Thin Blood Read Online Free

Deller. She had been seated in the front row, her brow furrowed in
intense concentration, when he first spotted her. But it wasn’t until the
session was well underway that he really became interested.
    Initially it was
because she was asking questions that he considered extremely basic, like ‘what
is the function of a hub?’, leaving him curious as to why an obvious amateur
would be attending a presentation aimed at IT professionals. But when she stood
her ground, undeterred by the barely disguised sniggers and the occasional
guffaw from those around her, he wanted to know more.
    At the
mid-morning break, he had searched for her amongst the people milling around
the tables set out with row upon row of white cups and saucers, plates of cakes
and bite-size savouries. The panicky fluttering in the pit of his stomach when
he couldn’t immediately see her passed as soon as he glimpsed her collecting
brochures and specification sheets from the table just inside the double doors.
    Taking a deep
breath, he picked up his cup of coffee and, trying to appear as nonchalant as
possible, wandered her way. He was taken aback when she continued looking
through the papers on the table, completely ignoring him. Of course, now he
knew from experience that she hadn’t done it intentionally.
    If the theory
that men could only focus on one thing at a time while women were capable of
multitasking held, then either Jacinta was a man, or she just didn’t fit the
stereotype. And with her long blonde hair, her petite but curvy figure, her
button nose and deep-blue eyes that sucked you right in, he vouched she wasn’t
a man. More like a shortened, freckle-faced Barbie doll with attitude. Not that
he would ever tell her so.
    After much
throat-clearing and cup-tapping, he eventually attracted her attention. She
looked around at him, starting in surprise to find that she wasn’t alone. Then
she smiled, her whole face lighting up.
    He could smell
her perfume, a light floral scent. The fluttering sensation in his stomach
returned, worse than before. He remembered standing there like a paralysed
idiot, unable to speak or breathe for what seemed like an eternity.
    Just then the
presenter called everyone back to their seats, rescuing him, or rather her,
from an awkward situation.
    He spent the
next hour and a half fidgeting, unable to concentrate on anything more than the
back of the blonde head in the front row, mentally rehearsing what he was going
to say to her — if he could stop acting like some fumbling, lovelorn schoolboy.
    The session
ended at noon, providing him with what he thought would be the perfect
opportunity to ask her to lunch. But she seemed to be in too much of a hurry to
bother with him, scarcely pausing as she turned him down flat, glanced at her
watch and strode off. Dejected and feeling like he’d been kicked in the
stomach, he had walked head down through the hall to the exit.
    About a week
later, he had received a call. It was her. It was Jacinta. Caught by surprise,
he regressed to gibbering nonsense. They hadn’t been introduced, so how had she
known who he was, or where to find him?
    She laughed and
reminded him that even though she didn’t know much about computers, she could
read. It took him a moment to comprehend what she was talking about. He felt
his face reddening, glad that she couldn’t see him, as he recalled the large
plastic-encased tags detailing name and company with which each attendee had
been issued on registration. How blind was he?
    Somehow, he had
managed to pull himself together enough to agree to meet Jacinta after work
that day, at some bar he had never heard of in the city centre.
    Over drinks, he
learned that the only reason she had been at that IT product release was to
cover for The Acacia Tribune ’s AWOL regular technology columnist.
    That had been
over three years ago, and yet he still hadn’t fathomed her completely. She was
as unpredictable as ever. And that was his predicament. Should