BLURB:
Cassandra by
Starlight
by SUSAN MAC
NICOL
A London woman is swept off her feet into the glamorous
yet surprisingly dangerous world of an up-and-coming star of stage and screen.
TO CATCH A
RISING STAR
Unconventional though she may be, Cassandra Wallace leads
the life of an average Londoner, from blind dates to rush hour traffic. Then,
along comes Bennett Saville. Charming, erudite, the up-and-coming actor is like
the hero of a romantic movie. He sets Cassie afire like he has the stage and
screen, and defies the tragedy that brought them together. From the tips of his
Armani loafers to their scorching hot first kiss, he’s perfect. Only, he’s ten
years younger and from the upper class, and those emerald eyes invite dangerous
secrets. The world is full of hungry leading ladies, and every show must have
its villain. Yet a true romance will always find its happy ending.
Chapter 1
The day the sky fell changed Cassie
Wallace’s world forever. She woke up that morning with the expectation that
this day would be like any other. She also had a slight hangover from the abundance
of wine she’d drunk the night before to try and get through a blind date organized
by her work colleague, Sarah.
The evening had been a total disaster.
Not only had the man been an absolute misogynist, one of the cardinal male sins
on Cassie’s unwritten list, he’d also had a habit of leering at her chest every
time he spoke as if he thought it might talk back to him.
She’d smiled politely whilst thinking
she’d like to take his smarmy public school tie and shove it down his throat.
When she’d finally left at around eleven, she hadn’t been able to get away fast
enough.
She stood in her bedroom, checking her
outfit in the mirror and sighed.
Was it too much to ask to find a
decent man just to share things with and have a good time? They all seemed to
be absolute idiots and in the old but true cliché, only interested in one
thing.
Cassie had been out on a few dates in
the past few months but somehow she never made it past the first one. A
previous date gone wrong had told her she was too independent and perhaps a
little bit ‘emotionally challenged, not affectionate enough’ for him.
She’d shrugged this off but it had hurt
her deep down especially as she knew it to be true.
My bloody expectations aren’t
even that high, she thought in exasperation as she
fastened her necklace. It’s not as if I’m such a
great bloody catch myself! Middle-aged and not really all that exciting. I’ll
take what I can get within reason.
Cassie smoothed her skirt down over her
hips and picked up her handbag.
When she left the house at six thirty,
it was a typical dark English winter morning. Fortyfive minutes later she was
sitting in the traffic on the motorway, listening to the news bulletin.
“Bloody idiot,” she mumbled in between
bites of a banana that she had hastily grabbed on her way out. “He wouldn’t
know a bloody budget if his life depended on it. Silly sod has got no idea how
to run a bloody country.”
She crept forward in her Honda Jazz at
about two miles an hour, watching the traffic in front which seemed to have ground
to a halt for no reason at all.
I really need to try and find
something closer to home, she
thought, not for the first time. This
travelling lark is really starting to piss me off. Four hours a day in traffic
is not my idea of time well spent.
Cassie wasn’t sure what other quality
pastimes she’d be engaging in if she did have more free time, given her current
‘lack of male’ situation but she supposed she’d find something. Join a book
club perhaps, or find more time to get to the gym. She might even start writing
that novel she’d always planned on doing.
Her fingers impatiently drummed on the
steering wheel in time to a melody on the radio. In response to another
bulletin by the newscaster regarding the level of binge drinking in the county,
she burst into a further diatribe. “For God’s sake, let the bloody idiots lay
where they fall. If they had any brains they wouldn’t let it get that far so
they needed an ambulance to take them to A and E. It’s my taxpaying money
that’s looking after these morons!”
She glanced at the clock on the
display. Seven thirty a.m. She’d be lucky to make it in on time today.
The story of my life, she thought resignedly. Slow death by traffic jam.
The traffic still seemed to show no
signs of moving any time soon. She switched off the engine and took out her
Kindle. She may as well catch up on her reading whilst she had nothing better
to do.
Her concentration span was low as she
tried to read. Last night’s ‘date’ kept replaying itself in random snippets of
conversation. Cassie could still hear Ron’s supercilious comment about women
needing to have a man in their lives to keep them focused on what was important—the
man and the provision of all his needs.
