Valentina shrugged. ‘It didn’t work out between us. Salvo stayed in New York, I came home. It wasn’t all bad, we had a kid, Francesco, he’s fourteen. I’m married to Vito Barsi now and this one, our first, is due in a few weeks! You remember Vito?’

Joe shook his head.

‘No, you wouldn’t. He was never part of our gang.’

‘I’m glad it’s all worked out for you,’ said Joe.

‘Yeah,’ said Valentina. ‘Thanks. What about you? Are you here on holiday? Is Anna with you?’

Joe shook his head and explained the reason for our visit.

Valentina paled when she heard Anna was dead. ‘Oh my, I’m sorry!’ she said, looking from me to Joe and back again. ‘You’ve both had such a terrible time.’ So she knew about Daniel. She gave me a sad smile. ‘At least you have each other.’

Joe pursed his lips. I tried to make my expression neutral.

‘Actually, we’re not together any more,’ Joe said.

‘We’re only here to sell the villa,’ I added.

‘We divorced after our son’s death.’

‘Ten years ago.’

Valentina said, ‘Oh God. I’m so sorry! Me and my big, stupid mouth!’

‘No, it’s fine,’ I said.

‘Fine,’ agreed Joe.

‘It was a long time ago.’

‘We’re both fine.’ That’s us. Everything is fine, fine, fine.

There was a moment’s awkward silence, then Valentina said, ‘Vito and me, we run the pizzeria by the harbour. Why don’t you come up one evening? For pizza?’

‘Okay,’ said Joe.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Great.’

Valentina’s phone pinged, an incoming text. She looked at the screen and her smile faded. ‘I’ve got to go. Don’t forget to come see us. Best pizza in town!’ She blew us both a kiss then returned to her basket.

Joe put his hands on the handle of our trolley and pushed it towards the till.

‘She seems nice,’ I said, as we queued.

‘She is.’

‘She was pleased to see you.’

‘We used to be good friends.’ Joe scratched the bottom of his earlobe.

‘What?’ I asked. ‘Why are you smiling like that?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Oh, it’s nothing.’

‘Joe!’

‘Okay, okay. It’s just… once, when we were teenagers, Valentina jumped off the floating dock into the sea and pretended she had cramp so I would dive in and save her.’ His smile was wide now. ‘She was a good actress! I believed she was drowning. I pulled her up, put my hand under her chin, like this,’ he demonstrated with his hand on his own chin, ‘and paddled her back to the beach, lay her on the sand and…’ he tailed off.

‘Gave her the kiss of life?’ I asked.

‘Something like that, yeah.’ He grinned, delighted but embarrassed.