It was 2.30 on a Saturday morning and Connie was finally leaving the hospital. The last-minute emergency had been a long, complex operation and she knew that a lesser surgeon might not have pulled it off but she had. She saw this as further evidence that she was, in fact, the best cardiothorasic surgeon around, not that she needed any. Only once had she ever doubted that she was the best and she got over that fast enough.
By the time she had left theatre at gone one in the morning she decided that she had earned a stiff drink so she had called Michael, knowing that she was too tired to drive and would shortly be too drunk and asked him to pick her up. Despite the sleepy displeasure in his voice, a result of being woken up in the middle of the night, he agreed readily. She knew he wouldn't mind – it happened a couple of times a month that an operation would leave her so emotionally drained that she would call him to take her home and he always agreed. She would joke that it was because he could never refuse her anything, he would joke that if he were to refuse her anything she would be left with no option but to kill him and find an newer, more amenable, model. They both knew it was more than that. Michael had been in such a state of emotional exhaustion many times himself. He understood what she was going through when she couldn't save a patient and he understood her elation when she was able to bring a patient back from the brink. It was this level of understanding that made Michael the only man who had ever been in with a chance of taming his wife. It was this level of understanding that made her feel loved and special when they were together. It was this level of understanding that made their marriage work.
A broad smile crossed her face as she made her way through the hospital car park towards the footpath that led to Michael's preferred waiting place of the public car park. It had, in the end, turned out to be a very good day, despite it's less than brilliant start. She had lost a teenage girl on her table during what should have been a routine procedure and it had shaken her badly. The confrontation that ensued between herself and the girl's father who blamed Connie entirely for his daughter's death had done nothing for her confidence. By lunchtime she was already in desperate need of a stiff drink. It was then that things started to look up.
In the board meeting – never her favourite part of the week – Michael had fought her corner and agreed to relocate Keller ward in favour of a permanently expanded Darwin ward. The only thing that could have given her greater pleasure would have been to see Griffin's face when they told him. Later on Zubin, back at his obnoxious best, had given her numerous opportunities to belittle him and she had ensured that not a single chance went to waste. The supposedly friendly banter that scarcely covered the loathing between them had further brightened her day. Kahn baiting never failed to put her in a good mood.
To cap it all she had seduced Owen Davis for no reason other than she could and it would give her valuable ammunition for when he inevitably discovered that it was his ward she intended to cleave in half to make way for the new Keller. Now he wouldn't dare oppose her for fear that she would spill all to Diane. He didn't know that even she would not sink so low as to regard Diane Lloyd's marriage as simply a piece of collateral damage in her management technique. She seriously doubted that he had a great deal more respect for his marriage but if he wanted to destroy it himself, that was his problem. She had never stooped lower than gentle blackmail and idle threats in all her years climbing the career ladder and she wasn't about to start now.
Still grinning she turned into the dimly lit path that led to where Michael would be waiting. For a couple of moments she walked quietly along as she had dozens of times before but at the sight of a shadowy but undoubtedly male figure blocking her way her smile dropped and she emitted a gasp of surprise. For a moment her heart began to pound in her chest with fear but she was quickly overcome with a surge of relief as she moved closer to the dim street light where he stood and saw who it was.
"What are you doing here?' she asked with a relieved laugh in her voice 'At this hour of the morning…'
'Waiting for you' He replied, his voice level as He looked her up and down in a way that could only be described as predatory. It made her more than a little uncomfortable but she wasn't scared. He wouldn't hurt her – he wouldn't have the guts.
'Why?' she asked, genuinely mystified as he gave a brittle, mirthless laugh and a look crossed his face that made her blood run cold.
'Why do you think?' he retorted and moved towards her, grabbing her right arm as she tried to dodge past him and make her escape. With one movement that showed strength she had not credited him with, she was against the wall, her arms pinned above her head by one of his arms to prevent her from clawing out at him in a desperate bid to escape. His other arm began to wander idly down her body, hovering over her breasts and her lower abdomen before it reached down and pulled her skirt up with such strength that it tore. At this point, as she realised his intention, her hysterical pleading that eventually gave way to pitiful screams could be heard throughout the back of the hospital car park and the darkened alley but at 2.35 in the morning there was no one to hear her cries.