Gina sighed. She and Georgie were doctors at Crocodile Creek, base for Air Sea Rescue and the Flying Doctor for most of far north Queensland. Gina was engaged to Cal, another Croc Creek doctor. Six months ago Alistair, Gina’s only cousin, had flown in from America to see what sort of set-up his baby cousin was getting herself into.
Unfortunately his visit had coincided with a ghastly patch in Georgie’s life. Georgie’s stepfather had just dragged her small half-brother away to join him in the seedy life Georgie knew he led. Max was seven years old. Their mother had disappeared into the limbo of drug addiction soon after giving birth to him and Georgie had become Max’s surrogate mum. She loved him so fiercely it was as if he was hers.
But he wasn’t hers. Half-sisters had fewer rights than fathers, no matter how creepy Georgie’s stepfather was. She’d had to let him go.
So Georgie had waved Max off, and then she’d gone to Gina’s engagement party. She had been off duty. She’d been trying desperately not to cry. She’d hit the bar, and then Alistair-Stuffed-Shirt Carmichael had asked her to dance.
Which had been … unfortunate.
Alistair had a great body. He was big and warm and strong, and she’d had too much to drink, too fast. She’d seen him earlier in the day and had thought—vaguely—that he was gorgeous. Now, at the party, battered with shock and grief, she’d let her hormones hold sway. She’d let him hold her as she’d needed to be held. She’d flirted unashamedly, and then …
He’d half carried her from the hall and they’d both known what his intentions had been. She hadn’t cared. Why the hell should she care when her life was going down the drain?
Only Gina had intercepted them at the door. ‘Georgie,’ she’d said in that soft voice, the one that said she cared, and suddenly Georgie had pushed away from Alistair, then sat down on the hall steps and sobbed her heart out, while the rest of Crocodile Creek had streamed in and out around her.
‘What the hell …?’ Alistair had demanded.
And Georgie had looked up at him and said, through tears, ‘I’m sorry, mate. It’s not that I don’t fancy you. I’m just drunk.’
He’d turned, just like that. From the big, gentle man he’d seemed to the prissy, disapproving toad he really was.
‘This is your best friend, Gina?’ He’d said it incredulously.
‘Yes. She’s just—’
‘I’ve just had too much to drink,’ Georgie had said, cutting across his question and glaring daggers at Gina, sending visual refusal for Gina to tell him more. ‘Gina’s right. I gotta go to bed.’
‘I’ll take you,’ Gina had said.
‘But it’s your engagement party,’ Alistair had objected, staring at Georgie as if she’d been some sort of pond scum.
‘That’s OK,’ Gina had said. ‘I’ll come back soon, but I’m taking my friend home first.’
‘You don’t need to take me. I have wheels. Hey, you want a ride on my bike?’ Georgie had asked, veering off on a tangent and motioning to her beloved Harley parked nearby.
‘I think we might leave your bike where it is, don’t you?’ Gina had said, and had smiled and tugged the decidedly wobbly Georgie to her feet. ‘I know you take risks on that thing but we don’t want to push it.’
So that had been Georgie’s introduction to Alistair. The next day Gina had taken him for a tour of the hospital and he’d been flabbergasted to find Georgie was an obstetrician.
‘She’s a really good one,’ Georgie had heard Gina tell Alistair as they’d disappeared from sight. They’d thought she’d left the ward but she’d forgotten something and returned just in time to hear them talk about her. ‘We’re lucky to have her.’
‘I know you’re desperate for doctors,’ Alistair had said. ‘But I sure as hell wouldn’t let her within a mile of any patient of mine.’
So that had been that. Alistair had left the day after, flying back to his very important career as paediatric neurosurgeon in a prestigious US hospital. Georgie had been delighted to see the end of him. But now …
‘He’s giving you away,’ she moaned to Gina. ‘We’ll have to be in the same church as each other.’
‘It’s not like he’s best man. You won’t have to partner him.’
‘He thinks I’m a slut.’
‘Hey, he was taking you to bed. His behaviour wasn’t exactly above reproach.’
‘He was taking me to bed because he thought I was a slut.’
‘Exactly.’
‘So two sets of appalling behaviour cancel each other out?’ She flopped onto the bed and groaned theatrically. ‘Agh, agh, agh.’
‘You could always turn over a new leaf,’ Gina said cautiously. ‘Greet him in twin set and pearls.’
Georgie choked. ‘Yeah. I could.’
‘That’s what his fiancée wears.’
Georgie lifted her head from the pillows and gazed at Gina in astonishment. ‘He has a fiancée?’
‘Eloise. He’s been engaged for years.’
‘So he was engaged when he carted me off the dance floor?’
‘See what I mean? Two sets of bad behaviour, and yours is the lesser.’
‘Twinset, eh?’ Georgie said, and looked thoughtfully at her reflection in the mirror. Her soft black top had crept up a little. She tugged it down to make it more revealing. Which was very revealing.
‘Don’t you dare,’ Gina said nervously. ‘Behave.’
‘I don’t have to wear twinset and pearls as bridesmaid?’
‘I was thinking you might like to wear purple tulle.’ And then, as Georgie stared at her in horror, Gina giggled and threw a pillow at her friend. ‘Gotcha.’
‘Cow. Purple tulle?’
‘Wear what you want,’ Gina said. ‘You’re my only bridesmaid so the choice is yours. Leathers if you want.’
‘Sleek black,’ Georgie said, and grinned. ‘Not trashy.’
‘Trashy if you want.’
‘I only do that—’
‘I know. When you’re angry. But, Georgie …’ She hesitated. ‘Do you know where Max is now?’
Georgie’s smile faded. She picked up the pillow Gina had just tossed at her and hugged it, like it was a baby.
‘I have no idea. I had a phone call five months ago, saying he was in Western Australia, but they were moving on that day. My stepfather’s always one step in front of the law.’
‘Oh, Georg …’
‘I wish he’d get caught,’ Georgie said fiercely. ‘I know he’s involved up to his neck in drugs. I want him to go to prison.’
‘Because then you’d get Max back?’
‘I’m all he’s got.’
‘Your stepfather must love him to keep him with him.’
‘Don’t you believe it,’ Georgie said fiercely. ‘He’s just using him. Last time he was here—last time Ron spent time inside—Max told me he does the running. He acts as lookout. Max shops for them when Ron doesn’t want to get recognised. Ron even used him for drops. When he was six years old!’
‘Oh, Georg …’
‘Ron’s