‘Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be in New York?’ I look over his shoulder to the door, up to the counter. ‘Is Francesca here too?’

Ben taps his fingers on the table and then turns towards me. ‘Didn’t you get my messages? I didn’t want to call and put you on the spot, so I thought texting would be better, give me a chance to explain.’

Explain what? I shrug. How can I tell him that I got them but I didn’t read them. That I blocked him! I shake my head. ‘I’m sorry, Ben. I didn’t open them,’ I confess. ‘Just thought it best that we left things as they were. Fresh start for me as well as you and your girlfriend.’

‘But that’s just it, that’s what I wanted to tell you. Francesca and me… Well, we broke up. We’re finished.’

I open my mouth to say something casual, trite, I should so say, ‘I’m sorry’. But how can I be convincingly sorry? I run my fingers through my hair, still trying to think of something to say that will be appropriate and sound genuine… ‘Sorry’ is not that.

‘Katie?’ Ben says. But I can’t, I just can’t get any words out. Ben and Francesca are finished.

‘What happened?’ is all I can manage. I need to know. After all, maybe Ben’s heart-broken? Maybe it wasn’t his choice. Maybe he caught her cheating on him and he’s angry and bitter and determined to win her back? Or maybe she was an idiot like me who walked away from the most brilliant boyfriend and best friend one could ever hope to meet in a lifetime?

‘I figured it wasn’t fair to lead her on,’ he says with a deep sigh. ‘When I was honest with myself, I didn’t want to go to New York. But she did. She really did. And that got me thinking about you and me. How we went our different ways. Why we went our different ways. And the way that I found myself back here with you.’

His fingers tiptoe across the table and he places his hand right next to mine. I can’t describe what it feels like to have him this close to me, speaking about us, feeling the heat of his body right by mine again without using the word electrifying. I mean terrifying. Everything about the way he makes me feel is absolutely terrifying. The way my heart wants to be held by him is terrifying. The way my knees have caved is terrifying. The way my mouth wants to be all over his skin, his face, his chest is terrifying. And electrifying.

‘You see, I get it now. When I wanted to go and travel and you wanted to stay, you never made me choose. You let me go. But Francesca, she was different, everything was different and that never quite felt right, never felt the same. She gave me an ultimatum. She told me that unless we went to New York together, we were finished. But you never did that to me. You wanted me to go for what I needed to go for, even if it hurt. So I told Francesca, we were finished. That I was coming back here, back home. And that it’s the right thing to do, because I’m still in love with somebody else.’

This time no words are stuck in my throat. The words slip out of my mouth before I have the forethought to check myself. ‘And are you in love with somebody else?’

‘Afraid so. Ever since I tasted her eggs Benedict, I knew she was the one. Tried to live without her. Not recommended.’

I feel my face flush with heat, with adrenalin, with shock… A really good kind of shock, like all my lottery numbers are flying up on screen one by one.

‘Do you mean it, Ben? Are you serious? You’ve got to be joking.’ I press my fingertips into my temples. This is all too much to take, the worst news of my life followed by the best? ‘I don’t know what to think anymore. Please tell me straight.’

He clears his throat. ‘Katie, I love you and I’m not joking. If anything, I’ve never been so serious. It’s crystal clear to me now, that no matter what I do or where I go or who I’m with, I belong with you.’

‘Kiss me,’ I say, swallowing hard and slowly looking up to his face, but he’s looking at my hand. He brings my palm to his mouth and kisses it, three slow, soft kisses which make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and my heart lunge up to my throat. I can feel the heat rise across my chest, up my neck, flooding into my cheeks. Then he pulls his lips away from my hand, meeting my gaze, gauging my reaction. His eyes are dark and piercing and they’re focused all over me. On my lips. On my eyes, on my neck, on my hair, on my chest. He can’t seem to take me in fast enough.

Oh my god, it’s too much. My head falls back against the wall when I feel his lips on the inside of my wrist, then moving up my arm, to my shoulder, to my neck. I naturally tilt my head to the side and, as soon as I do, I feel the warmth of his breath, he’s that close. I can breathe in his salty, cotton-clean scent; I can just about feel his stubble, his face is that close to mine. He pauses just below my ear and I think I’m going to slide right off this seat and under the table. I squeeze my eyes shut and hope my heart doesn’t explode when he leans in, because it definitely feels like it could. Ben’s lips press gently against my skin, and I swear the room fades out. I swear everything else just falls away.

He works his kisses all the way along my jawline until his mouth meets my chin. I can’t move. I’m literally panting for breath. I can take no more. I want to take it all. To take him all in, in to me. My hand slides up his arm and grasps the back of his head, not wanting him to pull away from me, wanting to devour him. He lifts away and looks at me directly. His eyes are smiling, knowing how crazy he’s driving me. We’re both breathing heavily, knowing exactly what’s about to come next. What we’re about to experience together all over again, remembering how it was like with us this before, impatient about how it’s going to be again.

I think he’s as excited and as terrified as I am right now. I brush my thumb across the back of his hand and he gasps quietly. The assent I just gave him with that tiny movement seems to break through some invisible barrier, because immediately, he slides his hand over mine and presses our palms together, intertwining our fingers. The warmth of his hand doesn’t even come close to the surge of heat that shoots through my entire body. A faint smile flashes across his lips and Ben leans his beautiful face right in to mine and covers my lips with his. I slide my fingers into his hair and I am home.

And then I believe that it’s true. Then I believe him that he knows that he belongs with me as much as I believe that I belong with him. Here, in this little dining booth, lost in a swirl of lunchtime crowds and hot trays and manic service, we are kissing like crazy. Like our lives depend on it. Our lips meet and I remember, I understand all over again, why people describe kissing as melting, because every square inch of my body dissolves into his. My fingers grip into his hair, pulling him closer. Every nerve in my body is alive, alert, craving more of him and my heart explodes. I have never wanted anyone like I want him and here he is, in my hands, on my lips, my Ben, my second chance at my only love.

He pushes me backward towards the wall, and we’re laughing and kissing and stroking each other’s faces, our cheeks, our lips together, making out in front of the whole restaurant and I don’t care, I don’t care one eensy bit. All I want is him. All I want is this moment.

I hear the clicking of a pen and a loud tutting. We stop and turn to the waitress, standing with her arms folded. ‘It’s lunchtime, sweethearts. I suggest you pay up and get a room.’

I turn to Ben, trying to force my lips to stay in a straight line so that I don’t look like a beaming idiot. I throw a note on the table and slide my hotel key out of my wallet. ‘I think she’s right. What do you think?’

‘What are we waiting for?’ he laughs and exhales at the same time and we both give up on holding anything else back. Two beaming idiots scramble out of the booth, race out of the Italian, across the road and into the Rembrandt and straight up to my suite. Hand in hand.