Love Is Blind (4 page)

Anthea refused to be amused. She bestowed on him the kind of icy look which could have got her the part of an extra in a Dracula movie. Jacko’s smile died on his lips. But not, as Anthea thought, because of her snooty response. The truck was rounding a bend in the road at speed. And there, right in their path, lay a fallen tree. Jacko slammed on the brakes. The truck corkscrewed to a halt.

Anthea lurched forward. She was then snapped back by her seat belt. The massive, charred gum tree lay right across the track. Weakened by the recent fire, it had toppled from the shallow ridge above the left-hand side of the road. The way
ahead
was totally blocked by a snarled wall of branches, leaves and blackened trunk.

Jacko slowly steered to the right side of the road and peered out of the window. The hill pitched down steeply into a tangle of dense scrub.

‘Damn,’ he announced. ‘No way round.’

‘Can’t you call someone to come and clear it?’

Jacko laughed. ‘We’re on bush time here, love. Nobody does anything in a hurry.’

‘Except fall in “love”, apparently,’ Anthea responded, sarcastically.

Jacko knew that a comment like that should be stepped around as carefully as a dozing crocodile. ‘Could be hours before they clear this lot,’ he said. ‘Jane’s dinner will be ruined … Don’t worry, I know a back road. Old fire trail. Don’t want to miss out on our tucker. Your sister’s a hell of a cook as you know.’

‘Actually I know no such thing. Are we talking about the same person?’ Anthea was growing tired of hearing about all of her sister’s talents. She had little doubt that Jacko was really interested in just one recipe. The recipe for success that he could attain using Jane’s inheritance.

Jacko swung the truck around, retraced their route for a mile or so, then lurched off on to a red dirt track. What would probably be classified as a traffic hazard anywhere else in the civilised world, Jacko saw as an actual road. The truck lurched and catapulted its way up the hill. It was a car journey which threatened to shake the fillings out of their teeth.

As the red earth gave way to rock, Anthea began to worry that she was being abducted. But once they crested the ridge and nose-dived down the other side, she could see that they were indeed heading in the same direction as the main road far below.

‘Anyway,’ Jacko picked up on his previous theme, ‘that’s what I love about your sister. She doesn’t judge a book, or in my case a bloke, by the cover. Besides which, do you know why it’s better to go out with a rough and ready, ugly bloke? Because we’re so damn’ grateful. Which makes us so much less demanding … I get down on bended knee and thank Jane for coming into my life, every damn’ day. I worship that woman. I suppose your legal eagle fella just expects you to worship the water he walks on’,
Jacko
laughed as the utility truck moaned its way up an incline.

Anthea was enraged once more. How dare he keep talking to her this way? They’d only just met and here he was, making inappropriate remarks about her boyfriend. She reeled around to face him. But as the car laboured up the rough ridge, the barrage of barbed replies on the tip of her tongue were abruptly silenced. A blur of feathers filled the screen. Anthea recoiled with fear, a scream in her blood. Jacko spun the wheel.

The truck slid sideways. It hit something solid and rolled over. The windscreen cracked on impact then shattered. As she tumbled over and over in the cabin of the truck, terror exploded on to the screen of her eyelids. There was a smell of burning rubber followed by the deafening roar of crumpling metal. The earth and sky blurred, and then the world imploded. Anthea was aware of smashing glass, a tinkling sound like waves on shingle, and then the world went black.

Chapter Five

If Looks Could Kill – Hate At First
Slight

ANTHEA FELT HERSELF
clawing her way back to consciousness. Patterns of light flickered across her closed eyelids. She opened her eyes to find she was lying on a blanket on some soft sand, her whole body coated in dust. The sting of blood was in her nostrils. Each ragged breath she took felt like inhaling fire, but the elation of still being alive engulfed her.

‘What … What happened?’ she stuttered.

‘Emu. Big bugger too. A male. Bounded into our path. Truck’s rooted – totally wrecked.’

A belch of petrol alerted her to the fate of the demolished truck, lying upside down in what appeared to be a giant ditch beside them. The aftershock rippled through her body and a bubble of hysteria rose in her chest.

‘An emu? Aren’t you supposed to know about these things? How could you just drive casually off the beaten track while there are giant creatures like that bounding about? Not only do you look as thick as a plank, you’re even less intelligent.’

