Instead of standing at the side of the dancefloor at the world’s most exclusive party, I was reliving the exact moment I found out Stew had cheated on me. We were getting ready for bed, Stew in his boxers and me in the tattered old PJs I threw out the next day. His phone, charging on my bedside table because he’d lost his cable again, lit up with a photo of a woman I didn’t recognize in a pose I did not care to see. I remembered it all so clearly. He saw my face, he read the text, then he apologized, made vague, remorseful noises, swore it was a one-time thing that would never happen again, and that was that.

I didn’t say a single word.

Partly because I was so shocked, I didn’t know what to say, and partly because I’d been waiting for him to cheat on me ever since we met. At least once a week, Mum had gone out of her way to tell me that all men lie and all men leave. I’d expected it of him. But Stew only proved Mum half right, He could have left, but he didn’t, and at the time, I was so grateful.

When he should have begged my forgiveness, he acted as though he was doing me a favour, and I let him. Every day since, I’d been giving away tiny little pieces of myself just to hold on to what I had. But was it worth it? And what would happen when there were no more pieces left to give?

I could have packed a bag and walked out; instead I accepted his excuses, waited for Stew to fall asleep, then locked myself in the bathroom to sob my heart out. Orlander was already tearing White Tux Man a new one in front of an entire ballroom full of people. She wasn’t ashamed. She didn’t blame herself. She wasn’t afraid.

With one last look around the ballroom, I smiled and tried to tie a bow around all my good memories of the ball, to keep them safe for Jess. It was time to make a graceful exit.

‘There you are!’

With his tie hanging loose around his neck and his shirt poking out of his unzipped fly, Andrew splashed an entire glass of champagne in my general direction.

‘Your majesty.’

My stomach lurched at the damp spot on my skirt as he stooped forward into a low bow before promptly toppling forward onto the floor, his face landing next to my feet. Dazed, he rolled up onto his hands and knees and stared at the broken glass, somehow still in his hand.

It was definitely time to leave.

‘No!’ he yelled from the floor as I turned around and walked away, searching for the gap in the wall panels where I’d snuck in. ‘Stop, I want to talk to you.’

‘No.’

‘You must.’