Ten minutes later, after she had made them both a cup of coffee and chatted calmly about their sons, Carol turned to Kate and said gently, ‘I’m not going to pry, Kate, but if you want to get it off your chest I’m a good listener, and I promise it won’t go any further.’ When Kate made no response, but simply continued to sit huddled in her chair, her hands gripping her coffee mug, Carol added quietly, ‘Not even to Tom, if that’s what you want.’

      Kate turned her head to look at her, her gaze blank and withdrawn, then forced herself to focus on her friend.

      Taking a deep breath, she began to speak, slowly and painfully. ‘I met Sean when I was eighteen. He was building an extension for my aunt and uncle’s neighbours. We’d had a very hot summer, and he worked bare-chested in a pair of old tight-fitting jeans—’

      ‘Mmm, sexy. I can picture the scene.’ Carol smiled encouragingly, relieved to see just the merest twitch of humour lifting Kate’s mouth.

      ‘I used to walk the long way round just so that I could see him,’ Kate admitted. ‘I hadn’t thought he’d notice me, but then one night at a local club he was there and he asked me to dance. Fantasising over him when I walked past the building site was one thing. Being confronted with him there in front of me in the flesh was another! I felt intimidated by him.’ Kate gave small shrug and looked at Carol.

      ‘I was a naïve eighteen-year-old virgin, and all that fierce, potent hot male sexuality was a bit overwhelming. Unfortunately he thought I was rejecting him, and…’ She shook her head. ‘I didn’t know it then, but like me he’d had a very unhappy and lonely childhood, which had left him with a bit of a chip on his shoulder and a determination to succeed. I can see now that I was a bit of a challenge to him, because I was a girl from a different background. A trophy girlfriend, I suppose the press would call it nowadays, and for a while I was good enough for him as just that. Good enough to marry, in fact. But once he’d become very successful I think he began to realise that I wasn’t much of a trophy after all, and that with his money he could afford a much, much better one than me.’

      Carol could hear the pain in Kate’s voice. ‘You obviously loved him,’ she said softly.

      ‘Loved him?’ Kate looked at her starkly, her emotions darkening her eyes. ‘Yes, I loved him—totally and completely, blindly and foolishly I realise now. Because I believed then that he felt the same way about me!’

      ‘Oh, Kate!’ Carol sympathised, her own eyes prickling with emotion as she covered Kate’s cold folded hands with her own.

      Kate swallowed and then continued. ‘My aunt and uncle were furious when it came out that I was seeing him—especially my aunt. There was a dreadful row, and it came out that she had never liked my mother, had been appalled when she had married her brother. She told me that if I didn’t agree to stop seeing Sean they would wash their hands of me and disown me. But I couldn’t give Sean up. I loved him too much. He had become my whole world! And when I told him what my aunt had said he told me that he wasn’t going to let me go back to them, to be hurt and bullied, that from now on he would look after me.’

      Kate exhaled in a deep sigh.

      ‘We were married six weeks later. Sean had finished the extension by then, and was ready to move on to his next job.’

      Carol could see the events of the day were beginning to catch up with Kate and, surveying her friend’s exhausted hollow-cheeked face, she stood up and told her firmly, ‘Look, you’re all in. Why don’t you have a rest? I’ll collect Oliver from nursery, if you like, and give him his tea.’

      Kate was tempted to refuse. But while a part of her was longing desperately to have the warm, solid feel of Oliver’s sturdy body in her arms, so that she could hold him and take comfort from his presence, another part of her said that this was not fair to her son and that she must not get into the habit of leaning on him emotionally. And anyway, she had things to do, she reminded herself grimly. Like finding a new job for a start!

      ‘You’re very kind,’ she told Carol wanly.

      ‘Nonsense. I know you’d do the same for me.’

      She would, of course, but it was hardly likely that she would ever be asked to do so, Kate acknowledged wearily after Carol had gone. Carol had a loving husband, and George had two sets of adoring grandparents only too willing to spend as much time as they could with their grandson.

      And Oliver only had her. No grandparents. Just her. Just her? What about Sean? He was Oliver’s father, after all, Kate reminded herself angrily.

      Sean!

      Her whole body felt heavy with misery and despair. She had struggled so hard, and it seemed so unfair that she should have her precious financial security snatched from her because her ex-husband had taken over the company.

      For the first time since