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‘Talk about what?’

‘Anything’ Francesca shrugged ‘What you’ve been up to What I’ve been up to The weather The crisis in the Health Service Why it always see’

‘We knohat each other has been up to The weather is autumnal The Health Service always seelish climate is unpredictable, diabolical and likes to see people cancel their planned activities at the last nalled for the bill and continued watching her while he waited

‘So it is I’ot that out of the way Noe can repair back to your place and do e do best’

‘Long evenings spent chatting isn’t what this is about, Francesca I thought you understood that’ He saw the way she flinched and was tempted to exercise a bitprecedents that he would then find hi He wasn’t in the business of building a relationship with her He had been there, done that and had the tee shirt to show for his efforts Besides, he thought, they talked, didn’t they? Howfor?

‘I do understand, Angelo I don’t knohat ca all sorts of stuff that she hadn’t intended She certainly hadn’t intended to launch into a tirade about wanting to go back to his place and bond on some kind of spiritual, platonic level The opposite She had been looking forward to seeing hi with him before she broke her news She hadn’t planned on an emotional outburst which would leave him cold and withdrawn

Angelo, expert as he was at second-guessing other people, recognised her wobbly s else, and for a fleeting second felt a chill of foreboding sweep through him before he re substantially wrong He had seen her two days ago and they had spent an aether, awhich they had not -sized bed And, dammit, they had talked then, hadn’t they? What could have happened in the space of two days to have brought about this sudden and unwelcome shift in atmosphere?

Had Jack been talking to her? He knew that they shared soh the reasons behind it were beyond hi the case, maybe the etting involved in a purely sexual relationship that wasn’t going anywhere From what she had told him, Jack was the last person to lecture anyone on the i relationships but then people who lived in glass houses were often the ones who threw the s theto put up with in view of the fact that they were just friends He did not feel inclined to be quite so generous if theideas into her head In fact, he would have to ive her a little talk on the is

He fulminated in silence as they stepped outside the restaurant, where the swing towards autu conversation, chatting about a television prograht before Nor a viewpoint he kneould get under her skin and they would have a heated debate, even if the topic only happened to be so trivial that had taken place in one of those ridiculous reality shows she was addicted to By the ti the subject her cheeks would be flushed and her eyes dancing with pleasure at the sparring

Not tonight

He waited until there was a pause in the conversation, then inserted silkily, ‘You never told me, how is Jack? Is he beto around the one with the kid?’

Startled by the abrupt change of conversation and the tone of his voice, Francesca glanced at Angelo’s hard profile and felt her stoo well but had to concede that she had a hi to talk to hi to knohether he would ever see her without sex being the prih his and attempted to smooth the situation back to where she wanted it to be