She’d almost choked on her wine when
she’d heard this and only just stopped herself retorting sarcastically that as
a man’s needs were so simple, the only ‘provision’ they really needed was a
soft toy shaped like a pair of boobs to play with and talk at. As she had very little
money in her purse other than her taxi fare home, she’d stopped herself.
After the hell she’d been through
sitting and listening to Ron’s drivel, the least she’d make him do was pay for
dinner. Cassie had made a decision after last night. She’d stay home with her
own company for the near future, with a bottle of wine and a couple of decent movies.
She’d rather drool over a virtual Mark Harmon in NCIS than a real life douche
bag like the Ronalds of his world. As for sex—well, that was what vibrators
were made for.
It was nearly ten minutes later before
the car in front of her re-started its engine and she followed suit and sped up
to about twenty miles an hour as the queue took flight. She settled in as it
got back up to the more respectable speed of fifty miles an hour.
As she drove she glanced idly up at the
foot bridges to see the people strolling with dogs, on bicycles and footing it
on their way to work.
At the bridge just ahead she saw a
solitary figure leaning over looking down at the motorway below. She slowed
down a little. Ever since those incidents a few weeks ago when someone had
thrown a concrete bucket off the bridge at a passing car, she tended to be wary
of people standing watching the traffic.
The figure didn’t appear to have
anything in its hands but then she had only caught a glimpse of it before
turning her eyes back to the road. She increased her speed as the traffic flowed
easier.
There was no warning, just a sudden
deafening bang of metal as the windscreen of her car collapsed inwards. Cassie
screamed in terror as glass flew towards her like wafer thin slivers from a
frozen icicle. Her hands left the steering wheel in panic, her foot pressing
down on the accelerator.
The Honda Jazz went out of control,
spinning around like a dirt dervish. Debris from the windscreen flew like lethal
missiles around the interior of the car. Cassie cried out in pain as she was
subject to a vicious assault by anything lying loose in her vehicle. She tried
to cover her face in an instinctive reflex but her left arm seemed
unresponsive. The pain horrifying. She whimpered as she glanced down and saw
the bone shard sticking out.
In her pain and terror she didn’t
notice that the car had stopped spinning. Everything went quiet. Cassie lay
slumped in the driver seat, dazed and unresponsive as the shock set in She
could hear the sounds of people shouting and heard someone asking her if she
was all right.
She vaguely registered the sound of
screeching metal as someone tried to pull the driver door open. It was as if
everything was being done underwater. The sounds were muted and her brain was
sluggish.
The older man looking in at her from
the road was speaking but she couldn’t hear what he was saying. Cassie looked
at him blankly. She couldn’t see clearly, as if a can of fine red spray-paint
had been aimed at her and the nozzle depressed, coating her eyes. She tried to move
her body but the pain in her right leg was excruciating.
She watched dully as the man outside
starting pulling away metal struts and twisted the door to get inside to her.
She could hear his voice vaguely now, a rough London Cockney accent as he spoke
reassuringly whilst trying to free her.
“All right, darling? Just stay calm and
I’ll try and get to you. The ambulance is on its way. They’ve told me not to
move you so I just want to try get in and keep you company till they arrive.
You look as if you could do with a bit of company. Just stay with me now. Don’t
go anywhere.”
He smiled at her, trying to keep her
reassured. With a final tug at the door, he made enough of a space to squeeze in
slightly and he took her right hand, avoiding the bad condition of her left arm
with its broken bone. Her hand was freezing and he rubbed it gently.
“There we go. That should feel better.
You just stay calm now and we’ll have you back to your old man in no time.” He
continued holding her hand, talking to her as she slipped in and out of
consciousness.
In one of her lucid periods she raised
an unsteady hand to her face to wipe her eyes. The fog cleared a little and she
was able to focus, then desperately wished she hadn’t. Lying in front of her,
across the bonnet, was a face, pulped and looking as if dark sticky jam had
been smeared all over it.
She could see the eyes open, looking at
her and she could see the mouth forming words before she screamed and screamed
and eventually the fog of blackness claimed her and the face could be seen no
more.
