He’s looking at me, as if he was just waiting for me to turn round, and he raises his glass to me. I feel butterflies in my stomach but fortunately I have the kind of face that can express absolutely no emotion whatsoever, and so I just raise my glass in return and turn slowly back to Jonathan. I’ve drawn breath to say, ‘Who is that gorgeous man behind me?’ but then I stop because, in the time it’s taken me to turn away and turn back, Jonathan has disappeared. I do a double take, and look around in every direction, but he is nowhere to be seen.

I must look completely flummoxed because the gorgeous man comes up to me, laughing, and says, ‘Your little bird has flown,’ as if I’ve somehow been stood up. ‘Oh, that’s not my little bird,’ I say, ‘that’s just my friend.’

‘Friend as in friend,’ he says, ‘or friend as in friend?’

‘Friend as in friend,’ I say, sounding like a complete cretin, but he smiles again and says, ‘Pleased to hear it,’ and we clink glasses. He is extremely good looking, with a strong jawline, narrow eyes, deep creases down his cheeks when he smiles and straw-coloured hair that looks as if it might even be natural. It’s cut short on the sides, with a long, thick bit at the back, which I want to grab. His shirt is even tighter than mine, and I can see that he spends a great deal of time in the gym, so we have that in common. I’m already planning a future together when he says, ‘What’s your name, mate?’

‘Robert.’

He puts out a big, square hand and says, ‘Stuart.’ We shake, and I’m relieved to find that he shakes hands like a normal person, not one of those complicated handshakes that I always get wrong. The shake goes on for quite a long time.

‘Good to meet you, Stuart,’ I say, taking back my hand. ‘How do you know Hadley?’

He laughs, and his eyes are so narrow that you can’t see any white at all, just two black slits, like in a mask. ‘How does anyone know Hadley?’

This makes me even more convinced that he’s a drug dealer.

‘What are you doing later?’ he asks, openly running his eyes up and down my torso. I was planning to be in bed by about ten o’clock, in order to get into work early and prepare for this big pitch meeting, but I say, ‘Nothing in particular.’

‘Good,’ he says. ‘Don’t go away.’

And then he, too, disappears, and while I’m tracking his broad shoulders and powerful arse through the crowd until he’s swallowed up by Romanian gypsies, Jonathan rematerialises. I almost expect there to be a puff of smoke. He is sniffing, so I know where he’s been.

‘Who were you talking to?’ he says, as if I’d been neglecting him.

‘Just a guy. His name’s Stuart.’

‘Stuart indeed.’ Jonathan hates all my boyfriends on principle, because they disrupt his social life. ‘He looks like a rent boy.’