Mario swiped at his tears and swallowed. ‘I was going to go inside and ask which room. I wanted to know which fucker you were spending time with.’ His top lip curled. ‘I was looking around for a parking space and I saw . . .’ He shook his head and looked towards the window as if still unable to process or believe what he was about to say. ‘I saw Maxwell’s Audi.’ He started to laugh, while his tears fell again. He laughed and rubbed his hands over his face. ‘Andrew Maxwell! The bloke I nod to in the morning, wondering how you get to be a bloke like that who drives a fancy car and goes off to a warm office in a suit while I have to haul my sorry arse out of the house and go to plaster houses with my joints on fire, racing every week to make my bonus so we can afford to live in a house opposite a man like that.’

‘I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to explain.’ Her words squeaked through her distress as her heart raced and her legs shook beneath the table.

‘I bet you don’t.’ He held her stare. ‘How long has it been going on?’

Bess sat forward and shook her head. ‘There’s nothing going on – nothing happened! I swear it, Mario, I swear!’

Again he looked into the middle distance. ‘Now there’s a surprise! Who’d have thought you might say that? Give me some credit. You’ve been found out. The game’s up!’

‘No, Mario, I swear to you! I swear on the kids’ lives! Nothing happened!’ Her voice rose another octave, a clue to the frantic wave of panic that had consumed her.

‘So what happened – you met him in a hotel room and had a chat, a cup of tea and came home? You think I’m stupid?’

‘No, I don’t think you’re stupid, but we did just talk . . .’ Desperation hit her and it was like running into a wall – how could she make him understand, believe her?

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, Bess! Stop lying to me!’

‘I’m not lying to you! I went to meet him and I know I shouldn’t have – it was stupid of me, really stupid. I don’t really know why I did, and if I could turn back time . . .’ Bess realised she had come full circle: from wanting to change the life she had to desperately wanting to save it. It would have been funny if it weren’t so tragic.