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‘So indulge my curiosity and tell me about him After all, you know all about my personal status’

‘There’s no one’ Poor Jack She was pretty sure he wouldn’t like being labelled as no one, not least because she had known hi down the road of little lies Although, did it matter any elo Falcone again She certainly wouldn’t be getting the plum job for which she had coly selected to bring with her were still sitting in her capacious bag, h hopes

‘Ah, Francesca’ He raised his glass to his mouth and sipped carefully ‘You may have lied to me about your name—’

‘I didn’t lie to you! Millband is my mother’s name and Ellie was always my first name I didn’t conjure the name Francesca Hayley out of thin air!’ One little truth

‘But you’re lying now Who is he? Do you think I care?’

Of course he didn’t care! Nor did she On that very last evening he had told her that they were ships that crossed in the night Now they were ships sailing different oceans They no longer had any impact on one another

‘His na ‘He works with ether, if you lass of water and then reluctantly took a so Noas metallic and tepid

‘Jack And how did youto expand his horizons?’

For the first tienuine aht-after boy in town, in the way that bad boys often were to teenage girls, but an ex- tattoos on his back and grinned She couldn’t help it Then she laughed That warh that was so infectious

‘I think he would be insulted if you called hiround in shock at the description!’

It was that laugh that did it Took hih the years, took him back to that place where he had been captive to her irreverent ebullience She had certainly never tiptoed around him More ran circles around him

‘No ex-elo smiled at her with cold indifference ‘What, then? A businessman? Someone in a two-piece suit and a bowler hat?’

‘Your Italian ancestry’s showing, Angelo Men these days don’t wear bowler hats’ And people shouldn’t find their past creeping up on theht ‘I really think it’s time I left,’ she said quietly ‘I’m sorry This has been a shock…’

‘But what about your elo asked ‘I wouldn’t want you to return to your little house without at least giving you the benefit of tellingbanquet…’

‘Stop it!’ Two bright patches of colour had appeared on her cheeks ‘I always knew you were hard nosed, Angelo I never realised you were just downright cruel!’

‘Cruel? How a cruel? Explain to h to ask you what you have been up to in that tiht with you Hardly the definition of cruelty’

‘You knohat I mean’

‘I have no idea what you are talking about Ti our memory of past acquaintances and their expectations’

There wasn’t a flicker of warmth on his face He had found himself in her company before he had had tie up some semblance of politeness because the situation demanded it A show of interest in herlevels as far as she was concerned The anger and dislike was there, she could feel it sier that had been roused by seeing her out of the blue She doubted that he had given her ht over the years or, if he had, only insofar as she had dao Now, to him, she truly was an ex-acquaintance hom he had shared a few months of his life, off and on