The Waiting Place Read online

  Chapter Four

  delicious

  He was back in less than ten minutes with my coffee.

  ..And croissants.

  …And sliced fruit.

  ….All neatly arrayed on a tray. With serviettes.

  Full service. Wow. On any other day I might get to like this guy.

  Assuming of course, that he wasn’t married or otherwise taken. I made a mental note to berate my angel if I later discovered there had been silver-framed photos of a wife and children in that bag I hadn’t searched.

  Staring at the tray, I noted that he had also added a cup for himself.

  Hmmm. It appeared he was planning a short layover in my secluded part of the lounge. So much for my solo sanctum sanctorum.

  Then I noticed that wasn’t all. He was holding the tray rather oddly, elbows stuck firmly to his sides. He had a newspaper tucked under one arm and magazines under the other. If nothing else, I was impressed at his ability to carry multiple items at once. Perhaps he had been a waiter before he turned soulless businessman?

  From these additional clues I surmised that Tom planned to stay quite a while. An extended visit, no less. Either that or he was trying to break back into the hospitality industry. I congratulated myself on my Sherlock Holmes-like observational skills.

  Keeping his arms close by his sides, he set the tray on the table closest to me then turned his body towards me, left-side first.

  “Do you mind taking these,” he lifted his left elbow slightly and I grabbed two magazines as they fell. “I wasn’t sure what kind of reading matter you preferred,” he explained, “so I picked up the latest Donna Hay and a Vogue Australia. Oh, and this,” he pivoted his body until his right arm was above me, dropping a third magazine that had been hiding in the folded newspaper and the paper in my lap. I wasn’t interested in the paper and placed it on the table next to the tray but the magazine’s glossy front cover caught my eye with a photo of a delectable-looking multi-tier ice-cream layer cake.

  Much more my style.

  Enough to make any red-blooded dessert-chef salivate.

  “I liked that one’s name …‘Delicious’,” Tom hummed the word, by way of explanation, “and I couldn’t leave something behind that said it was ‘Voted Australia’s best food magazine,’ could I?

  “Well no, you couldn’t,” I laughed, more impressed than I let on. Coffee, croissants, fresh fruit ..and magazines. Double wow.

  I was starting to like the lounge a lot better than I had at any time prior to …right now.

  He sat, regarding me across the table.

  “I want to get something out in the open,” he spoke in a serious tone.

  This early in the day what could he possibly have done that I needed to know? He’d ordered me a cappuccino instead of my usual latté? Brought only one sugar? If that was the case, he needn’t have worried -I always carried extra sachets in my bag for emergencies such as this. Or perhaps I was about to find out about the wife ..or worse still, wives. Trust me to attract the airport’s only polygamist. See, I hissed at my angel in an internal dialogue only she and I could hear -I knew that I should have checked that bag!

  I narrowed my eyes and afforded him my ‘what have you done?’ expression. It was the one I saved for Flanagan when he had been up to feisty feline mischief. Given that a growing Maine Coon, who thinks he’s still a kitten but weighs as much as a mid-sized dog, can get himself into quite a lot of trouble and that his mischief was generally rather expensive to put right, the look was well-practised … it had seen a lot of use this past year.

  “I only bought your cookbook when I saw it outside in the airport bookshop twenty minutes ago …with the idea that it would give me a bona fide excuse to come over and introduce myself.”

  “Really?” My appreciative smile turned a shade wary. Not a random admirer then? A stalker? Great ...And here I was in the furthest corner away from the door. I could feel my pulse-rate rising.

  Clever move, Kate. The multiple-wives scenario was starting to look good from where I was sitting …right now. So much for my thought of seconds ago of liking the lounge.

  Security, where were you when I needed you? Like now!

  I glanced around for the nearest lounge occupants but, of course, I had purposely sat as far away from anyone as I could. I didn’t like making scenes, but if a scream was called for I was fairly sure I could do a fair imitation of that quintessential cinematic shower-scene scream of Janet Leigh’s -or even Scar Jo imitating Janet Leigh’s-, if required.

