‘Thanks for coming today. As far as that lot are concerned you’re our official lucky charm now.’ He winked. ‘Not sure they would have gone into the game confident if you weren’t here. Come celebrate with us at the pub, hey?’

Nicole nodded.

Down at The Royal, Trevor handed Nicole and Mandy a glass of wine each. The whole team raised their glasses in salute with a chant of ‘Rangers rule, Rangers rule’, until they both raised their own in response.

‘Hurrah!’ came the collective shout.

From the jukebox in the corner, Nicole heard the first few bars of ‘Brown-Eyed Girl’ ring out. Trevor gave Mandy a cheeky grin and danced towards her. As one, the crowd parted and he took Mandy by the hands, leading her to the middle of the room.

As Nicole watched the couple that had caught everyone’s attention, Danny made his way over to her. He’d gone home and changed into dark jeans, a grey T-shirt and black leather jacket. Nicole couldn’t help but notice he cut a rather dashing silhouette. How had he managed that so quickly?

‘Cute, aren’t they?’ he said as he edged beside her.

‘Yeah, they make a pretty good case for the true love fanatics.’

‘Not a believer?’

‘A love agnostic, shall we say?’ She gave a half-smile then became suddenly very aware of Danny’s warm body beside her. She knew she had to change the conversation, retreat, but how? Before she could get too flustered, Danny saved her from an awkward attempt at small talk.

‘So, how are you liking life at the cove?’

‘It’s very different from Sydney, but I can’t complain about how welcoming everyone has been.’

‘Yeah, we’re a friendly lot. Bit strange sometimes.’ He laughed, nodding his head towards George trying to remove one of the young boys hanging upside down from the ancient bar top.

‘Well, weird isn’t restricted to the country.’ Nicole shrugged.

‘No. Never really spent much time in the city myself, but I reckon you’ve got your fair share of crazy there.’

‘True.’

‘Have you got much writing done since you’ve been here? Mandy’s hoping you will write her into your next book, I think.’ Danny turned his body ever so slightly towards Nicole and bent to speak close enough to her ear for her to hear above the crowd. He smelled of orange and cinnamon.

She coughed. ‘Oh. Um. I’m not really …’

‘You’re not writing?’

‘No.’

‘Why?’

‘I’m not sure I’ve got anything else to say.’ She had been filling up her notebook with questions and thoughts, yes. But she was still a long way off finding inspiration to actually write.

‘Maybe all you need is time.’

‘Time?’ Nicole frowned.

‘Joseph Heller took thirteen years to get his second book out after Catch-22.’

Nicole laughed. ‘And no one can remember the name of it.’