He levelled her with a gaze as if trying to see through her words to the truth. But it was the truth. She didn’t undervalue what she had achieved. She knew it had taken hard work, and a few sleepless nights at the beginning. But with Blake’s help, her mother’s, Victoria, Zoe and Malie’s constant cheerleading and support, she was happy. Just … a little lonely sometimes, that was all.

‘What about you?’ she asked, shifting the focus of their conversation over to him. ‘Apps? How did that happen?’

‘Well, it wouldn’t have happened without Ben, or my grandfather’s trust fund.’

‘Your business partner? From Thailand?’

‘He’s as English as they come, but yes,’ Henry said with a soft smile that gentled his features and made him even more handsome in the half light of the pub. ‘We met in Thailand. We were both doing “the travelling thing”, and got talking in a bar on the beach one night. He was midway through a tech degree, and had taken some time off because he didn’t like the constraints of fitting his ideas into the syllabus.

‘Ben was resistant to the sheer amount of weight put on the money-making applications and was disheartened by the lack of support for apps that had a more beneficial impact on society. And we shot some ideas around and came up with one that … that suited us both.’

‘Suited?’ Lily asked, wondering why Henry was being reticent all of a sudden. He sighed, the deep inhalation widening the breadth of his chest beneath the cables of knitwork on his jumper.

‘I … I suggested an idea based on connecting students, teens, with a charity that could provide support for people who felt they couldn’t reach out. Who felt they couldn’t ask for help through the usual channels – parents and teachers,’ he clarified.

‘People like Claudia,’ Lily realized.

Henry nodded. ‘If she’d been able to speak to someone, anyone, things might have been different.’ He gripped his glass, his knuckles nearly white. She placed a hand around his, until his grip loosened and a small smile raised his lips. ‘It was a success. The app won awards, but more importantly, it actually helped. With that we were able to develop more, invest in other projects, and fund the Avery app without investment. Which was brilliant because it meant there was no need for adverts or monetization that would take away from the app’s main goal. To help.’

Claudia Avery. He’d even named the app after her. She realized, in that moment, that Henry hadn’t walked away never looking back. He hadn’t cut his ties to the past at all. Instead, it had driven him to do something that helped others. To try to make sure that people like Claudia, people who struggled, had some kind of support. To try to make sure that what happened to them, didn’t happen to others.