I made painting the bespoke door signs a clandestine evening project and had set myself up in a corner of the sitting room, after making Ned promise not to peek. I would have been happy for him to just tell me he wouldn’t look, but he’d insisted on making it a pinky promise. As he had wrapped his little finger around mine and looked deep into my eyes as he made his vow, I had felt another rush of internal fizzing, far stronger than the one which had coursed through me when I had handed over the pen on Sunday morning.

I could no longer deny, that the longer I spent in his company, the more I liked him. As in liked him, liked him, not just thought he was a good guy and the right man to buy my stake in Wynter’s Trees. There was a definite spark there and an instant attraction and I was grateful to have painting the signs to focus on when we returned to the lodge at the end of every day, rather than lounging on the sofa and talking through his plans for the place.

It was hard enough internally acknowledging that, during my time helping set up the huts, I had felt a little of the magic my father had always insisted weaved its way about the place, so I certainly didn’t need to throw developing feelings for Ned into the mix as well. Consequently, I strove to keep myself continually occupied and ignored the stirrings in my heart.

‘So,’ I said, from behind the makeshift screen I’d set up as I finished the plaque which was to adorn Abbie and Noah’s beach hut door, ‘is there much left to do tomorrow?’

I could cope better talking to Ned if he was at a distance, just far enough to make his freckles a blur was ideal. However, when I looked over the top of the screen and saw him stretched out, surrounded by paperwork and with Bandit asleep on the rug close by, my libido longed to join him. I quickly bobbed back down again.

‘The bird feeders and baths should be here between eight and nine in the morning,’ he told me, ‘so I’m going to get those set up early and then I’ll make a start on the extra lights.’

It had always been Dad’s dream to extend the nature reserve as far into the plantation as possible and Ned and I had decided to set up a couple of bird feeding stations, in and around the yard, which would hopefully help further achieve that vision. One was going to be right next to the lodge and the other, next to the barn. They were supposed to be squirrel proof and I hoped they lived up to their glowing online promises. We wanted to attract more fluffy, feathered finches and their kind, not more furry grey pillaging creatures.