His suite is on the top floor, with views over Maximilianstrasse and the Schaezlerpalais. They enter with a key card to find themselves at one end of a series of rooms, each closing off to the next with a pocket door that disappears into the wall. First is a lounge area, with a widescreen TV, sofa, a low wooden chair and a huge knitted rug over a chevron-laid wooden floor. The bedroom is next, with a bed that must be the size of two kings combined, and the fluffiest bedding Evie has ever seen. Then there’s the bathroom, all shiny brass taps and marble tops, a huge wet-room shower, and then a wardrobe at the far end, where somebody has already unpacked Duke’s clothes, his designer suitcases stacked neatly in the corner.

‘Whoa,’ Evie says. ‘So this is how the other half live, huh?’ she marvels, padding through to get a proper look.

‘You say it like you’re not one of us,’ Duke retorts, doing the same. He hangs up his coat.

‘I’m not,’ she says, watching him peel off his jumper. He sees her, and she looks away immediately.

‘What do you mean?’ he asks.

‘I meant that I could never afford a hotel, or a room, like this, myself,’ she says, like it’s obvious.

‘But you’re a bestselling author,’ he says. ‘Isn’t this your world too?’

She scoffs, thinking he’s making a joke. Everyone knows you don’t get into writing for the money. ‘You know I didn’t write Harry Potter, don’t you?’ she says. ‘Most of us earn just about enough to get by.’

‘Oh,’ he says. ‘I didn’t know that.’

‘No reason why you should,’ she says.

‘Hmm. But how can a person be a New York Times bestseller and sell the rights to multiple books for screen, and not be …’

‘Rich?’ she supplies.

‘You know what I mean.’

‘Why are you so interested in my finances?’ Evie asks, annoyed. ‘I thought Brits were shy about money talk?’

‘I’m not interested …’ he tells her. ‘I was just curious.’

‘Curiosity killed the cat.’

‘Okay,’ he says, shifting so he can look at her. ‘Sorry to ask. My bad.’