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same way?
    Was there a possibility? Never in all her life could Dinah remember having experienced such a rush of joy as she had felt then. It lifted her, catapulting her into a whirlpool of emotion that left her breathless. In that moment she was afraid as well as wildly elated – afraid of meeting the son she had not seen since he was just two weeks old, afraid she would be unable to cope with the situation, afraid of what he would be like, afraid she might not live up to his expectations, or he to hers.
    But those fears had all been unfounded, she thought now, looking at Steve smiling at her across her paper-strewn desk. He was everything she had hoped for – and more. And thank God he had not simply visited her and then vanished again as she had been so afraid he might. She couldn’t have borne to lose him twice.
    â€˜So – what’s worrying you, Dinah?’ he asked now, sitting down opposite her in one of the blue leather chairs she disliked so heartily and stretching his long legs. ‘Is it business?’
    â€˜It’s always business,’ Dinah said. ‘But just for now, don’t let’s talk about it.’
    He raised an eyebrow in a lazy, quizzical gesture.
    â€˜Suit yourself. But remember, if there is anything I can do you only have to say the word.’
    Dinah nodded. ‘I know. And whether you realise it or not, that really is one of the most important things.’
    He looked doubtful. She saw it in his startlingly clear light-blue eyes. Where had those eyes come from? She sometimes wondered.
    â€˜It’s the truth,’ she told him and knew that it was.
    Ros’s absence, the anxiety about the meetings that were scheduled for the coming day, even the Reubens business all paled into insignificance beside this one very important fact of life.
    Steve was here. After almost thirty years of separation they were together again. And set against that yardstick nothing else mattered.

Chapter Four
    The Inter-European Airways jet was approaching Bristol Airport, coming in low over the Somerset countryside. Maggie looked out of her window, peering down at the patchwork of fields dotted with houses and farms, the dark clumps of trees, the blue expanse of water that made up the Chew Valley lakes. They were valleys, she remembered, that had been artificially flooded to make reservoirs to provide water supplies for the city and the surrounding areas. Beneath one of them was an entire village, houses, pub, church. The people who had once lived there still felt bitter and sad about what had happened; in times of drought when the water receded they gathered at the edge of the lake and walked down on to the dry caked mudflats trying to make out the tower of the church and pointing out the spot where their house had been to anyone who would stop and take an interest.
    Today, however, apart from the wildfowl and a few fishermen, the lakes looked deserted and the water, dark and mysterious, kept its secrets.
    â€˜Looks like we’re back to the English weather!’ the man sitting next to Maggie grumbled.
    He was still wearing a singlet more suited to the sunshine of Corfu than this damp grey day. When he had moved in beside her Maggie had been unable to avoid noticing that his arms were scorched red from too much unwise sunbathing and the skin across his shoulders and back was peeling away in big flaky bubbles.
    He was a holidaymaker, of course – herself excluded, holiday-makers made up the entire passenger list of the plane, she guessed, and she knew she had been lucky to get a seat at such short notice.
    Lucky – and crazy, as Ari had maintained.
    â€˜You can’t go to England just like that!’ he had said when he had finally come home the previous night to find her packing. ‘It’s madness!’
    â€˜I have to go,’ she had said, trying to make him understand. ‘I’m really worried about Ros. And it’s not as if I have anything