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‘Yes,’ Georgie said as she followed him out of the café, her forehead beginning to furrow in a frown of apprehension.
He looked down at her as they waited for the pedestrian lights to change. ‘Don’t be nervous, Georgie,’ he said. ‘You’re doing just fine.’
She gave him a little lopsided smile. ‘Thanks, it’s kind of you to say so.’
He led the way as the ‘walk’ sign appeared, his long strides making her almost skip to keep up. ‘We need to get together some time in the next week or so to work on your research proposal,’ he said as they went through the front entrance. ‘I’m seeing public patients in the clinic this afternoon and I’m operating at Greenfield Private tomorrow, so how about Friday afternoon, say, five?’
‘OK,’ she said. ‘Shall I meet you in your office?’
‘Yes, that would be good. I have to pick up Hannah at Central Station at seven so that should give us enough time to get the outline down on paper.’
He reached for his mobile as it started to ring. ‘Ben Blackwood,’ he said, and frowned as he listened to the caller. ‘All right. I’ll be there in ten minutes.’
‘An emergency?’ Georgie asked.
‘Not here,’ he answered. ‘One of my private patients has developed pneumonia. I’d better go and have a look at him before I start my public clinic. If anything comes in while I’m away, get Madeleine to cover for me. I’ll give her a call now to warn her.’ He opened his phone again and added before he pressed rapid dial, ‘Don’t forget what I said about my suspicions about Mrs Tander. Gut feelings aside, I haven’t heard anything from the police and until I do, let’s keep a lid on it.’
‘Good idea,’ Georgie said and watched as he strode back out of the hospital entrance, the phone pressed to his ear as he chatted to his colleague, his long legs making short work of the distance to where his utility was parked in the hospital car park.
She let out a shaky little sigh and turned towards the lifts. A girl could get kind of used to having that heartbreakingly handsome smile bestowed on her every day of her life.
CHAPTER TEN
GEORGIE was totally exhausted by the time her list with Richard DeBurgh ended and she still had three more hours of on call before she could finally relax. Richard had been encouraging towards her but he was nothing like Ben in Theatre. Richard had a tendency to snap at the nursing staff if instruments weren’t handed to him quickly enough, and when a patient with a meningioma had a major venous bleed from the sagittal sinus he swore as his tension level rose, which made everyone feel on edge. At one point he bellowed at Georgie for bumping the microscope while he was suturing the sagittal sinus bleed, and although he had moved it himself, she knew there was no point in trying to defend herself.
Linda Reynolds, the scrub nurse Georgie had met in Ben’s theatre on her first day, caught up with her in the female change rooms once the list was over.
‘See what I mean about there being a waiting list to work on Ben’s lists?’ she said as she stripped off her theatre scrubs. ‘Richard is fine unless things go awry. Don’t take it too personally if he occasionally shouts at you. He’s not the first and he probably won’t be the last.’
‘I know,’ Georgie said. ‘I hate it when surgeons do that though. It doesn’t help things at all to lose your cool. I get so flustered when people shout at me and that’s when mistakes get made. Why don’t they offer compulsory anger management courses at the college?’
Linda smiled as she untied her bandana. ‘Tell me about it,’ she said. ‘Mind you, your father had a bit of a temper at times.’
Georgie met the scrub nurse’s gaze in the mirror. ‘I’ve heard both good and bad reports about my father,’ she said. ‘It makes me feel a bit confused. He’s never raised his voice to me once in the whole of my life. He’s one of the most placid people I know.’
Linda bent down to pull off her paper overshoes. ‘Yeah, well, stressful jobs have a habit of extracting different facets of personality from all of us, I guess. The angel at home, the devil at work scenario is very common,’ she offered. ‘Take me, for instance. I’m fanatical about cleanliness in Theatre and yet you should see my kitchen at home. It drives my husband nuts. He’s forever coming after me with antibacterial spray and paper wipes when I’m cooking.’
Georgie smiled. ‘I guess you’re right.’
Linda straightened and turned to look at her directly. ‘How are you and Ben getting along after your rough start?’ she asked.
Georgie wondered if anyone had seen them have coffee that morning or dinner the night before. The hospital community was a small one and many staff members lived locally. Gossiping about colleagues was an occupational hazard—one she wanted to avoid if she could. ‘Fine,’ she answered, shifting her gaze. ‘He’s been very gracious about it all.’
‘He’s a gorgeous guy and I don’t just mean in looks,’ Linda said. ‘He’s got such a heart for patients. I reckon half of the time he spends advocating for patients against ridiculous decisions made by hospital management in their splendid isolation from the actual people they are meant to listen to. He works too hard, of course, but, then, most of us around here do. It’s part of the profession, but he always seems to go that extra mile. I guess it’s the country boy in him. You know what they say—you can take the boy out of the country but you can’t take the country out of the boy.’
Georgie grimaced inwardly at how insulting she had been when she’d refused his offer of a lift home the previous evening. She had come across as a toffee-nosed brat, born to wealth and privilege and overbearingly proud of it.
‘Well, I’m off,’ Linda said as she went to the door. ‘What are you planning for this evening?’
‘Once my on-call is over
I’m going to the gym, have some dinner and then fall into bed.’
Linda’s green eyes began to sparkle. ‘You sound exactly like someone else I know,’ she said. Patting her tubby belly, she added, ‘Do a couple of hundred abdominal crunches for me, OK?’
Belinda Bronson was in the cardio room when Georgie arrived so she took the treadmill next to her. ‘How’s it going, Belinda?’ she asked as she started her warm-up. ‘Is it your day off?’
‘Yep, thank God,’ the policewoman said, wiping her forehead with her wristband. ‘I’ve got four days off. I tell you, the way I’m feeling after the last few days, if I have to face another drunken, drugged-up dropout, I’ll scream.’
