‘Am I boring you?’
She nodded emphatically.
‘Lots of people are interested in that stuff,’ Jake said, back to being just the slightest bit defensive.
‘Not the average consumer,’ Ella said. When he opened his mouth—to argue, she was sure—she took much enjoyment in being the one to interrupt this time. ‘Put it this way. Do you want to hear me wax lyrical about my whole-food diet?’
He blanched.
‘Exactly. Your multi-field-API whatsit …’ her deliberate mangling of the secret language of software developers made him flinch ‘… is like my discussion on the health benefits of spelt. Only a very specific type of person is interested. And that person is not the average Australian.’
He nodded—reluctantly.
‘How about I ask you a question that people will really want to know about “Sydney’s reclusive millionaire”—’
‘I’d rather you didn’t call me that.’
‘I’d rather you didn’t interrupt me. You promised, remember?’
He gave the slightest of grins, and again she needed to bite her lip.
It was unexpected—this … what? Friendly conversation? Banter?
No. No. They were building a rapport, just as he’d said. That was all.
She took a deep breath. ‘You’re renowned for refusing to do interviews. What’s changed?’
Jake immediately swung back to the defensive—this time, very defensive. ‘I’m here to talk about the Armada phone. Not about myself.’
Undeterred, Ella carried on, now sticking determinedly to her interviewer persona. ‘But, Jake, all our viewers are equally interested in you.’
‘You know the answer, Ella. I’m sure Cynthia told you.’
‘Pretend I’m an interviewer, Jake. Not Eleanor.’
Jake stared at her for a long moment. What?
‘Eleanor?’
Too late she realised her mistake. One she’d never, ever made before.
‘Ella,’ she said. ‘Of course that’s what I meant.’
As he watched her Ella felt her cheeks grow steadily warmer, until she was very glad she wasn’t the one with the camera pointed in her direction.
She bit her lip, trying to refocus. Remember where she was. And, more importantly, who she was. She was Ella Cartwright—successful, confident, popular.
Ella Cartwright: businesswoman, friend, girlfriend, even—sometimes. For very short periods. Her career always came first. Always.
But what she was not—not even in the slightest—was Eleanor.
‘Freudian slip?’ Jake asked.
‘Not at all. My subconscious is obviously a little confused. When I knew you, I was Eleanor.’ She shrugged, attempting nonchalance despite the tomato-hue of her cheeks and the whirring of her brain.
‘You act like Eleanor’s an entirely different person.’
‘She is,’ she said. Firmly. ‘Now. I’m doing the interviewing, not you.’
‘I liked Eleanor,’ Jake said, ignoring her.
‘No, you didn’t,’ she said, quickly, before her distracted brain could halt her tongue.
But it was true. He’d made his dislike quite clear that night, in his bedroom. And then confirmed it when he left Perth, and her life, without a backward glance.
For weeks—months—she’d expected something. An email maybe, so she’d checked the computers at school religiously each day. Or a phone call—and for far too long she’d leapt to her feet whenever its ring had reverberated throughout her wooden-framed house.
Really, she would’ve been happy with a postcard of the harbour bridge, even.
She’d been totally pathetic.
And now she was horrified to register an echo of that ache she’d forcibly buried so long ago. It had faded, for sure, but it was still there. Somewhere inside her.
A little piece of who she once was. Of the girl that Jake had rejected.
That everyone had rejected.
The realisation shocked her.
‘Ella,’ he said, and his voice was far too kind. ‘You can’t possibly—’
No. She didn’t want to hear this. It should be impossible to remember his pity-edged tone from thirteen years ago but she did, and she didn’t want to hear it again. ‘When will the phone be available for purchase?’ she said, snatching up a question at random.
There was a long silence, and Jake’s brow furrowed as he studied her.
Surely he wouldn’t push? What was the point? If there’d been anything worth saying, or saving, between them, it would’ve been said and done long ago.
Eventually, finally, he answered. ‘The Armada phone will be launched worldwide on the first of August …’
And just like that, they were back on track. She was Ella, and he was Jake—her client. Only. Because that was the way it had to stay.
The way it was going to stay.
Jake tried—he really did—to pay attention.
It shouldn’t have been too difficult a task, as Ella was sitting a perfectly respectable distance away from him. Given the huge size of his LED computer screen—about the only thing he actually liked in his office—their chairs weren’t exactly shoved close together behind his desk. And yet, without the barrier of the desk between them, her nearness was distracting.
Currently she was possibly talking about the mock interview. But he couldn’t be absolutely sure.
He’d been right, yesterday. This was not a good idea.
He was still uneasy in a room alone with Ella Cartwright.
What he wasn’t—was any closer to understanding why.
She’d been right, logically. There must be a reason their friendship had ended with such finality. That he’d never been tempted to seek her out.
Nothing.
And yet, here they were, with definite undercurrents beneath every word they said, despite Ella’s absolute insistence that this was nothing more than a business relationship.
Why had he even agreed to this?
It was a total waste of time, only prolonging the inevitable. He didn’t need an image consultant.
He didn’t need Ella back in his life.
Although even yesterday, even as he’d been telling her he didn’t require her services, he’d been considering the possibility of asking her out for a—platonic—drink. A catch up between old friends. That was all. An hour or two of his life to get this weird imbalance out of his system.
Maybe he should still do that, once this was over. A means to an end, so to speak.
Because despite his best efforts, in the less than twenty-four hours since she’d walked back into his life, he’d spent way too much time thinking about her. Wondering. How could she possibly have changed so much?
Although—now and again, little actions had triggered half-forgotten memories. The way she tucked her hair behind her ears. The way, when the questions