Nobody looked up as they stepped from the lift. The place hadn’t changed much since last she was there. It was quiet. No one around. Must have been a big party last night, she thought. They’ll roll in at about midday, thinking that’s an early start . . . She could almost pretend that things were just as they had always been: that they were on their way to a lunch or a party, or taking a company car to the airport to catch the an evening flight to Nice, New York . . .

‘Come in. Sit down.’ He took her coat, hung it up carefully. ‘It’s been a while.’ He perched on the edge of the desk, smiling down at her as if nothing had happened. Well, thought Victoria, two can play at that game.

‘You look well, Massimo.’ He did too, damn him: no bags under the eyes, no dramatic weight loss, no balding or crow’s feet. Nothing to indicate imminent ruin. Perhaps the rumours were just that.

‘Grazie.’

He did not pay her a compliment in return. His phone rang, he grabbed it, gabbled something angry in Italian and slammed it down. He turned back to her, his lips parted in a carnivorous smile.

‘So, Victoria.’ He was looking at her legs; thank God it was far too early for them to be ruined by varicose veins and water retention. She recrossed them. ‘What do you want?’

‘You know what I want, Massimo.’

‘Ha! Always the same Victoria.’ He prodded her thigh with the tip of one highly polished black shoe. She shuddered.

‘I wasn’t talking about that. Or, at least, not only that.’ It wouldn’t do to let him think that she was anything other than majorly hot. ‘I need to talk about . . .’

‘Please do not say “us”, Victoria.’

‘Why not?’

‘There is no “us” any more.’

‘Ah.’ She felt a shiver in her shoulders, but controlled it. ‘At least you didn’t say there never was.’

‘No, of course . . .’ He waved his hand, brushing away the past like cobwebs. ‘But, as you know, things have changed.’

‘You are no longer married.’

He stood up, walked to the window and looked out, his back to her.

‘You must know . . .’

‘Massimo,’ she said, ‘I’m pregnant.’

He carried on looking out of the window. The phone rang once, the shortest of rings, and stopped. She could hear people outside the office talking, moving around. Traffic hummed past the window; in the distance, a siren.

‘Did you hear me?’

‘I heard you.’

‘Well?’

‘You must do as you see fit.’

Turn round, you bastard. Turn round.

‘It’s yours, of course. There’s nobody else.’

‘Ah.’

‘And I’m keeping it.’

For a man who believed that condoms were instruments of Satan, and who frequently insinuated that women who used birth control were little better than whores, he could hardly start arguing in favour of abortion.

‘I see.’