This was ridiculously awkward. ‘Yes, of course. We’re just going out. Let me give you the money now.’

I opened my wallet. It was empty.

‘How much is it?’ Charlie asked, opening her bag.

‘Sixteen pounds for two hours,’ Kristi said, looking around. The flat was messier than usual and probably stank of sex and the cannabis we’d been smoking occasionally. The bin was full of condoms and the bed wasn’t made.

Charlie handed Kristi £20 and told her to keep the change, as I always did. Then we left her to it.

It must have been zero degrees outside, the sky heavy with the threat of snow.

‘She looks like a model,’ Charlie said.

‘Who, Kristi?’

She rolled her eyes. ‘Who do you think I’m talking about? A model who’s been beaten up.’

‘Maybe she had an accident.’

‘What, she walked into a door?’ Charlie craned her neck to look up at my flat.

‘What do you think I should do?’

Charlie sighed. ‘There’s probably nothing you can do. It’s a shame, though.’ She touched her own face, staring up at the building. ‘She really is beautiful. Shame she’s being exploited.’

‘Please don’t start that one again.’

Charlie narrowed her eyes and for a moment I thought she was going to launch into another tirade. But she merely said, again, ‘It’s a shame.’

The next day, I had a meeting with Karen to show her the work I’d done on her site, after which I was due to see Victor to talk about the Wowcom project.

Karen was less than enthusiastic when I showed her the mock-ups I’d been working on – that were overdue, in fact.

‘I think it needs some work,’ she said, casting her eye over the simple white and purple design I’d created. ‘It’s a bit . . .’ She pulled a face.

I was taken aback. I thought it looked elegant and professional. ‘But this is what you said you wanted.’

We were in the same coffee shop as before but her mood was completely different. Gone was the playfulness and ironic conversation of our last meeting. I had seen her like this before, when she was overtired or had had a run-in with her ex or a difficult client. Maybe that’s what had happened. She’d been given a hard time and was paying it forward.

‘I’m sorry Andrew, but I imagined it completely different to this. I thought it would have some more “wow.” My friend Cassie has just set up her own site. It looks better than this and she used a template she found online.’

I wondered who she’d been talking to. Had someone told her she was being ripped off?