‘Six ... thirty?’ she squeaked, then lapsed into silence. The guilt she had gone to sleep with rose to fill her throat.
‘That’s what I said.’ Definitely there was a throaty chuckle this time. ‘Come on, girl. It’s not all that early. And they start judging the dogs early, so get the lead out and hurry things up a bit or you’ll miss half of it. And don’t forget your walking shoes; I fancy you’ll need them today.’
And he was gone. Alix knew it without being able to hear his departing footsteps on the thick carpeting of the suite.
She was ready in less than the twenty minutes, but she stayed in her room, dithering and growing increasingly nervous and increasingly angry with herself for being so, until he hammered on the door and announced, ‘Breakfast is here. Are you ready?’
‘Yes,’ she replied resolutely, and after gathering her courage she flung open the door and stepped out to face her host.
Quinn looked up at her from his seat at the small dining table, then rose languidly to his feet and held out a chair for her. He was dressed in a casual outfit of snug-fitting denims and a light shirt that was open halfway down his chest to reveal a heavy gold chain nestled in the curling hair. The jeans halted just above a pair of soft, expensive leather walking boots. Alix only half noticed his clothing; her attention was on his ruggedly handsome face, searching vainly for some hint as to his mood.
But it was a waste. Those deep green eyes were pleasantly welcoming, he nodded a silent approval at her own clothing and sensible footwear, then motioned her into the chair he held.
The small table was loaded with platters. Steak and stacks of hot buttered toast, crumpets, sausages and bacon and various condiments vied for position with a huge pot of steaming coffee, another of tea, and the various cutlery.
‘My goodness!’ Alix exclaimed involuntarily. Did he really expect just the two of them to eat all this? He couldn’t possibly!
Quinn chuckled. ‘Don’t look at it—eat it,’ he said quietly. ‘Don’t worry, you’ll still have room for fairy-floss and whatever at the Show.’
Alix shook her head wonderingly. It didn’t seem possible, but his words somehow created a surge of hunger inside her, and she quickly followed his example and began tucking into the food. Quinn ate quickly but with a contained neatness, and before Alix realised it the majority of the food was gone and he was reaching for the coffee pot.
‘Or would you prefer tea?’ he asked. ‘I wasn’t sure, so I ordered both.’
‘Oh, no, coffee is fine,’ Alix replied, forced to pause before answering because her mouth was full. She managed to nod her way through the expected questions about sugar and cream, but as both of them leaned back in their chairs for the supposedly relaxing interlude of after-breakfast coffee, her now full stomach began to knot up.
‘About last night...’ she began nervously.
‘Forget it.’ His voice was gentle, calm, yet edged with an iron she could feel.
Alix gathered her resolve. She could not, simply could not spend this day with Quinn without making some gesture of apology. She must not.
‘I don’t want to forget it,’ she replied, and then, as he opened his mouth to halt her, she rushed out the words. ‘Last night was ... was very beautiful, and I’m ... I’m sorry I said what I did.’
One dark eyebrow was raised enquiringly, but Quinn made no reply. He seemed only to settle more comfortably into his chair, holding Alix with his startlingly green eyes.
‘What I mean is ...’ she stammered, ‘th—that it was as much my fault as yours, I suppose, and that I really didn’t mean what I said at the ... the end.’
‘Ah ...’ Nothing else, just that uninforming sound that emerged so softly it might have been only a sigh.
Alix faltered, then sucked in a deep breath and concluded somewhat lamely, ‘Well, anyway, I’m sorry.’
‘So there!’
‘What? I didn’t understand,’ she said.
‘So there! That’s what you meant to finish with, even if you didn’t say it.’ Quinn’s mouth softened into a gentle smile. ‘Don’t look so defensive, Alix. I’m not trying to start another war.’ He smiled again, and nothing in his face or eyes revealed anything but genuine friendliness. ‘And if it makes any difference, I’m sorry too,’ he said softly. ‘Now can we just forget it, and — if you’ll pardon the expression — go to the dogs?’
‘But ...’
