‘Everything OK?’ he asked, as they walked down the corridor. ‘You seem a bit quiet today.’

It was almost as if he knew what she was thinking. ‘David, can I talk to you about—?’

The door they were standing outside suddenly flew open and Anji appeared. ‘David! Just the man! I need someone tall to pin up my dreamcatchers.’

‘Dreamcatchers?’ asked David innocently. ‘I thought they were classed as cultural appropriation now?’

‘What? Are they?’ Anji looked horrified. ‘Tara?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Tara. She wasn’t in the mood.

‘Let me have a look,’ said David, with a mildly reproachful glance in Tara’s direction. ‘Mine’s a black coffee, two sugars, demerara. And get me another slice of cake. Don’t tell anyone.’

‘OK,’ said Tara, and headed into the kitchen.

Kasia’s cake was indeed very moreish – the note next to it explained it was her mother’s original Polish recipe with no fewer than three ‘secret ingredients’ – and Tara was cutting two generous slices when she sensed a warm presence behind her.

‘Tarara-boom-de-ay!’ Jacqueline’s small hands clasped her shoulders. ‘So glad I caught you. I need to talk to you about …’ She stopped when Tara turned round, and said, ‘Gosh. Are you all right? You look drained.’

Such candour was very out of character for Jacqueline: normally she framed any enquiries about colleagues’ health in such discreet terms it was hard to work out what she was actually enquiring about. Earlier in the year Tara had had a whole conversation about the best place to get seafood in the UK before she’d realized Jacqueline was subtly suggesting she take some time off.

‘Um, just …’ What was the point in lying? Especially if Chrissie had already made good on her threat to report her ineptitude. ‘Bit of family turbulence. Nothing to worry about.’

‘Oh, you poor thing. As if you haven’t had enough family turbulence this year,’ said Jacqueline. ‘Can I ask what’s happened?’

Tara bit her lip. She couldn’t very well not tell Jacqueline, now Emily knew. She turned to spoon coffee granules into her mug. ‘My father’s brought my half-sister to stay.’

‘I didn’t know you had a half-sister?’

‘Neither did I until last night. It’s come as a bit of a shock. I mean, a surprise.’ Downplay it, downplay it. But her hand wobbled, spilling sugar over the work surface. ‘Whoops! Sorry, I’ll just clean that up.’

Now she looked, it wasn’t even sugar. It was salt.

Jacqueline’s eyes burned on Tara’s back as she wiped the counter.

‘Anyway!’ she went on. ‘We had a great time at the craft session last night. It’s a good idea – I might start making a flood blanket. Or we could do one between us here? A few squares each, mixed media?’