Secrets in Pelican Crossing (Pelican Crossing #2)

Nine

Liz was carrying a folder to the reception desk when the trio entered the medical centre. It had been a busy morning, and she was looking forward to her lunch break. At first, she didn’t pay any attention to the two men, one on either side of the old woman. ‘Agnes,’ she said, dropping the folder onto the desk and hurrying over, ‘what happened to you?’

‘A small altercation with her dog. She didn’t want to go to hospital, so I figured this was the best option,’ a deep, cultured voice said.

Suddenly aware of the figure on one side of Agnes, Liz looked up to see the tall man with a thatch of white hair. When his face broke into a smile and his grey eyes landed on hers – grey eyes like a stormy ocean – her breath caught and her heart started to pound.

She knew who he was. Finn Hunter was the new editor of The Crossing Courier . He’d been in Pelican Crossing for the past year. But he was a bit of an enigma. All she really knew about him was that he’d moved here when his son-in-law died in a dreadful accident.

Liz had seen him around town, and she’d heard him speak at the town meeting last year. But this was the first time she’d met him face-to-face, and he took her breath away.

He wasn’t drop dead gorgeous. Far from it. He wasn’t even as attractive as the hot air balloon guy. So why was she feeling as if…?

‘Sorry?’ she said.

‘Agnes had an accident. She tripped over her dog. Is there somewhere…?’ He gazed around the busy waiting room .

‘Of course.’ Liz’s training came to the fore. ‘The clinic. Follow me.’ She led them into the small room at one side of the waiting room and helped Agnes to a seat. ‘There’s no need for you to stay,’ she said to Finn when he and the other man who she recognised as Martin Cooper, the photographer, were still standing there. She knew who Martin was because she and a couple of friends had gone down to Bellbird Bay to see an exhibition of his work.

The two men looked at each other, then Finn said, ‘We’ll be right outside. We can take Agnes back home.’

‘Oh, right.’ It hadn’t occurred to Liz to consider how the old woman would get home. ‘It may take some time.’

‘No problem.’

The men left, and Liz gave herself a moment to breathe.

‘The nurse will be with you shortly, Agnes. Can I get you anything? Maybe a glass of water?’

‘That would be lovely, dear. It’s Liz, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ Liz remembered meeting Agnes with her dog on the beach. She fetched a glass of water, then returned to the waiting room where Finn and Martin were now seated. Liz checked her watch. ‘Okay if I take my lunch break now?’ she asked the receptionist. She often filled in for the receptionists at lunchtime.

‘No problem,’ Cheryl replied. ‘Take as long as you like. I won’t take a break today as I want to leave early.’

‘Thanks.’ Making an effort to avoid looking in the direction of where Finn and Martin were seated, Liz collected her bag and hurriedly left.

*

Liz was still feeling unsettled when she returned home that evening, the memory of how she had felt at the sight of Finn Hunter still fresh in her mind. She was glad there had been no sign of Agnes or the two men when she came back from lunch. An enquiry in the clinic revealed that Agnes’s injury hadn’t been serious. The nurse had been able to patch her up and she’d left with the pair of men who’d brought her to the centre, with instructions to rest for the remainder of the day and to return if she experienced any headache or dizziness .

‘She’s a game one,’ the nurse had said. ‘We don’t see many old dears as healthy as she is. It was good of those guys to bring her in.’

‘Yes, it was very good of them,’ Liz had replied.

Lacking the motivation to cook, Liz pulled a frozen meal from the freezer, and opened her laptop to check her emails, hoping there would be a reply from Julie. It had been two weeks since she’d replied to her letter.

There was still nothing. Liz sighed.

She poured herself a glass of red wine and took it and her meal out to the deck. It was lovely out here at this time of night, with a fresh breeze from the water a relief after the heat of the day. But tonight, the sight of the boats lined up in the marina, and the sound of the seabirds seeking their evening roost didn’t bring her the peace she sought.

She finished the spinach and feta cannelloni, poured a second glass of wine and thought about her encounter with Finn Hunter. She could scarcely call it an encounter. They had barely exchanged two words. So why did she feel as if her life would never be the same again? She could just imagine what Mandy would say. She must never know, or she’d pull out all the stops to bring them together.

Liz was musing over the fact that she’d finally come across someone who could stir her emotions when her phone rang, the familiar tone breaking into her thoughts. She was still so caught up in thinking about Finn Hunter that, for a moment, the voice asking if this was Liz Phillips didn’t register. It was a light, educated voice, not unlike Tara’s.

‘This is she,’ Liz said.

‘It’s Julie.’ There was a pause. ‘I got your email.’

Liz clutched the phone, her breath coming in gasps, her heart pounding. ‘Julie, I’m so glad you called.’