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He hadn’t anticipated the blinding excitement shining in her face. She’d arrived at the Pinnacle looking so incredibly young and innocent, so unspeakably hopeful. So thrilled!
And he certainly hadn’t anticipated her cheer squad of friends.
The girlfriends had been his final stumbling block. One mere male couldn’t be expected to confront three overexcited, chattering females with the bad news that the big deal date was off.
In future, he would make sure that Damien was forced to face up to the consequences of his thoughtless pranks, even if he had to drag the wretch to the scene of his crime by the scruff of his neck.
But tonight the result of Theo’s bungling was that he’d felt a compunction to hang around for the aftermath—to make sure Annie McKinnon wasn’t too terribly heartbroken.
The light beside the lift indicated that it had reached the ground floor and he stood to one side of the foyer with his hands plunged deep in his trouser pockets. There was a clean handkerchief in his right pocket and it would come in handy if he needed to mop her tears before he called a taxi to send her safely homewards.
The doors opened and he held his breath and steeled himself for the sight of Annie’s flushed, tear-ravaged face.
But no.
Annie swept out of the lift with her golden head high, looking pale but dignified, almost haughty. No sign of tears. Her pretty blue eyes were dry and glass-clear and her mouth was composed, almost smiling.
Almost. If Theo hadn’t been watching her very closely, he might have missed the tremor of her chin and the exceedingly careful way she walked, as if she needed all her strength to hold herself together.
Her unexpected courage shook him. He felt a sudden lump in his throat and an absurd urge to applaud her.
And he remained stock-still as she sailed across the foyer. Even as the huge glass doors at the hotel’s entrance parted, he didn’t move. It made absolutely no sense but this devastated young woman seemed more composed than he felt.
She disappeared into the night before he came to his senses. By the time he dashed outside she was already hurrying along the footpath, ducking her way past pedestrians with athletic grace.
He called, ‘Annie!’
But she didn’t hear him and when people turned and stared at him he felt several versions of foolish. What on earth had he thought he was going to do if she’d heard him? Offer her coffee and consolation?
Clearly she needed neither.
He came to a halt in the middle of the footpath. Ahead of him, he saw a flash of pink jeans and white top as Annie turned to her left. Then she hurried up a short flight of steps and vanished inside a bar.
Theo Grainger couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so inadequate.
‘The guy’s a jerk!’
‘An A-grade jerk.’
Mel and Victoria were vehement in their anger.
And never had Annie been happier to see friends.
As the three girls drowned their sorrows in strawberry daiquiris, she found it comforting to listen to their united rant.
‘Annie, your Damien has reached an entirely new, utterly despicable level of jerkdom.’
‘How dare he behave so jerkily to such a lovely, trusting country mouse?’
But the horrible part was that in between moments of righteous anger Annie still wanted to love Damien. She couldn’t let go of her fantasy man in the blink of an eye. She needed to believe he was helpless and guiltless.
Perhaps he really couldn’t have helped missing the date. There was still a chance that he was sick, in pain and feeling as bitterly disappointed as she was.
‘He might be sick,’ she said wistfully.
Victoria sniffed. ‘Yeah, that’s about as likely as he’s fallen under a bus.’
‘Or he’s found an urgent need to flee the country,’ added Mel, rolling her eyes. ‘Face it, Annie. If Damien was halfway decent and he had a genuine excuse, he would have gone out of his way to make sure you understood what had kept him.’
Annie sighed. ‘I suppose you’re right…I guess I just don’t want to believe it.’
It was so hard to let go of her happy dreams. She wanted to crawl away and cry for a month.
‘The thing is,’ said Mel, stirring her icy daiquiri with a slim black straw. ‘He’s not just a base-level jerk, he’s a cowardly jerk. He had to pretend to be someone else.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I bet you any cocktail on this menu that the so-called uncle who relayed the message doesn’t exist.’
The thought that it might have actually been Damien on the phone, pretending to be someone else, made Annie feel ten times worse.
Victoria patted her shoulder. ‘I reckon you should forget about blind dates and concentrate on raising the cocktail drinking statistics for the Greater Brisbane Area.’
Annie nodded miserably. It wasn’t her style, but losing herself in an alcoholic fuzz had definite appeal. The problem was that it would only take the edge off her pain momentarily. There would still be tomorrow. And the rest of the week in Brisbane. A whole week in the city. Without Damien.
