'He sent me a diamond bracelet while I was filming in Hungary and I knew it was over!' Tasmin suddenly spat tempestuously. 'He's found someone else, hasn't he?'

'You're better off without him, MissLaslo,' Sara heard herself saying. 'You're a wonderful actress. You're wasted on a slick, womanising swine like AlexRossini!'

Incredulous silence hummed on the line. 'I beg your pardon?' Tasmin finally gasped.

Sara looked down dazedly at the receiver and thrust it back on the cradle in shock. She was trembling all over. Dear heaven, had she really said that? She rose unsteadily upright again. Her stomach cramped with sudden, unbearable nausea. She lurched into the cloakroom across the corridor and was horribly sick.

Ten minutes later, still shaking like a leaf, she returned to her office. The phone was buzzing again. She ignored it, walked over to Pete's desk and withdrew the bottle of brandy that he kept in the bottom drawer. She poured a liberal amount into a cup and slowly drank it down, grimacing at the unfamiliar taste of alcohol. Maybe it would settle her stomach. Brian and Antonia. Their names linked in a ceaseless refrain inside her pounding head, making her want to smash her head against the wall in protest.

She felt as if she was going mad. Sensible, steady Sara, who always kept her head in a crisis. But Sara had never before faced a crisis in which her whole world had fallen apart. Shivering, she helped herself to another nip of brandy, struggling to get a grip on herself. 'No decent woman…' A choked and humourless laugh escaped her. She tore the ring off her finger, dropped it in a drawer and rammed the drawer shut. She made herself pick up the phone again.