Did she intend to? In truth, Laura had no idea what she wanted the end result to be. What she didn’t want was for all the attention to be on her – for everyone to be talking about her long after the party had finished – but then she did want those same people to know exactly the type of person Mia Anderson was. And surely Harry’s party, when each and every one of them was here, was the best place for Laura to unmask her.

Patrick was wittering on and Laura wasn’t listening, and now all she wanted was for him to leave her alone so that she could go and get Mia. And another drink. She wanted a refill first. Shaking her empty glass, she excused herself and when she emerged from the kitchen, Mia was alone.

Laura drew a breath and took another large gulp of the Sauvignon blanc, which really was going down extremely easily, and gripping the fragile stem of the glass firmly between her fingers, she strode across the decking.

‘I know you’re lying.’ Laura spoke to Mia’s back, her words hushed so that no one nearby could hear.

‘Sorry?’ Mia swung around, her eyes screwed up questioningly. ‘What did you say?’

‘You heard me,’ Laura said plainly. ‘I said I know you’re lying.’

‘I don’t want to have this conversation here.’ Mia’s eyes darted around them at the people standing only feet away. None of them had turned around yet, but they soon would, Laura assumed.

‘I want to,’ Laura said defiantly.

Mia pursed her lips and started walking away, down the lawn towards Harry’s dimly lit summer house, presumably knowing that Laura would follow.

Laura blinked; it was hard to focus when it was so much darker down that end of the garden. When she caught up with Mia she reached out with the hand that clutched the glass and pointed it at her. ‘I know you’re lying,’ she repeated. ‘I know about you. You’re not who you say you are.’

Mia bit on her bottom lip as she continued to watch Laura, but she didn’t respond.

‘I spoke to Tess. I should have done that a long while ago, shouldn’t I?’

Mia gave a small flick of her head.

‘You know why I didn’t? Because I was so worried about what I would hear.’

Still Mia didn’t speak.

‘She told me they’d started talking to other agencies. To keep costs down. They only kept the TV campaign at Morris & Wood because they thought we had much better experience at producing ads than anyone else local, and now apparently they’re planning to move to some agency near Bournemouth.