Page 3 of Best Laid Plans

‘Oh, yeah. I guess I’d better say something now before everyone gets too pissed.’

They went back inside and with the speed of a dream that fades upon waking, the moment on the veranda evaporated.

The spell was broken.

Everyone gathered around Will, and as he looked out at the sea of faces and prepared to speak, he thought guiltily of Cara, his girlfriend, waiting for him to join her in Sydney. Then he glanced at Lucy and saw no sign of tears. She was smiling and looking like her happy, old self and he told himself everything was okay.

Already he was sure he’d imagined the special magic in that kiss.

CHAPTER ONE

THERE WERE DAYS when Lucy McKenty knew she was in the wrong job. A woman in her thirties with a loudly ticking biological clock should not devote huge chunks of her time to delivering gorgeous babies.

Admittedly, the babies Lucy delivered usually had four legs and a tail, but that didn’t stop them from being impossibly cute, and it certainly didn’t stop her from longing for a baby. Just one baby of her own to hold and to love.

The longing swept through her now as she knelt in the straw beside the calf she’d just delivered. The birthing had been difficult, needing ropes and a great deal of Lucy’s perspiration, but now, as she shifted the newborn closer to his exhausted mother’s head, she felt an all too familiar wrench on her heartstrings.

The cow opened her eyes and began to lick her calf, slowly, methodically, and Lucy smiled as the newborn nuzzled closer. She never tired of this miracle.

Within minutes, the little calf was wobbling to his feet, butting at his mother’s side, already urging her to join him in a game.

Nothing could beat the joy of new life.

Except… this idyllic scene was an uncomfortable reminder that Lucy had very little chance of becoming a mother. She’dalready suffered one miscarriage and now there was a failed IVF treatment behind her. She was sure she was running out of time. The women in her family had a track record of early menopause and she lived with an ever growing sense of her internal clock counting off the months, days, hours, minutes.

Tick, tock, tick, tock.

Swallowing a sigh, Lucy stood slowly and stretched muscles that had been strained as she hauled the calf into the world. She glanced through the barn doorway and saw that the shadows had lengthened across the golden grass of the home paddock.

‘What’s the time?’ she asked Frank Evans, the farmer who’d called her in a panic several hours earlier.

Instead of checking his wrist, Frank turned slowly and squinted at the mellowing daylight outside. ‘Just gone five, I reckon.’

‘Already?’ Lucy hurried to the corner of the barn where she’d left her things, including her watch. She checked it. Frank was dead right. ‘I’m supposed to be at a wedding rehearsal by half past five.’

Frank’s eyes widened with surprise. ‘Don’t tell me you’re getting married, Lucy?’

‘Me? Heavens no.’ Peeling off sterile gloves, she manufactured a gaiety she didn’t feel. ‘Mattie Carey’s the lucky girl getting married. I’m just a bridesmaid.’

Again, she added silently.

The farmer didn’t try to hide his relief. ‘I’m glad you haven’t been snapped up. The Willow Creek district can’t afford to have you whisked away from us.’

‘Well, there's not much chance.’

‘Most folks around here reckon you’re the best vet we’ve ever had.’

‘Thanks, Frank.’ Lucy sent him a grateful smile, but as she went through to the adjoining room to clean up, her smile wavered and then collapsed.

She really, really loved her job, and she’d worked hard for many years before the local farmers finally placed their trust in a mere “slip of a girl”. Now she’d finally earned their loyalty and admiration and she knew she should be satisfied, but lately this job hadn’t felt like enough.

She certainly didn’t want to be married to it!

For Will Carruthers, coming home to Willowbank always felt to like stepping back in time. In all the years he’d been away, the sleepy country town had barely changed.

The wide main street was still filled with the same old fashioned flowerbeds. The bank, the council chambers, the post office and the barbershop all looked exactly as they had when Will first left home.

Today, as he climbed out of his father’s battered old truck, the familiar landmarks took on a dreamlike quality. But when he pushed open the gate that led to the white wooden church, where tomorrow his best mate would marry one of his oldest friends, he couldn’t help thinking that this sense of time standing still was a mere illusion.

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