'Get into your pyjamas, Owen and your mum will read to you for a bit,' Ed encouraged him and before Annie could even think about saying she didn't have time, he added quickly in her direction, 'Don't worry, it's an Alex Rider book. You're going to love it.'
Half an hour later, when Owen's story time was over and Annie had heard all about his day, kissed him thoroughly and turned out his light, she went back out into the terrace and found just Ed and a bottle of wine.
'Where's Lana?' she asked.
'I think she had some urgent texts to attend to.'
'Connor?'
'Locked in the bathroom . . . said he may be some time.'
'Ah.'
'You've driven the poor man to drink,' Ed couldn't help adding.
'Me? I wasn't even there!' Annie came over to stand behind Ed and ran her hands fondly over his shoulders.
'How about a walk?' he asked, taking hold of her arms: 'A little stroll, just you and I into the fig trees at the bottom of the road?'
'Sounds nice,' she agreed, 'sounds a little bit more fun than the sofa bed.'
'Definitely.'
As they walked hand in hand along the gravelly path which led from the villa to one of the little country roads, Annie had to talk about Mr B, his incredible handbags and his interest in finding someone to sell them in London.
Ed listened, leading her by the hand from the road and into a field where dry grass swished against their ankles as they walked.
'Do you know where we're going?' Annie asked.
'Oh yes,' he assured her, 'I saw this place earlier today with Owen and I wanted to come back with you.'
It was dark. Now that they were well away from the bright windows of the villa, they were relying on just the light of the pale half-moon in the sky to find their way through the velvety darkness.
'You should have brought a torch,' Annie told him.
'A torch? Where's the romance in that?' he laughed.
There was a fig tree just ahead of them with branches bent low, close to the ground, and thick green leaves almost still in the windless air.
'Doesn't it smell nice?' Ed asked, leaning up against one of the thick branches and pulling Annie in close beside him.
Annie breathed in the dark green, spicy-sweet smell of the leaves and the small unripe figs hanging between them.
'Mmmm . . .' she had to agree.
'I'm a bit worried about you,' Ed said, landing a kiss on her forehead.
'Why?'
'You sound like you have a big crush on this Mr B,' he told her. He didn't sound as if he was teasing, 'and we've been here before,' he added. 'Mr Flash in a big flash car, promising he'll keep you in handbags and posh knickers for ever more . . . and look how badly that ended.'
'Ed!' Annie exclaimed with as much horror and disbelief as she could muster, because way deep down where she could hardly admit it, she wondered if she did have the tiniest crush on Mr B. 'Are you jealous? Are you really jealous?'
'Of course I'm jealous,' he confessed. When he'd first fallen for Annie, she'd been dating and then had even moved in with a rich dentist, causing Ed the kind of jealous agonies which, at the time, he'd thought might be terminal.
Annie slid her hands into the back pockets of Ed's trousers and pulled him right up against her. 'Good,' she said, 'stay jealous, babes. It makes you much more interesting.'
Just as he moved in to kiss her, she pulled back her head and had to ask, 'What's this Owen was telling me about you hanging out with some incredibly attractive Italian woman all day?'
'Oh!' Ed spluttered, 'that's a total exaggeration. We ran into someone, literally, she said hello . . . she had her daughter with her . . .'
'Fabulously attractive though? Yes or no?'
'She wasn't bad . . . she was OK . . .' Ed answered in some confusion. 'I didn't really notice.'
'You didn't really notice?'
Their kissing was growing much more heated. Fingers were on buttons, fumbling to undo them and feeling urgently for skin.
'I'm going to see Mr B again tomorrow,' Annie confided, 'and you should be fine with that.'
'OK . . . OK,' Ed agreed, feeling Annie's cool hand slip into the open front of his trousers. 'How much did you spend?' he asked suddenly, feeling her tongue slide down to his nipple.
'I can't tell you,' was all the reply she gave.
'C'mon,' he murmured, feeling her lick down his chest and then against his stomach, knowing she was going to go lower. 'Two or three? Or more?'
She took him in her mouth, so when he repeated the question, it was in a very low voice, with his head pulled back, trying to find support against the branch of the tree.
'Just over three, but don't worry,' Annie broke off to tell him – but quickly carried on, deciding this was probably the best remedy.
'OK, OK,' Ed sounded a little surprised, but then murmured, 'I can live with that.' He ran his fingers through her hair. 'Another three hundred on your credit cards . . . we can sort it. We'll get there. We'll get there,' he repeated. 'Oh! I like that!'
Three hundred?
Now it was Annie's turn to be surprised. Three hundred pounds? No, no, she had just spent over three thousand . . . using the money borrowed against the house.
She had wanted to tell him then, she had wanted to have the conversation and clear the air, really she had. But obviously this wasn't the moment.
'And jus' where have you two been?' Connor, on the terrace with another bottle of wine, called out when he spotted them walking in from the garden.
