Cullen drinks his coffee and tries to block out the sound of Keane enthusiastically relaying the support services available to Natasha. Cullen has already informed Keane that it’s almost certainly too late and the best solution all round is for Natasha to leave. Had Keane checked Natasha’s academic records, which she may well have done, she will have spotted a student in considerable academic peril and will most likely take the same view. Had this been the end of the academic year, it would have been too late to have corrected Ratner’s overestimation of his paramour’s academic prowess but Cullen has seen to it that Natasha’s myriad failures have been faithfully recorded. Indeed, he might even have tweaked the odd, marginal, grade downwards. A kindness in the long run. Girls like Natasha don’t belong in academe.

As Keane chatters on, he leans back and allows his mind to drift back to lunch at Luigi’s and most especially to the troubling remembrance of Nevis’s hand in his. The gesture had been a calculated attempt to keep her close in order to get her to tell him what he wanted to know, but her response to his touch and, more to the point, perhaps, his own response surprised him. Until that moment he’d never once thought of her in any sexual way at all. Yet there was some palpable electricity between them that he found shockingly exciting.

His reverie is interrupted by Keane saying, ‘So, over to you, Professor,’ catching him off guard. He glances at Natasha who appears shell-shocked. Perhaps she thought that her little tryst with Ratner would protect her. He is ready with an intervention should she attempt to use it as leverage. Or even to speak of it. This is between him and her and Ratner. Keane doesn’t need to know.

‘Thank you, Dr Keane,’ he says, buying himself a moment to collect his thoughts. He turns to the laptop and peers at the screen as though he’s been chewing over Natasha’s case. ‘I’ve looked at your grades.’

He watches Natasha’s face brighten. She thinks she’s in the clear. What a little fool. ‘Let’s see, the last two pieces of coursework… 28 per cent on the cell dynamics module, 18 per cent for biochemistry.’ He puts the emphasis on the word eighteen and raises his eyebrows to indicate a rueful awakening. In fact, the figures were as laughingly simple to downgrade as they had been for Ratner to inflate. A few keystrokes earlier this morning and it was done.