‘I’m not tired! You promised me a cowboy sleepover, Gronny.’

Raising her hands, she went next door to pick up the handset, grateful to hear Blair’s voice, even crackly with interference on a bad line.

‘How’s it going, beautiful?’

‘I have two to babysit,’ she sighed, hearing shrieks and hoots next door, followed by the ‘You Got a Friend In Me’ refrain. ‘Talk to me like a grown-up, Blair.’

‘My pleasure,’ he growled. ‘I’ve missed you.’

‘I’ve missed you more.’

Which, Ronnie realised as they carried on in much the same vein, wasn’t very grown-up at all. But she wouldn’t change what they had for the world.

*

On a leather sofa by a pub fire, drunk on no more than mutual affection and honesty, Pax and Luca made a pact to start out on the road to recovery together with their own rules and no need to involve God, who they agreed was happy to keep a close eye on Luca and turn a blind one to Pax’s agnosticism.

And even though she knew he’d be gone by harvest, she felt stronger than she’d thought possible, not wanting to live in anything more than the here and now. All she had to do was think back to the wind on her face as she galloped, to his lips on hers like a first kiss, to her lioness determination to stand up to the Forsyths’ bullying and give Kes her best self. Her sober self. Her shiny and new self. Anything was possible just so long as she concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other.

‘I’ll be here for you every step of the way,’ Luca told her, his smile so different without the beard, no longer a defensive shield, but a force field with her inside it, with the best of company.

‘Not Twelve Steps.’ She pulled the leaflet from her pocket and held it up.

He took it and ripped it in two, their fingers touching, setting off a charge deep inside her. ‘We’ll make up our own twelve.’

‘One – admit you have a problem.’ She got lost looking into his eyes.

‘I am a drunk,’ he said quietly.

‘I am too.’

Neither of them looked away and he leaned closer. ‘Seek help for your problem is Step Two.’

‘Help me.’ She broke the eye-hold first, swallowing the sting of shame on her tongue, looking at his unfamiliar chin, transfixed by the new shelf of his jawline. She wanted to run her finger along it. But it was Luca who reached up, touching her cheek and tracing a line to her own chin, gently tilting it so that she was looking at him again.

‘I’ll help you.’ He held her eye.

They said nothing for a long time. Looking at each other was lovely.

‘Three,’ she whispered eventually, ‘we must trust each other.’

He made a fist and she followed, knuckles dovetailing together. ‘Four, admit our weaknesses.’

‘I lick the butter knife and leave lights on.’