‘Oh, calm down,’ Holly replied. ‘They’re nothing that would drag you into a scandal. But before I show you them, will you let me do something?’

‘That depends.’ But, intrigued as he was, Charlie couldn’t refuse. He’d crossed the threshold after all, and the wine and the candles were working their magic on him. ‘Oh, all right then.’

‘Just stay there for a sec.’

Charlie did as he was told, and before he could catch a glimpse of the pictures, Holly had tucked them into the back pocket of her jeans. Grabbing her phone, she swiped to Spotify and selected a song. As the song began to play through the Bluetooth speaker, Charlie raised an eyebrow. ‘Getting a bit retro tonight, aren’t we?’ The song was one from a few years into the millennium, possibly even old before then, with a sultry beat and a smoky-voiced singer. Charlie’s spine began to tingle. ‘This takes me back…’

‘Ssh.’ Holly swayed a little to the beat. ‘Think…’ She took the glass from his hand and placed it down on the side table, where it glinted in the candlelight. Straightening back up, she drew a little closer to Charlie. He could see the flecks of light from the candles reflecting off her tousled hair and, just for a moment, a slight hesitation in her expression as she put a hand on his chest.

Charlie, entranced, but mind still whirling from the strangeness of the situation and the elusiveness of his own memory, slipped his hands around Holly’s waist. They began to sway to the beat as the rhythm throbbed in the air. Charlie felt Holly slip her hand upwards until it rested on the back of his neck, causing his skin to tingle and a shiver to run down his spine. He drew her closer to him until their hips were almost touching and his hand was resting in the small of her back.

He looked down and saw the top of Holly’s head, and as she lay her cheek on his shoulder, nestling closer and closer, he was assailed by a memory, long lost and almost forgotten, of two people on the cusp of adulthood. On the cusp of… something. Of swaying together in a nightclub in Leicester Square as other people danced and pressed in around them until they were far closer together than they’d intended to be. Of a throbbing R&B beat and a drink or two to lower the inhibitions, a face upturned to his, and a gentle, feather-light kiss on the lips that promised so much but never had the opportunity to be delivered. The shiver down his spine, the breath that he’d unconsciously been holding, the sudden, sharp pinprick of desire. And then he knew.