Laura’s days were merging into long weeks, filled with work and not getting home in time to see her son before he was already in bed. She was making every effort to rectify that, or at least she was trying to, promising Nate it was a temporary issue. ‘Something has come up at work,’ she had said. ‘It just needs more attention for the next couple of weeks.’

‘Not Coopers?’ he had asked, one eye on the TV as she crashed down on the sofa next to him with a large bar of Dairy Milk that she had bought as a peace offering.

‘No. Something for a new client Harry has asked me to do. It’s good,’ she said. ‘It’s exciting.’

She didn’t tell him more, and Nate had nodded and eventually dragged his attention from the TV, breaking off a line of chocolate and putting it into his mouth. ‘So you’re – you know – you’re okay with not working on Coopers?’

‘I am,’ Laura had lied. It was easier that way. Nate didn’t probe any further into the work she was doing for this new client, and neither did she tell him that she was either spending these few weeks working her arse off for nothing or – more likely, given the effort she had put into it – carrying on at this level for the foreseeable future.

Nate didn’t ask, because why would he? He had no idea what pitching and tenders involved. She might once have shared with him these excruciating parts of her job, but he wouldn’t have taken on board what it meant.

And so Laura didn’t reveal that if she won the tender, then the next few weeks would actually turn into months of getting home late, of pouring everything into the tight timescales Miles Morgan insisted on.

Besides, Laura was still telling herself it wouldn’t come to that. Because once she could prove that Mia Anderson was lying, she would ensure she got Coopers back, and then she could tell Harry she didn’t have the time for Miles’s company.

Then she could get her life back. And so Nate didn’t need to know the details.

Nate turned back to the TV, happy that his wife had seemingly moved on and was no longer interested in the woman who had taken her job, leaving Laura wondering how he could possibly think it was that easy for her. Did he simply want to believe that she was relaxed and confident enough to accept the fact she’d been pushed out of her job on purpose, or did he really not know her at all?