‘That sounds like good advice to me,’ Rosalind said, not looking back towards Hugh. ‘Now, which is our car? I’m ready to get out of this place.’ For good, this time.

‘I’m off to fetch Susie.’ Caro jerked a thumb towards the stables. ‘I’ve got my own ride, remember?’

‘So, I suppose this is goodbye.’ Posy looked so uncertain, so naive, even dressed in what Rosalind assumed were her normal clothes of choice – jeans, a top that could only cover one shoulder at a time, and her hair up in a messy bun on the top of her head.

‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that,’ Rosalind said. ‘I mean, hopefully we’ve still got a film to make.’

Posy brightened. ‘That’s true.’

‘And I fully expect to accompany one of you to the premiere,’ Caro added.

‘It’s a date,’ Posy promised.

‘And besides,’ Rosalind added, looking up at Aldermere rather than her friends, because some emotion was best kept to oneself, wasn’t it? ‘We’re the three Dahlias. The only three in the world. It’s sort of like a club.’

‘Then we’ll have to have another club meeting, won’t we?’ Caro said, a knowing smile growing on her lips. ‘Sometime soon.’

‘I’d like that.’ Posy grinned, and the sun came out from behind a cloud, lighting up the roof tiles and chimneys of Aldermere House.

Rosalind smiled. ‘So would I.’

Five Months Later

Caro Hooper was balancing on a kitchen stool, trying to reach a rogue Tupperware lid on top of one of the cupboards with her wife’s favourite feather duster, when her phone rang. Holding the duster between her teeth, she fished it out of her pocket, pressed speakerphone, then dropped it onto the counter.

‘Caro? Caro! Can you hear me? This line is rubbish.’ Posy’s voice rang perfectly clear.

Caro rolled her eyes, and resumed her retrieval operation. ‘I can hear you. Must be all the egos on set messing with the reception at your end.’ Not that she didn’t wish she was there with them. Annie reckoned Caro’s ego could give some of theirs a run for their money. ‘What’s up?’

‘We need you. Can you come up to Wales? We’re filming in some old National Trust-type place since Aldermere’s up for sale.’ Posy’s voice caught a little on the word Aldermere. Even Caro paused, the dust bunnies on the top of the kitchen cabinets forgotten.

‘I did a god-awful indie film in a swamp of a woods in mid-Wales in the early noughties. Swore I’d never go back.’ Although she had to admit, even Wales sounded more fun than the cleaning schedule Annie had stuck to the fridge, and was insisting they follow with relentless attention to detail. ‘Unless Anton has suddenly found a part for me in the film …’

‘Not that I know of,’ Posy admitted. ‘But Caro, we really do need you. Me and Rosalind.’