‘OH MY GOD YOU’RE IN ITALY?’

I held my phone as far away from my ear as I could, which wasn’t actually very far since I was hiding in the back of my wardrobe, wincing as Jess screeched down the line.

‘Tell me everything. Do not leave out a single detail. I thought the job was in London?’

‘The interview was in London,’ I explained, stretching out one leg and then the other. It really was an absurdly roomy wardrobe. ‘But it turned out the job itself is in Italy.’

‘Who are you working for?’

‘I can’t tell you.’

‘Tell me immediately.’

NDA aside, it wouldn’t be fair to ask Jess, a woman who could tell you the shoe size of every member of Little Mix, past and present, to keep a secret of this magnitude.

‘I can’t,’ I replied. ‘You saw the contract, I can’t say a word. All I can tell you is I’m assisting a celebrity while they perform at a charity event. And I’m on a yacht.’

Jess screamed at the top of her voice. ‘Oh my god, you’re with Juliette.’

‘What? How did you know?’ I pulled a spare blanket over my head in case there were hidden microphones as well as hidden cameras in the cabin. ‘I mean, no, I’m not. I have confirmed nothing and cannot be held responsible in a court of law.’

‘The Crystal Ball always takes place on the last Saturday in November,’ she replied. ‘Everyone knows Juliette is the headliner, and everyone knows she hates flying so she always travels by yacht. It is, isn’t it? You’re Juliette’s assistant?’

‘And you’re basically Sherlock Holmes,’ I said, confirming without confirming. ‘You’re wasted at that brewery.’

‘Logic, my dear Francesca,’ she crowed. ‘Have you met her yet? Did you like her? What was she wearing? Did she really ghost Harry Styles after he proposed at the top of the Eiffel Tower?’

‘I have, I did, she was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and yes, that was the first thing she told me the moment we met, right before we got matching tattoos and braided each other’s hair.’

‘It’s the first thing I’d tell someone if it were me,’ she replied. ‘What’s she like?’

I pulled the blanket from off my head, red-faced and sweaty. What was she like? ‘I haven’t quite got a handle on her yet,’ I confessed. ‘I’ve only spent an hour with her. So far so not-a-demon.’

‘You might think you’re joking, but some of the stories that go around about her,’ Jess whistled, which I took to be Not A Good Sign. ‘Even if we go by the believe half of what you see and none of what you hear rule, she’d be a top tier, gold medal diva. Always has nice hair though.’