‘Oh my darling. Don’t ever wish you were normal – as if any one of us really is. Do normal girls find their long-lost grandparents and plan an expedition to meet them? Do they take in half-dead puppies they find in the woods and teach them how to dance? Do they decide that they’re so determined to be courageous and powerful that they change their own name? You are anything but normal, and that’s what makes you so incredible. Was Frodo normal? Was Katniss Everdeen? Joan of Arc was pretty much the least normal woman in history!’

‘Okay, okay, I get it!’ Joan sniffled, laughing through her tears. ‘I’m a weirdo but a good weirdo, so I might as well dress like it so we can find out straight away if Nana and Grandad are going to be all right with it or not.’

‘Genuinely, your outfit is not going to matter.’ I handed her a tissue from the box by her bed. ‘I understand that first impressions count, but I promise that it won’t make a difference here. Neither will what you say, or how you act.’

‘When you first saw me, what did you think?’ she asked, trying to sound blasé about it.

‘I thought, That girl has very fine taste in books. I think I’d better buy the house next-door-but-one so we can be friends.’

‘Oh, shut up!’ Joan gave me a frustrated shove, but when she appeared downstairs ten minutes later in her shorts and T-shirt, the worried look had been replaced by a gleam of excitement.

When I opened the front door, it took me a couple of blinks to process that it was Sam rather than a stray premiership footballer or Hollywood actor. The dark navy suit and white shirt unbuttoned at the tanned neck altered not only his appearance, but his whole posture and manner.

‘I told you,’ he said, grinning at the look on my face before affecting a serious, yet compassionate expression as he gazed (or dare I say smouldered?) into my eyes. ‘Hello, I do apologise for interrupting your day, but I’m Samuel Parker, solicitor with Parker and Sons. I was hoping to speak with Olivia Tennyson?’

Yes please!

The corner of his mouth creased up in a hint of a smile, and I had to turn away before my knees buckled beneath me.

‘Joan, Sam’s here. Are you ready?’

She burst out of the living room. ‘I was ready hours ago!’

‘You look lovely,’ Sam said, causing her to stop dead in her tracks.

‘You look weird,’ she replied, face screwing up. ‘But I appreciate the effort. I need to get my stuff – five seconds!’

‘No rush,’ I called up the stairs after her.

‘You look lovely too, by the way,’ Sam said quietly from behind me.