‘I’m going to stay with my parents for a few days,’ she answers, her voice level. She knows, somehow, that it’s important not to betray her nerves.

‘Your parents.’

His eyes are on hers, and even though he seems calm, unperturbed, an undercurrent of quivering doubt is there beneath it. He knows that she never goes home. He knows her reasons for staying away.

‘Jake is coming to pick me up,’ she says, the lie slipping awkwardly from her tongue. ‘He’ll be here soon.’

Anton nods, never once releasing her from his gaze.

The door to her bedroom lies open. She remembers that the letters are right there on the bed. Has he seen them? How long has he been down here? She doesn’t ask – or question him on the liberty he has taken in walking down here, entering her private space without first seeking permission. She doesn’t ask because she’s afraid, and somehow not asking draws attention to that fear.

‘You’re not coming back, are you?’ he asks, and she catches the forlorn note that is barely there in his voice.

She shakes her head. There is something shameful about her plan to run away. After all they had shared, all that he has done for her in the past few days. But those letters … Now that she’s read them, now that she knows …

‘Could I ask one thing of you?’

She looks up, sees the shyly perturbed look on his face.

‘Would you come upstairs and have one last drink with me before you leave?’

‘Oh.’

Fear jumps along her nerves. She knows she should not go back up those stairs.

‘I get the feeling that after today we will not see each other again,’ he tells her, his voice a silky ribbon. ‘I would so like for us to sit down this one last time, just like we did at the start of the summer. A cold glass of white wine, a little company. You have no idea how that was a lifeline to me, Leah. How that saved me. Please. Just until Jake comes for you. Let’s part as good friends. What do you say?’

She thinks of their conversations in the garden, the soft warm night air, the consolation of talk. He had been kind to her. He’s standing there, waiting for an answer, and she thinks about her phone charging in the kitchen, the front door locked, just the two of them alone together in this house. A whisper of nerves passes over the back of her neck. Somehow she cannot think of a way to say no.