‘Hello?’ I called, into the silence. Nothing. I took a breath and walked carefully up the stairs, until I stood, nerves twitching, on the landing. The room to the right was Lady Bailey’s; I could see a chaos of strewn clothes and stockings through the open door. And to the left …

‘Hello?’ I murmured again, though I had no idea what I would say if anyone answered. Silence. Before I could think about it, I walked quickly along the corridor, reached for a handle, and opened the door to what I thought must be Langham’s bedroom.

It was the finest room in the house. Windows opened on two sides, one on to the greenness of the garden, the other on to endless blue: the Mediterranean – my first love – throwing herself into the embrace of the Atlantic. Had I been Langham I would have lain in bed all day and drowned myself in that blue. The thought gave me shivers. His bed stood against one wall, the mosquito net tied back, the cotton sheets pale and smooth. I lowered my palm to the pillow, and was overtaken by an image of my own head resting there.

I snatched my hand away, but it was no use, an aching heat was pulsing through me, spreading through my body. I clenched my fingers, trying to will it away. I’d felt it sometimes at the inn. A few years ago, there had been a young gitano who had kissed me in the darkness of the stable, and put his hand between my legs. But I had shoved him away and run for the kitchen. It was too dangerous for me to feel anything like that, to be a woman who could be had. If I had allowed Morales, or anyone else to think of me as a woman, to remember that I was a virgin in a whorehouse, she might have weighed my value differently, and tried to sell me again, as she had done all those years ago.

But Langham was not like the Señor; he was not like any man I had ever met, not even Ifrahim. I let my hand drop, still staring at the bed, not knowing if it was the room I was aching for, with its quiet luxury, or the man who inhabited it.

Distracted, I went to the wardrobe and pulled it open, as if I’d find the answer there. The scent of sandalwood and musk enveloped me. Here were his suits, a dozen of them, and shelves of neatly folded shirts. Here were stacks of clean, silk underwear, finely woven, and a whole rack of ties. One in particular took my liking, a deep, secretive green; the same colour as Dar Portuna’s gate. It slid from the rack like a whisper. Slowly, I looped it around my neck, feeling its coolness against the hot skin of my throat. My hand lingered on the fabric, hanging above my bound breasts …