He called twenty minutes after they returned and said he’d made a dinner reservation in Denton’s. Where better to tell him, she thought, than in the best restaurant in town? Her parents seemed excited, asking her ridiculous questions, like, what time Tom was picking her up and what was she going to wear? Perhaps if Katie’s mind hadn’t been on Sam Hunt’s brown body and warm lips, she might have detected something was up in the Crosby household, but she slung on her green dress and grabbed a jacket when the door chimes announced Tom was there.

Tom held her and kissed her on the lips the moment she answered the door, as her eyes screwed in a grimace that he couldn’t see.

‘God, I missed you, you hick.’

She gave him a weak smile.

‘Let’s eat.’

He was looking unusually smart. He wore a grey Italian suit and a silk tie that she hadn’t seen before, and as he opened the passenger door of his Volvo for Katie she saw him raise his head and wink up at her father waving from the bedroom window.

They went to a wine bar first and Katie let him talk for three-quarters of an hour. He talked about the ball and how everyone had missed her. He told her about the trouble he’d had with his new PA and how James had a new car. He told her that she should enrol in this new health club on the coast that everyone was joining. It would do her good. Get her in shape. She watched his mouth move but struggled to concentrate on what the words meant. Katie was back in Silver, smelling the pines, hearing the woodpeckers knocking out a rhythm in the distance, feeling the rough dry earth beneath her back and buttocks as Sam blocked out the sun above her with his body. But here she was. Sitting in a bar full of vacant young men in crumpled designer suits and women pretending to be young and cool until they could revert to their true suburban colours the moment they hit thirty.

As she gathered the courage to say what she had to say, he motioned to the barman for the check and told her it was time to go. It could wait, she thought. She would tell him at dinner. Give him time to take it in.

They drove to the restaurant in near-silence, Katie staring ahead, Tom smiling and humming. She’d been to Denton’s only once but the head waiter greeted them as if they were long-lost friends. Tom took Katie’s arm and halted her in the marble-floored, plant-filled lobby.

‘You go in, darling. I’ll be there in a minute. I love you.’