Once again there was relief in his eyes and once again it was fleeting.

‘About bed, Liebchen,’ he said nervously. ‘I’m not sure that I…It has been a long time and I—‘

She raised one of his hands and pressed it against her cheek. ‘Let’s go to bed grateful we can lie in each other’s arms again,’ she said gently. ‘There’s no need for us to rush this part of our reunion. We can just be content to be together again.’

An hour later she lay in their vast double bed, struggling for sleep. It wouldn’t come. Having Berthold sleeping by her side felt too strange, as did being back in the house she had always disliked so intensely. Another thing she found strange was that neither Max nor Hugo seemed to share her aversion for the Remer mansion. They seemed, in fact, to relish it.

‘There’s a whopping great statue of Hercules on the first floor,’ Max had said to Hugo after his first exploratory expedition. ‘It’s an absolute whizzer, come and see.’

Nancy too, once Lotti had introduced her to the enormous nursery, had soon forgotten the mansion’s lack of parkland and river. ‘There’s a giant rocking horse and lots and lots of dolls and Lotti is now my best friend and she says I can have however many of her dolls as I want for my own,’ she’d said breathlessly when Vicky had gone in to say goodnight to her. ‘And I like Papa,’ Nancy had continued. ‘I like his spectacles and his moustache and the funny way he parts his hair in the middle. And I like Claus too. He’s teaching me German and I can already count from one to ten. Eins, zwei, drei, vier, fünf, sechs, sieben, acht, neun, zehn.’

It had been quite a performance and it had left Vicky with very mixed feelings. It was good, of course, that her children and Zelda’s had become friends so quickly and easily and that they were already beginning to be able to communicate with each other. The problem was she didn’t want them to adapt too completely to life in Berlin. She didn’t want them to become Germanized in case, if they did, they became strangers to her.

‘It’s only for the summer,’ she said reassuringly to herself, ‘and then next summer, Claus, Lotti and Ilse can come and stay at Shuttleworth Hall.’

She closed her eyes, certain she could at last sleep.

Adam’s image burned the backs of her eyes.

She opened them again swiftly, tormented by her mental unfaithfulness. Staring into the darkness she was forced to face the knowledge that her feelings for Adam were too deep ever to change. Though she and Berthold were reunited, her heart still belonged to Adam Priestley—and always would do.

By the end of the summer, when it was time for Vicky and the children to return to Yorkshire, the change in her and Berthold’s relationship had become something they both knew was not going to be reversed. Platonic friendship and deep affection suited Berthold. It was something he was good at, and for the first time Vicky realized what a strain the sexual part of their marriage must once have been for him.