‘I’ve got ’roo bars on the front of the truck,’ Jacko protested. ‘But I wasn’t counting on the death wish of our feathered friend. Emus are so bloody stupid. He saw the car and ran right into it. Worse than a ’roo, too, ’cause its body mass is just at window level. Which is why the glass smashed to smithereens …’

‘Suicidal emus … You see! Even the wildlife are depressed, living out here.’ Anthea’s voice had risen two octaves with terror.

Jacko moved closer, squatted down and scrutinised her. ‘You’ve been out for the count for yonks. Are you okay?’ She now noted that, despite his surface calm, Jacko’s skin had gone the colour of a cold roast.

Still shell-shocked, Anthea did a quick check of her limbs then wiggled her toes and swivelled her neck. There didn’t seem to be any serious pain. When she nodded that she was indeed okay, Jacko’s smile broke across his face like a wave over a beach.

‘Well, that’s a bloody relief. Don’t know what Jane would have done to me if I’d accidentally maimed her only sister. Reckon she’d be using my testicles for earrings.’

Anthea winced at the crudeness of his language. ‘Have you called an ambulance?’

‘Phone’s smashed. And yours is out of range. I checked it.’

‘Oh, no! Oh my God,’ she squeaked. ‘Then what are we going to do?’ Panic gripped her.

Jacko, on the other hand, didn’t seem to be remotely stressed. ‘I dunno. Eat dinner?’ He tilted his head towards some point beyond her shoulder. ‘He’s roasting nicely in the embers. At least we can have our revenge on that big stupid bird. Emu kebab.’

Anthea craned her neck in the direction he was pointing. A little fire was burning in a makeshift rocky hearth. Jacko got up and went over to poke at the smouldering pile. He kicked away the ashes and cut into the charred bird with a penknife. A tangy roasting aroma filled Anthea’s nostrils and whetted her appetite. He offered her some cooked white meat, skewered on the end of his penknife. But she resolutely shook her head.

‘Road kill? You seriously expect me to eat
road
kill? Tell me, are you just visiting from prehistoric times? Or are you actually planning to live here for good?’

‘Bloody handy, eh, that we got hit by something edible? And how lucky was it that we rolled into a riverbed? And for the river to be dry? Talk about a soft landing.’

‘Lucky? You think this is lucky? … Well, at least you’ve brought religion into my life, Mr Jackman. I now really do know what it’s like to be in hell. We could die out here!’

Jacko raised one furry brow in amusement. ‘Well,
I
won’t. But
you
could. You’re too damn’ scrawny. I could play your spine like a xylophone. A woman needs a bit of meat on her bones. Like my Janey.’

Anthea was offended. ‘Unlike my sister, I take pride in my appearance.’

Jacko laughed in her face. ‘So tell me, how many years of yoga does it take to be able to kiss your own ass like that? Have you actually
looked
in a mirror lately, woman? You’re so thin, your pyjamas must have only
one
stripe.’

Anthea felt a mixture of fury and despair well up in her. A sob erupted from her and her face crumpled.

‘Hey, come on now. Don’t have a meltdown,’ Jacko said in a more comforting voice. ‘Now the fire’s lit, we’ll be sticking out like a dog’s balls. A spotter plane will find us, easy. Once Jane realises that we’re overdue, she’ll call the cops. All the locals are bound to come looking for us. Pilots … well, they’re civil contractors, really, the guys who drop the miners back and forth from the city … they fly by all the time. She’ll be right. Don’t you worry.’

‘Worry! Of course I’m worried. Or do you think I always gnaw my nails right up to my elbows? I need some water,’ she demanded.

Jacko rummaged around in his Gore-Tex backpack and handed her a water bottle. ‘I’ve got painkillers too,’ he offered.

‘Just water,’ Anthea said crisply. She didn’t want to risk taking anything. Not when she was marooned in the Outback with an obvious maniac. She needed to keep her wits about her. Anthea took a swig of water then poured some on to her hands.

‘Oy!’ Jacko snatched back the bottle. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing? That water’s for drinking only. We’re in the middle of the desert, in case you hadn’t noticed,’ he
yelled.
‘You think
I’m
thick? Jesus. If brains were elastic, yours couldn’t make a garter for a canary.’

‘But I’m covered in red dust,’ Anthea whined.

‘Tough. Unless you want me to lick you clean,’ he laughed.

Anthea prickled with disgust at his suggestion. ‘Don’t be revolting.’

‘Relax. I’m only joking. Jeez, I’m beginning to think you wouldn’t know a joke if it jumped up and bit you on the bum.’

‘But didn’t you say we’re in a creek bed?’

