under his breath. If he’d known Toby was going to exit her life, he mightn’t have made that rash decision to marry Angie.
She gestured around her. ‘I’m in the middle of moving house. The landlord has put the apartment on the market and I’m going home to my parents’ until I find a new place. There are boxes still to pack, cleaning to be done. I—’
‘I’ll pay for packers, movers and professional cleaners. Please, Georgie.’
She paused, looked up at him with an expression he knew of old, halfway between exasperation and affection, then sighed. ‘For past times’ sake,’ she said. ‘No, for the baby’s sake. Unless you’ve changed a lot in the two years since I last saw you, I’m not so sure you’d know which end was up on a seven-month-old baby.’ Her smile—that lovely smile that had always uplifted him—danced around the edges of her lips.
Wil didn’t realise he’d been holding his breath until he let it out on a whoosh of relief.
‘Thank you,’ he said.
Now that Georgia was back in his life, he wouldn’t let her go again too easily. No matter what it took.
SO MANY TIMES during the years of her friendship with Wil, Georgia had escaped the city with him to head for the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney, to ride horses or bush walk. Only never with a rearward-facing baby car seat installed in the back seat of Wil’s car. Or four large packets of disposable nappies stacked next to it. ‘Just in case they’re all needed on the way home,’ Wil explained.
Georgia laughed. ‘Unless the baby has a particularly explosive digestive system, I very much doubt that.’
He scowled in a way she well remembered. ‘I told you, I know nothing about babies.’
She almost said, You’ve got a lot to learn. But Wil seemed only too aware of that. She almost asked if he was nervous about collecting the baby, but the tight set of his jaw and the way his hands gripped the wheel so his knuckles showed white gave her the answer.
‘You’ll learn quickly,’ she said instead, making it her mission to encourage and support him as she’d always done as his friend. And avoid jokes about dirty nappies. He was facing completely new territory without much of a map to guide him. She fought the urge to reach out and place her hand over his to reassure him, but that had never been the way with them. No touching.
‘I guess I’ll have to,’ he said.
Her friend had come back so unexpectedly into her life. She was churning with curiosity about what had happened in the two years since she had seen him. So many questions clamoured to be asked. But now wasn’t the time to ask them.
Wil was essentially a very private person. It took time for him to confide in his friends. Things must have ended badly for him to have been so estranged from Angie he hadn’t even known she was pregnant. Georgia admired the way he had stepped up to his duty as a father. Not every twenty-eight-year-old guy would react the same way to news of a secret baby. But then she’d always thought of Wil as one of the good guys.
She’d met him at orientation day on the first day of her first year at Sydney University. Thrilled by the newness of it all, she’d signed up for various interest clubs and had been searching for the equestrian club when she’d bumped into a tall, dark-haired guy doing the same thing. One glance had told her he was a country boy, his Western jeans, blue and white checked shirt and elastic-sided riding boots a dead giveaway. All that had been missing was an Akubra, the iconic Australian wide-brimmed hat.
‘They’ve closed the equestrian club for lack of interest,’ he’d said gloomily.
‘But I’m interested,’ she’d said.
‘So am I,’ he’d said.
‘That makes two of us.’
Then they’d looked at each other—really looked—and laughed. ‘Why don’t we start our own club?’ he’d said.
‘Let’s go grab a coffee and talk about how we’d do that,’ she’d said.
Excitement had hummed through her. He had been quite the hottest guy she’d seen on campus. But from the get-go it had been strictly a hands-off scenario. Wil had just started dating a girl and she’d still been seeing her high-school boyfriend. Despite that—perhaps because of that—she and Wil had fallen immediately into an easy friendship, talking non-stop for more than an hour. They’d done nothing about reviving the moribund university equestrian club. But the next weekend they’d driven up together to the Blue Mountains to horseback ride in the Megalong Valley.
This time, their hour-and-a-half journey to the mountains took them to a suburban area on the wrong side of Katoomba. Wil told her that his ex-wife had moved up there after their final split. The streets were steep and hilly, lined with small, free-standing houses, the bush never too far away. Georgia laughed when they had to sound the horn at a small flock of sheep grazing at the side of the road. No dimple from Wil. He was obviously too focused on what was to come to engage in her speculation about whether the sheep had escaped, or it was considered okay up here for sheep to wander all over a suburban street.
He pulled up in front of a shabby but tidy cottage, surrounded by a neat garden. ‘This is the sister’s place,’ he said. ‘She’s been looking after Nina since the accident.’ He made no move to get out of the car.
‘Nina is such a pretty name,’ she said.
‘Yeah. I like it,’ he said.
Georgia let him sit there, his gaze focused on the bright blue front door of the house, until the silence got uncomfortable. ‘So, operation baby pick up,’ she prompted. ‘What’s the next step?’
‘The social worker Maree meets us at the house to facilitate the handover. She’s in there now.’
‘And then you’re a daddy,’ she said. It scarcely seemed real to her. He would walk out of that house with a baby in his arms. A baby for keeps.
Wil turned to her, the colour drained from his face. ‘That’s what terrifies me. I want to do the right thing. But what do I know about being a dad? It’s not just the nappies or what to feed her. I’ll nail that. Suppose I haven’t got it in me to be a good parent?’
The anguish in his face told her there was something more going on here. She’d often had the feeling there was more to Wil than he’d ever let on to her. Something, perhaps, to do with his upbringing. She knew he’d been orphaned as a young child. But as a friend she’d never questioned his past. Right now he needed morale-boosting more than anything else.
‘The fact that you feel responsible for her is a very good start. That you’re actually here is a huge point in your favour.’
‘Guys usually have time to get used to the idea of being a father.’ He drummed his fingers on the edge of the steering wheel. ‘I’ve been thrown in the deep end.’
‘That’s true. You’ll have to learn on the spot. But you’re a clever guy. It seems to me that so far you’re doing great.’
‘She’s
