Ronnie covered her hand on the rail. Pax let it rest there as, without speaking, both women closed their eyes. And as the grass, hedges and clouds flew past in Ronnie’s head, she sensed how terribly alike they were.

‘When things got really bad with Mack – not the recent stuff, but before, when we were trying for Kes and he got so high-handed, I found I couldn’t do it at all, couldn’t close my eyes and ride away from it in my imagination.’

‘How do you mean “high-handed”?’

‘He’s always been a bit of a control freak, but he took conception so seriously, reading my temperature every day, checking my weight, making me take all sorts of supplements, wear loose clothes, do certain exercises, eat only certain food. He knew more about my cycle than I did by the end. He wouldn’t let me discuss trying to get pregnant with my girlfriends, wanted baby-making to be this intimate, private thing, but I felt like a lab rat. And every month I was a failure because I bled.’

Ronnie’s own blood boiled at this. ‘Was it Mack who stopped you making any contact with me?’

‘Alice was pretty set against it too,’ Pax hedged. Then she nodded, confessing, ‘Mack said you were a bad influence. I never told him about Bay,’ she added quickly, looking away. ‘I was in a bit of a bad place when we met.’

‘I heard your London friends were pretty wild.’

The hand beneath hers slid away. ‘My bath will be cold.’ She headed towards the stairs.

‘Run another later.’

‘You should go.’ She said it so kindly, it was a can’t-turn-down invitation.

‘I’ll let myself out.’

Pax kissed her mother goodnight at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Let’s not talk about this again.’

‘If that’s what you want.’

‘I’ve talked enough. Kes needs to believe there was love between his parents, just as I did.’

‘I loved your father very much once.’

‘And now you love Blair Robertson.’

Ronnie step back in surprise. ‘Pax, I really don’t—’

‘I think you two need each other more than you realise. Please call him.’ With a bright, defensive smile she must have picked up from Luca, Pax headed upstairs.

Guiltily and furtively, Ronnie hurried to the dresser and opened the bottom left-hand cupboard. A Horace Batten boot-box tied up with old horse-rug fillet strings, he’d said. You couldn’t miss it.

But the box wasn’t there.

Ronnie felt a sudden angry ache for Lester. He was needed here, guarding the secrets, demanding protocol. This was all wrong.

She could hear the tap running in the bathroom, the radio on, volume low. The Archers’ theme tune was playing through, an anthem that took her straight back to childhood, her mother cooking at the Aga, stepping over the dogs, sherry schooner and cigarette on the go, recounting every visitor to the stud that day. Pax’s childhood too. Mirror images.

Maybe nothing much had changed.

Heading through the courtyard to the back door of the main house, Ronnie could smell onions frying and saw Luca moving about in the main kitchen, drinking his funny green tea, freshly showered, all golden hair and big shoulders. Soon enough Pax would realise that he came straight out of the jar ready-mixed with concentrated goodness. Perhaps she had already.