Page 10 of The Wanderer

I’m at the Golden Treble in North Melbourne. Can you come now?

As his thumb hit the send button, he realised how that last sentence sounded. He hadn't meant it as an innuendo but considering how they bantered earlier, she might mistake it for such.

Her response pinged.

I’m coming.

She would in the not too distant future if he had any say in it.

Chapter Six

Hope loved the vibe of inner Melbourne and its surrounding suburbs. Carlton, with its lush parks and 'Little Italy' on Lygon Street, Albert Park, with its lake and restaurants, and Brunswick, the bohemian capital of the city jam-packed with alternative boutiques, bars, and comedy clubs. But she rarely ventured into North Melbourne and discovered she'd been missing out. Trendy eateries lined Curzon Street, but as she followed the instructions of her trusty Sat-Nav she found herself in the backstreets where a small, grungy pub sat on a corner.

It figured Logan would ask her to meet him here.

He had this thing for throwing her off guard. Maybe he wanted her to feel out of place? Maybe he'd already labelled her as some rich bitch wanting to slum it? Neither could be further from the truth because as she found a park not far from the front door and entered the pub, an immediate sense of coming home enveloped her.

This place reminded her of the small pubs Harry used to play in.

Dark wood panelling adorned the walls roughly three quarters of the way from floor to ceiling, with a deep crimson paint finishing the walls to the roof. A small elevated stage tucked into one corner, a cluster of tiny tables in another, with the mahogany bar dominating the back wall. A few tall tables and barstools were tucked behind the stage and that's where she spotted Logan nursing a beer and fending off a buxom waitress. Not that she blamed the woman. If she had DDs like that she'd be deliberately resting them on Logan's arm as she cleared the table too.

Unfortunately, her average Bs would barely make a dent in his biceps so she'd have to settle for wowing him with her scintillating wit.

That, and the fact he already knew she didn't wear underwear.

A tingling swept up the back of her neck at the memory of his hands on her, the slight rasp of his fingers against her bare ass…she'd been so turned on it wouldn't have taken much more rubbing against his crotch for her to come. It's why she’d had to take the edge off in the studio's bathroom. But it hadn't been enough, not nearly enough, and she'd asked to meet him because she wanted to have sex tonight.

She'd never done this before, brazenly approach a guy with the sole intention of screwing him. She didn't care that he was a direct adjunct to achieving her dream. She didn't care it might muddy their semi-working relationship. All she cared about was getting off with him, tonight.

As she wound her way towards him, her soles stuck to the navy-carpeted floor. Yeah, pubs like this were the same the world over. Despite regular cleaning, the spillage of many pints of beer over the years took its toll. She inhaled, savouring the smell of bar snacks predominantly featuring fried onions, and the yeasty aroma of beer.

Harry had been a stout man. She'd tried the stuff once and almost vomited. She'd stuck to G&Ts after that. He never baulked at her underage drinking; not that she had more than one drink and only after she turned seventeen. He didn't lecture. He supported her and nurtured her talent and was the father she never had.

Until he, too, betrayed her trust.

Harry died during her final year at music college, in the middle of her exams. She would’ve attended his funeral if he hadn’t shattered their relationship a year earlier.

She’d never forget the day she discovered the one person she thought she could trust was just as duplicitous as the rest of the people in her life.

Harry had been her go-to person when her first love had gone pear-shaped. She’d cried buckets over Willem, had poured her heart out to Harry, confiding in him in a way she’d never felt comfortable doing with her emotionally repressed parents. Yet a scant month later he’d crapped all over her regardless.

He’d stolen more than her songs from her. He’d taken her ability to trust and turned her into a hardened cynic.

Everybody lied. It was a fact of life, a human frailty. She should’ve been immune to it, growing up with parents who stretched the truth whenever it suited them, with so-called friends at boarding school who only told her what she wanted to hear in order to suck up, with her only serious boyfriend Willem.

But she’d expected better of Harry. He’d been her idol, her friend, her confidante; and he’d screwed her over regardless.

Hope blinked several times to dispel the moisture from her eyes and continued traversing the pub. A few old men sat at the bar, locals probably, from the way they bantered with the barman. Logan caught sight of her and stood. He didn't wave. He didn't smile. He just stared at her, jaw set, gaze steady, and she felt that damn jolt again arrowing between her legs.

She'd made the right decision in coming here.

She needed one night.

One night of fast and furious sex to dispel this weird fascination for him.

Then she could return to furthering her goal in setting up the best indie record label this city had ever heard.

She strode towards him, intent on appearing poised, when the closer she got the more her confidence fled and her legs wobbled like just-set jelly. The empty sensation in her stomach intensified when she reached him and a slow, knowing smile spread across his face, like he could see into her horny soul.

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