His honesty surprised her. There wasn’t a hint of resentment or anger there, just acceptance. So, so very different from the teen she’s once known.

‘Where did you meet him?’

‘In a bar on a beach in Thailand. I went there after …’

After he’d argued with Blake. After he’d been cut off emotionally and financially by his father. He didn’t have to say it. She knew about it – hell, the whole town knew about it.

‘You went to London?’ he asked, pushing aside his now empty bowl. He’d almost swallowed it whole.

She frowned, not quite sure where he’d got that from.

‘Small town. People talk. Even to me, albeit reluctantly most of the time,’ he said ruefully.

‘Ahh. Yes. London,’ she said, trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice. Although culinary college had been everything she’d wanted and more, she couldn’t help now but associate it with Alistair, with embarrassment and shame at how he’d run off with their wedding fund and nearly £15,000 of her inheritance from her father.

‘You didn’t like it?’

His question drew her back to the present. ‘I … No,’ she concluded determinedly. ‘I learned a lot, and it was great living with V for a year before … but it wasn’t Devon. There were bits I liked. The incredible mix of cultures, the different cuisines.’

‘The fact there was more than fish and chips on the menu?’

‘Hey – the restaurant at the estate offered more than that and you know it. But yes, Italian, Vietnamese, Indian, Spanish, Thai, Greek, French, Jamaican …’ she shook her head in awe, ‘it was incredible. But London? Dirty, smelly, busy … Rubbish piled up on streets blackened by chewing gum? Fights every Friday night as the pubs clear out? Yeah, I could do without that,’ she said, laughing a little.

‘Fair. That’s fair. But there’s something freeing about being anonymous, about being around people who aren’t—’

‘Don’t say it!’

‘What? Provincial and small-minded? You know what I mean.’

‘Not everyone is like that round here,’ she insisted, despite the fact she really did know what he meant and had also been on the receiving end of the village gossips.

‘Really? Mrs Whittaker?’

‘Is still mad at you for the Father Christmas stunt.’

He nearly spat out his wine. ‘You know about that?’

‘Henry, everyone knows about that.’

He laughed again and the sound washed over her, soothing yet firing something within her. She felt strangely nostalgic for it. Yes, she laughed with the girls during the Lost Hours, but it was different, having someone in person to laugh with. To make her feel funny. Especially when Alistair had always accused her of being boring. Of working all the time.

‘So you do something with apps,’ she said, smiling as he leaned back in his chair, clutching his hands to his heart as if mortally wounded.

‘Something with apps,’ he repeated.