‘Claudia. Her name was Claudia. She was my cousin’s wife.’

‘You were in love with her?’ Stupid question. Of course he was.

‘We both were. I met her at university, dated her, but when I brought her home she met Christopher and after that it was always him. It didn’t stop Chris obsessing that we were having an affair when we worked together on the store design.’

She lifted her hand to the bruise at her temple, gently rubbing her fingers over the sore spot, remembering his concern.

‘He was abusive,’ she said.

‘I believe so. She used to brush aside any concern, say she bruised at a touch. Was always walking into things. Maybe she was. She wasn’t eating properly, fighting an addiction to tranquillisers. Then one day I caught her running, terrified. I held her,’ he said. ‘Just held her, begged her to leave him. Not for me. For herself. And then Chris caught up with her, held out his hand to her and, without a word, she took it. Walked away with him. It was as if she had no will.’ He glanced at her. ‘It was just the hair, Lucy. You’re not a bit like her.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m shorter, fatter…’ He frowned and she rushed on, ‘You’re talking about her in the past tense.’

‘There was an accident. Chris always drove too fast, even though he knew it terrified her. Probably because it terrified her. It’s all about control, isn’t it?’ He looked away for a moment, but then looked back. ‘She died instantly. He’s in a wheelchair, paralysed from the neck down.’

She shivered, but not with the cold, and he turned to her, put his arms around her. Held her. Just as he’d held Claudia, she thought and, much as she wanted to stay there, in his arms, she pulled away.

‘I have no reason to protect Rupert Henshawe, Nathaniel. He does not control me.’

‘Doesn’t he?’ He shook his head, as if he knew the answer. ‘Reason has nothing to do with it,’ he said. Then, before she could deny it, ‘It was my fault. I should never have come back. Never accepted the commission.’

‘Why did you?’

‘Family. Guilt. I turned my back on family tradition and it broke my father’s heart. It was a way to make up for that.’

‘And, after the accident, you stepped in to look after things?’

‘There was no one else.’

‘No one else called Hart, maybe. Is Christopher punishing you for what happened to him?’ she asked. ‘Or are you punishing yourself for not saving Claudia?’ He didn’t answer. Maybe he didn’t know the answer. ‘Who is it who leaves the rose, Nathaniel?’

‘That’s enough, Lucy,’ he said sharply.

‘It’s him, isn’t it? A daily reminder that she loved him. He can’t abuse his wife any more, frighten her, hurt her, because she’s beyond his reach,’ she continued, recklessly ignoring the warning. ‘So he’s abusing you instead.’

There was a long moment of silence.

So not bright, Lucy Bright.

Blown it, Lucy Bright.

And then he touched her cheek with his cold hand. A gesture that said a hundred times more than words.

‘Bright by name, bright by nature. Good guess, but you’re not entirely right. I’m punishing myself for failing to protect her. But I’m punishing him, too. Even while it gives him pleasure to know that I’ve been jerked back into the family business, robbed of something I loved, at the same time it’s eating him alive to know that I’m in control. In his place.’

‘He had Claudia.’

‘Yes, he had Claudia. His tragedy, and ultimately hers, is that he never believed that she could love him more than me. That he always thought of himself as second choice in all things.’

‘Let it go, Nathaniel. If you don’t, it will destroy you and then he’ll have killed you both.’

‘I know,’ he said, looking at her. ‘I know.’ And somehow she was the one holding him. Hugging him to her, holding him safe. She could have stayed there for ever, making their own warm, safe space in an icy world. Then he dropped a kiss on the top of her head. ‘Your turn, Lucy.’

‘Mine?’ She looked up at him.

‘That was the deal. I tell you mine and you tell me yours. Tell me what happened on the stairs.’

‘I…’ About to deny it, she thought better of it. ‘I don’t know. I was in a bit of a state, confused. An emotional basket case.’

‘That would explain it,’ he replied dryly, ‘but I have to tell you that, between your criticism of the penthouse and the basket case explanation of a stop-the-world-moment, you are not doing a lot for my ego.’

‘I didn’t mean…’

Lucy faltered. She didn’t know what she meant. She was more confused now than she had been then. When he’d caught her, their eyes had met and the instant connection had entirely bypassed her brain.

Her response to him had been entirely physical, without thought or reason. Completely honest. Without guile. Innocent.

‘I wanted you to kiss me,’ she said. Then, because being honest really mattered, ‘I wanted you.’

Even in the light from the street lamps, Nat could see the blush heat Lucy’s cheeks. Felt an answering and equally primitive rush, a desire to recapture that atavistic moment of connection. The caveman response, with no need for words or complicated ritual.

Her honesty shamed him. He’d wanted her, too, with a raw urgency that shocked the civilised man. It was the same primal instinct that urged him to protect her. They were two sides of the same basic need for survival. Take the woman, plant your seed and then protect her against the world because she was your future. And he would. From what, he wasn’t entirely certain, only that this time he wouldn’t stand back. Wouldn’t fail. No matter what the cost.

The ‘no involvement’ mantra had gone right out of the window the moment he’d suggested this mad adventure.

That first life-changing encounter had given him back something of himself. The kisses they’d shared in the snow had broken through a barrier. More would have them naked, in bed. That was why he’d stopped by the hot dog stall instead of taking her straight home.

‘“I wanted you”,’ he repeated thoughtfully. ‘Maybe it could do with a little work. I was thinking that it was one of those perfect, never to be repeated, once-in-a-lifetime moments when everything seems to drop into place.’

She pulled a wry smile. ‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you. But they will keep happening to me.’

