‘When they’re paying out this kind of money, they don’t fuck around. You think they’re going to pay out close to a hundred grand a month to kiss you and play with your tits every now and again? Whoever hires you will work you hard as fuck, and you are not cut out for it. It would be entirely too overwhelming for your nervous system. I can’t even imagine the toll it would take on your mental health. What good will it do Tabby if her sole caregiver has a nervous breakdown because she’s so traumatised?’

I stare at her in horror. Her tone is cold, and her words have their desired effect because I know she’s right. When it comes to a normal, healthy sex life, I haven’t even been playing in the paddling pool in recent years. What I’m proposing would be the equivalent of cliff-diving into treacherous, shark-filled waters.

I’d be so out of my depth it would be laughable if it weren’t so utterly terrifying.

Except that I’m all out of options, and if prostituting myself is the sole remaining solution left to me, then I’m sure as hell going to take it. And every time I have to put out, I’ll close my eyes and think of my daughter’s right ventricle pumping lots and lots of juicy blood into her little lungs to get beautifully oxygenated.

‘I understand what you’re saying,’ I tell my best friend. ‘But you’re the smartest person I know and the most practical. This has to happen. For God’s sake, tell me how we do it in the least painful way possible.’

There’s silence as we glare at each other, and I see the moment she accepts that I’m not backing down. Her breath leaves her body with a loud, defeated whoosh, and she stands. She’s still in sky-high ivory-coloured heels and glossy nude stockings, and it strikes me that I’d have to seriously up my work attire game from the floaty, cheap sundresses I’ve favoured while working at the Royal Academy.

‘Getting you in would be the first hurdle,’ she muses aloud, strumming her fingers on the top of my TV. ‘But I could speak to Camille and try to pave the way. She won’t like it, but if I assure her that you can handle it, I suspect she’ll do it as a favour to me.’

Camille runs the Seraph team and is responsible for the hiring. From everything Athena’s told me about her over the years, she sounds both fair and sensible. I nod. ‘Okay. Good. I suppose you’ll have to tell her about Tabs, but I wouldn’t want any of the guys knowing.’