‘I think we did this one together.’ Kate tilted her head up. ‘You’re really happy about this, aren’t you?’
‘I’m thrilled. Aren’t you?’
‘I’m...a bit shocked, to be honest. I thought I had months to get used to the idea. To plan what to do about taking time off work and...and where we’re going to live.’ She pulled back from Luke. ‘Where are we going to live? We work in different cities. This apartment’s far too small and I can’t ask Georgia to move out of our house—she’s the one who took the lease. And she’s already planning how it’s going to work after her baby arrives.’
‘How much do you love Glasgow?’
‘I love my job.’
‘Me, too. But I’ve always loved my job—it doesn’t seem to matter where.’
‘You mean you might want to shift?’
‘I mean anything’s possible. We could go anywhere, Katy. Anywhere in the world. We’re going to be parents.’ Luke blew his breath out in an astonished huff. ‘How amazing is that? We could choose the best place on earth to bring up a family and make it happen.’
‘Is there a best place?’
‘I reckon. Somewhere that has a lot of sunshine, maybe. And beaches. Good schools and excellent hospitals. Australia?’
Kate’s jaw dropped. ‘You can’t be serious.’
‘No.’ But Luke’s lips were curving into a wide smile. Man, the possibilities suddenly opening up were exciting. ‘I think New Zealand would be even better. I’ve got a friend who emigrated a few years back and he reckons it’s the only place in the world he’d want to be raising his family.’
Kate shook her head. ‘You’re crazy.’
‘This is crazy. But it’s happening.’ Luke pulled her back into his arms and spun them around with a few impromptu dance steps. ‘We’ve chosen each other. We’ve chosen to start a family. Why not choose a whole new life? A new beginning for the rest of our lives?’
Excitement was morphing into an astonishing flash of happiness. This was so much better than anything he’d factored into his life plan. Because he could trust it? Kate was never going to break his heart. They had chosen to be together like sensible adults who knew that friendship was the only reliable base for a relationship. She felt exactly the same way he did about it and she was prepared to totally commit herself. The proof of that was in that little plastic stick he still had in his hand.
He let the stick drop as he brought the dance to a halt. He shifted his hands so that he was holding Kate’s head between them and then he bent to kiss her. A long, slow kiss that she responded to the way she always did—as if she was melting into his arms.
He loved that. He loved it that you could be no more than the best of friends and that sex could be better than ever.
And he loved it that a whole new phase of life was taking shape around him—like ripples spreading out from a thrown pebble. He was that pebble.
No. He and Kate were. All these new possibilities were only there because they were together. A new home. Maybe in a new place. A real home, with a whole family of his own.
This was exactly why he’d had that epiphany that resurrecting their pact wasn’t such a silly idea. When he’d realised just how much he loved kids, as he’d watched them scrambling for the sweets and gifts during that convoy at the end of the competition. After that moment he’d had with the little boy who’d been a part of that bus-crash scenario.
Everything was suddenly falling into place, far more easily than he would have believed possible.
Thanks to Kate.
He had to break the kiss. Before it spiralled into something that would make him forget anything else for quite some time.
‘Thank you,’ he whispered aloud.
Kate’s eyes drifted open. She was blinking up at him as if it was difficult to focus.
‘What for? Getting pregnant?’
Luke smiled down at her. ‘For being you. For being my best friend. For not...’ He wasn’t sure exactly what he was trying to put into words now.
He could feel her body tensing as it came out of that melted state. Her eyes had darkened, too. They looked clear now. Piercing almost.
‘For not falling in love with you?’
Luke closed his eyes, his breath coming out in a sigh of relief. ‘Exactly. This isn’t crazy stuff we can’t trust. We both want this so we know it’s going to work.’
‘Mmm...’ She was pulling away from him slowly. ‘Well, it’s in the fine print, isn’t it?’
Luke frowned. There was something in her tone that he couldn’t identify. Something that bothered him, even though Kate was smiling.
‘The pact?’ Kate stooped to pick up the pregnancy test stick that he’d dropped. ‘We made it because we were friends. If that changed, it wouldn’t work, would it?’
‘Mmm.’ Oddly, his tone was an exact echo of Kate’s. A little off-key? Something was bothering her. But what?
He watched her drop the stick into the rubbish bin. ‘Is it too early for me to have a craving for something, do you think?’
He couldn’t see her face at the moment, but her voice sounded perfectly normal again. Light-hearted even.
‘Depends what it is...’ He knew what he wanted. To kiss her again and take her into his bed. To forget about everything else for the rest of the evening.
‘Nachos.’ Kate turned and grinned at him. ‘That Mexican restaurant round the corner has the best nachos ever.’
‘Takeout or eat in?’
‘Takeout,’ Kate said. ‘That way you’ll have your laptop handy. You can show me everything I don’t know about New Zealand.’
‘Wow...you’d really consider that?’ Every time he thought he knew this woman so well, she had another surprise in store for him.
He loved that about her, too.
