So he would be able to take them on cook-outs and hunting and camping. Would the boys accept her? Ruth had – or appeared to have done, at least – despite the strained tightness of the initial confrontations and the immediate aftermath of the divorce. There’d only been one meeting with the children and they’d treated her then like the enemy she was, which she realistically accepted was all she could expect. She hoped the attitude would change, with time. ‘Is John wearing braces on his teeth?’ she said, passing the pictures back.

Blair stared down and said, ‘Difficult to tell. Ruth doesn’t say anything about it in the letter.’

He held it out to her, for her to read, another part of their no secrets agreement. Ann hesitated, appreciating the gesture but reluctant to take it from him. It was part of the undertaking between them. And he always read her letters, from her mother, although more out of courtesy to her than for any other reason, because they were so bloody stiff and formal. But she always felt the embarrassment of prying when it came to Ruth’s correspondence, which was probably illogical, considering that she’d taken the woman’s husband but it was nevertheless a sensation she always experienced. There was, of course, the other reason. To want to read the letters from his first wife could have indicated a jealousy. Ann was confident she didn’t have anything to be jealous about, not with Ruth. It was only to be expected that Eddie would still have some feeling for her: love, even, of a kind. But not the kind that was any danger to her. So there was no reason for jealousy and no reason, therefore, to do anything that might hint she felt that way. Like reading her letters. ‘Later,’ she avoided. ‘I’ve got dinner to fix first.’

As soon as they started to eat Ann recognised that the steaks were slightly more overdone than he liked, but Blair didn’t complain. ‘Sorry,’ she said, not wanting him to think she didn’t care.