‘I’d rather go back to your place and borrow your computer to send The Jerk a blistering email,’ she said.
‘Yeah,’ agreed Mel. ‘Great idea. Besides, Victoria and I still have to go to work tomorrow morning. Let’s go home and send Damien a message he won’t forget. Let’s make sure he absolutely understands just how totally bottom-of-the-pits he’s been.’
‘If he’s a true jerk, it’ll be like water off a duck’s back,’ suggested Victoria gloomily.
But Mel’s mind was made up. ‘It doesn’t matter. Annie will feel a lot better once we’ve told him off.’
CHAPTER TWO
TOSSING and turning on the lumpy old couch in Mel’s lounge, Annie stared into the darkness. This was the worst night of her life. She was never going to sleep.
After helping her compose the email designed to set Damien back on his heels, Mel and Victoria had gone off to their bedrooms and were sound asleep now. Annie was left to get through the long night alone. And, to her dismay, the satisfaction she’d felt when she’d hit the button to shoot their message into cyber space was evaporating.
Rolling on to her side, she punched her pillow and gave vent to a loud groan. It echoed through the house, but no one stirred. That was the one good thing about loneliness; she didn’t have to be brave any more. She could finally wallow in her misery.
Now, in a cocoon of silence and darkness, she could tell herself that never in the history of dating had there been a bigger fiasco, and if there had been she didn’t want to know about it. Her experience at La Piastra was as bad as it got.
She could admit to herself that she was truly devastated. Devastated, hurt to the marrow, disappointed to the max! And angry. Yeah, bitter too.
Her glorious romance was over before it had begun.
How could Damien have done this to her?
How could he have spent so many weeks courting her in writing, just to leave her stranded at the Big Moment?
And why? What had gone wrong? Had she been too forward when she’d suggested they should meet? Should she have waited till he’d broached the subject? The thing was, he’d shown no sign of caution or of having cold feet. Once she’d mentioned the idea of a date he had seemed very keen.
His absence didn’t make sense and she couldn’t let go of the slim hope that something completely unavoidable had detained him. Problem was, if that was the case, he wouldn’t appreciate the savage email the girls had encouraged her to send.
Oh, hell!
It seemed like agonising hours later that she banged the pillow with another thump and flung herself on to her back, still too tense to sleep. Mel’s house was in the inner city, not far from a main road, and as she listened to the alien sounds of never-ending traffic, tears seeped beneath her stinging eyelids and she felt a rush of homesickness.
At home the day started when the sun peeped over the Seaview Range and she was nudged awake by her Border collie, Lavender. She would give anything to hear the reassuring thump of Lavender’s tail on her bedroom floor. And at Southern Cross she’d be greeted by the friendly laughter of kookaburras and the warbling of magpies, or perhaps the distant soft lowing of cattle.
But thinking about home and her twin brothers, Reid and Kane, brought an added twinge of guilt. The guys had been away mustering cattle when she’d left for her adventure in the city. She’d left them a note, but because she’d been afraid they’d jump right in and put a stop to her plans, she hadn’t told them any details.
In her own mind she’d justified her dash to the city. Apart from the compulsion to meet her e-date, she’d felt a strong need for a holiday. But she knew that people usually planned their holidays. They didn’t dash away, leaving a note telling family members to look after themselves.
Perhaps she shouldn’t have been so secretive. Surely she should have been able to tell at least one of her brothers about the man she’d met over the Internet. But they were so protective of her. Which was why she’d resorted to writing a letter to the Mirrabrook Star.
If only her mother wasn’t so far away in Scotland…
But thinking about her family only made her feel lonelier than ever. As she waited for morning and for Damien’s reply to her email, she almost reached the point where she wished that her brothers had stopped her from coming to the city.
‘You got a reply.’
At breakfast, Mel came into the kitchen waving a sheet of A4 paper at Annie. ‘Here, I printed it out.’
Pain jabbed hard in Annie’s chest. There was no escaping the truth now. Very soon she would know Damien’s reason for avoiding her.
‘It’s from the uncle,’ Mel said as Annie snatched up the page.
‘The uncle?’ Annie clasped the paper to her chest, too disappointed to read it. ‘It’s not from Damien?’
