Chapter 352 In Love With Nia:>10

• "Alright, Jamie, complete honesty time. I asked Shelagh to come because I knew she wanted to take a run at you. I know how she feels about you, but I also know she's got no chance with you. She needed to discover that for herself, so she wouldn't keep ambushing you and making a fool of herself; she's my friend, and I love her, and I didn't want that to happen. This seemed the best way, the least painful or humiliating way for her; all that happened was one kiss, and she got the message; it may have been in public, but it was still anonymous; no-one here knows us. She won't try that on you again, and in a few days she'll be her old, predatory man-trap self. I asked Julie to come along because I didn't want Shelagh to be alone when she realised you weren't even slightly interested in her, Julie will help her hate you for a while, then it will all be forgotten. Trust me."
• I wasn't so sure. "I dunno, Nia, it seems a little...calculating to me, setting up your friend like that, she's your friend, and you used me to get her out of the way, not nice, Nia, not nice at all!" To give her her due, she at least she had the grace to look guilty. "Jamie, I promise you, I wasn't getting her out of the way, she was never in the way! I needed her to get the clear message that you were off the board; what would you rather, that she make some big move in front of all our friends and get blown out of the water in front of everyone she knows? Because that's what would have happened, and I won't let my friend be humiliated like that; it would destroy her!"
• OK, that made sense, so I decided to share some of what Julie had told me. "Your friend, Julie, she figured it out, why Shelagh was there, why she was there...and what's going on with you and me."