What followed was nasty. Dom gave her as much analgesic as he could, but short of a general anaesthetic-‘and I’m not doing that on my own’-he couldn’t stop all the pain.

There was gravel, deeply embedded. She’d felt pain as she’d walked but there hadn’t been a choice. She’d just kept on walking.

‘Any other night there’d be traffic on that road,’ he told her. ‘But it’s the Thursday before Easter. The whole town’s either left for holidays or hunkered down with visitors.’

He was trying to distract her. She lay back and tried really hard not to think about what he was doing. He was making sure not one trace of gravel remained.

‘So why aren’t you either on holidays or hunkered down with visitors?’

‘Hey, I am,’ he said, smiling suddenly. She liked it a lot when he smiled, she decided. Normally his face looked strained. Like life was hard. But when he smiled the sun came out. It made her feel…silly. No, she chided herself. That was the morphine. One man’s smile shouldn’t make her feel silly. She was a very serious person. Or she would be if he’d stop smiling.

‘One woman with a sore foot,’ he was saying. ‘One dog and three puppies. That makes visitors. Pity about the Easter buns.’

‘The Easter buns?’

‘They didn’t rise,’ he said sorrowfully. ‘I’m in all sorts of trouble. But don’t you worry about me. You just think about your own worries. Crashed car. Injured foot. Bruises all over and a messed-up holiday to boot. You keep thinking about them and let me get on with my own troubles. Easter buns as flat as pancakes.’

She chuckled. The sound surprised them both. He glanced up at her and grinned and then he went back to what he was doing. Ouch. Her smile faded. She bit her lip, then decided she needed to smile again. Suddenly it seemed really important to keep smiling.