but their coach had had the foresight to hire a minibus and had driven them the thousand kilometers overnight.
A lightbulb went on in Poppy’s mind. If it was good enough for Coach Wellington, it was good enough for her. She turned in a circle, looking for the signs for the car rental agencies. She spotted the glowing yellow Hertz sign. Then she spotted the lineup in front of it. Well, she could only try.
Fingers crossed, she headed over to join the masses.
JAKE WOKE, FEELING LIKE CRAP. Headache, furry mouth, seedy stomach—standard hangover material. He groaned as he rolled out of bed and blessed his own foresight in ensuring he had an afternoon flight out of Brisbane and not a morning one. He’d played this game before, after all, and he’d known last night would be a big one. And it had been. He’d lost track of which bar he’d wound up in, and who he’d been drinking with. There had definitely been some disappointed Bears players in the mix, drowning their sorrows. And he could distinctly remember someone singing the Hawk’s club song at one stage.
Whatever. A fine time was had by all.
Well, not quite all. Some people had chosen to forgo the festivities and hole up in their room with chocolate-chip ice cream and nacho-cheese corn chips.
He rinsed his mouth out as the memory of Poppy’s uptight little “I don’t need an escort” speech filtered into his mind.
He didn’t know what it was about her, but he couldn’t seem to resist poking her with a stick. Maybe it was the way her chin came up. Or the martial gleam that came into her eyes. Or maybe it was the pink flush that colored her cheeks when he bested her.
He stepped beneath the shower and lifted his face to the spray. Oh, man, but he needed some grease and some salt and some aspirin. Big-time.
Of course, Ms. Birmingham wouldn’t be in search of saturated animal fats this morning. She’d had hers last night, in the quiet privacy of her room.
Someone needed to tell her that road trips were a good opportunity to bond with her colleagues. Especially when you were a newcomer to the team.
He shrugged. Not his problem. And she was unlikely to take advice from him, anyway.
He recalled the way she’d looked last night, hair wet, face devoid of makeup. Sans bra, too, if he made any guess. She had more up top than he’d expected. Definitely a generous handful.
He soaped his belly and wondered again what she’d look like naked. She wasn’t his type, but he supposed he could understand why Macca followed her with his eyes whenever he thought no one was watching. She was striking. She could almost look Jake in the eye, she was so tall. He bet she liked to be on top, too.
He stared down at his hard-on.
Okay, maybe she was his type. But only because it had been a while since he’d gotten naked with anyone. Four…no, five months. That was when he’d decided that his fledgling relationship with Rachel-from-the-gym was too much of a distraction from the book he still hadn’t written.
He turned the water to cold. Brutal, but effective—his erection sank without a trace.
He dressed and packed his luggage. Then he checked out.
“We hope you enjoyed your stay with us, Mr. Stevens,” the woman on the reservation desk said. “And we hope the strike doesn’t inconvenience you too much.”
He lifted his head from signing his credit card slip. “Strike? What strike?”
“The baggage handlers’ strike. It looks like it’ll last three days minimum at this point. We’ve had a lot of people coming back from the airport to check in again.”
Shit. He had ten days vacation starting tomorrow. He had plans to go fishing with an old college buddy. No way was he going to kick his heels in Brisbane when there were rainbow trout going begging.
He grabbed his bags and headed to the taxi stand. He’d been caught out like this before and he knew that even during a strike there were still planes in the air. He might be able to talk his way onto one of them. And there was always the bus, God forbid, or a rental.
The moment he hit the airport he nixed the idea of talking himself onto a flight. Lines spilled out the door and every person and his dog was on a cell, trying to hustle some other way home.
He turned for the rental desks. No lines there. Bonus. Maybe no one else had thought of driving home yet.
He dropped his bags in front of the counter and smiled at the pretty blonde behind the desk.
“Hey, there. I need to rent a car,” he said.
She rolled her eyes. “You and the rest of the country. Sorry, sir, as we announced five minutes ago, we’re all sold out.”
He kept smiling.
“There must be something. A car due back later today? Something that didn’t pass inspection?”
“Many of our cars didn’t come in when our customers heard about the strike. We’ve been pulling cars in from our other branches, but there’s no stock left. I’m very sorry, sir.”
She didn’t sound very sorry. She sounded as though she’d had a long and stressful day and was privately wishing him to hell.
“There must be something,” he said.
“Where are you traveling to?”
He waited for her to start tapping away at her keyboard to find him a car, but she didn’t.
“Melbourne.”
“The only thing I can suggest is that you hook up with someone else who is driving your way. I know that blond woman over there is going to Melbourne. She got our last car—maybe she’ll take pity on you.”
Jake turned his head to follow the woman’s finger. He stared in disbelief at the back of Poppy Birmingham’s head.
“Shit.”
“Excuse me, sir?”
There was no way Poppy was going to take pity on him. She’d more than likely laugh in his face—if he gave her the opportunity.
“Is there a bus counter around here?” he asked. He hated bus travel with a passion, but desperate times called for desperate measures. There were trout swimming in the Cobungra River with his name on them, and he intended to be there to catch them.
“They’re on the west side of the airport. Just follow the crowd.”
“Thanks.”
He hefted his bags and started walking. He could see Poppy up ahead, talking on her cell phone. If it were anyone else—a complete stranger—he’d throw himself on her mercy in a split second. But Poppy didn’t like him. Admittedly, he’d given her plenty of reasons to feel that way, but the fact remained that she was far more likely to drive over him in her rental car than offer him a lift in it.
He walked past her, wondering how she’d react if he snatched the keys from her hand and made a bolt for it. But she was probably pretty fast on her
