His cheeks flushed with a rush of anger. ‘I don’t ever use it and I don’t want her to know about it. I certainly wouldn’t want to be with anyone who was impressed by it.’

‘Look, Matty only thinks she cares about that stuff because she had so little growing up. The truth is, she doesn’t know what she wants.’

He gave a bitter laugh. ‘Trust me, she wants what she’s got! Prince fucking Charming.’

Clover shook her head. ‘Julian’s a rich, stupid playboy. He’s not what she needs, we both know that. The two of you are always laughing together.’

‘When you say laughing, I assume you actually mean “fighting”?’

Clover ignored his sarcasm. ‘And she didn’t stop going on about it when you went home with whoever you went home with in Saas-Fee.’

Johnny didn’t reply.

Clover cradled the tumbler in the palm of her hand. Its weightiness felt reassuring. ‘Opposites attract, Johnny. You ground her and she elevates you. It’s so obvious. I don’t get how the two of you don’t see it.’

‘Like you don’t see what’s right under your nose, you mean?’

‘Huh?’

‘I’ve been standing behind that camera, watching the two of you prowling around each other for the past five weeks. I’ve got over two hundred hours of footage through there, of you two.’ He pointed towards his bedroom across the hall. ‘You never take your eyes off each other – he watches you when you’re not looking; and you watch him when he’s not looking. Every room he walks into, he looks to see where you are in it . . .’

‘Yes! Because I’m persona non grata; public enemy number one.’ She gave a shocked laugh.

He stared at her. ‘What exactly happened between you on the mountain?’

The mountain? ‘. . . You know what happened! I almost went over the edge and he stopped me.’

‘No. There was more than that – because the very next morning you had run off to Geneva and he was left like a clockwork toy someone had forgotten to wind up!’ He stared at her almost angrily. ‘You maintain this hostility towards each other, but it fools no one but you two. Your problem isn’t that you slept with him, Clover. It’s that you only slept with him once!’

Clover stared at him, aghast. Where had this come from? Johnny couldn’t possibly think—

The sound of a cough made them both jump.

Ari was standing by the door. Clover felt her cheeks flame. How much had he just heard? Had Kit’s name been mentioned? Was there any way for Ari to have identified him?

‘Hey,’ Johnny said in a strangled voice. ‘How’s he doing?’

‘Fine.’

‘Fine?’ Clover echoed.