‘Then why have an assistant in the first place?’ I asked. ‘Why not tell Sarah you didn’t need me?’

Juliette laughed and kicked one leg up onto the railing that ran around the outside of the terrace. ‘Because you’re here for her benefit, not mine. You’re basically an adult babysitter, babysitting another adult.’

‘I’ve never thought about it that way at all,’ I lied instantly. ‘The way I look at it, I’m here to make your life easier.’

As the yacht took a turn, the last rays of the setting sun sliced across the table between us and shone right into Juliette’s face. I pulled the pair of sunglasses I’d picked up from the floor out of my pocket and passed them across the table. She accepted them with narrowed eyes and half a smile.

‘You’re thirty-two, you’re from Sheffield, you’re engaged, and you have a degree,’ she said. ‘Fine. But why are you here? Every assistant I’ve ever known has had an agenda.’

It wasn’t the first time I’d been asked why I wanted to be an assistant, but it was the first time I’d been asked by the person I was supposed to be assisting.

‘No agenda, I’m just here to do my job,’ I replied. ‘Cards on the table, all my other jobs were more in the corporate realm? This isn’t exactly something I had planned.’

‘Interesting,’ Juliette clacked her fingernails against the frame of her sunglasses as she processed the information. ‘But you’ve been doing it for a long time?’

‘Best part of ten years,’ I confirmed with a nod.

‘Don’t assistants usually move up to a proper job at some point?’

‘Most of them,’ I agreed, reaching for my ring again only to remember it wasn’t there. For the want of something to fiddle with, I pulled my braid over my shoulder and began twisting the end.

‘But not you?’