Falling for Mr. Mysterious. Barbara Hannay

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      CHAPTER ONE

      WHEN the train drew in to Roma Street Station, Emily checked her phone messages one more time. There was still nothing from Alex, so now she was officially worried—not only about Alex’s twenty-four-hour silence, but also about her own fate. She had no idea what she’d do if he wasn’t in Brisbane.

      She’d rushed to the city in blind despair. She needed to see Alex, to stay with him and, yes, to pour out her heart to him. Of all her family, Alex would understand, and Emily had been so very desperate to get away from Wandabilla that she’d jumped on the train in the vain hope that Alex would return her call before she arrived.

      Now, the train came to a stop with a wheezing sigh of brakes and, all around Emily, passengers were rising from their seats, gathering their belongings in a businesslike fashion, pulling on jackets and coats and heading for the carriage doors, eager to be out on the platform and gone.

      They, of course, had somewhere to go.

      Emily did not.

      If Alex was away, she would have to find a hotel. She certainly wasn’t going to turn tail and head home to Wandabilla, to face the music, with everyone in the small country town knowing what had happened to her.

      Besides, Emily told herself, there was still a slim chance that Alex was home. He might have a problem with his phone, or perhaps he’d let the battery run down, or he’d bought a new phone and changed his number and hadn’t got around to telling her.

      Although her doubts about the wisdom of rushing to Brisbane were mounting fast, she rolled the magazine she’d been trying unsuccessfully to read and stowed it in her shoulder bag, then retrieved her suitcase from the luggage rack.

      It was an unusually cold August afternoon, and a biting westerly wind whistled callously along the platform. Shivering, Emily buttoned her coat and turned up its collar, then she lugged her suitcase behind her and headed for the warmth of the pedestrian tunnel.

      As luck would have it, she was in the depths of the tunnel, jostling with crowds of shoppers and commuters, when she heard the soft quack-quack, which was the silly ringtone she used to distinguish social from business calls. She grabbed her phone from her bag. It was a text message.

      Em, sorry I missed you, and very sorry to hear about that @#$%$# of a boyfriend. Wish I could be with you now, but I’m in Frankfurt at a Book Fair. Please use the apartment tho. Stay as long as you like and use my room. I’ve checked with Jude and he’s cool, so he’s expecting you.

      Hugs,

      Alex xxx

      Emily had to read this twice, standing rock still in the tunnel while commuters steered somewhat irritably around her. She needed a moment to take the message in, to deal with her see-sawing emotions of relief that Alex was OK, and her disappointment that he was so far away.

      Very quickly, overriding these initial reactions, rushed a flurry of questions. Who was this Jude person? When had he arrived in Alex’s life? And … would he really be as cool as her cousin suggested about her sudden appearance on his doorstep?

      She felt awkward about imposing on a stranger and she wondered, briefly, if she should continue up the coast to her grandmother’s instead. Granny Silver was as understanding and welcoming as Alex, but she preferred to see the world through rose-coloured glasses, so Emily rarely burdened her with her problems.

      Also, if this Jude fellow was expecting her, and if he was anything like Alex—which he probably was, remembering Alex’s former housemates—he’d probably already jumped into host mode.

      Jude could well be whipping up something delicious for their dinner right now, so it would be rude to simply not turn up. Emily headed to a nearby bottle shop, bought a good quality red as well as a white, because she didn’t know Jude’s tastes, then went to the taxi rank. But as the taxi sped towards West End, crossing a bridge over the wide Brisbane River, her impulsive dash to the city began to feel more foolish than ever.

      She’d been so self-absorbed, so totally СКАЧАТЬ