‘’Fraid not.’
Victoria turned from the microwave where she was heating coffee. ‘So there really is an uncle?’
‘Looks like it,’ said Mel, reaching for milk to pour on her cereal.
Annie groaned. ‘You mean an uncle read that email we sent last night?’
‘Seems so.’
‘But we were so—’ Annie gulped. ‘So—’
‘Tipsy,’ supplied Mel, looking sheepish.
‘And rude,’ added Annie. ‘I had no idea his uncle would read it. Heck, we should have toned it down.’
‘Hey, don’t sweat,’ said Victoria. ‘We were relatively sober and we were merely being honest. We told it like it was.’
‘Yeah…but to some old uncle!’ Annie cringed at the thought of a sweet, elderly uncle reading their message. It had sounded so forceful and feminist last night. But when she thought about it now…
Oh, crumbs…
Fearing the worst, she looked down at the page…
From: T. G. Grainger
To: anniem@mymail.com
Date: Monday, November 14th 6: 05a.m.
Subject: Re: You’d better have a brilliant excuse,
you jerk!
Dear Annie M,
I hope you don’t mind my replying to your message, but my nephew is out of town this week and he’s asked me to respond to any important emails. I consider your communication to be of the utmost importance. I regret having to intrude into such a personal exchange but I believe you deserve the courtesy of a quick response.
Please accept my sincerest apology for the unpleasant experience you suffered last night as a consequence of my nephew’s inexcusable thoughtlessness.
Damien was called away at short notice and I contacted La Piastra restaurant on his behalf. However, I understand your deep distress and I am saddened by my nephew’s bad manners. You’re absolutely right; you deserved an explanation from him and I will make sure that he contacts you immediately on his return.
In the meantime, I trust that you are still able to enjoy the remainder of your stay in Brisbane.
Yours sincerely,
Dr Theo Grainger.
Annie dropped the page on to the tabletop. ‘Oh, my God. Damien was called away at short notice.’
‘Oh, yeah,’ scoffed Mel. ‘And we all came down in the last shower.’
‘You don’t believe him?’
This question was greeted by a significant silence while Annie watched Mel and Victoria exchange knowing glances that snuffed out her final glimmer of hope. After a bit, Victoria leaned across the table, grabbed the page and scanned the printed message.
‘The uncle’s a bit of a wordsmith, isn’t he?’
Annie nodded sadly. ‘I guess “inexcusable thoughtlessness” is a refined way of saying that his nephew’s a bottom-of-the-pit jerk.’
Mel grinned. ‘I rather liked the way we described his rotten nephew in our email.’
‘Yeah,’ said Victoria. ‘There’s nothing wrong with short, shoot-from-the-hip language.’
Annie managed a small smile.
‘Anyway.’ Victoria tapped a French tipped fingernail against the email printout. ‘This uncle’s a doctor, so you’d expect fancy words.’
‘He’s not a medical doctor,’ said Mel.
Annie and Victoria stared at her. ‘How do you know?’ they both asked simultaneously.
‘Because a Dr Theo Grainger was my philosophy lecturer at university and it’s not a common name. I’m sure this must be the same guy.’
Annie’s mouth fell open. ‘You studied philosophy?’
‘In my first year. I didn’t keep it up because I wanted to major in urban planning, but Dr Grainger was a pretty cool lecturer. He had quite a following.’
To Annie the very word philosophy sounded lofty and unbelievably clever, and she found it hard to imagine an ordinary girlfriend like Mel studying the subject.
Suddenly Victoria looked at the clock. ‘Hey, look at the time. We’d better get moving or we’ll be late for work, Mel.’
The two girls jumped to their feet.
‘Don’t worry about the kitchen. I’ll tidy up,’ Annie called after them, but they’d already disappeared into their rooms. It occurred to her that if she stayed in their house much longer the girls would soon treat her the way her brothers did.
At home, Kane and Reid ran around doing important outside work like mustering the cattle, fencing, servicing the bores and machinery, and they left her behind to cook and clean and keep the books, as if she were some outback version of Cinderella.
It was a big part of the reason she’d wanted to get away and it wasn’t very comforting to think that in no time at all she was becoming a City Girl Cinders.
A broken-hearted, disillusioned City Girl Cinders.
