Love Is Blind Read Online Free PDF

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,