As she got into it, she saw her friends being pestered but couldn’t think how to help them, and at least there were two of them. Switching on her engine, she drove quickly off into the traffic, heading for home.

She was furious about this. Had those idiots nothing better to do than hound her?

When her friends joined her at her house, they thought it was a bit of a laugh.

She didn’t.

Lisa and Ashley pestered her for information about Jez, but she didn’t give them anything that wasn’t already known, nothing personal. It’d have felt like a betrayal.

She hoped this stupid fuss would soon die down. How did the poor man stand it, year after year? No wonder he looked sad.

But his music wasn’t sad – well, most of it wasn’t. His music ranged over every human emotion she could think of and touched all of hers. She smiled wryly – hers and those of thousands of other women of all ages. As did his looks, that wonderful hawk-like face and those deep-set dark eyes that seemed to brood and smoulder.

Before Jez could leave the next afternoon to look at some houses, the room phone rang. Since Donna was on her mobile, gesticulating and talking earnestly, Jez picked up the call himself. No danger in speaking to hotel staff, just the irritation of their always being so damned obsequious.

‘Reception here, Mr Winter. I’m so sorry to disturb you, but we have a young man down here who says he’s your son.’

The room spun round him and Jez had to clutch the table to steady himself. ‘What—’ He had to swallow hard before he could finish the sentence. ‘What’s his name?’

There was a mutter of voices, then, ‘Tom Prichard.’

The room spun even more wildly but he forced words out. ‘Get someone to bring him up and please, not a word about who he says he is to anyone.’

‘Of course not, Mr Winter. You can rely on our discretion absolutely.’

Jez put the phone down and closed his eyes for a moment, then realised he was wasting time. He went across to Donna, who had her back to him, and tapped her shoulder.

‘Just a minute,’ she said into the phone and looked at him enquiringly.

‘My son’s turned up at the hotel. I’ve never met him before, and I’d like this meeting to be private. Could you and Craig go somewhere else for a while? And obviously, I shan’t be going out now.’

She stared at him wide-eyed, mouthing the word son in shock. Then she nodded and said curtly into the phone, ‘Something’s just come up. I’ll ring you back in five.’ She looked at Jez sympathetically. ‘I didn’t know you had a son.’

‘No. His mother kept him well away from me.’

‘That’s sad. Will you be all right?’

Even in the midst of his turmoil, he could tell that she really cared about how he felt, and was touched by that. She’d only been with them for five months, on a year’s contract, but she’d been brilliant as a PA, the best he’d ever had. ‘I don’t know. But this is something for me to do alone.’ He couldn’t imagine what had suddenly brought Tom to London to see him, but it could only be trouble.