‘Firstly, they wouldn’t stop and you know it. They’d probably start referring to him as my “first husband”. Secondly.’ I stopped, took a deep breath, and dared to sneak a look at him through the darkness. ‘We aren’t engaged. Adam asked me, and I said no. We aren’t anything. Which is why I’m here.’ Another deep breath. ‘And why I abstained from the vote.’

For an endless, heart-wrenching minute, Henry said nothing. Eventually, at the point I was about to get up and run away again, he cleared his throat.

‘Are you… do you… you abstained from the vote because you aren’t ruling out the possibility that I become a member of your family one day?’

‘Yes,’ I managed to squeak. Then, emboldened by the darkness, knowing that I had to do something about these feelings or I’d simply implode, I carried on. ‘Via marrying me.’

The shadows prevented me from seeing his expression, but I could hear the familiar frown in his voice. ‘You mean you don’t not want to marry me, one day?’

‘I mean that I’m definitely up for exploring the possibility of our parents being right.’ I let out a weak laugh. ‘They’re right about practically everything else, after all. Worth giving it a go, perhaps? We could, I don’t know, try a few dates?’

‘Except there’s Adam.’

‘What? No, there isn’t Adam, I just said that.’

‘Bea. There’s always been Adam. At the Christmas party, the Spectaculars, even sharing a room in Scotland he was there, with his flirty messages. You’ve broken up with him, what, half a dozen times before? And every time.’ He paused to swallow and catch his breath. ‘Every time, I felt that twinge of hope. That stupid, pointless hope. That maybe, this time, your whole world would stop revolving around him long enough for you to see me. I can’t go back to that. I’m working for your family now. I live in the stable block. Initially, part of the reason I applied for this school rather than anywhere else was because I actually fooled myself into thinking he was out of the picture for good this time. And then here he is, Christmas Day, knocking on your door. I can’t go on a few casual dates with you, as if it’s not that big a deal. As if I haven’t loved you since we were six years old. Like when he turns up again with some new song about your hair or your smile or how this time he’s finally stopped being a selfish git, and you go to him, it won’t destroy me.