LITMIR.BIZ

       An enormous Thank You to Beth Thomas for helping me understand the process that the Home Office requires when seeking to marry a foreign national. Your expertise was invaluable!

       Prologue

      ‘Are you positive she’s not dead?’ My niece’s worried whisper is so close to my face that I catch a whiff of her sweet Frosties-breath. At six, she’s the perfect height to scooch onto the sofa where I’ve spent the night. The middle cushion has slid partway off, and no wonder, with its silvery brocade that always gave my clothes a fierce case of static cling when I perched there in happier days. My arse is wedged into the sofa’s murky depths, definitely touching whatever is underneath, but I’m not about to move a muscle now.

      ‘She’s not,’ Leo answers with his usual big brother authority. ‘Mum says she only wishes she was. She’s had a hard time so she’s sleeping.’

      He whispers the words, as if I’ve got a terminal diagnosis. He’s not far off.

      ‘But it’s almost lunchtime.’ Little fingers poke at my shoulder.

      ‘Caitlin, don’t. Mum said to leave her.’ I can hear the start of a wrestling match as Leo subdues his sister.

      I pry open one eye just in time to catch him snatching the biscuits Rowan left last night with my undrunk tea. ‘Leave me alone, rug rats, and put those back! Can’t a person have a mental breakdown in peace?’

      Then I hear a ping. Finally! Better late than never. ‘That’s my phone!’ Frantically, I fling things from the coffee table: balled up tissues, my bra, more open packs of biscuits than you’d find at a blood donation clinic. ‘Where is it?!’

      That sends them scattering. I must sound completely unhinged.

      That’s because I am completely unhinged.

      ‘You’re up,’ Rowan calls from the lounge doorway. She doesn’t wait for an invite to come into what is, technically, at this moment, my bedroom. She simply makes her way towards me, picking her way past my overnight bag (or rather overnights, plural), discarded clothes and seemingly every toy in the house. Still, she manages to get a march on. My sister-in-law never lets any stumbling blocks, literal or otherwise, get in her way.

      Everything about Rowan screams efficiency, from the top of her no-nonsense (but still very cute) pixie cut to her always-in-ballet-flats feet. Pretty Ballerinas too, not knock-offs, on account of her high-flying programming job for one of the big banks. I had hoped my niece and nephew would inherit her looks instead of my brother’s, but they’ve been cursed, like Paul and me, with the long Fraser nose, close-set eyes and furry brows that I have to pay good money at the salon to keep under control. Paul really should too, instead of walking around with a sleeping chinchilla on his brow. They did get our good lips, though, so that’s something, and Rowan’s pale blonde waves – though both Caitlin and Leo wear those longer than Rowan does – and they don’t turn beetroot in five minutes of sun like their mum.

      I’d take Rowan’s lack of melatonin any day to get the rest of it. Imagine, if you will, the woman who really does have it all (without being smug about it like I’d probably be) … Well, that’s Rowan. To this day I don’t know how my brother ever convinced a gem like her to give him the time of day, let alone marry him.

      But then, people are probably about to say the exact same

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