There were three highly sober and contrite players at breakfast the next morning. To say they looked the worse for wear would be an understatement. Figuring that having to play for hours in the sun with a hangover would be punishment enough, and buoyed with relief over not being discovered, Matt let it go. "Just hold off until the end of the week next time," he told them.

Regardless of the drama last night, Matt was feeling content. Happy, even, though his focus on the test series tended to keep his mood serious. His game was better than it had been in ages. The team was in form. The press were supportive. There were no heavy politics distracting him behind the scenes.

And he hadn’t heard from Miggy in days which was a welcome break for his peace of mind.

Not only that, he was enjoying the most amazing nights with an incredibly sweet and beautiful girl. He knew it couldn’t last, and he knew it wasn’t serious, but occasionally he smiled just thinking about her. She might not have Miggy’s worldly sophistication but she was fun to be with and at times when he had been momentarily stressed, she had made him laugh. Lifted his mood.

Miggy used to be able to make him laugh. She would endlessly regale him with anecdotes of various famous people who moved in the same circles she did. At first he had found it fascinating, amusing. But after a while it started to pall. So what if another eighties popstar had got into a fight with a TV actor at a party? Or a peer of the realm had been caught with his trousers down in a lap dancing club? After a while it simply wasn’t interesting any more.

Cara didn’t know anyone and instead of finding this dull Matt found it refreshing. Being with her was an escape, a relief. It was real. She may not have had Miggy’s experience, but she was generous and willing in bed. He found himself lost in her in a way that shut out the rest of the world and any stress or worry he had.

With Miggy it was all about her. They talked about her thoughts, her friends, her problems, never his. She understood Matt couldn’t drop what he was doing cricket-wise to be with her, she wasn’t that self-centred, but everything else they did was her choice, her preference. She’d also drop their plans like a stone if a last minute job came up, such as her trip to Peru during the previous test series. Which Matt figured was fair enough as she had her own career to think of, but he sometimes felt taken for granted.

Whereas Cara had been interested in him. Genuinely wanting to know about him, and what he thought about things. She was smart. She could talk about science, which Matt appreciated as his own degree had been in engineering.

He shouldn’t be comparing them, he supposed, it wasn’t fair on either of them. It wasn’t as though it was either or. It was Cara now, a brief and enjoyable overseas fling, and then back to Miggy and regular life when the tour finally ended.

But standing there, on the pitch, thinking about what he wanted to do afterwards to unwind, it was only ever Cara that came into his mind.

Cara was still pinching herself daily, feeling as though she was in some wonderful and forbidden dream. She knew that she absolutely must not fall for Matt but trying to discipline her thoughts and feelings to stay platonic was not easy. They were taking a huge risk regardless, as the intrusion in Matt’s room the other night had demonstrated.

Matt wasn’t available. He had been clear about that. He was in a high profile relationship with a famous model, and when Cara went back home she would have to put all this behind her and move on. Wrap her memories up in a box and store them away, like putting old photos in the attic.

"Every girl should have a secret affair," an elderly aunt of hers had once said.

Aunt Diana probably hadn’t intended a full blown affair in the sense it was understood today though. She had meant something far more chaste and reserved, carried out through love letters and dances at chaperoned balls, tragically ended by some misfortune or forced separation. Leaving nothing behind but a few billets-doux and dried rose petals to grow misty-eyed over in old age.

What would Cara’s mementoes be? A few faded photos - none directly of Matt, of course - and the ticket stubs to a long-ago test match.

But right now it wasn’t time to think about that. It was time to simply enjoy the moment.

They couldn’t be seen together by other people, since although Matt trusted his team mates, the more people who knew about it just made it riskier. Plus there were journalists around the place. If he had been single, or even just one of the team, it might not have mattered. But as captain he was under more scrutiny.

So late each night Matt would come to her room, as his was now too much of a risk, and they would make love and lie in each other’s arms until morning.

He slipped off to his own room at dawn, and Cara would sleep for a couple more hours before getting up herself. She breakfasted in the company of the Hilliers, with whom she had become firm friends - they had invited her to visit them in Surrey - and the three of them set off to the cricket together.

A week of sheer joy. A week of being thrust into a world she had never experienced.

"I’ve always thought cricket whites look very dashing on a man," Mrs Hillier said to Cara one day at the play. Cara privately agreed but did not dare say so. She would never have considered it were it not for her awareness of Matt’s rippling bronzed muscles beneath his white shirt.

Mrs Hillier had asked Cara about her own romantic situation and Cara had told her the truth, that she was recently single and concentrating on her studies for the time being.

It was more or less the truth, anyway. Cara was trying not to give anything away: her crashing disappointment when Matt was finally caught out. Her use of the field glasses to view him when he was fielding, rather than the action on the ground. Her heightened tension when he was opening the second innings.

She tried to keep her reactions neutral but it was hard. Her connection with him brought her into the game, it made everything far more charged.

It didn’t help that Matt was one of the players that Mr Hillier particularly admired, and frequently praised. She just hoped nothing showed on her face when Mr Hillier yet again lauded Matt’s "outstanding performance" and "aggressive strokes".

Matt was so fired up after scoring another half century in his second innings that Cara had barely let him through the door before he was all over her. Hungry to celebrate, hungry for release he practically ripped her clothes off and threw her on the bed.

She was happy to reciprocate: the hours of waiting for him, thinking about him, had driven her nearly wild.

She couldn’t believe how hard he was or how much stamina he still had after such a long day.

