Kate withdrew her hand. If his touch had thrilled her earlier, she now couldn’t bear it. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘What did I say?’

‘It’s not what you said, but what you did. I . . .’

He nodded. ‘I understand. I’m sorry.’ He stared at his hands. She couldn’t help noticing how fine they were, always one of the most attractive things about him. ‘I’m here for you,’ he said. ‘Always. If ever and whenever you need me. That’s all you should know. I have nothing else in my life, and if I never have anything else but your occasional friendship, that’s enough for me.’ He smiled at her, and the genuine love and warmth in his gaze brought tears to her eyes. She brushed them impatiently away.

‘How would it work?’ he asked. ‘This friendship, this new life, just to give me some hope to live for.’

‘I don’t know. I’d have to do some thinking about it. I’d need to persuade the Service to turn a blind eye to you moving permanently to take up residence in France or Spain or Italy, perhaps.’

‘France. It’s closer.’

‘Okay. You’d have to work out where you wanted to go. Then we could try to make a plan so the kids could come over once or twice a month. Maybe sometimes I could come along.’

‘Sounds great.’ His smile was broad. She found herself smiling back, the warmth spreading through her. ‘Come on,’ she said. ‘We’d better get going.’

Back in the car, most things were the same: the intermittent rain, snow and hail, the poor visibility, the condensation on the windscreen and the gloom of the drab Russian night.

But something was different. Hope had transformed their demeanour. Kate could hear it in Stuart – he was mentally far away, but humming old songs from the eighties – and feel it in herself. She found her mind roaming through the possibilities she had just outlined. Where would he go? What would he do? She found herself excited already at the prospect of getting on a plane with the kids to spend a weekend with their father in the South of France. Not for love, much less for sex. But the prospect that a true and decent friendship held, well, that was something to hold out for.

She thought about sex. She’d changed her sanitary towel in the disgusting toilet in the last diner and, while there was certainly some bleeding, it was nothing like as profound as the last time she’d taken the morning-after pill. She allowed her mind to roam worriedly over the possibility that it might not have worked. Christ, what if she really was pregnant?

All of which led her back to the thought of Sergei’s slaughtered body in that carriage. The momentary sense of wellbeing that had enveloped her evaporated in an instant.