‘Oh wow,’ I say, blown away as soon as I enter the living room. There are wooden beams crisscrossing the ceiling and a brand-new cast-iron stove sits in an ancient-looking fireplace. A plush sofa in heathered blue tweed sits on one side of the room, facing a wooden slab of a coffee table and a winged armchair in a damask rose. Warm rugs cover the flagstone floor. Thick, grey velvet curtains hang beside the small windows through which I can see fragments of the loch and sky. ‘This place is amazing,’ I sigh. And it is; it looks like something out of an interior design magazine.

‘Home for the week,’ Liam says, clearly also impressed. ‘Come on, let’s look around.’

We wander through into a kitchen at the rear of the cottage. It’s simple but tastefully done, with granite surfaces and state-of-the-art appliances, including a coffee maker, which I know will make Liam exceedingly happy. He loves his coffee in the morning.

True to form, Liam notices it with glee, running his hand over the surface. He then makes for the fridge and opens it. It’s full to bursting with groceries: milk, cheese, vegetables, packages wrapped in brown paper, which I assume are the steak and the fish that we ordered in advance. I count two bottles of white wine in the door, as well as six cans of IPA. In the wine rack by the back door I notice another three bottles of red.

‘Seems like everything I ordered,’ Liam says, shutting the fridge and opening cupboards, to find them stocked with staples and dried food.

We run up the stairs like a couple of giddy teenagers to discover the bedroom. I stop in the doorway and take in the double bed under the eaves, decorated with a warm quilt and several throw pillows, then I cross to the large dormer window.

‘Check out the view,’ I say as I gaze out over the vast expanse of the loch. It’s like we’re on a boat at sea.

‘I am,’ Liam answers.

I turn and find him looking at me from the threshold, grinning in a way that makes my stomach flip over on itself again. I know what he’s thinking about, it’s clear from his expression, but I need a shower first. We’ve been on the road since six this morning and I feel gritty and rumpled from the journey.

I make for the en-suite bathroom. There’s a clawfoot tub set in front of a window, this one facing the back garden. I peer out to see that it stretches all the way towards the forest, standing proudly several hundred feet away.

Liam comes up behind me and wraps his arms around my waist. He rests his chin on my shoulder. ‘Let me run you a bath,’ he murmurs into my ear.

I close my eyes and lean back against his broad chest. ‘Mmmm, that would be nice.’