‘Do you have five minutes?’ he asked.

She nodded. It was the sweet spot between the lunchtime rush and the mid-afternoon sugar-fix run. She finished their coffees and brought them over to a quiet table near the back of the café. She didn’t need to work in the patisserie any more, the staff were fantastic, but she insisted on doing a day a week in the City. She liked to don a La City Pâtisserie T-shirt (black with a discreet white logo, modelled on the girls’ simple, matching Eiffel Tower tattoos) and see for herself the reaction to a new product or hear the sort of off-the-cuff feedback you would never get from a focus group. It was coincidence that her day in the City – Wednesdays – coincided with Flynn’s regular shift.

‘What can I do for you?’ she said, setting down the coffees.

‘I never said sorry. For what happened before the wedding. And I never explained to you what happened after I left that day.’ He spoke in a measured tone, as though this was something he had been rehearsing.

‘We don’t need to talk about that,’ she said. ‘It was a long while ago. It’s fine.’

He looked down at the table in his grey suit, lightly drumming his fingers on the marble-effect top. ‘It was a long while ago,’ he agreed, ‘but it’s not fine. My behaviour. Not fine at all.’ He sighed and looked up, meeting her eyes. ‘I did go to tell Alice. I know you probably think I got what I wanted and scarpered, but it wasn’t like that.’

He looked into her eyes and all the layers fell away. He was briefly returned to the young man she met at le Bal, confident but newly so, still half-glancing in her direction when he spoke, desperately hoping he was sounding cool, meeting Nina’s approval.

‘I ran into Dickie, outside the hotel. He was furious with me, slapped me, said I had to do the decent thing and marry Alice and figure out what to do later. Said I couldn’t jilt her in Paris of all places, with all our family and friends having travelled there.’ His voice wobbled, uncertainty flashing over his features. When he resumed speaking his tone was crisp, as if he was back on script: ‘And he was right, I suppose. All her brothers there… Mind you, I was more afraid of her mother’s wrath than theirs.’

He smiled wryly at Nina but she was deep in thought, her brow furrowed.

‘The next morning, Alice told me she was pregnant and I thought, “well, that’s that then”. And ever since… I’ve tried to forget it happened. To put it behind me. But the truth is, I’ve been a rotten husband. I’ve been a rotten father. I’ve let everyone down.’

Pride, Nina thought, was something she could relate to. Cowardice too.

‘Did you sleep together that night?’ Nina had always wondered but never wanted to ask. She had read once that very few newlyweds had sex on their wedding night.