9/20/2012
I’ve been away this week and my little blog has been a bit neglected. I thought with the release of Hearts Afire about a week away I would post the opening here for something different. I hope you like it.
***
Hearts Afire
Chapter 1, Opening
“See” said Lisa, “This is why people don’t cater their own weddings! It’s just too stressful.”
Cassie looked at her sister and shook her head. They were standing in the kitchen of her business, Callahan Catering, surveying the mountains of food that she had prepared in time for today’s wedding reception, her own wedding reception.
There were blinis with smoked salmon and plates of plump oysters. There were slabs of roast beef and jugs of au jus to pour over them, platters of rocket, pumpkin and feta salad and her
signature cous cous dish. There was even a magnificent 4-tier cake covered with fresh magnolias. Now all of it was for
nothing.
“Lisa, getting the food ready was not the stressful part! Having the groom call and cancel the wedding just hours
before hand is the stressful part!”
Today Cassie Callahan had been supposed to marry her long-time boyfriend Angus. Cassie could not believe that
Angus had waited till just two hours before the wedding to decide he needed to go trekking in Nepaland find
himself.
“How can I commit to you Cassie, when I don’t even know who I am?”
Puh-lease. Why now? Why not yesterday? Why not last week? Why not last month?
So now Cassie was left, standing in the kitchen in the white dress Angus had chosen, a frilly strapless
meringue-like arrangement that she wasn’t even sure she liked, surveying the wedding banquet that wasn’t to
be.
“Well,” she sighed. “When Gavin gets here with the refrigerated truck we’ll just have him take it to a women’s
shelter instead of the Botanical Gardens. It can’t all go to waste!”
Cassie Callahan was nothing if not a pragmatist. She hadn’t cried or begged when Angus had called. Certainly, she’d
been dismayed, but if the man didn’t want to marry her, then there wasn’t much she could do about it. Cassie had learnt long ago you couldn’t really change people, or bend them to your will.
“What’s that smell?” Lisa asked.
“What smell?”
“Like something burning….oh no!”
All of a sudden the fire alarm sounded and the automatic sprinkler system came on soaking Cassie, Lisa and the
platters of food. Could the day get any worse?
***
Hearts Afire will be out late September/early October.
Meanwhile Mr Right and Other Mongrels is available at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0086L8NBS.
Comments
Nic herrmann
9/20/2012 12:20:19 pm
Love it Monique! Xxx
Reply
Monique
9/20/2012 12:44:07 pm
Thanks Nic!
