She thought she was putting on a pretty good show of not having a care in the world, but it didn't seem to fool Josh. Sometimes he knew her too well, thought Bella with an inward sigh, wishing he would stop asking if something was wrong. She didn't want to tell him that she was feeling edgy and unsettled, because then he would ask why, and she didn't know why.

Only that wasn't quite true, was it? She did know.

It was something to do with the way Aisling's arrival on the scene had brought her up short. Something to do with looking across the table at that engagement dinner for Kate and realising that Josh was no longer the familiar, slightly geeky student she had known for so long.

For Bella, it had been like finding herself suddenly face to face with a stranger. There was nothing obvious about Josh. He had a quiet, ordinary face, ordinary blue-grey eyes, ordinary brown hair, she had always known that.

But she had never before noticed how he had thickened out and grown into his looks, or how the fourteen years they had known each other had given him a solid, reassuring presence and an air of calm competence that was impressive without being intimidating.

She had never noticed his mouth before or his hands or throat or that line of his jaw. Never noticed that he had a great body. He wasn't exceptionally tall but he was lean and compactly muscled, and he moved with an easy, loose-limbed stride.

And now that she had noticed, Bella couldn't stop noticing.

It made her uneasy. This was Josh. Her best friend, the one who had seen her through endless romantic ups and downs. She had cried on his shoulder and laughed and talked and hugged him without a thought for more than ten years now. He had seen her without her make-up, seen her tired and cross and sick and hungover, and she had taken him for granted. Being with Josh had been like being with Kate or Phoebe, as comfortable as an old pair of slippers.