Zak’s hand covered hers on the table. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I don’t mean to pry. But could I just ask you, do you really think that you’re getting all that you need from this relationship with Jude?’

Lauren was taken aback at his directness. She and Zak had become good friends over the last year or so and he knew the issues she had, but they always skirted round the subject, pretending that it didn’t exist. He’d never before asked her so directly about her relationship with their boss.

‘He’s going to leave her,’ she said. ‘He’s going to leave his wife for me. This isn’t just a fling for either of us.’

‘And is that what you really want? To break up a family?’

‘She doesn’t love him,’ Lauren insisted. ‘It’s just a matter of time.’

‘Is that what he keeps telling you?’

‘It’s what I sincerely believe.’ She swigged her wine again.‘We’re not doing this lightly. I know that people will get hurt.’

‘And what if the person that gets hurt is you?’

That stunned her to silence.

Zak sighed. ‘Sorry, Lauren. That was below the belt. I didn’t ask you to come out with me to have a go at you. I just wonder exactly what it is that you see in Jude, that’s all.’ He held up his hand. ‘And no, I don’t want you to tell me.’

They both laughed at that and it broke the tension.

‘I’m sorry,’ Lauren said. ‘I’m being a miserable old moo. In my defence, it isn’t easy not being able to be with the one you love.’

Zak gave her a wry glance. ‘Tell me about it.’ He picked at the tablecloth.

She didn’t know much about Zak’s romantic past and perhaps now wasn’t the time to pry.

‘You’re a beautiful woman, Lauren Osbourne. Don’t spend the best years of your life waiting for someone you might never have.’

‘Is that what you did?’

Her friend looked at her enigmatically. ‘It’s what I’m doing,’ Zak said.

Chapter 13

Chapter 13

I go to the library on the way home and take out a travel book on Peru. Just out of curiosity.

I can’t go. I can’t possibly go. I just want to see where everyone else is going. For my own interest.