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and transferred toanother division. He’d been more furious about that than the implosion of their relationship. Not surprisingly, he had blamed everyone for his demotion except himself.
    “Things weren’t right between us for a long while,” she continued. Now that Dion had got her started she couldn’t stop. “I realise that now, but at the time I thought it was normal. Nick was my first serious boyfriend. I didn’t have anything else to compare us with.” She glanced across at Dion. “It would’ve been good to have you there, telling me the ugly truth. I had other friends, but I’d only known them a short time. Not like you. You wouldn’t have pulled any punches, would you?”
    His eyes were heavy on her. He didn’t give her the flippant answer she half-expected. “I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe I wouldn’t have wanted to burst your bubble. You were … crazy about Nick. I’d never seen you so nuts over someone.”
    Sheesh, Dion had only seen them together a handful of times, but he’d known she was completely enthralled by Nick and oblivious to his faults. That hurt. She pushed to her feet and walked over to the flyscreen to stare out at the night. “Did I seem stupid to you? Was I a pathetic, clinging girlfriend?” The image made her grimace.
    “You’re never pathetic.” His warm breath wafted over her bare shoulder. He’d risen too, she realised, and was standing just behind her, close enough she could feel the heat spreading off his body.
    A shiver ran down her spine, even though the night was humid. Turning to face him, she said, “Those few times you met Nick, what did you think of him?”
    His gaze flicked over her face, focused as a laser beam, as if he’d never seen her before and wanted to memorise her every feature. “I shouldn’t really say.”
    All the air seemed to be trapped at the bottom of her lungs. She caught a faint whiff of his scent – soap and shaving cream. Had he always smelled this enticing? It shocked her to think she’d never noticed before. She gulped and said tightly, “Sounds as if you never liked him. Is that true?”
    The outline of his shoulders grew rigid. She sensed him tensing as if he was about to tell her something disagreeable, but then he softly expelled his breath. “I hardly knew the guy.”
    Frustration welled up in her. “Come on. Since when did you start tiptoeing around the truth? Remember when I had that massive crush on Corey in Year Ten? You told me not to waste my time with him, and you were right. You’ve never bothered hiding your opinion about anything. So why start now?” Clenching her fists, she glared up at him. “Is there something you knew about Nick? Something you didn’t want to tell me? Huh?”
    He didn’t step back from her open hostility but stood there, solid as granite, hands on hips. “I didn’t know the first thing about Nick.” His voice was rough, impatient. “All I knew was that you were head over heels in love with him. That’s all, and that was enough for me.”
    She studied his glowering expression, trying to winnow out the truth. Dion had never sought Nick out, never tried to forge a friendship with him. Dion wasn’t shy about anything. If he’d kept Nick at arm’s length it had been for a reason. An uncomfortable possibility spiked through her thoughts. Maybe Nick had made Dion feel inadequate. Everything was a competition to Nick, and he loved being top dog. With his looks, money, and career, Nick regarded himself a winner, whereas Dion was just a laidback cook in a Chinese restaurant with no ambitions except to enjoy life. Yes, she could just imagine Nick having a few digs at Dion on the side, just to make himself feel superior. Typical of him. Indignation on Dion’s behalf swelled up.
    “Well, I’m not in love with him any more,” she declared a bit too loudly. “That’s for sure.”
    “Yeah?” He lifted his eyebrows.
    “Nick is an insecure, cheating, no-good bastard.”
    “But you