He turned an even brighter shade of red and I started doing a very passable goldfish impression. His admittance that he fancied me had me floating on cloud nine, but I was still in shock that another assumption I’d made had been so wide of the mark.

‘And you fancy him too, don’t you?’ Hope beamed.

I couldn’t believe she was going to out me like that.

‘Yes,’ I swallowed, ‘I do actually, but I had kind of assumed . . .’

‘What?’ asked Sam.

‘Well . . . I assumed that you and Hope were a couple,’ I said sheepishly.

‘If it makes you feel any better, until this afternoon, so did I,’ Joe admitted.

‘But we’re not,’ said Hope, looking shocked. ‘We never have been.’

‘But the day you came back from your travels,’ I said to Hope. ‘You and Sam were—’

‘Hugging,’ she cut in. ‘Because we hadn’t seen each other for ages.’

‘Oh,’ said Sam, clicking his fingers before pointing at me, ‘now I get it. At last, it all makes sense.’

‘What do you get?’ I asked, my thoughts freefalling.

‘You changed,’ he said, biting his lip, ‘when Hope got back, you were different, Tess.’

‘Was I?’

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘to start with, when she wasn’t here, I thought you might fancy me and I was beginning to think that I could finally act on that crush I had all those years ago, but then when Hope came back you became more distant. Was that because you thought we were together?’

‘Yes,’ I admitted. ‘Yes.’

‘And you thought I’d snogged you behind Hope’s back at the party?’ Sam tutted. ‘And that’s why you never acknowledged our second kiss, even though it was so phenomenal?’

‘Yes,’ I swallowed. ‘And I’ve been feeling as guilty as hell about it.’

‘I can’t believe you thought that of me, Tess,’ Sam said, shaking his head.

‘And I can’t believe that you thought I was here to smooth the way for Joe telling everyone that he’d sold up to Sunny Shores,’ I pointed out, eager to remind him that I wasn’t the only one in Wynmouth who had got the maths wrong when I’d put two and two together.

‘Touché,’ he grinned, making my stomach flip.

‘So, that’s it, then right?’ Joe announced. ‘We’re sorted, yes? All the romantic muddles have been unravelled. I love Hope, Hope loves me and you pair fancy the pants off each other?’

‘Sounds about right to me,’ Sam laughed.

‘Great,’ Joe said, leaping up and dashing around the table before lifting Hope off her feet, wrapping her in his arms and kissing her deeply.

‘This has been like a Shakespearean comedy,’ said Sam, reaching across the table for my hand.

‘You’re not wrong,’ said Joe, when he finally came up for air.