‘Yes, a dry creek bed … About as dry as your bloody personality,’ he said under his breath.

‘What? What did you say?’ she fumed. ‘I heard that!’

Jacko was back at the fire now, poking around in the ashes. Anthea watched him cut off another huge hunk of charred emu with his penknife. He thrust some white meat in her direction on the end of the blade.

Anthea recoiled once more.

Jacko shook his head. ‘Your stomach must think that your throat’s been cut. Okay, it’s not exactly cock-a-leekie-dick-in-the-spotted-hole or
whatever
the hell it is you people eat in England. But it’s good bush tucker.’

As he chewed her share, Jacko eyed her thoughtfully. ‘Look, you’re probably in shock. That’s why you’re acting as though you’ve got kangaroos in your top paddock.’ He tapped his head, by way of explanation. ‘But don’t sweat it. Why don’t you just look on the whole adventure as a spur-of the-moment camping trip? You can experience first hand what it’s like to get back to the land.’

‘Camping doesn’t make me want to get back to the land. It makes me want to get back to a five-star hotel suite for a bubble bath.’

‘But just look around you,’ Jacko insisted. ‘The birdsong, the wind whispering in the gum trees, the landscape dotted with ’roos …’

‘Men may find it romantic to sleep rough and live off the land, cooking on a campfire. To most women it just describes fleeing the Japanese army in the Second World War through the jungles of Borneo.’

Jacko let out a loud bark of a laugh. ‘Jane said just the same thing to me the other day. She reckons the true definition of a campsite is an insect-infested area, enclosing nostalgic,
competitive
men and pissed off, freezing cold women who are secretly planning a mass exodus to the nearest shopping mall.’

‘Or concert hall,’ Anthea added, pointedly. ‘Doesn’t that illustrate just how ill-suited you are? This is why I’m so worried about your future together. Think it through, Mr Jackman. You’re a bushman. Jane’s natural habitat is the opera house. She should be with the kind of man who went to a famous college. Like Rupert did.’ The thought of him was like a warm embrace. ‘The sort of man who will one day cure cancer. Or invent something astonishing. And you … well …’ Anthea cast a scornful glance at her companion.

Jacko curled his lip at her superior tone. ‘I have my talents,’ was all he said.

‘Like what? Driving a car off the road and nearly killing your passenger?’

‘Like living off the land. Personally, I can’t think of a more important skill.’

‘Oh my God. What’s that noise?’ Anthea replied. ‘Oh, I know. It’s the sound of millions of women laughing themselves to death … I mean, how ridiculous. We’ve had centuries of civilisation. We don’t need to live off the land any more.’

‘Yeah. Your type just live off your rich, successful husbands.’

Now it was Anthea’s turn to take offence. ‘I don’t live off Rupert! I am an independent career woman, I’ll have you know.’ She felt perplexed. Surely Jane’s inheritance was the only reason he was marrying her sister. And yet he was acting as though he didn’t know anything about the money.

‘I’m a survivor. Once, when I was in the army, I came within a whisker of being paralysed in a free fall from a helicopter. I had to bite the head off a snake to survive. I slept inside a slaughtered camel to stave off hypothermia in the desert. Out here, your precious Rupert would be about as useful as a …’ Jacko cast around for the right words ‘… as an ashtray on a motorbike.’ He looked lovingly at his Harley-Davidson, half buried but still intact under the upside down truck.

‘Oh, really? Well, I’d love to see how you’d survive in the urban jungle. Man versus Wilderness is one thing. But what about Man versus Child Minding?’ Anthea ranted. ‘Yes, you’ve demonstrated survival skills in one of the world’s most desolate regions … But can you survive
the
brutal realities of marriage? The fights over housework and food shopping? The school run? The perils of Parent Teacher Night?’

Anthea took a deep breath, and continued. ‘Yes, you’ve climbed great mountains, but what about social climbing? Have you got a head for heights? How will you cope with Jane’s smart musician friends? Okay, you survived a free fall jump from a helicopter. But what about the free fall when your babysitter cancels and the kids come down with flu and Jane’s playing in the city at a concert? How will you cope then, eh?’

‘Do you know what? You should give up the law and get a job as a life saver in a sewage plant ’cause you talk such shit. You’ve just dismissed all Aussie blokes as a bunch of retarded rednecks. But you know nothing about us. You know what? Maybe it’s kind of a good thing that the truck rolled and we have this enforced time together. So you can get to know me better.’