From nowhere a bubble of laughter rose up inside Naomi and she laughed.

Her face deadpan, Geraldine said, ‘I’m glad you think my dull sex life is a matter for merriment.’ But then she smiled. ‘So come on. Tell me all. The good bits, that is, then we’ll get to why you’ve lost your nerve.’

‘Who says I’ve lost my nerve?’

Geraldine tutted. ‘It’s written all over your frowny face. By the way, I like the hair. It’s not dissimilar to how you wore it when we were students. And we’ll read into that what we will,’ she added with a raised eyebrow before draining her glass and holding it out to Naomi. ‘Time for a top-up, followed by a rundown on Lover-Boy’s sexual prowess. Oh, don’t look so coy, you know jolly well you must have been bursting with hideous smugness and the raging desire to boast about what you were getting up to.’

Taking the bottle out of the cooler bucket on the table next to her, and refilling Geraldine’s glass, and a more modest amount for herself, Naomi said, ‘You came here with an awful lot of ready-made assumptions, didn’t you.’

‘Rather my stock-in-trade, I’d say. Have I made any incorrect assumptions?’

‘Plenty! Firstly, you assumed incorrectly that I would want to share anything of an intimate nature with you.’

‘You used to.’

‘Yes. That was when we were young and silly and shared every jot and tittle. But we know better now.’

‘Do we?’

‘Yes. As adults, we know to respect that there are certain lines we don’t cross.’

Geraldine shrugged. ‘Can’t say I’ve ever respected these so-called lines. I’ve always been honest with you.’

Yes, thought Naomi, much too honest at times. Geraldine had always prided herself on her robust frankness, which didn’t necessarily go down well with everybody. She had once told Naomi that she had put on weight and that it didn’t suit her. Naomi had been mortified, but without retaliating – by saying that was rich coming from Geraldine! – she had lost the weight and resumed her usual size ten and consequently received compliments from other friends on how well she looked. That was the mark of a true best friend, Naomi had concluded, the one person in the world who could be relied upon to speak the truth.

But in her current frame of mind, she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to be on the receiving end of Geraldine’s particular brand of home truths. Last week she had gone for a walk with Ellis along the beach as far as the dunes and asked him if he’d really meant it when he’d said that if she thought they’d rushed into things, he would understand and give her some space. With sudden wariness in his eyes, he’d said of course he had.

‘It’s your family, isn’t it?’ he’d gone on. ‘You’re upset by their reaction to me?’

‘Yes,’ she’d replied. ‘I don’t want to be pushed into making a choice between you and the girls.’