'Fruit picking,' Annie called out to him.
'Fruit picking? A likely story . . . Squeezing his plums and chewing his banana maybe.'
'Connor!' Annie had reached the terrace by now and seeing how pale and sweaty her friend looked, she reached over for the remains of the wine.
'You have to go to bed now,' she instructed him. 'Your liver can't take any more. You've been pure for four months, you'll have to break yourself in gently. I know, babes, because it's just like after childbirth when the first glass of champagne makes you high!'
Connor drained the glass he had in his hand and then tried to stand up. But he wobbled dangerously and had to sit down again.
'Oh babes,' Annie sympathized, 'you are going to feel so bad in the morning. I don't know if I can let you share a room with Owen tonight, he might get drunk just breathing in the fumes you're giving off.'
'Shud
up
,' Connor said, holding out a hand for Annie to pull him to his feet.
'C'mon,' Ed joined in and together, each with an arm of Connor's over their shoulders, they led him first to the bathroom, where he insisted he'd be fine and shut the door on them, and then helped him to his bed.
'Just take off my shoes,' he groaned, sinking down onto the mattress, 'I'll just sleep in these.'
'Can't I at least take off your trousers?' Annie had to ask. 'Make my day?'
'I thought Ed had already done that?' Connor wasn't too drunk to tease. 'OK, you can admire my trunks. I think you bought them for me anyway. In medium!'
'It goes by waist size, gorgeous,' Annie retorted, briskly hoicking down his cargoes, 'otherwise you'd obviously be extra, extra large.'
Connor was already curling up on his side, eyes shut, falling either asleep or into a coma. Annie was going to put a big plastic bowl at his bedside just in case. She was feeling deeply guilty about him now. She shouldn't have left him in the café with Lana for so long. Temptation must have come breezing by and although Connor was a big boy, he still hadn't learned to stop before he fell over. Maybe he was an alcoholic. Maybe he should abstain. Maybe she had not exactly been very supportive of his attempts to address the problem.
But he was so much fun just a little bit drunk. It was hard to give that side of Connor up. Even Hector had agreed with that.
'I only love him when he's at least one glass down,' Hector had told her. 'That's not a very healthy basis for a relationship, is it?'
'You know, I can think of worse,' Annie had replied.
Italian Annie:
Vibrant orange and pink chiffon dress (Boutique Nina)
Pale camel fake snake heels (Boutique Lorenzo)
Bouffant hair (by Patrizia)
Total est. cost: £110
'When in Rome . . .'
The next morning, straight after breakfast, Annie got into the people carrier and drove herself back to Mr Bellissimo's shop.
No one else had volunteered to come with her. Not that she'd minded: she was sure it was more professional to go and talk business with Mr B on her own. Besides, Ed and Dinah wanted a quiet day by the pool, maybe with a touch of exploring round the villa, even a little light food shopping in the afternoon, and Billie and Owen were happy to stay with them. Connor and Lana were still in bed, which wasn't so surprising, whereas Aunty Hilda, the creature of habit, had woken at 7 a.m. and wheeled herself into the kitchen for a cup of tea.
'
Lipton's . . . it's just terrible stuff. You can't get it in Britain,
but you can't get anything else abroad, of course. It's just one of
those strange, strange things
,' she kept telling everyone who hung around long enough to listen.
'Are you really going back to Mr B?' Dinah had wanted to know.
'Yes! He wants someone to sell his bags in London and I think I—'
'Are you sure?' Dinah had asked, 'You don't think he was just saying—'
'Shhh!' Annie had interrupted her because Ed was coming back out to the terrace.
'So you're off to speak to your new handbag guru,' Ed had smiled at Annie, 'and we're stuck here just sunbathing, swimming in the pool and all that terrible stuff.'
'If you're going to sunbathe, you've got to have my posh sun cream,' Annie had insisted and went off to rifle through her suitcase to find it.
'Sisley,' she'd showed Dinah proudly as she'd rubbed some lovingly over Ed's forehead, nose and cheekbones.
'Nice!' Dinah had said. 'Am
I
worth it though? Isn't this stuff about eighty pounds a pot?'
Ed had spluttered with horror and moved Annie's fingers from his face. 'I'm definitely not worth it!'
'It's OK,' Annie had assured them, 'I got it online, fabulous deal. It's fantastic. For tanning without wrinkling.'
'Oh good, because I was so worried about that.' Ed snaked an arm around her waist. 'I think you should stay here,' he'd wheedled, 'I've still not seen you in your swimsuit and that's the only reason I agreed to come to Italy, to see you in your new swimsuit. How have you managed to come on holiday and fill up your time with appointments and meetings and things to do?'
She'd looked at him with some sympathy. 'Ed, I
am
in the shoe and handbag manufacturing capital of the world,' she explained.
'Annie, if I took you for a minibreak to Outer Mongolia, you'd spend the whole time negotiating the best price on saddle-bags because they are just
so this season
.'