SPLASH! Forward they plunged, water foaming around their shoulders as they surged across the pool. ‘Go on, Jack!’ Em cheered, recognizing the determination on her son’s face. She dodged out of the way as they drew near, neck-and-neck, both finding an extra burst of speed for the final metre. Down slapped their hands on the pool’s edge. ‘Jack wins by a finger!’ she decreed, which made him whoop and leap in the air.

‘I’ll get you next time,’ George said, holding out a hand to shake. ‘Oh hey, Izzie,’ he said just then.

Em turned to see her daughter strutting towards them, wearing only a pair of mirrored aviator shades plus a tiny – and Em really did mean tiny – black bikini. Where had that come from? She must have picked it up in town with her mates, because Em certainly would not have willingly purchased it for her.

‘My eyes, my eyes,’ Jack groaned, clapping a hand over his face as he saw his sister. ‘Jesus, Iz, you’re scaring the horses.’

‘What horses?’ Seren asked.

Em felt flustered. There was something a bit seedy about seeing your own beautiful teenage daughter looking like a sex object. Looking womanly, with far shapelier thighs than her own mother and an enviably toned stomach. In the blink of an eye, Izzie had blossomed from a sporty, ponytailed girl in school uniform into this . . . well, this beautiful young woman, frankly, all hips and boobs. What with Jack suddenly becoming interested in girls and now Izzie turning into this goddess, Em felt as if someone had pressed a fast-forward button on her children’s lives. Or was it that she hadn’t paid enough attention to them lately?

‘Jump in! The water’s lovely,’ she urged Izzie, with just a fraction of desperation in her voice. Cover yourself up! Too much bare flesh on display here.

Izzie didn’t jump in, though. She sat at the edge of the pool, her legs dangling in the water, with a strange look on her face. It was hard to read her expression while those mirrored sunglasses were down. ‘You had a phone call, George,’ she said in this artless sort of way. She tossed her head so that her long tawny hair fell swishily down her back, then turned her gaze back towards him. ‘It was a woman.’

It was weird, the way she said it, carefully enunciated, loaded almost. Oh God, thought Em immediately. What woman? What had happened?

George seemed to be taking great care not to look directly at Izzie. ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Any woman in particular, or did you not get that far?’

‘Your ex-wife,’ Izzie said, which was rude, seeing as Charlotte did have a name, and Em was fairly sure her daughter knew it. She raised an eyebrow. ‘I told her you were semi-naked and a bit tied up with Mum, so . . .’