‘Well... So far, you’ve persuaded me to buy into the pact and give up on my lifelong dream of being swept off my feet by a grand passion. Now we’re actually going to have a baby.’ There was a brightness in her eyes that suggested tears might not be far away but she was still smiling. ‘I’d say the chances of talking me into starting a new life on the opposite side of the world are pretty good, wouldn’t you?’
Was this what was bothering Kate at some level? How much of what was changing in their lives was about persuasion and how much was what Kate was really happy to be doing?
Had she brushed off the idea of getting married because she thought that was what he’d prefer? He had dismissed marriage along with the idea of ever falling in love again when they’d first reconnected but maybe it was more important to Kate than he realised. Especially with a baby on the way. Had she been hiding how she really felt?
‘You know how I downloaded those forms about registering an intention of getting married?’
Kate was putting on her coat, ready to go out and get their dinner. ‘Yeah. I had no idea you couldn’t just rock up to a registry office and do the deed.’
Luke picked up his own coat. ‘I think we should sign them. Just in case.’
‘In case of what?’
‘In case we...oh, I don’t know...decide that it would be better for our kid to have married parents. Or if we decided to emigrate and suddenly find it’s a whole lot easier to be legally a couple. It’s not as if we have to set an actual date or anything yet. I’d leave that up to you. Whatever you want.’
A flash of something crossed Kate’s face and Luke was certain that he was right. She had been hiding something and he was doing the right thing here, by giving her some options. Control even.
He couldn’t be entirely sure but she looked a bit more relaxed.
‘Okay. Thanks.’ She was smiling again. ‘Now can we go and get some food?’
* * *
The lights were on in every corner of this paediatric ward of Glasgow’s Eastern Infirmary, even though it was the
middle of the morning.
Kate glanced through a blurred window at the heavy, grey sky.
‘It’s raining. Again.’
‘That’s Scotland for you.’ Her registrar was leading the way to the next patient on their ward round.
‘How long have you been here?’
‘Two years. But I’ve applied for a job back home and I’ve got my fingers crossed. They’re short of paediatricians in New Zealand at the moment.’
‘So I hear...’ Kate smiled at the young mother sitting cross-legged on the bed with a baby on her lap. ‘Hi, Janet. Oh, my goodness...you’re looking happy this morning, Muriel!’
It was such a grown-up name for the three-month-old and, along with the bright red curls on her head and the cutest button nose, it made her smile every time. Especially now, when Muriel had come through a terrifying battle with pneumonia but had now been out of Intensive Care for several days.
And she was such a smiler. Kate only had to touch the tiny nose or make a surprised face and the baby’s mouth curved into a grin that seemed to go from ear to ear.
‘She still sounds a wee bit wheezy. I’m going to have a good listen to her chest now. How’s her feeding going?’
‘She’s still getting a bit tired so I have to do it little and often. I’m so happy to be breastfeeding again, though.’
‘It’s so much better for both of you.’ Kate dangled the disc of her stethoscope so that Muriel could catch it in her hands. She smiled at the baby and got a big grin in response. For a moment she was completely distracted by the tiny fingers exploring the new toy.
Baby fingers were just so adorable...
These momentary distractions were becoming familiar now. She’d had nearly three weeks to get used to the idea of being pregnant herself. That, in the not-too-distant future, she would have one of these tiny people in her own life. Her own set of tiny little fingers and toes to marvel over. Her own smiles to make the world seem suddenly a much happier place.
Her own baby to hold and worry about and...and love...
She loved this baby growing inside her already. She couldn’t give her such an adult-sounding name, though. Her favourites were the classics, like Emily or Amy for a girl and James for a boy. Of course, James sounded a bit too grown-up, too, but he could be Jamie to start with, couldn’t he?’
‘Sorry?’ Kate covered up that she hadn’t heard Janet’s question clearly by making a show of gently extracting her stethoscope from small fists and placing it on the tiny chest.
‘I’m just wondering what I can do to keep her safe when we get home. I’m so scared that she’s going to catch something else and I’ll end up watching her on that breathing machine...’ Janet’s voice hitched ‘...not knowing if I was ever going to get to hold her again.’
‘The best thing you can do is to keep her away as best you can from anyone who has any symptoms of a respiratory illness—even a cold. Don’t let them hold her or kiss her. Don’t let anyone smoke anywhere near her. And she’ll be old enough for her vaccines soon. That’s the best protection. Make sure all her caregivers are up to date with things like the whooping cough booster and flu shots.’
Kate was silent for a minute as she moved her stethoscope from one lung field to another. Muriel was staring up her with wide, blue eyes and one hand curled around the tubing of the stethoscope.
‘That all sounds so much better... I think you’re going to be able to go home very soon, sweetheart. Maybe tomorrow.’
Her next patient was a two-year-old boy who had suffered a serious leg fracture, requiring surgery, after an accident on a trampoline. Sean was a very different personality from the happy Muriel. Dark-haired and very shy, he was inclined to hide his face against his mother if spoken to directly by anyone he didn’t know well. He’d been here long enough for Kate to become a familiar figure, though.
‘Can you wiggle your toes for me, Sean? This little piggy goes to market...this little piggy stays home... Ooh... I saw that little piggy move. Yay!’
She shared a smile with Sean’s mother. ‘He’s making great progress.’
