Afterwards, he let her down gently, before collapsing onto the floor, panting hard. Maddy couldn’t speak for a minute or two, as she waited for her body to recover some normal functions.

‘Whew!’ she managed eventually, ‘that was something else…’

Matt looked up and grinned. ‘Well, you seemed-,’ he was still catching his breath, ‘you seemed to enjoy it.’

‘Oh yes, I think you can safely say that I enjoyed it.’ She lapsed back into silence, listening to her breathing as it gradually slowed, and becoming aware of the annoying dampness that accompanied any vigorous sexual adventure. Sweat was cooling as it trickled down her back, and there was a sticky patch under her thigh, which squelched slightly as she moved. ‘Oooh, time for a shower, I think,’ and she dragged herself towards the bathroom.

She was half expecting Matt to join her, but when she reappeared, wrapped in a threadbare towelling robe that was on its way to the bin, he was sitting on the end of her bed, half-dressed.

‘Matt? You OK?’

‘What?’ he looked up, startled. ‘Yeah, I guess…’

‘Aren’t you, well, I thought you might-‘

‘Thought I might what Maddy?’

‘Well, I thought you might want to stay the night.’

‘You mean, stick around so we can have some more great sex in the morning when you’re feeling horny again?’ his tone was harsh.

Maddy was taken aback. ‘Er…not necessarily, if you don’t want to-‘

‘But it’s never been about what I want has it?’ Matt seemed genuinely angry now.

‘Matt…’

‘No, it’s always been, come around, I fancy a shag, or come out to this party, I could do with a quick one in the loos to keep me going, or come on over, show my mate a good time…’

‘Now, come on,’ Maddy was beginning to get angry too, ‘I thought that’s what you wanted. You certainly didn’t seem to be objecting too much that time with Toni on the living room floor.’

‘You thought-‘ Matt stood up and ran his hands through his hair. ‘Why do you think I followed you to London in the first place?’

‘Well, we’d had a bloody good night down in the New Forest, and I rather got the impression that you were game for more.’

‘Just another good shag then, was that it?’ He crossed the space between them and was glaring at her, arms crossed, from a distance of eight inches.

Maddy was beginning to feel cornered. She wasn’t sure quite why he was so angry. ‘Look, Matt-‘ she began placatingly, ‘I don’t know what you thought our- well, our relationship was, but I never made any promises-‘

‘Too bloody right you didn’t. Every time I tried to talk to you about it, you changed the subject, or started undoing my flies…’

Maddy grinned, she couldn’t help herself. ‘Mmm, it was good, wsn’t it?’

‘Don’t!’ But despite himself, she could see a smile hovering around the edge of his mouth.

‘Do you remember that time in the back of the cab, on the way back from that awful first night?’

He snorted with laughter, and dropped his intense gaze. ‘Yeah, how could I forget?’

‘And the time-‘

‘Stop it! You’re doing it again. Come on, Maddy, I’m trying to have a serious conversation here…’ He reached out to hold her arms. ‘Look, I just want to know whether, well, what- Damn it!’ He paused and took a deep breath. ‘I want to know whether you’ll marry me.’

Maddy was shocked, frozen into immobility by the unexpectedness of the words. This, from Matt? Matt, that she was waiting to slide out of her life so she could focus on the future and her career. Whoa, no, she must have heard him wrong. ‘Er… run that one by me again?’

‘You heard.’ His grip on her arms relaxed as he saw the genuine confusion in her face. ‘OK, maybe that was a bit sudden. Let me try again – come on, sit down.’ He led her to the edge of the bed. ‘I guess I knew from that first night, I knew you were special, so I had to come and find you. And last year, all that rushing around, all those parties, all that sex,’ he smiled wryly, ‘well, I thought you felt the same, I thought we were having an amazing, modern relationship. Then-‘

‘No, no more,’ Maddy interrupted, regaining some of her faculties. ‘Matt, I’m so sorry if I sent out the wrong signals, I should’ve known better…’

‘But it was good, wasn’t it?’

‘Yeah, it was good, but it wasn’t really a relationship, was it?’ she asked gently. When he didn’t reply, and simply continued to look deflated and miserable, she carried on. ‘I should’ve explained, but I was so caught up in- well, in everything I guess. Look, Matt, I’m not good at relationships, I swore off them a long time ago. In fact, I gave myself a rule: “If you shag them, never see them again; if you want to see them again, don’t shag them.” It always seemed to work quite well, kept sex separate from friendship, kept it down to the basics I guess. But then-‘

‘Then I followed you to London.’

‘Er, yes, and I should’ve sent you packing, but I was in need of company that night, and well, you looked so optimistic…’

He turned away from her and stood up. ‘So you felt sorry for me, is that it?’ He sounded bitter.

Maddy winced. ‘No, no that’s not it… I guess, well, I guess I liked the fact that you’d made the effort to find me, and I was feeling lonely, and yes, I was very attracted to you, physically, and you have to admit that the sex has always been sensational…’ Matt had his back to her, and appeared to be chewing his nails. ‘So then we kind of fell into this- well, I guess it was a sort of relationship, but I always assumed you’d find someone else, you know, there must be loads of gorgeous girls going in and out of that hotel you work at.’

Matt spun around. ‘Never looked at a single one,’ he stated primly.

‘Oh no?’

‘Well, okay, maybe one or two,’ he conceded. ‘But then you were off to New York, and I missed you, and a guy can only go so long without- well, without. So.’ They stared at each other for endless seconds. A race of emotions charged across his face. Incomprehension, hurt, yearning, hope… ‘So,’ he began tentatively, ‘would you- could you ever think about marrying me?’

‘Oh Matt, I don’t know. Not now, not just when-‘

‘When what?’

‘Not when my career is just taking off. You must see that it’s important to me to get this New York office going, to take this opportunity that I’ve been given?’

‘Well, I thought that I might be important to you too.’

‘Of course you are,’ Maddy insisted, standing to give him a hug, ‘it’s just that this is more important right now.’

‘Well, could I come to New York too?’ he asked, almost eagerly.

Maddy stood back to look him straight in the eye. ‘I don’t think that would be a good idea, do you?’ He didn’t reply. ‘I’m going to be concentrating on my career, and I’m still not ready to think about a relationship in the proper sense of the word. Apart from anything else I can’t believe I’ll have the time!’ Maddy smiled, ‘Go on, enjoy yourself out there in the big bad world of London, yeah, we had a good time, but there’s lots more girls out there that you could show a good time to, and who knows? Maybe, just maybe you’ll fall in love…’

Matt’s shoulders slumped. ‘OK, message understood.’ He turned to gather up the rest of his clothes, as Maddy watched with mixed feelings. He looked so vulnerable, so much like a puppy that had been kicked by its master that she couldn’t help but feel a pang of sympathy. But she knew that marriage was not for her now – she doubted that it would ever be for her – and that she was doing the right thing in severing ties with Matt like this. She followed him to the door of the flat.

‘Take care of yourself, won’t you?’

‘And you, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’ He managed a weak smile. They embraced tightly, before she let him out of the flat and out of her life.