so old school, Kate. An ultimate romantic.’ This was good. She could divert the attention to Kate’s love life—or lack of it—instead of her own. ‘You really believe that you’re going to see ‘the one’ across a crowded room and it’ll be love at first sight and a happy-ever-after with a few bluebirds fluttering over the carpet of rose petals and—’
‘Oh, stop it...’ Kate growled. But she didn’t sound cross. Her tone was more concerned than anything. ‘Just be careful, hon. Okay?’
‘Of course.’ Georgia breathed a sigh of relief but that seemed to earn a sharp glance from Kate.
‘You have given up on that hare-brained scheme you came up with after that bastard, Rick, walked out, haven’t you?’
Uh-oh... ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’
‘Oh, yes, you do. The one where you gave up on men completely and were going to have a baby all by yourself?’
Georgia pretended to be distracted by the map in her hands. She couldn’t afford to allow Kate to get suspicious. She had the lid firmly in place over her own doubts about what she was planning and it would be too easy to get talked out of it if that lid got lifted.
She could almost feel that biological clock ticking more loudly than ever. Or was it her heart thumping? Excitement...or trepidation?
She cleared her throat. ‘Well, obviously I haven’t given up on men completely. And I’m over Rick. He’s ancient history—like all the others.’ Oh, man...she had to change the subject of conversation. Nerves were kicking in and the feeling was not pleasant.
She told herself to calm down. It was just an option—she didn’t have to follow through with her plan if she wasn’t sure. Maybe she wouldn’t meet anyone suitable. And, even if she did, what were the odds of getting pregnant with a single encounter anyway? She wasn’t even sure that it was the best time of the month, given that her cycle wasn’t that regular.
There were other reasons to be here. Exciting reasons. And there was no need to continue with any hazardous chatting either. Georgia had seen the perfect distraction.
‘Ooh, look...a signpost. We’re only fifteen kilometres away.’
‘Halleluiah. The end is in sight.’
‘Nah...the beginning is in sight.’ Georgia stretched her arms above her head and gave a whoop. ‘Bring it on.’
YES...
This was all shaping up to be even better than Georgia could have imagined.
While she was well aware that she was a part of the growing percentage of women succeeding in demanding careers like paramedicine, there were hundreds and hundreds of people here and it seemed like the majority of them were men.
The kind of men that had always stood out from the crowd for her. Intelligent, confident men who were caring enough to devote their working lives to caring for others. Born leaders who could wear a uniform like a second skin rather than an advertisement of achievement or authority.
One of them could be exactly the kind of man she would choose to be the father of her child.
The sense of unease that touched the back of her neck and rippled down her spine was becoming familiar but Georgia had come up with a way to shrug it off with what seemed a perfectly feasible argument in her defence. She wasn’t the only woman who was prepared to embrace the decision to bring a child into the world without a partner.
She could have taken what was becoming an accepted route to parenthood by paying for the services of a sperm bank and the initial part of that process would be to peruse the profiles of available candidates. She would be making judgements based on physical attributes like height and colouring. Academic qualifications and profession could indicate levels of intelligence and determination and interests in things like sport or music could offer an insight into attitudes or talents.
She could well end up doing exactly that but what put her off that route to parenthood was the fact that it would be recorded. Traceable. The risk of that knowledge being used to interfere with her life was probably small enough to be insignificant but Georgia knew only too well how damaging that interference was capable of being. Why take the risk if it was possible to eliminate it completely?
She had convinced herself that all she was planning to do was to peruse profiles in a much less clinical fashion, by means of personal interaction.
The thornier issue of consent was more difficult to shrug off, of course, but there wasn’t any point in facing that one unless she found a suitable candidate. Given her list of requirements, it was quite possible that even this best-case scenario of potentially great men wouldn’t provide exactly what she was looking for.
What with getting through the registration protocol and transferring their luggage to their accommodation, the time since she and Kate had arrived at the rally had been a bit too busy to get more than a very general impression of their fellow competitors but that had just changed. Standing in a crowded dining hall, holding her dinner tray, Georgia found herself joining Kate’s attempt to locate two empty spaces at a table. Except that it was the array of faces capturing her attention instead of any empty chairs. Surprisingly, many of those faces were looking back at them and they didn’t seem to be simply curious glances that might be assessing competitors. There were smiles to be seen, along with raised eyebrows that suggested friendliness, if not interest.
Like that very tall guy, with a mop of sun-streaked blond curls and a cheeky grin. The tilt of his head was an unmistakeable invitation to claim the extra space at his table.
Georgia smiled back.
‘There’s some space on that table,’ she told Kate, leading the way. She smiled again as they got closer. ‘Do you mind if we join you guys?’
‘Please do.’ He looked delighted. ‘I’m Dave. This is Ken and that’s Sally, who’s stuffing her face there.’
‘You’re from Australia, right?’
‘No. New Zealand.’ Dave sighed heavily. ‘Everybody thinks our accent is the same but it really isn’t.’ He grinned at Georgia. ‘No mistaking yours. You’re Scottish.’
‘I am.’ Georgia took the empty seat right beside Dave.
New Zealand... It was a country that conjured up images of clean, green forests and pristine beaches—like advertisements for healthy lifestyles. Even better, it was a country on the opposite side of the globe. About as far from Scotland as possible. It was impossible not to register that that fact ticked one of the first boxes on the list of requirements she had drawn up on her potential master plan.
The plan that had suddenly become rather more than just a half-baked idea, in fact.
The dumplings on her plate were rather dense and speckled with something green that could be parsley. Dave appeared to be enjoying his meal and Georgia was never fussy with her food so she took a large bite and found that the dumplings were actually better than they looked, especially with a covering of the gravy they were swimming in.
She
