Secrets of a Career Girl Read Free

cruise.’ Jasmine smiled. ‘Well, she’s made it to her flight.’
    ‘And she’ll make it to her cruise.’ Penny was firm.
    ‘What if something happens while she’s stuck in the middle of the ocean?’
    ‘There’s a medical team,’ Penny said, but of course that didn’t reassure her sister. ‘Jasmine, are you going to spend the next month worrying about things that might happen and every imagined scenario while Mum is no doubt having the absolute time of her life?’
    ‘I guess,’ Jasmine conceded. ‘Though I really did think we were going to lose her.’
    ‘We didn’t, though,’ Penny broke in.
    While Louise Masters’s heart attack and emergency admission had been a most difficult time, from there good things had sprung—an urgent reminder for all concerned that you should live your life to the full.
    Which was why their mother would soon be sailing around the Mediterranean, why Jasmine had followed her heart and opened up to Penny’s then fellow senior registrar Jed, and why Penny was, at this moment, walking along the beach with a face that was bright red and breaking out into a sweat as she experienced yet another wretched hot flash. Not that Jasmine noticed; her mind had moved on to other things.
    ‘What do you think of Ethan?’ Jasmine asked for Penny’s thoughts on the new consultant, but Penny didn’t answer; instead, she suggested a walk in the shallows, much to little Simon’s delight. Both holding his hands, they lifted him up between them, swung him over the water, and finally Penny felt herself calm, the heat fading from her face, her racing heart slowing, and then Jasmine asked her again what she thought of Ethan.
    ‘He thinks that he’s God’s gift.’
    ‘So do a few other people,’ Jasmine pointed out, because since Ethan had arrived, a couple of hearts had already been broken. ‘He is funny, though.’ Jasmine grinned.
    ‘I don’t think he’s funny at all,’ Penny said, but then again she didn’t sit in the little huddles at the nurses’ station, neither did she wait for the latest breaking news to be announced in the staffroom. Penny loathed gossip and refused to partake in it, though, given it was Jasmine, there was one thing she did divulge. ‘He seems to think that he got the job over me.’ Penny gave a little smirk. ‘He has no idea that I declined to take it.’
    ‘He doesn’t know?’
    ‘God, no!’ Penny said. ‘I would assume he knows that Jed turned it down to take the position at Melbourne Central, but it would be a bit much for him to know that he was actually the third choice.’
    ‘Wouldn’t Mr Dean have told him?’
    ‘Mr Dean wouldn’t discuss the other applicants with him—you know what he’s like.’ Penny rolled her eyes. Mr Dean had put her through the wringer over the years—he was incredibly chauvinistic and had been reluctant to promote Penny to senior registrar. Penny was quite sure it was because she was a woman—she’d heard Mr Dean comment a few times how you trained women up only for them to get pregnant. Still, Penny had long since proven herself and, though Ethan might think otherwise, the consultant’s position had been Penny’s. She had chosen not to take it, deciding it would be too much on top of going through IVF, and more and more she was glad she had made that decision.
    ‘Ethan’s gorgeous.’ Jasmine nudged her. ‘He’s so sexy.’
    ‘Jasmine!’
    ‘What? Just because I’m married I’m not supposed to notice just how stunning he is?’
    Penny conceded with a shrug. Yes, Ethan Lewis was stunning. He had thick silky black hair that seemed always to be just a day away from needing a good cut and had unusual hazel eyes. He was very tall and broad shouldered and so naturally he stood out. He was also a bit chauvinistic, not that the women seemed to mind.
    ‘The trouble with Ethan,’ Penny said, ‘is that he knows how gorgeous he is and he uses it unwisely. Someone should stamp “not the settling-down type”