev.’

‘You mean Samara?’ she corrected him and he made a noise under his breath.

‘I was long gone by the time they changed the name.’

This piqued her interest. How much didn’t she know about this man who was here with her, in another country, sharing a bottle of champagne? Up till now, she had chosen not to ask. Leaning forward, she waited for him to carry on.

‘So you want to know more about me?’ he said, his tone provocative in a way she’d never heard before, and her voice rose accordingly.

‘Yes, actually, I do.’

‘OK, fine.’ He sat up straighter. It was the first time they had locked horns like this and she couldn’t tell whether they were fighting or not. ‘What do you want to know?’

The question caught her off guard. ‘Well, I don’t know. Your business, how did it start?’

‘I think you probably know the answer to that, Gabriela.’ Now he raised his own glass and knocked back half of it in one gulp.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Oh, come on, don’t play dumb. You read the papers, you’ve lived in Moscow, for God’s sake. How did any Russian oligarchs of my generation manage to build a business?’