Eve waves away a bee that has strayed from the sage, picks up the knife again and continues to slice the okra. Martin is their guest, on holiday with his kids. He is married as she is, of course nothing’s happened. They are playing, that’s all, he knows that too, a delicious little game, as brief and harmless as any the children play.

‘Eve!’ It’s Charley’s voice this time, she sounds breathless.

‘Here I am,’ Eve replies calmly. Grace is joining them in a few days; her children have been fine, playing with the others in the pool or crouching and running with them among the trees. Their voices thread through the day; she has hardly seen them since they arrived.

‘Ash has been stung.’ Charley bursts through the olive trees, she looks scared. ‘Eric said to find you, you have to bring something, his arm’s all puffy.’

Eve puts the knife down, hurries into the kitchen and burrows into the cupboard above the sink, pulling out a half-empty box of paracetamol, bandages, a sticky bottle of Calpol and a can of antihistamine spray. Eric is sitting on the stone wall by the pool, Ash hiccupping and whimpering in his arms. Sorrel stands next to him, sucking her thumb. Blake and Poppy are nearby, shivering. Izzy is floating in the centre of the pool, eyes closed and arms out, her face relaxed.

‘He’ll live,’ Eric says. The small upper arm is bulging, a punctum at its centre. Eve kisses the swollen flesh, tasting an echo of sweetness on the hot skin. She sprays antihistamine on the sting and Ash yells with surprise, then seeing a spoon of Calpol approach, clamps his mouth around it. She takes him from Eric, unbuttoning her shirt. Her breast spills out, white against the brown of her arm, the surface veins like blue-green tributaries flowing towards the dark nipple.

‘Ugh.’ Poppy screws up her nose in disgust. She swerves away and jumps neatly into the pool followed by Charley and Blake. Eric stands up, shaking his head.

‘It’s time he grew out of that, Eve.’ He slides into the pool after the children.

Sorrel lingers, her breath warm on Eve’s shoulder. ‘I thought he was going to die,’ she whispers, her eyes swimming with tears.

Eve puts an arm around Sorrel’s stocky little body and pulls her close, kissing her damp forehead. ‘Ash isn’t going to die, sweetheart, it’s just a bee sting.’

‘Joely couldn’t breathe when she was stung, she had to go to hospital in an ambulance.’

‘Joely is allergic to bee stings then; Ash isn’t. You mustn’t worry.’

Ash’s eyes are shut, his fingers starfish on her breast. A cool shadow falls on her skin and Martin smiles down at her, grasping a sheaf of papers in ink-stained fingers. He sits on the wall beside her, comforting and disconcerting at the same time.