Later on, having finished work, Robyn was walking to pick up Sam and Daisy from school, bracing herself for part two of Bite the Bullet day: telling them the truth about where John really was. While negotiating with Victoria – if she could even use the word ‘negotiating’ – had been gratifyingly straightforward, she suspected that this next challenge was going to be a whole lot harder. The thought of her children’s bewildered, sad little faces turned up questioningly to hers as they tried to fathom why – why? – their dad had done such a thing was enough to break her heart clean in two. What were you even supposed to say in this situation? Were there any words in the lexicon that could make this remotely okay to an eleven-year-old and a nine-year-old? She suspected not.

Her phone started ringing as she walked through the primary-school gates and she gave a little start as John’s office number came up on her screen. Oh my goodness. What was he doing, back at work? How long had he been in town? Turning hot and cold all over, she jabbed the button to pick up. ‘Hello?’

‘Robyn? It’s Gabby here. From the engineering faculty.’

‘Oh,’ said Robyn, deflating all over again. Of course it wasn’t John. He was living the life of Riley up in Edinburgh and probably hadn’t even thought about her – or work – since he’d left. ‘Hello. Is everything all right?’ she remembered to say in the next moment. It was probably something tedious concerning John’s dismissal, she thought glumly, wandering through to the juniors’ playground.

‘Yes,’ replied Gabby. ‘We had a message from John the other day with his new postal address, for any mail to be sent on to him,’ she went on, ‘and I’ve just had a call from a Professor – Tomlinson? – asking me to urgently pass the address on to you. Something about . . .’ Her voice was becoming more doubtful by the second. ‘Ah, I might have got this wrong, but . . . scrambled egg?’

Robyn let out a snort of laughter as she pieced all of this together. What was Victoria like? ‘Thank you,’ she managed to say. ‘Don’t worry, that makes perfect sense. If you could just email me those details, that would be very helpful. You’ve got my email address, haven’t you? Great. Thanks very much.’

She gave another snigger of amusement as she reached the edge of the playground, imagining John’s face if she really did send him an envelope full of scrambled egg. It was actually kind of tempting.

‘Hi, how are you?’ She hadn’t noticed Beth Broadwood walking up next to her. ‘You look – dare I say it? – more like your usual self. How’s it going?’

Robyn was still smirking. ‘I know this might sound childish,’ she said, ‘but I’ve just been given John’s new address. And I was wondering . . . if you were a gorgeous young twenty-two-year-old shacked up with a much older man, what would you be most horrified to see arriving in the post for him?’