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She closed the menu and met his eyes across the table. Sharing a dessert seemed a little bit intimate but, then, so too did the fact that they were now the only people in the restaurant. The lights were low, the background music soft and romantic—even the single red rose on the table added to the atmosphere of courtship.
‘Maybe I’ll just have coffee,’ she said. ‘I’m on call again tomorrow from eight in the morning so I might have to cut my gym class short.’
‘I hardly think you’d need to bother about excess calories,’ he said as he closed the menu. ‘You’ve got a BMI of about nineteen.’
‘I hope you’re not implying I’m too thin,’ she said with a quelling glance. ‘I’m in the normal weight range for my height.’
His eyes went to the slight swell of her breasts before coming back to mesh with hers. ‘It’s an addiction, you know.’
‘What?’ she asked with a pert tilt of her head. ‘Looking at women leeringly?’
His dark blue eyes glinted. ‘Exercise,’ he said. ‘People get high on the endorphins. They can’t go a day without working out or they get agitated and edgy.’
‘I can assure you I have no such addiction,’ she said with a little toss of her head. ‘I just enjoy the thinking time it gives me, as well as the cardiovascular fitness. Anyway, what about you?’ Her eyes ran over his toned upper body. ‘Your body mass index is probably just as low and your percentage body fat percentage is certainly below mine.’
‘That’s true, but I try and keep a healthy balance between work commitments and exercise,’ he said. ‘Pushing your body to the limits all the time is damaging in the long term. Besides, the hours we work are punishing enough, without overloading the body with even more stress.’
‘Thank you for the advice but I am not a gym junkie with no respect for my own well-being,’ she said. ‘I do actually know how to look after myself. I am a doctor, remember.’
‘Was it your choice to do neurosurgery or something your father expected you to do?’ he asked a few moments later when Roberto had brought them their coffees.
‘It was my choice,’ she said. ‘From when I was young I loved hearing about my father’s work. I was fascinated with neurosurgery, the delicacy of it, the skill and dedication it takes to become highly competent. I never considered anything other than following in his footsteps, although, as I said earlier, I see myself in paediatrics eventually.’
‘So what about marriage and babies?’ he asked as he stirred his coffee. ‘Is that part of your overall plan?’
She toyed with the handle of her cup with her fingers, her eyes shifting away from his. ‘Like every other career-woman, I’m a little worried I might end up childless because of circumstances beyond my control.’
‘Circumstances such as what?’
Her eyes met his briefly. ‘Well, I’ve got another four years of study, meaning I’ll be thirty-one when I finish. So if I haven’t found a partner by my mid-thirties who is also keen to have children straight away, fertility issues might be a problem.’
‘It’s certainly a problem most professional women have to face,’ he agreed. ‘But you could always suspend your training if you wanted to. That’s at least one option female trainees in years past didn’t have the opportunity to do. The Australasian College of Surgeons has become one of the most progressive in the world for facilitating surgical training for women.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘And I would do it if the right man came along but I don’t see that happening any time soon.’
‘Ah such cynicism in one so young,’ he drawled. ‘Maybe your standards are a little too high. Have you considered that possibility?’
She gave him an arctic look. ‘No, and I have no intention of lowering them. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect a man to treat me with respect and deep and abiding love for the term of our natural lives.’
‘So you’re a romantic, are you?’ he asked.
‘No more than the average woman.’
‘Are your parents happily married?’
Georgie hesitated for a fraction of a second before she answered him. Her mother gave the appearance of being perfectly content with the luxurious life her position as the non-working wife of a very successful man afforded her, but Georgie often wondered if she filled her days with bridge games and book club meetings in an effort to make up for the loneliness of enduring a marriage that had not been an overtly affectionate one. She couldn’t remember a single time when her parents had kissed in front of her, apart from a rather formal peck on the cheek whenever her father had left on one of his overseas conferences. She hadn’t even seen them hold hands in public. They shared a bedroom but that, of course, didn’t necessarily mean their relationship was still a physical one.
‘They’re still together after thirty years,’ she finally said.
‘You didn’t really answer my question.’
‘That’s because it’s none of your business.’
He smiled at her pert expression. ‘You don’t need to get all prickly, Georgie,’ he said. ‘To tell you the truth, I’m a bit of a romantic myself. I’m a great believer in the institution of marriage. My mother has been married twice, and very happily, too.’
‘You mentioned you have a stepfather,’ Georgie said. ‘Does that mean your own father died?’
A shadow flitted over his face but disappeared just as quickly. ‘Yeah,’ he said, shifting his gaze a fraction. ‘I was six years old.’
