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bad-tempered sex-god who didn’t take kindly to being woken up in the middle of the night.
    I ran my hand through my hair, wondering what possible excuse I could come up with and then, remembering I’d been trying for spontaneous, decided not to bother.
    ‘I was hoping I wouldn’t need the shirt.’ I held the polo shirt to one side, jutting a hip out in what I hoped was a vaguely provocative way. ‘I was thinking …’ Deep breath, Anna. ‘I was thinking … we could have sex together.’
    ‘Ha! Ha, ha, ha, ha!’ He laughed just like that, as though I’d said something really stupid or funny. Which I hadn’t. ‘Sex? Oh, Anna, that’s funny!’
    ‘What’s so funny about it?’ His reaction was really rather insulting, I thought. ‘I was being spontaneous. I thought maybe you might want to have sex with me. Why would that be so ridiculous? Am I not attractive, is that it? Everybody else seems to be having sex all over the place. Why not me?’ I folded my arms crossly and turned away from him, feeling a heat rise in my cheeks. I felt silly and self-conscious.
    ‘Come here. ’ He opened his arms wide. ‘I’m flattered, Anna, really I am,’ he said, trying but failing to keep the smile from his face. ‘And you are very attractive. But I don’t think that would be a good idea, do you? You’d only be doing it to get at Ed and it would make you feel so much worse tomorrow morning.’
    He hugged me, our bare upper bodies touching and I rested my head on his chest. He smelt so good, my arms around his body felt so entirely natural, his bare body strong and firm beneath my hands and almost overwhelmingly enticing. My body’s reaction was immediate and intense. So wrong and yet so right too. At this moment I felt sure sleeping with him would make me feel a whole lot better. Trust Ben to have his sensible head on tonight.
    ‘Jump into bed then,’ he said, indicating with a sweep of his head for me to join him.
    ‘Really?’
    ‘Well, I’m clearly not going to be getting any sleep with you stalking around the house all night. Although you must promise to stay over your side of the bed. I don’t want you taking advantage of me.’ He was grinning as he climbed back into bed and I slipped in beside him. Instantly everything felt so much better. My legs gently touching his, I closed my eyes and was asleep in a moment.

Chapter Four
    When I woke, it was just gone seven. Shame washed over me as I looked across at Ben’s empty place in the bed, feeling a pang of disappointment that he wasn’t there. He’d been right. Even without having seduced him I felt much worse this morning as all the events of yesterday crashed in on me. I wasn’t sure if my pounding head was down to the awful memories of the day that would surely rank as the worst of my life or the number of glasses of wine I’d drunk.
    I located my jeans in the guest room, pulled them on and wandered downstairs to find Ben.
    ‘Hey!’ He turned round from where he was standing at the stove and flashed me a big grin. ‘I was just doing you a bacon sandwich.’
    ‘Oh, lovely,’ I said, my nose twitching at the delicious smells wafting my way. For the first time ever, I felt self-conscious in his company, the memory of standing half-naked in front of him making me cringe with embarrassment. I dropped my gaze to the floor. ‘Look, Ben, I just wanted to apologise for last night. Really,’ I said, catching his eye, ‘I don’t know what came over me.’
    ‘Forget about it. I have.’ Clearly my spectacular entrance into his bedroom hadn’t been as memorable as I thought. ‘You’d had a tough day; it was perfectly understandable,’ he said, in the understatement of the year. He fell silent as he spread butter onto bread and then scooped the bacon out of the pan and onto the bread, squirting ketchup on the top. He handed me a plate and it felt like the loveliest thing anyone had ever done for me. I wasn’t sure Ed had ever fixed me breakfast in