‘But nothing! It’s over, finished, done. Now get yourself organised and be quick about it or I won’t buy you any fairy-floss.’ He was already pushing away from the table, and Alix had little choice but to follow his example.
Infuriating man, she thought as she gathered handbag and accessories together and dashed to join him at the door. Arrogant, infuriating, and ...
The hire car took them to the Brisbane Exhibition Grounds and after giving the driver instructions for their collection later, Quinn led Alix straight to the dog judging area, arriving just as the first German Shorthair Pointer class came into the ring.
‘Just in time,’ he muttered caustically. ‘Two seconds later and you’d have been buying your own fairy-floss, young lady.’
‘I’m always punctual,’ Alix replied lightly, her mood greatly improved by the tangible excitement of the Show, of his apparent acceptance of her apology, and by having somehow been able to push aside the bad feelings created the night before.
‘Just one more attribute to set you aside from the common herd,’ he quipped, and then turned away to scowl at the judge’s initial decision.
During the next two hours they said nothing to each other of a personal nature, but their conversation centred around the dogs, the judge’s decisions and comments, and their shared interest in the breed on show. Quinn seemed to know virtually every one of the exhibitors, and nodded politely to many, but all those involved in the show were too busy with preparations to stop and talk.
Alix revelled in it all. She was here, with Quinn, with their differences forgotten and both of them in a pleasant, relaxed, holiday mood. Sighing deeply, she looked out at the ring and half-heartedly wished she could have entered Nick, because so far none of the dogs in his class appeared quite as good.
‘Although I suppose I’m prejudiced,’ she admitted half aloud. Quinn turned as if to ask her what she had meant, but was halted by an all-too-familiar voice calling a greeting to him.
Michelle! Alix’s insides shrivelled like frying bacon. She should have expected it, indeed had expected it in some forgotten corner of her mind, but nothing could prepare her for the reality.
Michelle patently ignored Alix as she strode over to kiss Quinn lingeringly on the mouth, a kiss, Alix noticed, he made no effort to evade. Only Michelle could wear white to the Brisbane Show, Alix thought. Or at least only Michelle could wear white and somehow manage to keep her casual-expensive white clothing looking totally cool and immaculate.
She was chiding herself for being so catty when Michelle turned, as if seeing her for the first time, and then politely muttered, ‘Good day, Alix. I didn’t know you were coming for the Show.’
Alix didn’t reply aloud, but she nodded a greeting that Michelle pointedly ignored in her haste to reclaim Quinn’s attention. With a familiarity that fairly made Alix squirm inside, she took Quinn by the arm as she leaned enticingly against him, whispering something into his ear that brought a brief bark of laughter.
Damn the woman! Damn her entirely to hell, Alix thought, wishing she could summon the nerve to simply walk away and leave the two of them to their snuggling and cooing. But she couldn’t, of course, not that it helped to realise it.
A hand at her elbow made her start with slight alarm, and she turned to find herself facing the broad smile of Derek Sanderson.
‘Well, good morning,’ he grinned. ‘I rather expected I’d find you here. Come along and I’ll buy you something to drink.’
He was already steering her away when Alix halted in her tracks. She couldn’t just walk off without a word, disregarding
that a moment ago she’d been thinking of doing exactly that. But when she said as much to Derek, he merely shrugged and turned to shout Quinn’s name, and when Quinn turned, Derek pointed quickly to both Alix and himself and mimed the action of drinking.
Quinn raised one eyebrow and his mouth quirked into a wry grin, but his eyes locked with Alix’s in a fashion that made Derek’s presence take on a sudden, almost sinister implication. Then, with a shrug, he waved one hand carelessly as if in agreement and turned his attention once again to Michelle.
And so much for you, Alix thought ruefully. Well, perhaps it was no more than she deserved anyway, and even Derek’s company was infinitely better than playing gooseberry to Quinn and Michelle,
If Derek felt himself to be a poor second choice, he gave no indication of it, but instead showed every inclination to pick up where he had left off the night before. Taking Alix by the hand, he shouldered a path through the crowd until he had found a kiosk where they could sit and enjoy a drink without having to stand and fight off the crowds at the same time.
