‘He’s my manager, not my brother – or my dad, as Ali wonderfully joked. You can say it how it is about him.’

‘Well, he acts more like I would’ve expected you to act. Thinks he can have any girl he wants, treats them like prostitutes…’

‘I can treat you like a hooker if you want,’ Freddie jokes.

‘If that means you’re going to pay me, go for it,’ I reply.

Jokes aside, Freddie is so unbelievably handsome and charming and funny, I do actually feel as if he should be invoicing me. For the acting work he’s doing for me, not the sex. Although I’d certainly command a much higher wage for that performance if I were him. The Freddie you see on the big screen – the Edward Eden character – is almost too sexy. Unrealistically, unattainably sexy. But the real Freddie, the one I slept with… there’s something far sexier about him.

Freddie sweeps my hair from my face before taking my chin in between his thumb and his index finger and kissing me on the lips. He is somehow even more delicious than my hot chocolate.

Sitting here, wrapped up in him, gazing at the stars and talking, pausing only to eat, drink or kiss, I can’t believe my luck. Somehow the worst thing that has ever happened to me has turned into the best thing that has ever happened to me. Well, sort of. Living in the moment, everything is amazing, but my heart has taken this little burst of joy and run away with it. I know that it’s one of the scariest things you can do, but I’m falling for Freddie. I need to know what he thinks the future holds.

‘I know what I’m supposed to be doing,’ Freddie says, resuming our conversation after yet another kissing break. ‘I should be driving expensive cars, full of drugs and Victoria’s Secret models, to my massive house in the hills.’

I laugh to myself, because my life is more a case of driving the Ford Fiesta I share with Daniel, full of shopping and the grandma I just drove for it, to her retirement home in South Croydon. My, how the other half lives.

‘What’s stopping you?’ I ask.

‘I became an actor because I wanted to act. Edge of Eden might not be my first choice of role, but I’m so lucky to have landed it, and we’ve all got to start somewhere. I know that, if I do this, I’ll have my pick of whatever roles I want after.’

‘You don’t have that yet?’ I ask curiously.

‘Contracts,’ he tells me. ‘I’ve agreed to do the Eden trilogy, so I’ll have to wait until after that.’

‘I can’t believe you’re Edward Eden,’ I say, laughing to myself. ‘You’re every woman’s fantasy.’

‘It’s not all it’s cracked up to be,’ he says. ‘It’s a bit full-on for me. I’m not used to it. I was still serving people drinks the day before I got the call to say the role was mine. Pretty much from the moment they announced my name, I knew that my life wouldn’t be the same. I just didn’t realise how different it would be.’