The Goodbye Girl (3 page)

A last wave to a smiling Harly, and she drove down the drive and out onto the road, turning back towards town.

Right.  Dinner tomorrow night at Harly’s, six o’clock
.  She better make sure she wasn’t late.  They’d made the dinner date a few weeks before, not knowing until later that Alex’s friend was arriving the same day.  Harly insisted on keeping the dinner date as a simple gathering of a couple of friends.

Bree would have been alarmed if she didn’t know that
Harly wasn’t the kind of person to set up her single friends.  Knowing there was no pressure, she was certain she’d enjoy herself.  All she knew of Alex’s friend was that he was a soldier and was going to be staying with them for awhile.

Hmmmm
, maybe he’d know something about the lights in the sky, if it was experimental fighter jets or something else.  She’d have to see if she could pump Alex and his friend for a little information.

Meanwhile, she had her own contacts
.

Zipping through to
wn to the other side where the houses were well spread apart on four acre lots, she turned off the highway into the winding driveway of her rental and studied the house.  Old, built of stone and wood, wrap-around veranda.  One passage down the middle with the rooms opening off each side and the kitchen and dining room taking up the whole back of the house.  The back veranda was built in with netting, providing a shelter of sorts, and she’d decided she could drag a stretcher out there on warm summer nights and snooze.  Awesome.

This was the
house she had her eye on to buy.  Turning off the motor, she sat in the silence, listening to the birds twittering in the fading light.  Big, old rose bushes grew along the cracked footpath, and old vines wove their way around the veranda post.  An old swing chair swayed slightly in the breeze that was rapidly turning into a wind.  Trees to the side of the house and a little further away shook their branches, leaves tumbling down to skitter along the wild grass that grew abundantly.

She should probably see
someone about trimming the grass and trees.

Behind the house was an old barn containing a rusted tractor.  Contentedly, Bree’s gaze drifted along the house.  Big windows, faded curtains.  She’d actually bought furniture that though it was new, was old-fashioned.  It suited the
house.

Yep, as soon as Mr Tinsdale decided on
a price for the house, she was putting in an offer.  She wanted this house.

The curtain in the lounge window shifted and
the slim shape of a cat pushed its way through to sit on the window sill and stare out at her.

Sheba or Bast, she wasn’t sure
in the dimness of gathering dusk, but no doubt about it, whichever girl it was, she was waiting for her dinner.

Getting out of the car, she looked at the sky. 
Clouds blocked off the moon and she could taste the rain in the air.  It wouldn’t be long and it would rain.  Not a particularly good night for a UFO watch, but then one could never predict when they’d come out to play.

Or probe.

Those little grey men did love to probe.  No orifice was safe from them.  Putting things up, planting things in, they’d do it all.  Talk about not being fussy…or maybe that was talk about being perverted.

Laughing quietly, Bree ran across
to the veranda and up the steps just as rain started to patter down.  Loving it, she turned to watch as the light drops turned heavier.  The sound on the tin roof of the veranda was magic.

Taking in a deep breath,
she sighed happily before turning to unlock the door and be greeted by Bast and Sheba.

Big blue eyes looked out of a seal face, little seal paws padding along the hallway runner and long, thin tail straight up in the air as Sheba trotted daintily towards her.  Then she opened her mouth.

The yowl would have stripped paint off the walls.  It was just so wrong that such a screech could come from such a dainty bit of Siamese.

There came a thump, a scrabble, and then Bast came running out of the lounge room, scrabbling on the wood floor until she hit the hallway runner, where she gripped and skidded to a halt before proceeding to sit and slurp on one blue paw, pretending that she hadn’t been the one scrabbling clumsily around the doorway.

“Yeah, sure,” Bree said dryly.

Bast blinked and looked
away, blue nose in the air.

Sheba squawked.

Definitely time for dinner.

Feeding the two Siamese was the first order of the day
before Bree had a shower, washing the combined scents of dyes, lotions and other chemicals off her skin.  No doubt she actually didn’t have any on her, but she always felt as though she’d bathed in it by the time she knocked off work.

Wrapped in a dressing
gown, she sat on the sofa and checked through her phone book for her friends, the UFO Hunter Team.  Dialling their number on the landline, she settled back on the sofa.

“
Hello?” A woman’s voice came through the receiver.

“Jackie,
its Bree.”

“What’s the password?”

Paranoia had nothing on the UFO Hunter Team.  “Bigfoot’s boffing the troll.”

“That’s not the password.”

“A horny ghost and a blow-up doll met in a bar-”

“Not
the password.  One last chance and then I’m hanging up.”

“
Bag an alien, save an orifice.”

The phone hung up in her ear.

Laughing, Bree redialled.

“What’s the password?” Jackie asked in a no-nonsense tone.  “Last chance and I mean it, Bree.  You never know who’s listening in, things like wasting time on the phone gives the government time to track us.”

Bree rolled her eyes.  “United Federation of Omegas.”

“Is this pleasure or business?”

More than used to the way Jackie got down to business, Bree replied, “Business.”

“Reference or search?”

“I don’t need a reference for anything weird, but I do need to know if any planes were flying around the Whicha area last night.”

“Lights spotted?”

“By a local who swears it was a UFO.”

“You did explain to her that a
UFO stood for Unidentified Flying Object, and what she saw falls under that classification only by the chance that she couldn’t identify it as a plane or something else?”

“It’s the something else I’m going to see if I can spot tonight.”

There was silence for several seconds, then, “You have rain down your way.”

“Thanks for the update.”

“Last night was clear.”

