Oh, shit. I’d forgotten something important. It definitely wasn’t our anniversary because while we hadn’t worked out when it officially was on account of the whole pretending-to-date-before-officially-dating thing, we’d agreed it was before the Beetle Drive, which had already happened. And it wasn’t Oliver’s birthday because, while I had forgotten when that was exactly, I knew it wasn’t in May.

“What’s going on?” I asked in the wary voice of a man who felt he should have known but didn’t.

Oliver had gone a little pink. “Well, I felt bad that I wasn’t more supportive when Bridget needed your help. And I thought since we missed Pretty Woman: The Musical, I could, instead, bring Pretty Woman to you.”

My gaze flicked from the jewellery box to black-tie Oliver and back again. “You’d better not be taking me to the opera. You know I hate opera.”

“I’m not taking you to the opera,” Oliver said. “I couldn’t get tickets and my private jet is being detailed.”

Thank God for that. I’d do many things for Oliver, but I drew the line at watching people sing their feelings in languages I didn’t understand. Relaxing slightly, I gave him a quizzical look. “Do I need to be in a red dress?”

“You can if you want to be, but I’m not sure it’s quite your style. Although”—he offered the jewellery box—“there is something missing.”

“I’m not sure anything else is going to fit in these…” I peered down at myself. “Jeans?”

“You do wear very tight jeans,” agreed Oliver. He flipped open the box to reveal a necklace of Love Hearts—the weird chalky sweets with little messages on them—threaded on elastic. “You mustn’t get too excited,” he went on, “because they’re on loan.”

I gaped at him. “From whom?”

“Well, I can’t say, ‘Don’t get too excited, I bought these for one pound thirty from a sweet shop.’”

“You could say, ‘Don’t get too excited, these are disgusting.’ Which would be true. My rule is never buy a sweet that’s more famous for how it looks than how it tastes.”

Oliver’s brows dipped scowlishly. “Just take the fucking necklace, Lucien.”

I reached out, then hesitated. “You’re going to snap the box on my fingers, aren’t you?”

There was the slightest of pauses. Then Oliver smiled. “For verisimilitude.”

So I reached out, and he snapped, and I tried to look as adorable as Julia Roberts, but I think I mostly looked like someone who’d had a jewellery box closed on his fingers.

“Oh, come on,” said Oliver, “that did not hurt. I was very careful.”

“It’s not the pain. It’s the shock.”

“You knew it was coming. You literally told me you knew it was coming.”

I glared in a not-really sort of way. “Then you try it.”