In the harsh light of day, Derek’s resemblance to Bruce was less obvious, but daylight did nothing whatsoever to shade his obvious brash immaturity, and within a few minutes Alix was wishing she had simply stayed and watched the dog judging. But when she suggested returning, Derek brushed aside the idea.
‘Don’t tell me you’re as besotted with canines as Quinn is?’ he said. ‘I mean, I don’t mind with him; it made it rather easy to figure out where you’d be. But surely you don’t want to spend the day watching a bunch of old stodgies parading their pets?’
‘Yes, I do, actually,’ Alix replied. ‘Or at least I want to see the rest of the GSP judging, because I have one I reckon is at least as good as any I’ve seen so far.’
He returned her to the judging then, if somewhat without much good grace, only to Alix’s dismay he showed no sign at all of making himself scarce afterwards. Or of being quiet — and that was the worst part. She could have put up with his company, but his chatter combined with the heat of the sun to give her a whopping headache.
As luck would have it, they had returned to a point directly across the ring from where Quinn and Michelle were standing, and just as Alix gave a painful little shake of her head at one of Derek’s worst jokes and reached up to press upon her eyelids with her fingertips, she looked up to see Quinn staring not at the dogs, but at her. Or was he? It lasted so short an instant that she couldn’t be sure. Just when she thought she had actually met his eyes, he looked away again.
And then, to her surprise, he looked back — directly at her and no mistake this time, because he winked! And taking Michelle by the arm, he leaned down to whisper something into her ear before leading her round the outskirts of the crowd on a route that would bring them to where Alix and Derek were standing.
Derek looked expectably impressed when Quinn introduced him to Michelle, but much to Alix’s surprise Michelle appeared even more impressed, and she turned on her charm so brightly that Derek became the personification of that classic Australianism—the ‘stunned mullet’.
Alix was still trying to sort out what had happened when Quinn took her arm and steered her away, muttering that she’d better get out of the sun. If Derek even noticed her departure she would have been surprised.
They were a hundred metres away, and still shifting easily through the crowd, when Alix looked up to suddenly realise that Quinn was happily chuckling to himself as if enjoying the greatest private joke on earth.
‘What have you done?’ she asked abruptly, and when his eyes shifted back she repeated it. ‘What have you done?’
‘I told Michelle he was a keen Samoyed fancier,’ Quinn chuckled. ‘She’ll be all over him like a dirty shirt for the rest of the afternoon.’
‘You didn’t!’ Alix couldn’t contain her surprise. ‘But, but he doesn’t even like dogs.’
‘Ahah! You know that and I know that, but do you think he’s going to tell her that?’ And again he chuckled, only this time the mischievous element in his laugh wasn’t hidden. It was a side of his nature that Alix had never seen before, and despite her own pleasure at being returned to his company, she was somewhat taken aback.
‘But ... but why?’ she asked.
‘One way to get rid of the little twit ... or would you rather share yourself between us?’ he asked sarcastically. ‘I got the distinct impression young Sanderson was giving you a headache.’
‘He was,’ Alix replied ruefully. ‘But that’s nothing to what Michelle will be giving you once she finds out. Or doesn’t that bother you?’
Quinn shrugged, ‘Not especially.’ The unspoken but obvious implication was that he was so sure of Michelle he could risk such a deception, and Alix shivered a little inside. What kind of man would do such a thing to somebody he cared for? she wondered. It didn’t seem at all like Quinn ... and yet …
Suddenly the humour of it struck her, and she began to giggle. The giggle matured quickly into full-blown laughter, and even this grew as she heard Quinn’s deeper voice join in. She couldn’t see him for the tears of laughter that filled her eyes, but as she stumbled, bent almost double by the spasms of laughter, his hand took her arm to steady her.
The rest of their visit to the show was a time of untrammelled delight for Alix, Quinn seemed to have shed all of his seriousness and sobriety in his manipulations of Derek and Michelle, and he became almost boyish in his company. They stuffed themselves on fairy-floss and waffles and assorted other junk, including some especially tantalising candy apples that neither could resist. They went on many of the rides, ventured into side-shows that neither would have bothered with on their own, and toured the various agricultural and commercial exhibits.
