Jake disappeared for two hours after the interview and didn’t answer my calls, so I sent him a message to warn him the last part had been recorded. Hayley emailed me then to ask how the interview had gone but I was too nervous to tell her. I hoped I’d be able to temper sending news of that disaster with a good report from the author panel at least, so I held off replying to her for now.

I walked into the room the panel was going to be held in. There was a table set up with five spaces for the authors and the chair of the panel. The rest of the room had chairs placed in rows and people were starting to fill them, a buzz of chatter humming around me. I was relieved to see Liv and Tessa in the back row, waving at me to join them.

‘I didn’t think you’d come to this,’ I said as I sat down next to Liv.

‘We wanted to support you and see how Jake went down in the room,’ Liv replied. ‘Plus, we always need writing tips ourselves,’ she added with a laugh.

I leaned in closer to them. ‘The podcast interview didn’t go very well so I’m worried…’

I trailed off as the panel host, the romance conference organiser Christine came in, followed by Davis Mulberry, two other authors I vaguely recognised, and then Jake. He strode in but I wondered if anyone else in the room could see the way his eyes roamed over the packed-out audience or the way he stumbled a little on the way to his seat, or if it was just me.

As Jake sat down, his gaze fell on me. I tried to give him a reassuring nod.

He kept his eyes on mine for a few seconds, his face expressionless. I longed to know what he was thinking. He had to be nervous especially after the difficult podcast interview. I was too. I really hoped this would go better otherwise I had no idea what Hayley was going to say. When Jake looked away from me, I felt strangely disappointed. I was intimidated by that piercing gaze of his but it also felt weirdly special to be on the receiving end of it.