‘Pax.’ Misreading the fevered look in her eyes, he stepped towards her, gaze unwavering. Her hair was out of control again, finding its own wind funnel to whip his collars and shoulders like Medusa’s snakes. And then he was in amongst the red serpents, his face almost against hers, his voice in her ear. ‘I have never stopped regretting what I did to you, you do know that, don’t you?’

‘Let’s please forget it ever happened.’

‘How can I? It was entirely my fault, and I ruined everything.’

‘It’s forgotten.’

‘Forgiven?’

She pulled away, heart thumping in her throat. Her gaze fell to the bottles in his hands. His signet ring glittered on his little finger. She’d worn it on a gold neck chain that long summer they’d been together, running it across her lips each night in bed, a small engraved game bird and an inscription of the Austen family motto inside.

‘Dum Spiro Spero,’ she said, remembering.

‘ “While I Breathe, I Hope”.’ His gaze didn’t leave hers. ‘I’ve never given up hope you’ll come back to me, Pax.’

She wanted to hear him say it again. Every word again and again and again. Only better. Louder. Shouty and broken. With tears and sobs and snot and real, deep pain like she’d felt fourteen unlucky years ago. The sort of on-your-knees pain that sent a life racketing in the wrong direction like an Exocet missile. The sort of pain that still hurt today when she looked at him.

‘Dum Spiro Spero,’ he repeated.

‘You’ll be holding your breath in hell,’ she said gently.

‘Rather a contradiction in terms, don’t you think?’

‘Don’t bloody patronise me!’ She pushed him away. The puppy, cowering, started to bark underfoot.

‘I always loved that temper of yours.’

‘Get lost!’

‘We’d have fucked sensationally after every row.’

‘Something you’ll never know.’

‘Oh, I think we will.’

‘You are so fucking shallow!’ Her hand flew out with all the instinctive, venomous rage of her teenage self, her slap deflected easily by his arm, her rings scratching across the glass of the bottle he was still holding.

He caught her fingers against its neck, admiring the big sapphire overlapping its neighbouring gold band, both now too loose. ‘Still wearing Mack’s ice and a slice, I see.’

‘What’s it to you?’ Snatching her hand away, she folded its fingers into a fist, the rings a little knuckleduster ready to knock a tooth or two of his smile out.

‘I want to see you happy, Pax.’ The arrogance had vanished. ‘Back in the day, we discovered love together, and that means a lot.’

‘Cut that out.’

‘I did.’ He patted his knuckles against his chest, wine bottle swinging. ‘I cut it straight out of here to give to you, but you’d gone.’

She rolled her eyes. ‘You always were a self-dramatist.’

‘And you still care…’ He moved closer again, voice low. ‘Which is why you’re angry.’

‘No,’ she kept hers as calm as she could muster, ‘that is because you’re a bastard, Bay.’