Everyday Woman wasn’t a self-portrait but she was using her body as a reference – she was available whenever needed and sure as hell fit the remit of not having the willowy body of a ballerina. Concentrating on her sketches was staunching her tendency to wonder about Grady, about their broken date and the following silence. It was stopping her wondering – more than once an hour, anyway – whether she’d see him this evening when she and Daisy delivered Christmas wreaths to some of the Craft Stuff crowd.

She tousled her hair – loose because Everyday Woman’s hair would be – stood on one leg and threw up her arm. Experimentally, she steadied herself with a fingertip on the back of a chair so she could rise up on tiptoe as if ready to leap, trying to replicate how the muscles would look. The weight-bearing leg was fundamental to figure drawing but this leg would have just launched Everyday Woman from the ground so would be slightly different again. Absorbed, gazing between the mirror and the computer screen freeze-frame, she half-registered a flash of movement at the window.

Then a knock fell on the studio door and a low voice called, ‘Laurel? It’s Grady.’

Surprised at the flash of pleasure that accompanied the sound of his voice, she called, ‘Come in,’ turning her head to watch the door open. When Grady halted for a long moment before closing it behind him, realisation hit her that she was standing on one leg in long, clinging navy blue leggings and a matching top. Almost overbalancing, cheeks burning, she thudded back onto her two feet and swept up her hoodie from its untidy heap on a chair to yank it over her head. It fell to mid-thigh. Despite the blast of frigid air he’d admitted, heat crackled across her skin.

‘You’re working,’ he observed uncertainly, one eye on the sketch, one hand drifting back towards the door handle.

Her face still scalded. ‘It’s fine, come on in. I’ve been wondering about you.’ When he didn’t respond, she clarified, ‘After what you texted about a family situation, I mean. Daisy hasn’t passed anything on from Niall, so I thought maybe it was an adults-only thing …’ She trailed away at the way his pale face pinched in on itself. Oh. It looked serious.

He cleared his throat. ‘It’s definitely not something to be shared with Niall.’ His gaze slid off to the window as if he was suddenly fascinated by Rea’s frozen garden, which looked as if it were carved from crystal. Then he dragged his attention back to her. ‘Laurel—’ He stopped, raising a hand to massage his temples.