‘I haven’t enjoyed a show so much since I was sixteen ‘ Alix told Quinn when they finally returned to the hotel in the late afternoon. ‘But I must admit I won’t be sorry to see the inside of a shower; I feel like I’m carrying half the showground around with me.’
"Well, I don’t know what’s left for the people, then because I’ve got the other half,’ he responded with a grin. And it s a good thing we have separate rooms or there’d be a war to see who’d have the shower first. You’d lose, by the way, because I’m no gentleman in such matters ‘ Then he shot a wry look at her and said, ‘although on second thoughts I could perhaps be seduced to share ...’
No, thank you,’ she laughed. ‘I’m perfectly capable of scrubbing my own back. I just hope Brisbane isn’t having any water shortages, because I think I may be under the shower for quite some time.’
‘I can’t imagine it being a problem in this hotel,’ he said dryly. Just see that you’re ready for a sundowner about six- thirty, and tonight we’ll see if we can manage dinner without all the business trimmings. Something nice and quiet and peaceable, and not too late, would suit me very well indeed.’
‘Second the motion,’ Alix replied. Whereupon she retired to her own room, spent what seemed like half an hour beneath the shower, and then lay back for a much-needed nap. But not before plaiting her hair into a style that would let it dry properly. She had no idea what Quinn might mean by nice and quiet and peaceable’, but expected it could range anywhere from Chinese takeaway to some hidden little restaurant with superb food and ‘quiet’ atmosphere.
Secretly she rather hoped for the latter, and was glad she had brought at least one more dress that was remotely suitable for dining out.
She had just entered the lounge room of the suite when the telephone began to ring, and Quinn poked his head through the doorway to his room. ‘Answer it, would you please, Alix,’ he said. ‘I’ll just be a minute.’
She picked up the receiver, identified herself, and was hardly surprised when the caller asked for Quinn. She was just turning to call him when Quinn emerged from his room to take the telephone from her, and she was surprised that he appeared to be somewhat annoyed.
His first words, however, showed a change from annoyance to pleasure, and told Alix the
ir quiet evening alone was about to suffer a drastic change.
CHAPTER SEVEN
JIMMY, you old bushwhacker! I should have known I couldn’t sneak in a few days in Brisbane without you finding out,’ Quinn said into the telephone.
And then: ‘He’s here already? Fantastic! Surprised I didn’t see you at the show...
…of course the trials are still on next weekend; you don’t think we’d let Andrew come all this way and then forget about him ...
‘…Tonight? Well...’ He looked across at Alix with an expression that combined super-confident male adult with eager, enthusiastic small boy. ‘…Yes, fine, mate. About an hour — but we won’t stay long; I have other plans and a long drive tomorrow into the bargain. Right! See you then.’
He was about to put down the telephone when a final question must have caught his attention, for he suddenly looked over at Alix once again, this time with a totally male, speculative appraisal before he answered.
‘Yes, exceptional y pretty,’ he said into the phone. ‘But you won’t like her, old son; she owns a GSP’
‘Is that supposed to be some sort of recommendation?’ Alix asked rather acidly. ‘I hadn’t realised your circle judged girls on the basis of the dogs they choose.’
Quinn’s laugh was both loud and genuine. ‘Jimmy Grove does,’ he said then, ‘but don’t let it bother you. He’s too old for you, has a perfectly marvellous wife that he loves dearly, and he favours Weimaraners over all else.’
Oh, well then, he’s perfectly safe from me,’ she replied tartly. ‘I could put up with him being old, and maybe even married, but a Weimaraner owner ... well...’
‘That’s my girl!’ Quinn chuckled. ‘Just keep your priorities right and you’ll go far. Speaking of which, we’d best be off. Jimmy lives way to hell-and-gone over the other side of the city and we’ll be all night getting there and back if we don’t get going.’
‘Would you ... rather go alone? Alix asked then. She felt suddenly uncertain, not at all sure if she would be genuinely welcome.
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