‘You’re telling me that you keep meeting strangers you want to kiss?’ he asked, his voice even, but the caveman response was, he discovered, a lot more powerful than the civilised veneer would suggest. ‘Oh, not kiss.’ Her smile deepened. ‘That was a bonus feature. And of course last time it wasn’t a chance encounter, but stage-managed, so actually you’re right. Once-in-a-lifetime it is.’

‘Stage-managed?’

‘You want the story.’ She nodded as if she’d been expecting that. ‘I warn you that it’s long. You’ll probably want another hot dog. Extra onions for me.’

He returned with two fresh hot dogs, dripping with mustard and onions, and leaned back against the wall, his shoulder just touching hers. Just so that she’d know he was there.

Giving her courage to tell her story. Face the betrayal head-on.

‘The Henshawe Corporation’s High Street fashion chain had lost market share,’ she began. ‘It was no longer hot so they made the decision to give the stores a new look, a new name. Re-brand it. Take it upmarket.’

Lucy bit into the bun, chewed it for a while, watching a police launch moving slowly up the river, the lights dancing on the water, while she gathered her thoughts.

Nathaniel slipped his arm around her shoulder as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

‘They went to their PR company, as you do,’ she said, ‘and commissioned them to come up with a strategy to launch the new brand. One that would not only garner maximum media coverage, but engage their target consumer audience of young women who read gossip magazines and aspire to be the wife, or at least the girlfriend, of a top sports star.’

‘Or, failing that, one of the minor royals,’ he said, raising a smile.

‘You’ve got it.’

‘So far, so standard.’

‘Their first step was to set up focus groups to find out what that group were looking for. Get feedback on likely “names” to launch the new brand.’

‘Classy, stylish, sexy clothes. Good value. A label with cachet. You don’t need a focus group to tell you that,’ he said.

‘No, but they were surprised to discover that concerns were raised about sweatshop labour. And then someone said wouldn’t it be great if they used an ordinary girl, someone like them, rather than a celebrity to be the face of the store.’

‘What they meant was one of them.’

‘Undoubtedly,’ she said. ‘But it gave the PR firm their hook. Their media campaign. All they needed was an ordinary girl.’

‘So how did they find you, Miss Ordinary?’ he asked.

‘They advertised for a junior clerical assistant.’

‘Interesting approach,’ he said dryly. ‘You ticked all the boxes?’

‘Good grief, no. I wasn’t thin enough, tall enough, pretty enough or even smart enough.’

It was all there in the file. Painful reading.

‘I thought they wanted ordinary.’

‘Ordinary in quotes,’ she said, using her fingers to make little quote marks.

‘You must have had something.’

‘Thanks for that,’ she said, waving towards the road, where the cars were moving slowly past in the slushy conditions.

‘Who are you waving to?’

‘My ego and yours, hand in hand, hitching a ride out of here,’ she said, her breath smoking away in the cold air. Her mouth tilting up in a grin. Because, honestly, standing here with Nathaniel, it did all seem very petty. Very small stuff. Except, of course, it wasn’t that simple.

‘Actually, I happen to think you’re pretty special,’ he said, capturing her hand, wrapping it in his. ‘But we both know that you’re not classic model material.’

‘You’re right. I know it, you know it, the world knows it. But I had three things going for me.’ They’d handily itemised them on a memo. ‘First, I had a story. Abandoned as a baby-’

‘Abandoned?’

‘The classic baby in a cardboard box story, me.’

He made no comment. Well, what could anyone say?

‘I had a dozen foster homes,’ she continued, ‘a fractured education that left me unqualified to do anything other than take care of other people’s children. Not that I was qualified for that, but it was something I’d been doing since I was a kid myself.’

‘You truly were Cinderella,’ he said, getting it.

‘I truly was,’ she confirmed.

The hot dog was gone and she reached for her coffee. Took a sip. It was hot.

‘Second?’ he prompted.

‘I had ambition. I worked in a day-care nursery from eight-thirty until six, then evenings as a waitress to put myself through night school to get a diploma in business studies.’

‘Cinderella, but not one sitting around waiting for her fairy godmother to come along with her magic wand.’

He was quick.

‘Cinderella doing it for herself,’ she confirmed. ‘Not that it did me much good. I didn’t get a single interview until I applied for the Henshawe job.’

‘It’s tough out there.’

‘Tell me about it. I really, really needed that job and when they asked me why I wanted to work for the company I didn’t hold back. I let them have it with both barrels. The whole determination to make something of my life speech. Oscar-winning stuff, Nathaniel. They actually applauded.’

‘They were from the PR company, I take it?’

‘How did you guess?’

‘HR managers tend to be a little less impressionable. You said you had three things.’

‘My third lucky break was that some woman on the team was bright enough to realise that I was exactly the kind of woman who would be walking in off the street, desperate for something to make her look fabulous. Let’s face it, if the gold-standard was a size-zero, six-foot supermodel, the reflection in the dressing room mirror was always going to be a disappointment.’

‘But if they compared themselves with you… Who is this PR company? I could use that kind of out of the box thinking.’

‘Oh, I don’t deny they’re good.’

‘Sorry. Your story. So, having applauded your audition, they told you what the part would be?’

‘No.’

‘No?’

‘You’re missing the point. I was going to be a genuine “ordinary” girl who had been picked from among his staff. I had to believe in the story before I could sell it.’

‘Did I say they were good?’

‘Oh, there’s more. Someone added a note on the bottom of their report to the effect that this was going to be a real fairy tale. And then they started thinking so far out of the box they were on another planet.’

His hand tightened on hers. ‘It was all a set-up? Not just the job, the discovery…’