“Young men in their twenties?” I qualify.

“I like uncomplicated men,” he corrects me. “It just so happens that men in their twenties fit the bill perfectly. They don’t want any ties or a relationship.”

“Some of them obviously do,” I correct him.

He grimaces. “He was an anomaly.”

“Good job, really,” I say in a comforting tone. “You’d never have afforded his haberdashery bill.”

He shakes his head and then loses the battle with laughter. I fight the tug of my mouth at the sight of him. He has such enticing energy. He seems more alive than anyone I’ve ever met. I push the thought away. He could be a complication for me. One I don’t want. I’m relying on the fact that I’m a good twenty years over his shagging criteria to keep me safe. I’ve never needed a relationship, and that’s more true now than at any other time of my life. However, I can always use a friend, and he interests me enough to keep talking.

I turn to him. “So, tell me about your pupil. Is he a mini Mags?”

“He is not,” he says, revolted. “He has thought processes like tinned tomatoes at the moment. Soggy and mushy,” he clarifies.

“He must be in his twenties. Is it some sort of apprenticeship?”

He nods. “Anyone who passes their bar finals and wants to be a barrister must go through a pupillage with a senior barrister. For the first six months, they can’t represent anyone in court, so he shadows me and watches the process. He’ll spend a year with me, and I’ll show him the way to conduct himself in court and the way to behave as a barrister.”

“Is it with extreme sarcasm?” I ask.

He chuckles. “He could do with some of that. He’s alarmingly literal.” He shrugs. “He’ll get there.”

I eye him as we cross the road. I bet he’s a good teacher. He’s scarily bright and rather intimidating, but I’m sure that anyone who spends the year with him comes out a better lawyer. For all his laconic air, he’s a brilliant defence barrister, and you don’t enter that occupation unless you need to right a few wrongs.

We pass through some ornate cast-iron gates and onto a street lined with beautiful old regency buildings that are slumbering in the late afternoon sunshine.

I look around with interest. “So, this is Lincoln’s Inn?”

“Have you been here before?”

“No, but I love London’s history.”

“Well, this is the largest of the Inns of Court.”

“What are they? I’ve heard my stepfather talk about them before, but I’ve never wanted to ask. Mainly because I couldn’t spare the month needed for the answer.”

He laughs. “I’ll endeavour to be brief.”

“Much obliged.”