An image of Tom in his swimming shorts flickered distractingly in her brain, but Imogen forced her mind away from thoughts of that lean, tautly muscled body.

Away from the image of his hands.

Of his mouth.

From the memory of how he had looked when he was laughing.

Friends would be enough for now.

Slipping her feet into her favourite sequinned flip-flops, Imogen went out to find Tom.

He was waiting for her on the veranda, his feet up on the railing and a beer in his hand, looking more relaxed than she had ever seen him.

‘Better?’ he asked as he saw her.

‘Much, thank you.’

Tom swung his legs down. ‘Would you like a drink?’

He made her a gin and tonic. It was deliciously cold and refreshing, and Imogen sipped it appreciatively as she leant against the railing.

It looked as if she had missed a glorious sunset while she was in the shower. She could see through the coconut palms to where the lagoon gleamed dark and still, and beyond to a vivid streak of crimson along the horizon. Unseen insects were working themselves up into a frenzy of creaking and whirring and sawing and rasping in the tangled foliage, and the air was hot and heavy with the intense scents of the tropical night.

Suddenly something swooped in front of her, and she straightened in surprise. ‘Was that a bird?’

‘A bat, I think.’

Imogen wrinkled her nose. ‘First cockroaches, now bats…Somehow this isn’t how I imagined paradise!’ she said dryly as she watched the creatures, darting and diving through the hot dark air.

‘Don’t tell me you’re afraid of bats too?’

‘Of course not,’ she said, shooting him a look. ‘I’m not afraid of cockroaches either,’ she said, not entirely truthfully. ‘I know I screamed, but it was just a shock seeing it there. I wasn’t expecting it,’ she finished lamely.

Tom looked down at his beer and reflected that he knew how she had felt. He hadn’t been expecting to see her without any clothes on either, and that had been just as much of a shock, if in a different way.

‘About earlier,’ he said abruptly. ‘I’m sorry if I embarrassed you, bursting in like that.’

‘That’s OK. I’m glad you were there. I would never have been able to scare that cockroach away by myself.’ Her smile glimmered. ‘My flamenco dancing isn’t up to much!’

The corner of Tom’s mouth lifted at the reminder of what had set them laughing. He was glad Imogen had mentioned it. When she had appeared, looking lush and glowing after her shower, her hair falling damply to her shoulders, he had wondered if the idea that had come to him while she was showering might be asking for trouble, but now the constraint had eased he decided to put it to her after all.

‘I’ve been thinking,’ he began.

‘Oh?’

He gestured around him. ‘This place…it’s much more intimate than I was expecting.’

‘It’s meant for honeymooners,’ Imogen pointed out. ‘It would be surprising if it wasn’t intimate.’

‘I know,’ said Tom with just a touch of his old irritability. ‘I wasn’t thinking clearly.’

‘That’s understandable,’ she said, instantly feeling guilty. ‘None of this can be easy for you.’

‘The thing is…’ Tom frowned, wondering how best to put it. ‘We’ve got three weeks here,’ he began again. ‘The chances are that we’re going to find ourselves in more embarrassing situations when there’s just the two of us.

‘I thought with it being a whole island we’d have more space,’ he tried to explain himself. It had all seemed so obvious when he was working it out in his mind, but it felt more difficult with Imogen’s eyes on his face. He was no good at this kind of stuff. If he wasn’t careful, he’d be talking about his feelings.

‘As it is, we’re going to be effectively living together for the next three weeks,’ he ploughed on. ‘That’s going to be awkward unless we agree to be…I don’t know…normal.’

‘That’s just what I was thinking,’ said Imogen eagerly.

‘I’m just not quite sure what normal is,’ confessed Tom.

‘Let’s be friends. Just temporary ones, of course,’ she added quickly in case he thought she was trying to take advantage of Julia’s departure.

‘Temporary?’

‘Well, it would be difficult to go back to working together if we were friends, wouldn’t it?’

‘Perhaps,’ he acknowledged. There was no use pretending it wouldn’t be awkward, anyway.

‘But, in any case, I’m leaving soon,’ Imogen went on, ‘so I won’t be around much longer.’

‘Leaving?’ Tom asked, startled. ‘Why?’

‘I’m going to travel,’ she said. ‘I’ve never been outside Europe before. I’ve always wanted to go to India, so I’m going to start there and make my way down through South-East Asia to Australia, and I hope that on the way I’ll decide what it is I really want to do with my life.’

