‘I loved it,’ she nodded, feeling a tug of emotion.

‘Good. Excellent. Well, we’re delighted with your work. Now, what did you want to tell me? Does this have anything to do with Madeleine?’

Gabriela paused, confused for a moment before remembering Emsworth’s request, which had not so much slipped her mind as been shoved aside. Of course she wouldn’t spy on Madeleine, she didn’t need to. Whomever the source of the leak was, Madeleine had nothing to do with it.

‘No, I’ve been struggling to get hold of her,’ Gabriela lied.

There was no easy way to deliver her real news, and so with a sharp inhalation of breath, she said it, keeping her face as bright as she could: ‘I’m pregnant.’

There was a moment’s hesitation as Emsworth kept his gaze steady, the carefully arranged smile at his mouth barely flickering, and then he replied, ‘Gosh, congratulations.’

‘It’s due in October,’ she added, trying her best to keep the conversation businesslike, to keep control of negotiations, as if this was nothing but another event in the timeline of her career.

‘So I’ll be off for six months and then back in April next year. I was thinking I could start to take on a bit more responsibility over the next few months, in preparation for—’

He cut her off. ‘Oh, there’s no need to be worrying about that. Not now.’ His tone had shifted, in a way that would be barely perceptible if she hadn’t worked with him for so long.

‘OK, I just want to make sure that you know that my commitment to this job hasn’t changed. If anything, it’s stronger. I still very much want to move up the ranks, and—’

Once again, he silenced her, this time with a slightly raised hand. ‘Gabriela, think no more of it.’ He stood, indicating that it was time for her to do the same.

The day she went on maternity leave, Emsworth was not in the office.

‘He went on annual leave yesterday,’ Lauren confirmed when Gabriela asked, having already packed up a pathetically small box of possessions from her desk, a ‘good luck’ card awkwardly signed by a few of her colleagues (All the best with it!) balanced precariously on the top.

‘Really? But he didn’t say—’ Her cheeks reddened as Lauren looked back at her impassively, her expression a simple shrug conveying the words Gabriela knew she was thinking: And?

Emsworth had hardly spoken to her since that meeting in his office. He had certainly never asked about Madeleine again, even after her return from Krakow a few weeks later. At this point, Gabriela simply assumed he had forgotten that he’d ever suggested she probe her colleague for information, or that perhaps he had found an alternative explanation. Whatever his reasons were, if he could forget the incident then so could she.