I watched Alex’s eyes scan over her. “Can you get hold of a wig or something, just in case? If the angels have him, they’ll see you in his memories. And you’re pretty distinctive.”

Another time, I knew Kara would have bantered with Alex over this; now she just nodded. “I’ll get one tomorrow. See what I can do with some make-up too.”

“Good,” said Alex. “And I’ll do some checking around myself. Plus keep training these guys – maybe take them on another practice hunt.”

Sam was shaking his head. “Yeah, but what about—”

He broke off as Seb came into the kitchen, looking like he’d just taken a shower – his chestnut curls were damp, shoved away from his face as if he’d raked his fingers through them. When I saw him, something in me tightened...because I realized that the whole time we’d been talking, part of me had been thinking about Seb, wondering where he was.

Silence choked the room. Seb obviously noticed, and knew it was because of him. His eyes found mine and he smiled slightly. Despite my discomfort, I gave him a rueful one back; I knew exactly how he must be feeling. The team’s stony faces were bringing back some not-so-pleasant sensations of déjà vu. Clearly I had made a little progress with them, even if I hadn’t been all that aware of it – because now Seb was here, it was obvious that was something else that was back to square one.

Alex sighed. “Hey, Seb,” he said, and I wanted to hug him just for managing to sound normal. “We were talking about something that’s come up; I’ll fill you in after dinner. You finding everything all right?”

Seb’s eyebrows rose at “something that’s come up”, but he didn’t comment. “Yes, fine, thanks.”

As we all started sitting down to eat, Seb took the seat next to me – the place where Alex always sat. Obviously he didn’t know that, but I could see everyone sort of glancing at Alex, to see what he would do. As if there was some sort of competition going on.

My face went hot, and I cleared my throat. “Um, Seb, that’s—”

“It’s okay,” said Alex briefly. He took the seat to my other side, the one where Trish usually went, and Trish squeezed in next to Wesley, where I’d put an extra chair. I saw Seb get what had happened then; he looked like he was holding back a smile despite himself.

Hardly anyone spoke. The clink of knives and forks against plates sounded deafening. My own awkwardness around Seb wasn’t helping much either, to be honest...and I was feeling a lot of it.