He frowned across at her. ‘What happened?’
She shrugged with forced nonchalance and set her sights out of the passenger window.
If he couldn’t see her, he couldn’t read her.
‘It just wasn’t meant to be.’
‘What about this year? It’s just over a month away. I know people that can sort you a nice VIP package.’
She gave a laugh that sounded far more bitter than she intended. ‘Thanks, but it’s going to be a pipe dream for a while, just until I get my business up and away.’
He studied her for a moment and she wondered if he would press further but then he looked away and she breathed a small sigh of relief.
‘I read up on your previous company,’ he said, cutting her relief short, and sh
e clamped her jaw shut. ‘It was very lucrative...still is, from all I can gather.’
Her pulse twitched in her cheek, the tablet biting into her fingers as she sensed his continuing attention on her, split between her and the road.
‘Seems strange that you would give all that up because your relationship with Charles broke down.’
She loosened her jaw, letting out a small breath to say, ‘It wasn’t straightforward.’
‘No?’
What would it hurt to be honest with him? Just get it out and be done with it.
She hated voicing it though. Made her worst fears feel more real. That she wasn’t good enough. Still wasn’t.
‘I couldn’t remain in business with him after we broke up.’
‘I take it that was his decision?’
‘Yes.’
‘After five years?’
Christ, he remembered that too.
‘Yep, five years.’
Five years, and every one of them wasted.
He flexed his fingers around the wheel, his gaze unreadable on the road. ‘It’s a long time to be together. What happened?’
She turned to look at him.
Why all the questions? The interest?
‘It turned out I wasn’t enough woman for him.’
His eyes snapped to her, narrowed and intent, and then he blinked and looked back to the road, but they’d left their mark, searing her with a passion she couldn’t quite decipher.
Was it anger? Desire?
‘He was unfaithful?’
‘Repeatedly.’