“That it was.”

“No planes flying.”

“
Helicopters?”

“Don’t you think I’d have said that?”

“Gotcha.  No planes, clear night.”

“No planes scheduled for tonight, either.”

“Tonight is rain and darkness.”

“Not good weather for UFO spotting.”

“Gotcha again.”

“Who’s your partner?”

“Me and me.  Did I mention me?  Oh, and there’s me.  Quite a crowd.”

She could hear the frown in
Jackie’s voice.  “You know hunts should never be conducted alone.”

“I don’t actually have a UFO cohort with me right now.”

“Want me to send Mick down?”

“No need.  There’s no confirmed sighting, I’m just doing recon.”  Bree rolled her eyes. 
She sounded like a drongo but Jackie liked that kind of talk and she needed information, so it was a small price to pay.

“Maybe you should give me the location and I can track you.”

“You can do that?  From one thousand kilometres away?”

“You think I can’t?”

To be honest, Bree wasn’t certain exactly what Jackie could do.  If she teleported herself right beside Bree one day, she wouldn’t have been surprised.  The woman was a wonder with the computer, not to mention a great hacker.  The only ones a little scarier than Jackie were her team.

“Have to go,” Jackie informed her.  “Never know who might be tracking us.  Report in as soon as you get home.”

“I don’t think that’s-”

“Do it.”  Jackie hung up.

Grinning, Bree got to her feet.  The UFO Hunter Team could be a bunch of loons at times, but there was no doubting their intelligence.  She’d been in contact with them long enough to know it first hand.

Now that she knew there had been no aircraft in the skies the previous night, it meant that if
Charlotte had really spotted a light it had to be something - UFO, secret testing of aircraft, who knew?  But it was something to be checked out.

Dressing quickly in stretch jeans, thick socks, sneakers
and a long-sleeved t-shirt, she picked up a thick, padded, rainproof jacket and grabbed a bag of equipment that she used when out on a watch, setting both down on the hallway table.  Returning to the kitchen, she got a flask of hot water and stuffed a twenty dollar bill in her pocket.  Satisfied that she had everything, she bid the appalled cats goodbye and locked the front door before making a dash for the van in the light mist of rain.

The night was dark, and while the rain didn’t make for good viewing, the darkness certainly made it easier to
spot a light in the sky.

Once out on the road, she headed for the field she’d scouted earlier.  Flicking on the police scanner, she listened to it.  Silence.  Whicha was a small, quiet town.  If she had to spend her night listening to the scanner only, she’d fall asleep.

Switching on the radio, she nodded.  Any alien aircraft would interfere with the radio, a sure sign that would alert her even if she didn’t see a space craft.

The rain started to teem down and she sighed.  A mug of hot Milo and a good book while curled up on the sofa sounded awesome, but it wasn’t happening anytime soon.  The best she could have was hot
soup and - she indicated and turned into the café - a toasted sandwich.  If she had to sit out in the cold and rain, albeit in the shelter of the van, she could at least have some hot food besides the Cup-A-Soups she carried in the bag.

Pulling up near the café, she went in, ordered a toasted ham and cheese, caved in and bought a small bucket of chips as well, and was making her way back to the door when it opened to admit a tall
, broad-shouldered man dressed in jeans and a jean jacket that hadn’t fared too badly from the rain.  His boots were mud-spattered.

Lifting her gaze, she
was treated to a mouth-watering view when he held the jacket out at the sides and gave a shake.  Beneath he wore an unbuttoned flannel shirt, the sides flapping back to show a t-shirt that hugged a very muscular chest and abdomen. 

Oh, yummy
.  Hell, if aliens had bodies like that, she wouldn’t mind being captured and probed.

Her gaze drifted higher
to study a face that was an excellent match for that delectable body.  Short, fair hair, dark eyebrows, straight nose, square jaw, firm, masculine lips, and oh man, be still her pounding heart, brilliant green eyes.  Pure green, piercing, all-seeing.

Oh hell, if aliens looked like this yummy specimen of manhood, she’d be
begging
them to probe her.

Maybe she was more her mother’s daughter than she’d thought.

The man’s green-eyed gaze swept the small café before passing over her.  His gaze sharpened, swerved back, and studied her intently.

Holy crap.  He was watching her watching him.  How Twilight Zone, how spooky, how odd, how…amusing.

Liking him instantly, even though they hadn’t said a word to each other, Bree smiled.  Her gut instinct said he was all right, a fine specimen of manhood that wouldn’t harm her.  Her head told her that one never knew, he could be a serial killer with a thing for big girls.  Her heart just sighed wistfully.

The man’s lips curved upward in an answering smile and her heart nearly swooned in delight, her mind sneered, and her gut went
yep, fine specimen all round
.

“Hi,” Bree said.

“Hi.”  His voice was deep, smoky, making her toes curl in her sneakers.  “Bit wet out there.”

“Just a tad,” she agreed, seeing the rain pouring down through the window.
  “Do I see before me a weary traveller seeking shelter?”

“More like a hungry traveller seeking nourishment.”  His gaze dropped to the bag in her hand.  “As one hungry traveller to another.”

“Huh.  In that case, you’ve come to the right place.  They make the best hot, artery-clogging food around.”

“How could I possibly bypass that brilliant observation?  You talked me into it.”

“But you were hungry anyway,” she pointed out.  “So I really didn’t have to talk you into it.”

Laughter sparkled in his eyes.  “Another brilliant observation.”

Thunder rumbled, the lights in the café dimming before again flaring bright.

“And we have a storm,” Bree said.