Pulling my collar up around my ears, I sit at the little bistro table with the letter in my hand. The wind almost whisks it away and I grab it firmly, turning it over to stare at my name, handwritten on the front. Nico’s writing is purposeful, and each letter is carefully crafted. Little curlicues on the tail of the F and the N look like tiny flowers. It could almost be a wedding invitation, except that if it were the case, I know Isabel would have told me before she handed it over.

We met up in August of last year when she came to London for an important art auction. She invited me to go with her and afterwards insisted I accompany her to an exclusive reception in one of the local galleries. I wasn’t keen on going, but she’d been so good to me and I didn’t want her to think I was ungrateful. She had no idea I was going through a painful divorce. Aiden was rarely contactable as he was trekking in the Himalayas, I presumed with Joss. But I couldn’t be sure, seeing as he didn’t leave a note the day he left. That broke my heart; it wasn’t that I begrudged him a new start, but the fact that he’d put up with the constraints my hang-ups had forced on him. He’d never complained, but stifling his yearning to travel must have made him unhappy. As unhappy as I would be now, if I couldn’t paint. Aiden had loved me once, I know that for a fact, as I had loved him. The unknown, was when exactly that love had started to fade and die.

‘You should read this,’ she’d said as she handed over the envelope and we’d hugged goodbye. ‘I have no idea what’s in it, but I can tell you that Nico was adamant I deliver it in person.’

‘Has he finished the portrait?’ An image of his face filled my mind as I recalled the night that I posed for him.

‘Yes. He has captured you perfectly. It’s rather beautiful.’

I’d looked at her, shocked. Captured me? ‘You’ve seen it?’

She’d nodded. ‘Of course.’

I remember feeling the colour draining from my cheeks as I’d stared at her in horror. Nico had betrayed me; betrayed my trust and my good intentions. I would never have sat for a nude portrait, but I was prepared to sit for him so he could finish the painting that tormented him.