Finally, at around two o’clock in the morning, the band retires, and Rupert realizes he is ready for bed too. He turns to Emily, who has matched him dance for dance tonight, dancing with not only him, but Will, Miles and a few of Miles’s colleagues as well. She looks flushed and rosy-cheeked, a grin plastered across her face as she tries to get her breath back.

‘Hey,’ Rupert stops her in her tracks as she passes, ‘ready to go up?’

‘Absolutely,’ she smiles up at him, ‘ready when you are. Oh, Sadie—’

Sadie has appeared beside them, a glass of what looks like water in her hand. Rupert remembers that Sadie is always the sensible one, the first to start combatting her hangover before she’s even gone to bed.

‘Are you sure it’s OK for us to stay? We can always get an Uber home.’ Emily looks down quickly as she says the words, and Rupert realizes that when she says ‘home’, she means his house.

‘Of course, Rupert and Caro always stay when we have a party,’ Sadie says, a boozy red flush creeping up her neck as she carries on regardless. ‘It’s no problem for the two of you to stay. There’s plenty of room. Mi casa es tu casa.’

Rupert is mortified as Sadie gives a shrill laugh and knocks back the contents of her glass. Maybe it isn’t water after all. Emily says nothing, and Rupert admires her restraint.

‘Thanks, Sadie,’ Rupert finally manages to get the words out, breaking the cloud of tension, ‘I think we’ll just go up.’ He grasps Emily’s hand firmly in his and they make a quick escape, managing to get upstairs without bumping into anyone else. Rupert closes the door to the spare bedroom quietly, and turns to Emily, who is very quietly reaching behind her neck to unzip her dress.

‘Are you OK?’ he asks, as she fumbles with the zip. ‘Here, let me.’

Emily’s arms fall to her sides. ‘It’s all right, Rupert. It’s not the first time this evening someone has referred to me as “Caro”. It’ll take people some time to get used to me, I suppose.’

Rupert turns Emily to face him, lifting her chin with one finger so he can look directly into her deep blue eyes. Eyes that remind him of Caro’s. He blinks away the vision of Caro’s face that swims briefly in front of his eyes, and kisses Emily. Her face is set, but he feels her mouth soften under his as he gently slides the shoulders of her dress off, letting it fall to the expensively carpeted floor. He breathes in her scent, floral and by now familiar, and rests his chin on the top of her head.