‘I’m afraid,’ Ray began sombrely, and with those two words her heart sank into her pink court shoes again, ‘that you were right when you said that we aren’t going away. I have booked us a room here for tonight, but that’s all we can manage, so we’d better make the most of it.’

He winked at her salaciously, but Melissa suddenly wasn’t feeling all that sexy. One night in a hotel with Leah in the room wasn’t what she called a honeymoon, and she couldn’t understand why Ray thought it was. She’d almost rather go home. She picked at a fingernail and refused to meet his eye.

‘But,’ Ray continued – he seemed unable to maintain his serious tone any longer, and a grin spread across his face – ‘I do have a surprise for you, and hopefully you’ll think it’s better than a holiday.’

Melissa couldn’t think of much that was better than a holiday right now, but she played along, smiling expectantly as she waited for him to do his big reveal. He was rummaging around in his trouser pocket. Was it jewellery, she wondered? She hadn’t had an engagement ring as such, so maybe he had spent their honeymoon money on a diamond instead. But when his hand emerged it wasn’t a small velvet box that it was holding. It was a key.

Ray held the keyring between finger and thumb and swung the key provocatively under her nose. ‘Ta dah!’

Melissa stared at him and shook her head. She had no idea what he was talking about. Ray, his enthusiasm seeming to dip a little at her lack of comprehension, pressed on.

‘This, my darling Mrs Allen,’ he said, ‘is the key to our new home.’

Melissa heard what he was saying and watched the words as they formed on his lips, but their meaning eluded her. What was he saying? What home? They had talked about maybe renting somewhere together when her current tenancy at the caravan park ran out, but getting a house now, without her knowing anything about it? That was something new.

‘What?’ she managed.

‘I . . . have bought us . . . a house,’ Ray said triumphantly, and he looked so very pleased with himself that the first bubblings of anger that had started in her gut just moments before evaporated.

‘Lovely though your caravan is,’ he continued, ‘we really can’t live there together. Not now we’re married. There isn’t the room, for one thing, and once Leah starts to crawl she’ll need more space, too.’

He had a point, Melissa had to admit. Much as she adored her caravan, she was already struggling with the lack of storage space for Leah’s paraphernalia, and staying there really would be a challenge once Leah started to move.