Now that she had finally given up dreaming of Andrew.

Tom was frowning. ‘I didn’t know about this.’

‘That’s why I’m temping,’ said Imogen. ‘Didn’t you know? I’m only filling in until you appoint a properly qualified executive PA.’

He had known that, of course. He just hadn’t wanted to think about it. He had been too busy steering Collocom away from the rocks to take the time to choose the right person. Besides, Imogen might not be your classically cool and competent secretary, but she had been managing well enough. There had been no reason to think about replacing her.

‘When’s all this going to happen?’ asked Tom, conscious of an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach. That wasn’t dismay, was it?

‘As soon as you appoint a permanent PA. I’ve been saving for nearly a year now, so I’m ready to book my ticket whenever you find the right person. I assumed you were putting it off until after the wedding, but if you interview in April and we have a handover in May, I could be packing my bags in June.’

‘June?’ No mistaking the dismay now! ‘That’s only three months away!’

Imogen nodded. ‘I know, but if it’s awkward when we get back, well, at least it won’t be for long.’

Tom looked out into the night and tried to imagine the office without Imogen. Oh, he’d known she would go one day, but he hadn’t thought it would be so soon. She was as much part of his life as Julia had been, if not more so. He saw Imogen almost every day, after all. It would be strange without her now.

But it wouldn’t be the first time he had had to get used to a new PA, Tom reminded himself, alarmed by the bleak drift of his thoughts. He would be fine.

‘That might work out quite well then,’ he said, conscious that he sounded as if he were trying to convince himself. ‘You’re right, it might be difficult to go back to our old boss/PA relationship after being here, but if you’re leaving soon, that won’t matter.’

‘Exactly,’ said Imogen, keeping her smile bright.

What had she expected? That Tom would fall to his knees and beg her not to leave him?

No, it would be better this way. There was bound to be speculation at the office when they went back. The sooner she left and got on with her new life, the better, but for now, being friends, even temporary ones, seemed like the best way to get through the next three weeks.

‘So are we agreed?’ she said. ‘As long as we’re here, we’re not boss and PA any more, but just friends?’

There was only the tiniest moment of hesitation, then Tom nodded. ‘Agreed.’

‘Great,’ said Imogen. ‘Now that’s settled, let’s go and see what’s for supper. I’m starving!’

She chatted easily as she set out the delicacies that had been left in the fridge, and Tom found himself almost mesmerised by the readiness with which she was prepared to treat him as a friend. It made him realise how little he had known about her when she was just his PA. He had had no idea that she could be that sharp or that funny, and he watched her as if he had never seen her before as she told him about her friends, about the flat she shared with her friend and the life she led in London, so different from his own.

Suddenly Imogen broke off with a grimace as she listened to her own words. ‘This must all sound so dull to you!’ she said.

‘Actually, it doesn’t,’ said Tom, almost to his own surprise. They had found a bottle of perfectly chilled wine in the fridge, and he leant across the table to top up her glass.

Imogen didn’t believe him, of course. What had she been thinking of, rabbiting on about wine bars and chaotic supper parties and the snap quizzes she and Amanda held to test their embarrassingly wide knowledge of TV soaps? She cringed at the memory.

‘But your life is so much more glamorous!’

She couldn’t imagine Tom sprawled in front of the television, for instance. He and Julia would have gone out to smart restaurants or grand parties. They would have been to the opera or polo matches or the kind of clubs she and Amanda only ever read about in magazines.

‘Is it?’ said Tom. ‘My apartment may be bigger than yours, and I may live in a more exclusive part of town, but I don’t do much when I’m there. I just work.’

‘What about when you were with Julia?’

He shrugged. ‘We’d eat out a lot, and yes, there would quite often be some kind of reception, but those events aren’t nearly as much fun as they’re cracked up to be.’

What had he and Julia done together? Tom tried to remember. Julia was into art, but galleries and openings bored him rigid. He had often used work as an excuse not to go with her. Perhaps Patrick had gone instead?

It was all obvious in hindsight, of course, but shouldn’t he have wondered how much he and Julia had in common before he’d asked her to marry him? He had thought that a similarly cool and careful approach to life would be enough. How wrong could you be?

He looked across the table at Imogen, whose own approach to life could by no stretch of the imagination be described as cool and careful, certainly not from what she’d been telling him.