It would not be an overstatement to say he’d splurged a bit. But it was nothing to do with pampering himself and absolutely everything to do with being practical. At the beginning of December, he’d drawn up a plan with Ibrahim to give himself the best chance of making it through this evening without a major slip. In the run-up to tonight, he’d been to both Totnes and Dartmouth numerous times, and had even fitted in a trip to Exeter. It had been a hard slog, sometimes feeling like one step forward and two steps back, but he thought he was ready. He hoped he was ready. While he still wasn’t comfortable with large crowds for extended periods of time, he did have a variety of tools to help himself cope with them.

Part of the plan for tonight was to limit the triggers, not dealing with packed spaces more than necessary. So, when he’d discovered there was a hotel in the Shard itself, and that it had parking facilities, meaning he’d be able to drive all the way from his front door to the hotel, it had been a no-brainer. It hadn’t mattered how much it cost, which was just as well, because availability on New Year’s Eve had been slim, so he’d ended up with one of the fancy suites.

He was already in the right building, so no need to deal with taxis or crowded public transport, or even herds of excited revellers in the streets below. And if he felt a panic attack looming, maybe he and Anna could come down here to get away. It would solve a dual purpose, because he had something to give her – if his courage didn’t fail him.

In less than seven hours he would meet her, and they would speak face to face the way they talked on the phone. He’d be able to see her frown in concentration as she chewed an idea over, or watch her eyes light up in delight. He’d imagined what her smile would look like a thousand times, but tonight he would see it for real, and that meant he didn’t really care about the £2,000 price tag for this stupidly ostentatious suite. It was worth every penny.

Don’t dream about midnight, though, mate. She’s not Cinderella and you’re definitely not Prince Charming.

Brody nodded to himself and walked through to the immense drawing room of his suite, complete with seating area, dining table laid for six, and a telescope on a tripod. He turned right and headed into the bedroom, then sat down on the end of the sumptuously bedecked bed, stared out the window at the darkening sky, and wondered what to do next.

ANNA EMERGED FROM London Bridge station along with what seemed like half the city. Everyone was in groups. One such sprawling collection of friends flowed around her on the pavement as they joked and sang, dawdling along the road in the vague direction of Borough Market. Anna waited until they’d passed and then she looked up. The height of the glass building above her was dizzying. She was still a little jet-lagged, thanks to her flight home from Canada only two days earlier. Why else would she feel so jittery this evening?