‘Do you want to go clubbing tonight, Jake? I thought we could check out some of the local talent in the nightclubs. Come on, we’ll go into town.’ Tony knew Jake didn’t want to move; he was settled in his lounger and that would be it until Rosanna shouted that their next meal was ready.

‘No, I don’t want to go clubbing to check out the talent; I’m a married man, for God’s sake. I’ll come for a drink with you, though, and if you get lucky, that’s your business.’

‘Done… but what if I get lucky and you’re thousands of miles away from your wife, and my lady friend has a friend?’ Tony teased. He knew there was no baiting Jake, but he liked winding him up, anyway.

‘You’ll get lucky, Tony, we both know that, and she will probably have a friend, but her friend won’t be half as beautiful as my Sharon, and she won’t know the way I like things done.’ Jake could have kicked himself. Now he knew he had raised Tony’s curiosity.

‘The way you like things done? What do you mean?’ Tony was laughing and he sat up on his sun lounger to look at Jake. ‘Have you got some hidden agenda in the bedroom that I don’t know about?’

‘None of your business; I’m not discussing it with you. All I’m saying is, Sharon is the woman for me, and that is final. Let’s go for your drink and come home.’ Jake had never discussed his sex life with Tony; while Tony’s sex life was an open book, what went on between himself and Sharon stayed in the bedroom.

Jake knew he had started something though and that Tony wouldn’t give up.

‘Do you dress up, Jake? Do you like all that whips and chains stuff? Do you use toys?’

All afternoon Tony kept coming out with the weird and the wonderful, and Jake just sighed and shook his head. ‘You’re sick, Tony, you do know that, don’t you. Some of the things you’re saying, I haven’t even heard of.’ They were laughing and joking together like the old days when they didn’t have a care in the world. This was, indeed, a much-needed break.

‘Hey, do you know that Wendy I’ve been seeing? She likes being blindfolded and doing it. She says it heightens her other senses. Have you tried that?’

‘Maybe, just maybe,’ said Jake, as he was getting ready to go out that evening, ‘she likes to be blindfolded so that she doesn’t have to look at you.’ He burst out laughing and watched as Tony’s face fell. That put an end to that conversation.

The club scene was good in the centre of Italy, and the girls were certainly plentiful. Jake sat at the bar while Tony flirted with the women. Finally, he settled on one, and she wanted to take him back to her place.

‘Come on, Jake,’ he said, ‘you’re my wingman. Her apartment’s only around the corner and you’re coming with me.’ Tony took hold of Jake’s glass and put it on the bar. He then took the arm of a beautiful Italian woman with long black hair. ‘This is Maria, and this is her good friend and flatmate, Susie. Girls, this is Jake.’ Tony charmingly did the introductions and led them all to the exit.