Doctor Ian Spencer frowned as he read
the patient chart in his hand. He glanced at the patient, an old man in his
seventies, matted grey hair curling around his face like tendrils of an
octopus, framing a bucolic face of cherry red, his bulbous nose caked with
fresh snot.
“Up to your old tricks again, Terry?”
the ER doctor asked resignedly. “I thought perhaps last time we had reached an
understanding of sorts?”
The old man chuckled hoarsely.
“The drink beckoned again, Doctor, I’ve
told you before, cider waits for no man.” He coughed, his body wracked with
spasms. The doctor motioned with a hand to the waiting nurse who offered Terry
a glass of water. He drank it greedily and lay back in the hospital bed.
Ian Spencer made a notation in his
patient’s chart.
“You realise this time, Terry, you’ve
really outdone yourself? You had what we call a minor varicose bleed which
basically means your insides leaked with blood because they couldn’t do what
they were supposed to do. I managed to stabilise you and you’ve been in
intensive care for two days. Given the state of your liver you were very lucky
not to have it worse. As it is, you’ll need to be here a few more days before I
can release you.”
“I’m very grateful to you, Doctor.”
Terry leered at the nurse who moved out of the way of his groping left hand. “I
can always count on you to put me right.”
“Not always, Terry, not always.” Ian
passed the chart to the nurse and continued on his way.
He’d just completed his surgical rounds
and was walking down the hospital corridor when he heard an ambulance arrive
and saw the frenetic activity bursting through the double doors. He heard the
ambulance staff calling out their incoming triage procedures to the attending
doctor and watched as a trolley with a woman covered in blood was wheeled into
the waiting operating theatre.
One of the staff nurses, Judy, a good
friend, hurried past him.
“I don’t believe this one,” she
muttered to him. “Some poor woman minding her own business on the motorway and
somebody falls on top of her car. We were lucky no one else was hurt as well
when she spun around or we’d be running out of space this morning.”
“What about the man who fell?”
“He’s dead, poor bugger.” Judy’s voice
was terse as she hurried off.
It was some hours later in passing Ian
saw his colleague, fellow trauma surgeon Phil Moodley, come out of the
operating theatre where the woman had been wheeled.
“Phil!” Ian hurried to catch up with
him. “Wait up.”
Phil turned and proffered a tired smile
when he saw Ian.
“Ian, how are things? I’m just on my
way to catch a few minutes doze. It’s been a long day.”
“How did things go in there?” Ian
motioned to the OR. “I heard she was hit by a man falling on her car.”
“Yes, it was very bad. The poor woman
has a ruptured spleen, a hairline skull fracture, a broken femur and radius,
and a wealth of lacerations and internal bruising.” He frowned.
“She also has a small foreign body
embedded in her left temple. It’s in an awkward place and fairly deep. I’ve
recommended not removing it at this time. I’m not sure it would be prudent. It
doesn’t appear itself to be life threatening. She’ll be in intensive care for
some time. I need to keep an eye on her for any possible embolism. She’ll
probably need some physical therapy afterwards if there are no complications.”
He squinted at Ian with tired eyes.
“You seem interested in this one, Ian? Did you know anyone involved?”
Ian shook his head. “I was involved in
a similar situation some years ago when I was at Lakeview Hospital and that
one—that one I did know. The person that fell though, not the victim.”
Phil nodded his head.
“This woman was very lucky, the young
man was not. He was dead at the scene. His relatives are on their way.”
Ian nodded. “Thanks, Phil. You’d best
get off and get that sleep, you look all out of it.”
Phil patted Ian’s arm and wandered down
towards the staff room. Ian wouldn’t tell Phil the real reason for his
interest. It was too personal and no one in the hospital knew anything about
his reason for leaving Lakeview three years ago and joining Tilhurst Hospital
on the outskirts of Essex.
In 2009, his wife Sandra had jumped off
a foot bridge straight into the path of a passing mini-van. To this day he had
no idea why. The mini-van driver, a young man called Freddy Clifford, who had
just become a father, had died in the incident with Sandy. The feelings of
guilt for both Sandy’s and the man’s death (he should’ve known what was going on
in his own marriage for God’s sake!) had never left him.
