Phantom Marriage. PENNY JORDAN

emotional commitment—he just doesn’t strike me as that kind of man. Look, I’ll go downstairs and ask Mrs B., our treasure, to make us a pot of tea and some orange for the kids, and you come down when you’re ready and I’ll introduce you to Alec. We’ll be in the sitting room. It looks out over the gardens, first left in the hall.’ She walked towards the door, paused and then said impulsively, ‘I’m so glad you and James could both be here together. It’s almost like old times…’

      They viewed ‘old times’ differently, Tara thought tiredly as she unpacked for the twins and herself; Simon and Mandy had made themselves at home almost immediately, and within twenty minutes of Sue leaving them they were ready to return downstairs with Tara; their hands and faces washed and the clothes they had travelled in exchanged for dungarees and tee-shirts.

      Everyone else was already in the sitting room, as Sue had called it, but what in actual fact was a generously proportioned room furnished in tones of pale lemon and soft blue, with huge french windows opening on to the gardens.