“And you have been glad of that too many times to count, Laurie.”

I lean in and kiss him, making it slow and sweet, and he cups my face in his big palms, running his fingers through my hair. I pull back, dabbing a kiss on his nose that makes him give a moue of disgust, and then I move about the studio, putting things away as he launches into a description of my stepfather hobbling a colleague of his in court.

I listen idly as I admire the former bedroom that Mags had converted to a studio for me when we got together. It’s the best room in the flat, light-filled and airy, with a fantastic view of London and the river.

“You like him,” I say finally. “I don’t know why you have to conceal the fact. You’re always in a corner chatting the law.”

“What a shocking expression,” he says, wrinkling his nose. “It’s more the fact that I don’t move quickly enough when he gets near me.”

“Oh, okay,” I say, grinning at him. “Whatever you say, dearest.”

He kisses me, his lips warm and soft. I smile against the kiss, feeling him do the same. I’m ridiculously in love with him. He’s everything to me. Best friend, co-conspirator, confidant, and fierce defendant. I bless the day I came down that corridor and saw the big man and the beribboned twink. It sounds rather like an odd book by Barbara Cartland, but the truth is that it was the start of our own love story. Strange and beautiful.

I suppose it’s because of him that my family are back in the foreground of my life. Through his friendship with Lennie and Chris, he leveraged his way in with the rest of my siblings. My mother adores him, and even my stepfather is happy to have the former bane of his life to talk to at dinner parties. In fact, Mags might be the one person who none of my siblings have a problem with.

I’ve met his family too. His father is a physical vision of how Mags will look in the future, although Mags won’t have the very dramatic woman who is his father’s fourth wife. I inveigled Mags into visiting him the first time by claiming that I needed to get out of the city. He obliged with that fierce concentration he focused on my rehabilitation, but it went so well that we now visit them every month. It’s usually a visit filled with tons of marital drama that I love, and Mags treats with a blithe equanimity. Nevertheless, his father adores him, and I make every effort to bring him into our circle, and they’ve grown closer over the years.