"I needed that so much," he said afterwards. "I needed you. I can’t get enough of you."

Cara knew he was just saying it. It was just the kind of thing that people said in these circumstances, so she supposed anyway. But a tiny part of her thrilled in the hope that it was true.

She said nothing but lay there, just enjoying being with him. They were both damp and glistening with perspiration and she decided to take a shower to cool off. She would probably sleep better afterwards.

"Can I join you?" Matt asked.

His intentions were certainly not to save water by sharing the shower. The minute they were under the water he took full charge. He ran the soap all over Cara’s body, paying attention to every part. His hands glided over her breasts, across her stomach, around her buttocks.

She was drowning in the water, drowning in him.

Despite his previous exertions finishing just minutes before, he was rock hard and ready for action again. Putting her hands on his body, feeling the muscles of his chest and the hard flat stomach, Cara ran her lips down his body until she was on her knees below him.

Holding him in one hand she took him in her mouth, her lips enclosing his swollen head. She wanted to be intimate with every part of him. He had given her body so much pleasure, leaving her helpless with desire so many times, and she wanted to feel the same power over him.

Matt groaned and jerked his hips involuntarily when her mouth came down on him. She felt warm and wet around him. Instead of letting him slip out when he staggered backwards against the shower wall she moved over him more firmly, taking him deeper, not letting him go.

Not that he wanted her to let go. The pressure of her hands and mouth, the sensation of her tongue swirling around him, were a rare ecstasy.

Just watching her drove him wild, that she would do this for him. That she seemed to want to do it so badly.

Her eyes were closed and she was totally focused on him, on his sensation, on his pleasure.

He found himself twisting his fingers through her hair, falling in dark, wet tendrils as the shower rained down on her.

Cara could feel him tensing. When she flicked her tongue in a certain way he would throb in her grasp. His reactions made her ache as well, she felt as though she was becoming as swollen and sensitive as he was.

She was determined not to stop. She wanted to do this all the way, to lose herself in stimulating his desire.

Her mouth kept up the pressure and Matt began to rock into her gently, not wanting go too deep, but wanting more of her. He held her head at just the angle he liked, which she seemed instinctively to accommodate.

"God I want you," he said. "It’s never felt this good."

In response Cara increased the pressure, gripped him a little harder. Let the rhythm get faster.

She felt him swell. Felt the tempo build as he guided her. He was pushing into her a little deeper now, not enough to cause her discomfort, but enough that she realised he was getting to the point of losing control.

Matt had his own eyes closed now, he could only feel. His entire hardness was trapped in a hot, sweet ecstasy. She had him in complete control.

He could feel his orgasm boiling within himself. He knew he was going to come violently, long and intensely. He didn’t want to choke her.

Just as he reached the point of no return she swirled her tongue around his tip one more time, right on the most sensitive nerve endings.

There was no going back.

That sweet, sharp edge…

He jerked, pulled out of her, but couldn’t get away quickly enough and his seed spilled out over her face, each pulse carried in rivulets by the water, down her body and away.

Cara was still holding him, looking up at him. Her own eyes were glazed with desire.

He wanted to bury himself in her.

He scooped her up, laid her on the bed and forcefully pulled her legs apart. She was clean and dripping wet from the shower, yet when he inserted a finger in her he could feel her own slick moisture.

Knowing he needed some recovery time - probably considerable after the violence of the orgasm he had just had - he wanted to make this all about her. He gripped her hips, pulling her against his face.

It was usually something Matt could take or leave. But with this girl he desperately wanted to feel her trembling with need as he focused his attentions on her.

Something about her - being younger than him, being less experienced than him - turned him on. He had been her first and he felt an unsettling sense of male pride wanting to also be the best. As though he were in competition with an unknown future lover of hers.

"Want me to keep going?" he asked her, deliberately tormenting her by stopping just as he could hear her breathing getting shallower and her body starting to spasm.

"Yes, oh god, please don’t stop." Cara felt ashamed of her own wantonness: she still struggled to articulate her needs, but he was driving her wild.

Matt was loving the power he had over her. He was feeling both possessive and territorial. Even the thought of her ex fiancé pissed him off and spurred him on to make her completely lose control under his ministrations.

"There?" he demanded. "Or there? Do you want me to do this?"

"Yes, everything. Everywhere." She was just a rush of sensations, wherever he touched her was driving her wild. All her nerves were jangled together, when he touched her between her legs she felt it throb to her nipples. Her body was completely connected in sheer craving for his touch.

He was using his fingers now so he could continue to talk to her. He could feel himself starting to go hard again as well.

"Like this?" He would circle her most sensitive spot, then withdraw. Curl his fingers inside her. Stretch her. Pull her tender folds.

Enough to cause her just a bit of discomfort, to make her writhe a little more beneath him. So she would know he was in charge. So when he gave her pleasure, it was all the more heightened.

"And this?"

"Please." She was practically begging him now. Every thing he did to her was a sweet, unending agony of desire.

Sensing she couldn’t take much more and knowing he was going to need release again himself, he spread her taut with his hands and put his mouth straight over her bud. He sucked on her forcefully.

It was just what she needed. She actually screamed and writhed when she came, wanting him to stop as it was suddenly too intense, but he kept going, draining her of every last wave and shudder of pleasure.

Then he moved up her body, and kissing her gently, he slid inside her and slowly, slowly began to take his own pleasures from her yet again. He could do this all night.