Dom Perignon… in a place like this… she was slightly annoyed by his don’t be silly but more than happy to be spared the cost. ‘Thank you.’ She picked up her handbag. ‘I should be getting home.’

‘I have my car parked close by; I’ll drop you back.’

Strangely relieved to have his abstinence explained, she shook her head. ‘No, that’s fine, thank you, I can call a taxi.’

‘Nonsense.’

She should have been irritated at his dismissal of her decision but when she got to her feet and felt the floor swaying under her, she was inordinately grateful. If she hoped he wouldn’t notice, she was enlightened when he laughed and put a hand on her waist. ‘You’re a lightweight,’ he said, pulling her closer to him.

He was solid, his hand warm through the fabric of her dress. It was the excess alcohol that made her melt into him, that allowed her to be led along, and once again she thought of the sacrificial lamb being led to the slaughter.

But who was leading whom? Because suddenly she thought Peter could be exactly what she needed.

6

It had been her friend, Portia, who’d inadvertently given Allison the idea. They’d met at yoga, quickly discovering they had a similar dismissive, cynical attitude towards those for whom the perfect bird of paradise pose was a raison d’être.

Allison was between boyfriends. Boyfriends. She called them that although they were rarely more than one-night stands. It wasn’t that men didn’t like her… they did, but they were such hard work and she bored easily.

She was feeling more than a little… untethered. ‘Lonely’ wasn’t a word she allowed into her vocabulary. Perhaps it was why she allowed herself to drop her guard a little and agreed to join Portia for coffee after the class. She was far older. Sixty, Allison decided when she was being kind, nearer to seventy when she’d had a bad day and wasn’t feeling generous. Despite the age difference – thirty or forty years – and although they had little in common apart from their shared dislike of pomposity, the coffee became a weekly habit and they became friends.

Allison didn’t have any others. Circumstances had meant she’d made none in school and those she’d made in university had dispersed to other cities, other countries. Despite vocal and usually drunken promises to stay in touch, they hadn’t. Eventually she could barely remember their names and wasn’t sure she’d recognise them in a crowd.

Portia, with her vividly bright red lipstick, sky-blue eyeshadow and dramatically arched eyebrows, was amusing, eccentric and, if her designer clothes, bags and expensive jewellery were any indication, also very wealthy.