One thing was sure; she didn’t want to spend this week keeping Mel and Victoria’s flat clean and tidy. But what were her options? She could reply to Dr Grainger’s email and press the issue about Damien by demanding to know when he’d be back. But she was fast losing confidence in the Internet as a form of honest communication.
She lifted the printout from the table and read the uncle’s email again. Philosophers were fantastically brilliant and thoughtful and wise, weren’t they? Pity some of it hadn’t rubbed off on his nephew.
Actually, it was a wonder this philosopher uncle hadn’t lectured her on her own lack of wisdom. No doubt he took a rather dim view of any girl who dashed recklessly into the city from the far reaches of the out-back and expected a blind date to fulfil her silly romantic fantasies.
She was halfway across the kitchen with cereal packets in hand when she paused. Come to think of it, Uncle Theo hadn’t expressed any negative opinions about her. He’d been surprisingly sympathetic.
Perhaps there was something deeper behind this—something the uncle understood. A direct approach to Dr Grainger might sort this whole mess out. Rather than mucking around with email, it would be better to deal with him face-to-face. That was the McKinnon way. It was what her brothers would do.
Look the enemy in the eye so you knew what you were dealing with.
But how the heck did you confront a philosopher?
Dropping the dishcloth, she dashed into the bathroom, where Mel was applying mascara.
‘Which university does this Dr Grainger teach at?’
Mel frowned at her reflection in the mirror. ‘UQ at St Lucia. Why?’
‘I—I’ve always been curious about philosophy and I was thinking that, as I have time on my hands, it might be interesting to sneak into the back of one of his lectures. Is that allowed?’
‘Well…yes.’ Mel gave her eyelashes a final flick with the mascara wand and turned to face Annie. ‘But don’t you think you should just let this Damien thing die a natural death? You know what they say about other fish in the sea. There are some okay guys at my work—’
‘This isn’t just about Damien,’ Annie said quickly. ‘It’s about me. I want to sort it out. I don’t want to be left up in the air until Damien eventually decides to turn up.’
Mel gave a puzzled shrug.
From near the front door Victoria called, ‘You ready, Mel?’
‘Yeah, coming.’ To Annie, she said, ‘You do what you like, Annie, but I think you might be out of luck. The university year will be winding down now. Lectures will have finished and the students will be on swot vacation getting ready for exams.’
‘Oh.’
As Mel hurried for the door she called over her shoulder, ‘If I were you, I’d stick to shopping.’
‘No, thank you,’ Annie said quietly.
When a knock sounded on his office door Theo Grainger was deep in a mire of student assignments and he grunted a greeting without looking up from the papers on his desk.
‘Dr Grainger?’
He’d assumed that Lillian, the philosophy department’s receptionist, was dropping off the day’s mail. But this voice wasn’t Lillian’s; it was younger, no doubt a student panicking about forthcoming exams.
He didn’t bother to raise his head. ‘Do you have an appointment?’ he asked just a little too gruffly.
‘No.’
His aggrieved sigh drifted downwards to the pile of papers on his desk. ‘You must know by now that all students have to make an appointment to see me. Put your name against a time slot on the notice board.’
‘All right.’
He returned to the assignment he was grading—a rather badly constructed analysis of utilitarianism.
‘One problem,’ the voice at the door said. ‘Could you please tell me where the notice board is?’
Theo’s head snapped up and he glared at the caller. ‘How long have you been a student here?’
‘No time at all.’ Her mouth twisted into an apologetic smile and she pushed a wing of blonde hair back behind her ear. ‘You see, I’m not a student.’
The surprise of recognition startled him like a bolt from the blue.
Annie McKinnon.
Just in time, he stopped himself from saying her name aloud. The last thing he wanted was for her to realise that he’d seen her before—that he’d been watching her—virtually spying on her yesterday evening.
He rose slowly to his feet. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘What did you say your name was?’
‘I didn’t actually get my name out. I must be nervous.’ She gave a self-conscious roll of her eyes. ‘I’m almost ashamed to admit it, but I’m Annie McKinnon.’ She winced. ‘You answered an email I sent to your nephew, Damien.’
‘Ah, yes.’ Theo knew it was unkind, but he couldn’t resist tipping his head forward to appraise Annie with a searching look over the top of his spectacles.
