‘Flynn and I are on the same page. We have a lot of fun together and that’s it,’ Nina said firmly, to envious looks from her friends. Jules couldn’t imagine a life that wasn’t riddled with complication. Was it really possible, no-strings-attached sex?

‘Does he have a gig this weekend?’ Alice asked.

‘Yep. Edinburgh, I think,’ Nina said vaguely. Jules sensed she seemed keen to shut the conversation down.

‘I love spoken word! Can we go to see him sometime?’ Alice asked eagerly.

‘Mm hm,’ Nina said unconvincingly and Jules, taking the hint, returned to Luca. ‘I messaged Luca to say thank you. I’ll pick him up something in Paris. Does he still love macarons?’

‘It’s no big deal, honestly. And I do need to learn to let go a bit. There’s so much other stuff going on with the expansion. I can’t be in there every day. But it’s hard to let go when it’s your baby.’ Something flickered across her face then, her countenance briefly jolted and Jules felt a flutter of irritation: Nina didn’t usually censor every conversation slip around her. She resisted the urge to sigh as Nina moved and shifted things around on the table, topping up both Jules’s and Alice’s coffees even though neither had taken a sip yet.

‘How are things going with the expansion?’ Alice asked. ‘Ted’s working flat out.’

Jules tuned out her friends’ conversation and gazed down the aisle. She considered a walk along the carriages just for something to do. She drummed her thumbs on her thighs, her phone still in her bag. How long had it been since she’d last checked? Twenty minutes? Thirty? She dared not look.

Needing to satisfy at least one impulse, she reached for a rose and cardamon croissant, pink sugared petals scattering artfully over her napkin. Everything about Nina’s products was perfection: the flavours, the presentation, the culmination of years of her friend’s hard work. Nina had started with patisserie and pastry but later, due to popular demand, had introduced a lunch menu too. Jules delicately tore apart the layers of flaky pastry, delighting in the streak of blush pink within. She was practically drooling now as layers of butter and rose – and almond? – sunk on to her tongue. At Flora’s instruction, she’d trained herself out of eating sugar and fat over the last few years. Along with caffeine. Alcohol. Anything that had been processed. Not that any of it had made a difference.

She knew that was the point of this trip: to let loose, to relax, before her final round of IVF, her last chance… but to enjoy Paris she’d need to be deprogrammed; all the information she had read and digested about fertility and optimum conception conditions somehow wiped from her highly retentive brain. She could tell you the calories and fat content in virtually any foodstuff; the pH level of a banana, the mercury content of tuna. When Jules took on a project, she took on a project and this one – the baby project – was the only one she’d failed to complete.