He’d left Lakeview and started again
where no one knew his history and no one could feel sympathy for him. He felt
he didn’t deserve it. He was sure a psychiatrist would have some insight to
offer on his reaction but he had never engaged with one, preferring as he did
to manage it himself.
Ian made his way over to the nurses’
station outside intensive care. He saw Nurse Angie, a bubbly young woman with
bleached blonde hair and a Carry
On set of breasts, sitting behind the
desk. She smiled as she saw him approach.
There were more than a couple of nurses
who’d tried to form a relationship with him but none of them had been
successful so far.
“Doctor. What can I do for you?”
“The woman that Dr. Patel has just
operated on—can you tell me a little bit about her?
How’s she doing?”
Angie consulted her notes.
“Let me see. Hmm, she’s in a private
ICU room, so she must have great insurance. Room 310. Cassie Wallace,
forty-seven years old, divorced. Her sister is coming in to see her. She’s on
her way from Kent.”
She looked at Ian enquiringly. “Has Dr.
Patel asked you to keep an eye on her?”
Ian shook his head. “No, just curious
about how she’s doing. It just seems so tragic, minding your own business then
POW! You find yourself in this situation. Thanks for the info, Angie.”
Ian made his way towards Room 310. He
couldn’t say why he was so interested in this woman, only that he felt he had
to find out more about her.
He clothed himself up with a mask and
gloves and nodded at the ICU nurses as he walked through the main ward to the
private ones at the back. The hum of machines and the absolute quiet in the
ward was strangely restful. Ian reached Room 310, opened the door and slipped
in.
Cassie Wallace lay on her back,
surrounded by soft light from the equipment. The constant beep of the life
support machines and monitoring equipment comforted Ian. This unit was
dedicated to keeping people alive with the best care the hospital could
provide. Cassie Wallace was in good hands.
Cassie had her left arm in a splint,
her fingers cold and pale like soft, limp white gloves. Her right leg with its
broken femur rested on the bed covers. Ian guessed she had pins and rods inside
keeping it together.
Her face was battered and bruised from
the accident. He could see the rise and fall of her chest as she breathed. Her
pale strawberry blonde hair was spread across the pillow like soft gold straw,
with a large bald patch on the left side where Dr Patel had shaved her skull.
Even through the cuts and bruises, Ian
could see she was a very attractive woman. Not just pretty or beautiful, but
with a look of her own that even under current circumstances made her look
younger than her forty-seven years. She reminded him very much of a curvier
Michelle Pfeiffer. A noise at the door made him turn. Judy stood there, looking
surprised to see him.
“Ian? What are you doing in here?” she
whispered.
“I was just checking up on her. I know
I’m not her doctor but I really wanted to see how she was doing.”
“It’s all right, Ian.” Judy patted him
on the arm. “She can do with all the help she can get. I need to check her
vital signs now. Do you want to stick around?”
“No Judes, I’ll let you get on with
your job. Thanks.” Ian left the nurse with her patient and made his way back
towards the main reception.
BIO:
Sue Mac
Nicol was born in Headingley, Leeds, in the United Kingdom. When she was eight
years old her family emigrated to Johannesburg, South Africa. One day, after
yet another horrific story of violence to friends, they decided it was time to
leave. In December 2000 they found themselves in the Arrivals area at Heathrow
and have stayed in the UK ever since, loving every minute of it.
In
between her day job as a regulatory compliance officer for a financial services
company in Cambridge and normal daily life, the inspiration for the Starlight
series was born; Sue’s characters, Cassie and Bennett, finally made their debut
onto the flickering screen of a laptop and gave her the opportunity to become a
published author—a dream she’s had since being a young girl old enough to hold
a pencil.
Sue is a
member of the Romance Writers of America and the Romantic Novelists Association
in the UK. She lives in a town house in the rural village of Bocking, Essex,
with her husband of twenty eight years, Gary (who believes he deserves a long
service award for putting up with her for so long), two children, Jason, 24,
and Ashley, 19, and a mixed collie mongrel called Blu.
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