Not surprisingly, she squirmed.
‘So,’ he said. ‘I have the pleasure of meeting the forthright Miss McKinnon.’
‘I’m sorry, Dr Grainger. If my friends and I had known you were going to read that email we wouldn’t have been so—so forthright.’
‘I can well believe that.’ Theo was still holding the pen he’d been using to mark the students’ assignments. Now, he replaced its lid and set it carefully back on his desk. When he looked at Annie again he felt as if she’d been staring at him intensely. He offered her a cautious smile. ‘So why did you want to see me?’
She returned his slow smile measure for cautious measure. ‘I wanted to apologise to you.’
‘I’m not sure that you need to apologise.’
‘Well, I also wanted to find out the truth.’
‘The truth?’
‘About Damien.’
Her gaze locked with his and she stopped smiling. Her eyes were clear blue—the kind of blue that made Theo think of summer sky reflected in spring water, and it occurred to him that their astonishing candour must be an Annie McKinnon trademark.
Standing straight as a soldier, she said, ‘I need to know if Damien was really called away on urgent business, or if he simply didn’t want to meet me.’
Theo cleared his throat. After observing this young woman last night, he should have known that she wouldn’t simply turn tail and give up. ‘Perhaps we should discuss this somewhere else,’ he said and he glanced at his watch. Best to get her safely away from the curious eyes and ears of his colleagues and departmental secretaries. ‘Let me buy you coffee.’
‘Thank you,’ she said warmly. ‘That would be wonderful.’
Seeing the sudden animated brightness in her face, Theo wasn’t so sure. He lifted a navy-blue blazer from the back of his chair and shrugged his shoulders into it, then he gestured for her to accompany him down the hallway. It was a warm November day and the formality of the blazer was unnecessary, but it gave Theo a sense of protection and, for some peculiar reason, a glowing, excited Annie McKinnon at his side called for protection.
Their journey took them through the Philosophy department’s reception area and Lillian looked up from her desk.
Annie smiled and waved to her. ‘I found him,’ she called gleefully.
Lillian returned Annie’s wave, and then her amused eyes met Theo’s. They glimmered with undeniable curiosity and one eyebrow rose, but Theo hurried forward, eager to get his nephew’s jilted girlfriend out of the building.
Wow.
As she walked with Theo Grainger through the Great Court of the University of Queensland, Annie was seriously impressed.
Talk about hallowed halls. With its stretch of green lawn encircled by graceful columns and arches, the courtyard was as dignified and atmospheric as any place she’d ever seen. And all the surrounding buildings were made out of beautiful sandstone, too. As she looked around at their impressive façades she felt a sense of awe.
She could almost smell knowledge in the air. How could anyone not become earnest and clever in this inspiring environment?
‘Do these people have any idea how lucky they are to be here?’ she said, casting an envious eye over the students strolling casually past.
Theo smiled. ‘Not enough of them, I’m afraid.’ He turned to her. ‘So you didn’t have the chance to go to university?’
‘I was planning to go straight after boarding school, but then my father died and things kind of fell apart at home. I live on a cattle station up in North Queensland—so I stayed home for a year, and after that it was just assumed that I would stay on indefinitely.’
‘But that wasn’t your plan?’
‘I didn’t mind at first, but in the past few years I’ve been champing at the bit.’
‘It’s never too late to start at university.’
‘That’s what I’ve been thinking. Twenty-four’s still quite young really, isn’t it?’
‘Very young,’ he said in an ambiguous tone that puzzled her.
They reached a café in a leafy garden setting and Theo collected two white coffees and carried them to a secluded table, away from chattering students.
They both opened slim paper sachets of sugar, used half, then twisted the unused halves and set them on their saucers. Annie laughed. ‘We could have shared a sugar if we’d known we only wanted half each.’
Theo looked surprised, then smiled and shook his head as if he didn’t quite know what to make of her.
Well, that made two of them. She was certainly feeling shocked and unsure about Damien’s Uncle Theo. He wasn’t anything like she’d expected.
She’d had an image in her mind of an absent-minded professor type—a badly groomed academic, aged fifty plus, carelessly dressed in a wrinkled shirt and rumpled trousers. She’d expected untidy hair, a beard perhaps, and most definitely a scowl.