But one other thing made her shiver. She had gone to collect her coat from the cloakroom while Victorija paid the bill. She got her coat and saw Victorija on the other side of the room, then turned away to slip her coat on. In less than a second Victorija was behind her helping her put her jacket on. Byron had appeared from nowhere, several times during their courtship, making her jump, as Victorija did tonight.

There were some truths she had pushed to the darkest part of her mind for the past months, and now after meeting Victorija, they were demanding she address them again.

Amelia felt the cold through to her bones tonight. She made a hot water bottle and a hot cup of cocoa, and went to bed. She got under the blankets and picked up her iPad from the side table. She had a few messages and emails to check. Just as she opened up Facebook, she got an instant message from Daisy asking her if she got home safely.

She recalled Daisy’s strange reaction to Victorija earlier that evening, and now she was checking to see if she was safe. It wasn’t something she would normally do.

“Why do I feel like I’m the only one who doesn’t know what’s going on.” Just like Monte Carlo.

She quickly typed out a reply, and checked her emails. There were at least five different messages from Daisy with links to her YouTube videos. Amelia clicked the first one and it happened to be about the legend of the New Forest witches’ coven, in the south of England.

Her religious parents always made disparaging comments about the folk stories and rumours about them while she grew up. She could never quite believe why her parents were worried about an apparently harmless gaggle of witches casting imaginary spells, but they did believe that gay people were evil, and that women who wore make-up were harlots, so it was hardly surprising.

Amelia watched Daisy and her friends walk through the forest paths, which during the day were idyllic, but in the early evening took on a whole other feel. Daisy’s presentation to the camera was so professional, and her group of friends so charming, that she found herself laughing often, until they emerged into a clearing with an old stone cottage. The place felt eerily familiar.

Daisy walked to an old stone circle in the grounds outside the cottage, where she explained legend said the witches gathered and performed their old traditional magic.

An uneasy feeling gripped Amelia, and her heart began to pound. Something wasn’t right, but she didn’t want to face it. She shut off her iPad and got up to draw at the drafting table in the living room of her flat. Drawing and designing always calmed her.