Bonnie shrugs. ‘It must be my sister’s. Carla’s been coming in to take bookings and do some paperwork for me.’

Ty doesn’t say anything, causing the conversation to fall flat. Bonnie knows the date isn’t going as well as it could be. Things are too stilted.

‘Have you read it?’ She tries to spark something up.

‘Yeah.’ He nods, the word coming out slowly. ‘My ex, she commissions books.’ His eyes only glance up at her for a second before looking back at the book. ‘She was reading this manuscript when I met her.’

A metallic taste develops in the back of Bonnie’s throat.

‘She spent every day hunched over manuscripts,’ he volunteers. ‘Yoga was her out.’ He gestures to the photograph up on the wall and Bonnie knows he had been thinking of her earlier.

Bonnie feels like she should say something, but Ty continues on, seemingly not realising that this is already an awkward conversation.

‘She’d always have piles of manuscripts around the house. I’d get home from work and she’d be reading, pen in hand, jotting down notes.’

Bonnie watches him remember, still unsure what to say, waiting for Darcy to interrupt and redirect the conversation. Desperately hoping Darcy will redirect the conversation.

‘Most of the time she could tell if the manuscript was going to be any good from the first page.’ Ty shakes his head, a little smile on his face, clearly still in awe of his ex’s brilliance. ‘But she’d always read the first three chapters. Always, even if she knew it was total rubbish. She’d sit there twisting her hair, her eyes narrowed, totally absorbed in another world.’

Bonnie glances at Darcy again, hoping she’ll somehow know how to steer this back on track, but Darcy’s eyes are blank, her expression unreadable.

‘I never used to read before I met her, but now I’m hooked on action-adventures. Can’t get enough of them.’

Bonnie wants to say something, that she wishes she had more time to read, or that she’d hate to have to read books that were rubbish, but ideas of what to say fly out as quickly as they pop into her head.

‘Why did you break up?’ The words surprise even Bonnie as they spill from her mouth, but she feels like she needs to know.

‘Penny broke things off,’ he murmurs.

Penny. His ex has a name. Bonnie’s stomach clenches in reaction to the way he said it. Bonnie waits for Darcy to call cut, expects that it will come at any second.