They drank copiously and gorged themselves on the various delicacies they had procured, making one another laugh by attacking the crab lasciviously, raising eyebrows at each other as they slurped the meat loudly from the claws.

‘Wait till you see me tying knots in the cherry stalks with my tongue …’ said Bella.

Andy laughed. ‘Oh, God, I love you. Promise me you’ll never leave me.’

‘Of course I promise.’ Bella leant over and kissed him. ‘What’s brought this on?’

‘This is all just so perfect, and – well, I suppose work’s getting me down a bit recently.’

‘Do you want to talk about it?’ Bella knew that Andy was investigating some Russian people traffickers, but generally he just wanted to switch off when he got home.

‘Not in too much detail.’ Andy smiled at her. ‘The way those girls are treated beggars belief, and it makes you feel filthy just knowing what actually goes on. But I think I’m getting closer to finding out who the main boss is.’

‘Jesus, Andy, what are you getting yourself mixed up in?’

‘I’ll be all right, sweetheart.’

‘Hmmm …’

‘Anyway …’ Andy hurriedly moved on. ‘He’s been around for years as far as I can gather. Started off exploiting underage girls in former Soviet states – Ukraine, Georgia, Belarus. Once the Soviet Union split up he realized there was more money to be made from Western punters, so he started bringing the girls over here. Anyway, it’ll all be worth it if we expose him and, with any luck, break up his disgusting empire.’

‘God, you’re a good man. What did I ever do to deserve you?’

‘I ask myself the same thing every day.’

‘Git.’

‘Git?’ Andy laughed. ‘I don’t think anybody’s said that to me since I was twelve.’

Her new iPhone beeped. Bella was always the last person to get around to the technology everybody else had been using for years.

‘Oooh, Facebook message.’

Andy rolled his eyes.

‘It’s from Poppy. A round robin about a party she’s having tonight. Now, why do you think she’d include me in that? She knows I’m not in New York. Is she just trying to rub my nose in how bloody glamorous her life is?’

‘Belles, stop it.’ Andy took the phone away from her and topped up her glass. ‘And listen to yourself. Your life’s not too bad, now really, is it?’ He gestured at the leafy canopy above them, at their lavish picnic spread, across to the Serpentine, where a magnificent heron was picking his long, spindly-legged way through the swampy undergrowth, staring at them beadily.

‘No it’s not, it’s wonderful.’ Bella lay back and rested her head on Andy’s lap, smiling up at him. ‘I love you.’

‘I love you too.’

Poppy and Damian’s Prohibition party (dress code: gangsters and molls) was in full swing, their interior-brickworked warehouse flat crammed to the rafters with glamorous New Yorkers. Not bad, considering they’d only been living there a few months. Although pretty much all of them were new contacts of Poppy’s, thought Damian bitterly, as he poured himself a strong cocktail out of a teapot into a pretty china teacup. Another of Poppy’s bright ideas, though he’d mixed the cocktails.