He sniffed. ‘Can’t say I’m bowled over. Next.’

Rude. He met my eye and shrugged, a mean grin of amusement plastered across his face. It was just as I thought; he was enjoying taking us down and there was nothing I could do about it.

I uncorked the Blanc de Blanc and poured some for everyone, including a drop for myself, explaining for the listeners’ benefit that it was made solely from Chardonnay grapes, left on its lees for eighteen months and had hazelnut notes and a citrusy acidity on the palate.

Fiona and Olivia made appreciative noises while they sipped it; Thomas stared into his glass as if he’d spotted a fly in it, knocked it back in one and gave a slight shudder as he set the glass down.

Fiona noticed and shot him a warning look. ‘What would you recommend to serve this with, Olivia?’

‘It’s elegant and the bubbles are super-fine, I think it would work well as an aperitif and perfect with something delicate like seafood.’

‘Would you agree with that, Thomas?’ I asked.

‘It has nothing to recommend it, I’m afraid,’ he said curtly, focusing on his bottle of champagne as he whipped off the foil and removed the wire cage. ‘Why don’t we try the real stuff now?’

I quickly scanned the bottle but despite the work both Sidney and Matt had done with me, I didn’t recognize the house it was from. Maybe it was far superior to ours, I couldn’t tell, but there was a chance that Thomas wouldn’t be able to tell either and at this point it was a risk I was prepared to take.

‘How about a blind tasting?’ I blurted out, challenging him with my stare. ‘The French fizz against our Classic Cuvée. We could put a blindfold on Doubting Thomas here and ask him to name which is his favourite.’

‘That would be interesting.’ Olivia’s eyes sparkled with mischief.

Thomas’s face was a study in lemon-sucking and he shook his head dangerously at me. The tension in the air had immediately doubled.

‘I love it,’ cried Fiona swiftly, clapping her hands. ‘We’ve got ninety seconds until the news, so let’s make it snappy.’

Olivia and I leapt into action, uncorking the bottles while an assistant came in and tied a West Ham scarf around Thomas’s face.

‘Careful, not so tight.’ He grimaced. ‘Ugh, this rag smells of fried onions.’

Someone else appeared with fresh glasses, Fiona read out the names of the two bottles in the blind taste test and I passed Thomas his first glass.

‘I’m being stitched up like a kipper here,’ he muttered.

This time, with Fiona giving a running commentary, Thomas laboured over it, inhaling, swirling the liquid around, inhaling again before taking a big draft of the pale yellow sparkling wine. It was ours. I daren’t speak in case I gave something away; I so wanted him to prefer it.

‘It’s crisp and fresh, full of minerals. I’m getting that nice brioche flavour. Creamy soft mousse. Not bad,’ he said after swallowing.