‘I thought you could probably do with this, after earlier.’ He caught her expression, eyes narrowing as he handed her one of the glasses. ‘Is something wrong?’

‘No, nothing.’

‘Okay.’

The fact that he didn’t push stopped her closing down completely and she stewed over the message for a few moments, wondering if perhaps it would help to talk about it with someone unbiased. Usually, she just vented to Rosie, but, of course, Rosie was of the same mindset as Hannah, so always sided with her, and occasionally Hannah had a niggling feeling of guilt that perhaps she was being unreasonable where her mother was concerned.

‘It’s my mum’s twenty-fifth wedding anniversary next weekend,’ she blurted. ‘I’ll go of course, but she wants me to stay over. I’m just not sure I’m brave enough to do that.’

It might be insignificant to Liam, but admitting to her shortcomings, putting it out there that she was scared to go back and stay in the village, was a huge deal to Hannah and she took an anxious sip of wine while she waited for him to react.

‘Have you stayed there since you left?’ he asked eventually, coming to sit on the sofa beside her.

‘Just the once.’

‘And what happened?’

He was watching her again, his blue gaze intense, but where before it had made her a little jittery, now it anchored her.

‘I couldn’t do it. I woke up from a nightmare and found myself in my old bedroom and I panicked.’

Hannah recalled the memory, the shame of it burning inside.

‘Did you talk to your mum about it at the time?’

‘I tried. She didn’t get it though, and kept telling me I just had to move past it.’ She gave him a pointed look. ‘So am I mad or just pathetic?’

‘Actually, I don’t think you’re either. I do think you should try to face your fears again. But I also get it if it’s too tough.’

She noticed he hadn’t asked her about her family set-up or questioned that she was nearly thirty-four, yet it was only her mother’s twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. That’s because he would have done his research, she supposed, so would know that her dad had died when she was six and her relationship with Geoff, her stepfather, had often been turbulent. It was something that had her guards raising again. ‘Thanks for listening. I’ll figure something out.’

Josh had offered to go with her if she had no choice but to stay. Hannah had mentioned it briefly to him on the way back from Norwich. Taking her ex-husband, though, would likely throw up some awkward questions and she didn’t want to give anyone the wrong idea about them.