‘When can he go into a cast? And come home? My husband’s about at the end of his tether with the older kids. My mum’s great but she can’t take much more time off work...’
‘The surgeons are going to review him after his X-rays today. We should know something by this afternoon. I’ll pop back and talk to you as soon as I can.’
Her registrar was shaking her head as they moved on. ‘I don’t know how some of these families cope. Did you know that Sean’s the youngest of five and the oldest is only ten? How hard would that be?’
‘I can’t imagine.’
It was scary enough to think about being the caregiver for one tiny, defenceless baby and Kate was getting more worried about Georgia with every passing week. How would she cope on her own? Especially now that Luke was getting more excited about the possibility of a new life in New Zealand. He’d found several positions going, one in the biggest city of Auckland in the North Island and a couple in a much smaller town, at the top of the South Island, in a place called Nelson that seemed to have a hospital big enough to need specialist paediatric staff like both herself and Luke.
Last night, he’d shown her pictures of the kind of scenery they would have on their doorstep. Astonishingly beautiful beaches and forests and views of islands and it looked as if the sun shone all the time.
‘Have you ever been to Nelson?’ Kate asked her registrar.
‘Only on holiday.’
‘Was it sunny all the time?’
Her registrar laughed. ‘Pretty much.’
‘Would it be a good place to work?’
‘It would be a dream. Great hospital with enough of a population base to keep things interesting. Not somewhere I can dream about until I get some impressive post-grad qualifications, though. It’s competitive enough to give them the luxury of choosing the best.’
The comment came back to Kate as she finally finished her busy day and was struggling to open her umbrella as she emerged from the Eastern’s front doors. She had arranged to meet Luke in a nearby pub across the main road for a quick meal before they went to an opening of a new art exhibition.
She would have to tell him about what she’d heard. That Nelson must be the place to pick if so many people wanted to live and work there. He wouldn’t be fazed by hearing about how competitive it was to get a job. If anything, that would probably make him even keener. And he didn’t need to worry, did he? Luke was the best in his field. And she had gathered some hard-won postgraduate qualifications herself. How good would it be if they could both get new job offers easily? A sign that it was the right thing to do?
Kate tilted her umbrella to try and stop it blowing inside out. She could feel her legs getting damp and cold as she hurried towards the controlled crossing at the intersection of these main roads and there was a knot in her stomach that she knew was caused by her worry about deserting Georgia. How could she be seriously considering emigrating?
Because this was the kind of weather she hated so much?
Because the dream of the perfect family deserved to have a perfect setting?
Maybe Georgia should consider the idea of emigrating herself? It wasn’t as if she had family to help out here. How good would that be, to have her own baby growing up with her best friend’s child as a kind of cousin? Georgia might actually like the idea. Not only would the father of her baby remain unknown, he could be half a world away and so much easier to forget.
Unless it had been one of the New Zealand paramedics that had been at the competition? That blond-headed guy they’d sat with at that first dinner maybe. What was his name...
Ken.
No... Dave.
He’d certainly been very friendly. He’d liked Georgia and he’d been a very long way from home. Why not throw a bit of casual sex into th
e enjoyment of a new experience?
Good grief...why hadn’t that occurred to her before?
Slightly dazed, Kate realised that the lights had changed some time ago and most of the pedestrians waiting to cross were already more than halfway across the road.
And...wasn’t that Luke standing on the corner outside the pub, waiting for her? She couldn’t really tell from this distance but it seemed as if he was looking right at her, so she raised her hand in a wave. The unexpected pleasure of seeing him so soon prompted an automatic smile but it faded swiftly. Why wasn’t he inside in the warmth? He didn’t even have an umbrella, for heaven’s sake...
The lights were flashing a warning now, but Kate made a run for it. Both she and Luke would only get a whole lot wetter if she waited for the next cycle of lights.
The rain was even heavier now and it distorted the headlights of the vehicles. Someone tooted and Kate turned her head for an instant, aware that she wasn’t following the rules and probably deserved the reprimand.
That was why she didn’t see the car in the next lane, hidden by the tooting SUV, taking off the instant the traffic lights changed.
She just saw the blur of headlights coming towards her.
And then...nothing...
CHAPTER EIGHT
NO-O-O...
For just a heartbeat, Luke was frozen the spot with disbelief.
He’d seen Kate waiting at the corner for the lights to change and he’d wondered why it had taken her so long to follow the other pedestrians. She’d clearly been lost in thought so the contrast, when she’d spotted him, had been revealing.
Even from this distance, he could see how happy she had been to see him. That smile...
It had made him feel so...special. To be able to give someone pleasure simply by existing. By waiting to give them your company. He might be getting rather wet by standing outside like this but he wasn’t cold. How could he be when such an astonishing warmth was being created inside him? And he wasn’t going to go inside either. Not until Kate was here.
He was actually smiling himself as he saw her start to run across the road. He could see that the signal was flashing, which meant that you weren’t supposed to start crossing at that point. He’d have to tease her about breaking rules like this. Except that she was breaking those rules because she wanted to be with him and Luke couldn’t think of anybody else who had ever done that.
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