The Real Thing — Catherine Alliott

“Is that what you really think I am, Laura? Some bored Putney housewife with seven-year itch who's just ripe for bumping into her glamorous ex-boyfriend on holiday, ditching her nice, comfortable husband and embarking on a steamy affair with him? And all in the name of finding myself or something? This isn't one of your Aga Sagas, you know. This is me, Tessa Hamilton, happily married mother of two, and apart from anything else, I went out with Patrick years ago...”

Everyone's got one -- an old boyfriend they never fell out of love with, they simply parted because the time wasn't right. And for thirty-year-old Tessa, it's Patrick Cameron, the gorgeous, moody, rebellious boy she met at seventeen; the boy her vicar father disapproved of; the boy who left her to go to Italy to paint.

And now he's back.