She never did sit and watch. Even when they’d been older and the boys from the other islands became part of their pack, she’d always been included. Until…

Let’s not go there, she told herself. She’d moved on. She was fashion editor for one of the world’s best-selling magazines. She lived in New York and she was fine.

So what was Nikos doing, here, ushering her into a restaurant she recognised? This place usually involved queuing, or a month or more’s notice. But Nikos was a man who turned heads, who waiters automatically found a place for, because even if they couldn’t place him they felt they should. He was obviously someone. He always had been, and his power hadn’t waned one bit.

Stunned to speechlessness, she found herself being steered to an isolated table for two, one of the best in the house. The waiter tried to take her jacket-his jacket-but she clung. It was dumb, but she needed its warmth. She needed its comfort.

‘What’s good?’ Nikos asked the waiter, waving away the menu.

‘Savoury? Sweet?’

‘Definitely something sweet,’ he said, and smiled across the table at her. ‘The way the lady’s feeling right now, we need all the sugar we can get.’

She refused to smile back. She couldn’t allow herself to sink into that smile.

‘Crêpes?’ the waiter proffered. ‘Or if you have time…our raspberry soufflé’s a house speciality.’

‘Crêpes followed by soufflé for both of us then,’ he said easily, and the waiter beamed and nodded and backed away, almost as if he sensed he shouldn’t turn his back on royalty.

Nikos. Once upon a time…

No. Get a grip.

‘I’m not going anywhere,’ she muttered into the silence. ‘You can’t make me go back.’

Nikos smiled again-his smile wide and white, his eyes deep and shaded, an automatic defence against the sun. His smile was a heart stopper in anyone’s language. Especially hers.