Feeling an awful lot better, Sam took a gulp of champagne out of the mug and said, ‘Thanks. I thought you were so stuck up and posh before.’

‘Oh, fuck, no, common as muck. Daddy’s in trade, darling, talks like a barrow boy. It’s only the schools that make you speak like I do.’

‘But you’re so confident. I’d feel like a complete dick wafting around in lace with a parasol …’

‘You’d look one too,’ drawled Sienna, and they both burst out laughing. Of course, Sienna could carry it off with her height and blonde otherworldliness. Buxom little Sam with her dyed-auburn hair would look as though she were auditioning for a period porn romp.

‘But where d’you get it? The confidence? I mean, I think Josh is a … cunt … too …’ Sam hesitated over the word as she’d always disliked it and her parents had been pretty heavy about the swear-box at home. ‘But wouldn’t it tear you apart if he did to you what he’s just done to me?’

‘I suppose I’ll never know the answer to that – horrible little shit wouldn’t dare – but I doubt it. The obscene amount of money Daddy’s earned over the years must have given me some kind of coat of armour.’ Sienna dismissed her birthright with a wave of her wafty hand and added, ‘Let’s have some more booze, then get tarted up and go and have some fun. I think you need cheering up.’

‘That sounds brilliant,’ said Sam, wiping away the vestiges of tears. ‘What are you going to wear?’

Sienna laughed. ‘Don’t worry, I don’t always dress like this. It’s fun to have a certain image with these college idiots, mess with their boring heads, but when I go to Camden I like to rock it up a bit. Pints of snakebite and Lanvin are not the best bedfellows.’

‘Camden? Where?’ Sam was excited; she loved indie music, and that whole kind of grungy scene, but she’d been so focused on earning a living to study, so she could get somewhere in life, that she’d never really had time for that sort of fun.

‘The Hawley Arms.’

‘Fuckin’ ’ell, I think that’s Natalia,’ said Mark to Justin, Bella’s father. They were on their third cognacs after lunching at Club 55 on Pampelonne Beach in Saint-Tropez, where they’d just been shooting for GQ. ‘She’s not bad for an old tart.’

‘Not bad at all,’ said Justin appreciatively. ‘Apparently, she goes like the clappers too. Hey! Nat!’

Natalia, who had just swum onto the beach from her yacht, was wearing an emerald-green high-cut swimsuit with the sides cut out, which made her 44-inch legs look endless. Always aware of keeping the façade intact, she had scraped her white-blonde hair back into a tight bun. There was no way she’d put her face or hair underwater. She felt a stab of annoyance at seeing Mark and Justin. Of all the people she’d met at Poppy and Damian’s wedding, they were probably the ones she liked the least, with their wandering eyes and overt lechery. Oh, well. She sighed and approached their table.