‘It was your mention of the yellow sundress that she used to wear when we holidayed here,’ he told me. ‘The way you described her reminded me that you still had the perfect image of her in your head. You might have grown apart as you got older, but that was still the Mum that she was to you, Tess. I wasn’t going to destroy that.’

‘Oh, Dad.’

I watched as he leant over and added another spoon of sugar to my coffee. It was going to take a lot more than that for me to get over the shock.

‘Hey,’ said Hope, who suddenly burst in and set the café bell jangling. ‘What’s going on? I just had a text from Mum saying she needed me to come down. Is everything all right?’

Sophie came out of the kitchen, untied her apron and took the seat next to Dad, before telling Hope to squeeze in next to me.

‘What’s up with you?’ Hope said to me. ‘You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’

‘I’m all right,’ I croaked, wondering why on earth the four of us were sitting together when Dad and I clearly still needed more time to talk and I needed some space to think through everything he had just told me.

‘Well, you don’t look it,’ Hope said again.

‘I’m fine,’ I sniffed, ‘really.’

She didn’t push me further, but turned her attention to Dad.

‘Sorry,’ she said, ‘I don’t think we’ve met.’

Now it was my turn to apologize.

‘Sorry,’ I said, finally remembering my manners. ‘This is my dad. Dad, this is my friend, Hope.’

‘Pleased to meet you,’ said Hope, looking between the two of us. ‘I didn’t know you were expecting a visitor,’ she said to me, obviously trying to gauge my reaction to Dad’s unexpected appearance.

Thankfully, I didn’t have the opportunity to try and work out how to answer her.

‘Are you sure you’re all right, Tess?’ Sophie asked, noticing my pallor now Hope had pointed it out.

I nodded.

‘I’m okay.’

Sophie looked at Dad.

‘I don’t think . . .’ she began, but Dad stopped her.

‘It’s time,’ he said. ‘And I really don’t want to have to stop, not now that I’ve started.’

Hope and I looked at each other again, both of us now sporting deep frowns. The morning had already held enough shocks for me, but clearly there were more to come.

‘As I said a minute ago, Tess,’ Dad said, looking directly at me, ‘I did try my best to be a good husband.’

‘Of course,’ I nodded.

‘But no one’s perfect,’ he swallowed, biting his lower lip to stop it from trembling.

‘Please,’ said Sophie, looking first at me and then to Dad, ‘let me explain.’

Dad nodded and dropped his gaze to the table.