Paula looked away, towards the floor-to-ceiling windows that offered a view of the sea. It wasn’t an answer. Well, it was, but it was a placatory one. He had chosen his words deliberately. It was an answer that meant he didn’t believe her version of events. She twisted her fingers together, staring down at them until her knuckles turned white.

He was probably right. She had drunk too much and it had been bitingly cold; her senses had been dulled. The accident was her own stupid fault. After all, who on this ship would want to hurt her?

But a niggling doubt pulsed in her head like the beginning of a migraine. Tears pricked behind her eyes and she blinked them away.

‘What time do we dock?’ she asked. ‘I’d like to try and book an appointment at the salon before we get off the boat.’

‘You’re going back there? Even after…’ He raised a hand and circled it around her head.

‘I have to,’ she said. ‘It’s the only hairdresser on board and I really don’t want to spend the rest of my holiday like this.’

‘There might be one in Åndalsnes. I could find a pub while you’re—’

She shook her head. ‘I’ll go to the salon now. I’ll find out what time we dock and I’ll meet you at the gate.’

Pushing back her chair, she gave Tommy one last lingering glance. Tell me that you believe me about what happened last night. Tell me that my hair’s not too bad. Tell me we’re going to have a nice day together. But he had already turned away from her.

As she waited for the elevator to arrive, she moved back a few feet and watched him. He had his phone out now, stabbing at the screen with one hand while shoving a bacon roll in his mouth with the other.

At that moment, the lift doors opened, and Anna’s unmistakable figure appeared. She looked every inch the centre spread in a glossy magazine, with her blonde hair styled under a pink beret, wearing a tailored black coat with a tiny pink dogtooth design. Paula kept dead still as she watched her. Anna scanned the room, her gaze alighting on her target, and she glided through the restaurant towards him, feigning surprise to see him there. Paula’s insides churned as the two of them launched into an animated conversation.

She turned and stepped into the lift, not waiting to watch as Anna pulled out a chair and joined Tommy in a breakfast for two.

They fawned over her in the salon, three stylists working all at the same time, deliberating, explaining, choosing colours that would not only rectify their error but enhance her hair, make it better than it had been before the incident.