RUSH HOUR ENDED HOURS AGO, BUT the traffic on I-275 crawled. Cassidy Sinclair drove home on autopilot while her brain rehashed the last few wasted hours of her life. After a big yawn, she blew an errant strand of auburn hair out of her face and noticed a new billboard on the side of the road that announced the grand opening of the Daegon Gray wing at St. Matthew’s hospital. The date posted on the sign fell exactly one week from today.
Are you kidding me?
Four hours. She’d stood for four hours on a marble tile floor in three inch heels with those damn pointy toes. And for what? To hear the President of Daegon Gray announce the opening of the new hospital wing.
I could have saved my poor feet and read the sign. She scrunched her toes against the floor mat and winced as they cracked and throbbed.
Four hours of listening to a lobby full of overpaid, surgically enhanced, bimbette news anchors cluck about Alexander Gray. Oh, he was so dreamy. Oh, he was so rich. Oh, he was so…give me a break.
The worst part about the evening was that the press conference never happened. Every thirty minutes that blond chippy from the Mayor’s office popped her head out of Gray’s butt long enough to announce that the meeting would start in a few minutes. Then, at around nine o’clock, she came out to say that Mr. Gray received an urgent call and had to leave.
Asshole.
Cassidy took a deep breath. And then another. Ran slender fingers through shoulder-length hair. A nice long soak in the pool, that’s what she needed. That, and a glass of red wine.
Yeah. And my imaginary pool boy Carlos, with the washboard abs, wide shoulders and magical hands, will start at my feet and rub his way to the top.
She rolled her head. Tight muscles stretched, joints popped.
St. Matthew’s. She’d blocked that place out of her mind, but this assignment dragged it back. An older hospital, it prided itself on the care of its patients. The doctors rallied around the belief that they didn’t treat patients, they treated people. During her previous life as an EMT, Cassidy saw many of the St. Matthew’s doctors and nurses go far beyond what the insurance companies would approve of in order to treat a person. They didn’t have the latest technology or whiz-bang medical gadgets, but they had years of experience and a truck load of compassion.
If it were up to her, she would have traded that compassion for an up-to-date burn unit.
Don’t go there.
She laid on the horn. “Come on, move it.”
Let it go.
Now an entry-level reporter for a local rag, she wrote fluff pieces for minimum wage. The money wasn’t important. Her parents had left her a few million and a nice house on Anna Maria Island that backed up to Tampa Bay. While being a reporter had never been part of her life’s plan, it got her out of bed in the morning and forced her to mingle with the living again.
Cassidy slammed on the brakes and missed the car in front of her by inches. A long line of brake lights snaked out ahead of her.
Really? Tonight this happens to me? She wanted to cry. God, I just want to get home.
She smacked the steering wheel. Tears built up behind the dam of her closed eyelids.
NO.
Cassidy jumped as the first notes of ACDC’s Hells Bells burst from her cell and scared away the traitorous leakage.
Saved by the bells.
The adrenaline surge sent her arm scrabbling for the phone hiding near her bag and briefcase on the passenger seat. By the second bong she flipped the top and snapped at the caller.
“Yeah, yeah. Hello?”
“Sinclair.” Eric Rancor, Cassidy’s editor, had a high-pitched, edgy voice that colored every conversation with a sense of impending doom. “I heard about the press conference; or, should I say, lack thereof.”
Great. “And?”
“We’ve got nothing to run and I need a Daegon Gray story. Club Mastodon is on your way home.”
“Yeah, but I’m not feeling very we—”
“Good. Head on over and see what’s doin’.” Eric paused, probably trying to figure out how to grease her up. “I need your take on the club atmosphere.”
“They won’t let me in. You know, no press.”
“Talk to some of the people outside. See what they have to say. Maybe we’ll get lucky. You got this.” Click.
When Eric was done, he was done. No, “Goodbye.” No, “See you later.” He was all click-you-very-much, now do what I told you to do.
I just want to go home.
Like a good reporter, she sucked it up and checked the exits to see how far she was from the club.