  “I noticed you last night but we were sent to different hotels.

  Hmpf, I thought. I saw you too. Mr Grumpy-britches. And what’s the bet that your hotel was closer to the airport than mine. I mentally kicked myself. Get back on track -who cared where his hotel was? …talking potential stalker here.

  He appeared to not have noticed my frantic glance around or the way I was cringing back into my chair, as he continued his declamation, “Then, this morning I was sitting behind you on the flight down from Brisbane and I saw you turn in here to the lounge. I was planning on introducing myself when I saw that you had parked yourself as far away from the madding crowd as you possible could have and figured I’d need a better than average excuse to break into this Tom Hanks - Desert Island Castaway thing you had going on,” he stopped to draw breath.

  Perhaps if I ran now I could make it back to the civilised end of the lounge, with all those lovely businessmen and chatting couples?

  Than his words sank in:

  Desert Island.

  Castaway.

  Thing …

  Huh - I saw no volleyballs with faces drawn on them here and I wasn’t so sure I liked the comparison with a gaunt and somewhat hairy Tom Hanks stranded on an atoll in the middle of nowhere. Okay, I was having a bad-hair day, but it wasn’t that bad. This Tom’s explanation did, however, fill in enough gaps to take my focus off being concerned about him stalking me.

  Besides, I could hardly refute something that was true. I had intentionally sat as far away from anyone else as I could. It wasn’t as if I was the best known celebrity on the planet, but having your face gracing book covers and television shows did occasionally get to be a pain for someone as introverted as I. Sitting on a deserted island -with the proviso that it was one that included lattés and sun umbrellas …and chocolate …Did I mention chocolate?- did not sound so bad to me. Though perhaps, thinking it through, I had a preference more for Dessert islands than I had for Desert -the extra ‘s’ made a world of difference in what you got …and all that desert sand always worked its way into the wrong places…as I’ve said, I’m not a beach person -added to my aversions to Cottesloe’s sea life, I burned too easily to be a beach bunny and I detested sand’s ability to sift its way into every nook and cranny of my backside. Even when I tried to stay on a towel. The stuff had a mind of its own.

  I was still musing on this, metaphorically brushing sand off my buttocks when I felt a light touch on my forearm. Startled, I clasped my hands in consternation, pulled from my beachfront reverie by the warmth of a human hand. Not surprisingly, it was Tom’s. He was leaning forwards as if he was about to say something important.

  Then ...I noticed…

  He was squinting at me with that same leery look that I’d noted with some disgust yesterday evening. I was about to mention it, forming a protest at being appraised this way when he suddenly raised both hands to his eyes, pressing his fingertips over his tightly shut eyelids, “Hang on a minute,” he said grimly, “if I don’t get rid of these new contacts I’m going to want to scratch my eyes out.” With that, he briefly turned away, flipped the offending lenses into one cupped hand and turned back to me. “Phew, that’s better,” he breathed a sigh of relief, using the heel of his other hand to massage an eye socket, “course, now I can’t see anything clearly, but it’s probably better than peering at you like some insane pervert.”

  I unclasped my tightly clenched hands and waved one in absolution, like some form of Pa
pal pardon. New lenses, huh, “Not at all,” I spoke magnanimously…

  … “Liar, liar, pants on fire,” said a little voice. It seemed my angel hadn’t left the building as I’d supposed.

  I rolled my eyes in irritation, “well, I never thought you were insane,” I qualified my earlier clemency.

  “Just a pervert, aye?” while speaking, Tom leant down to open his black bag, pulling forth a glasses case from which he withdrew a nifty pair of black frames. He deposited the lenses in a branded container and rezipped the bag, giving me no opportunity to check for any silver-framed family portraits. I kept my disappointment under wraps, fearing a reprisal from my resident guardian angel, but I couldn’t help an internally whispered taunt of, “so you at you -all dressed up and nowhere to go?” just to keep her on her well-shod toes.