I follow her through to the kitchen where my brother is putting the finishing touches to what smells like stir-fry. On the nearby table is a huge stack of Audacity Foundation brochures. They have a stall at the green summit tomorrow. He comes over, slaps me silently and heartily on the back once, and slides an open bottle of beer over to me. I take it with an equally silent salute and raise it gratefully to my lips. Jesus, that’s good.

While my mind was busy formulating questions on the bike ride over, it was also busy prioritising them, so I go ahead and blurt out what is by far the most important one. ‘Is Tabby going to be okay?’

Athena picks up her glass of white wine. ‘It seems so, yes.’

I blow out a breath. ‘Good. That’s good. What’s wrong with her?’

‘She has a rare congenital heart defect.’

Congenital… ‘She was born with it?’

‘Yes. Her pulmonary valve, which takes blood from her heart to her lungs, was too narrow when she was born. She had an operation at birth to replace it, and one aged three, but she’s been overdue another one for some time. She had the replacement done yesterday, and from what Marlowe tells me, it all went smoothly, thank God.’

She’s been speaking to Marlowe. Marlowe has shared this emergency with her. Of course she has—her little girl is Athena’s goddaughter.

‘But I thought she was in the ICU.’

‘It’s standard for a major operation like that,’ Athena says, and her voice is so calm and assured that I could kiss her. ‘They’re just observing her.’

‘Okay. Great. That’s good. And—sorry, why go to the US?’

‘Duke has the world’s leading paediatric cardiothoracic surgeons,’ she explains patiently, and I realise she’s already told me this over the phone. ‘Plus, they did it laparoscopically. Over here, it would have meant open-heart surgery. The NHS was dragging its feet and Great Ormond Street couldn’t operate before November in any case. Tabby didn’t have time to wait.’

Great Ormond Street. The gala that I treated as a chance to flaunt my boring-as-fuck supermodel trophy on the red carpet was actually raising money for families like Marlowe’s. A wave of nausea and self-disgust rolls through me.

‘How do you know she didn’t have time to wait?’ I ask. My voice sounds thick. My brain feels thick. Cotton woolly.