He pulled me into his arms and held me close.

‘I thought you wanted to wait,’ he said, smiling down at me.

‘I did,’ I said. ‘But I’ve changed my mind. Is that all right?’

It was fast becoming a habit since my return to Wynter’s Trees.

‘More than all right,’ he said. ‘We’ll have a kiss under the mistletoe in the pub. That’ll give everyone the right idea.’

‘What about a kiss now?’ I suggested.

He was more than willing to oblige.

‘Hey!’ shouted voices from the cliff above. ‘We can see you down there, you know!’

It was Abbie and Noah.

‘I knew it!’ Noah bawled, sounding ecstatic and when Ned shone his torch, I could see he was jumping up and down and clapping his hands.

‘So, did I!’ added Abbie, who was by his side.

‘Not such a secret after all then,’ Ned said to me.

‘What gave us away?’ I called up to the two of them.

‘Ned was like a cat with two tails the morning after the party,’ Noah laughed. ‘So, we knew something had gone on and as it didn’t seem to have anything to do with Maya and he kept slipping back to the lodge…’

‘All right,’ cut in Ned. ‘We get the idea.’

‘And you’d better get off the beach,’ called Abbie. ‘Unless you’re planning to swim back to the pub!’

The cheer that erupted when Ned and I finally walked into the pub, having stopped for another kiss once we’d safely reached dry land, left us in no doubt that Noah and Abbie had made it back first. Ned swept me up into his arms and spun me around, just to confirm the news that our two mischievous friends had already announced.

‘Congratulations!’ said Sue, rushing over and pulling me into a hug the second Ned set me down. ‘I’m so happy for you both.’

Her warm embrace was swiftly followed by another from Wren, a third from Maya and a final one from Noah. There was much back slapping and handshaking for Ned and from what I could make out, the whole gang had been secretly thinking we were made for each other right from the moment I’d arrived.

‘You guys,’ I said, feeling my face flush scarlet.

‘I hope you didn’t want to keep your new-found love under wraps,’ said Abbie. ‘Because I couldn’t stop Noah.’

‘Oh, you fibber,’ he cut in with a gasp. ‘You were the one who burst in—’

‘No,’ Ned then interrupted him, ‘we didn’t want to keep anything under wraps.’

‘That’s all right then,’ the pair chorused. ‘No harm done.’