Page 2 of Blood Game

“In a developing story, eye-witness accounts support earlier reports that another automobile may have been involved in the tragic accident three days ago that took the life of war-time correspondent and Pulitzer Prize-winning author CB Ross in the French countryside.

“Catherine Bennett Ross was known for her work over forty years as one of only a handful of female war correspondents, with a career that spanned the Six-Day war in 1967, the Vietnam conflict, the fall of the Berlin wall, as well as countless assignments in the Middle East, followed by a successful publishing career with top-selling political thrillers after retiring to the Scottish countryside.

“Condolences have been pouring in to her New York publisher from heads of state, members of the military, and those she worked with in a career that spanned four decades and covered some of most pivotal events in modern history. Catherine Bennett Ross, who redefined the role of women in journalism and then went on to win the Pulitzer Prize, dead at the age of sixty-four.”

And she was her friend.

She had pushed it back since first hearing the news—the shock and disbelief, everything on auto-pilot, putting together that first press release; calls back and forth with the London office; bringing in their legal team in spite of the fact that it was the middle of the night when they first heard the news; coordinating the marketing teams that were already gearing up for promotion on that next book, then trying to get a flight out.

A passenger from some other flight bumped into her shoulder, then stepped around as she stared at those images now, like so many times Cate had reported from some foreign location she couldn’t name because of rebel attacks in the area—” CB Ross reporting from Afghanistan,” with a burned-out Humvee and those stark, barren mountains in the background.

“How did you do it?” she had once asked the world-famous correspondent who had become a client with that first book—living out of a suitcase, going to places other people only read about in the middle of some war zone or the next military coup in some other part of the world. Living life on the edge, and sometimes over the edge.

Cate had shrugged in that no-nonsense way she remembered from one of those first conversations, after hours in the London office when she first came on as a new author.

“You have a job to do. You pull up your big-girl panties and put one foot in front of the other.”

Kris’s hand tightened over the handle of the carry-on as she headed for ground transportation.

One foot in front of the other.

James Morgan scanned the arriving and departing passengers—business types, students, late-season tourists, going on the description and a publicity shot taken a couple years earlier—university education, editor with a prestigious New York and London publisher.

He looked for the stereo-type—the executive suit, heels exchanged for expensive walkers for those midday sprints through Manhattan or London to a local salad bar with dressing on the side; then after-hours drinks with the girls at the latest hotspot or trendy nightclub before heading out to the country for the weekend. But there was just one problem with assumptions. The first three letters of that word said it all.

Kris McKenna could have been just another late-season tourist, or one of those students returning from holiday—the faded jeans, the sweater and denim jacket, sport shoes that looked as if they’d seen some miles, and the canvas bag over her shoulder.

Except for the wave of long auburn hair that brushed her cheek then fell just below her shoulders, glimpsed in one of those publicity shots—the finely carved features that had looked up into the camera, and that dark-blue gaze that had a way of reaching deep into the gut at the same time it said, “go fuck yourself.”

Assumptions. He took another drag on the cigarette, as he watched her cross the terminal toward ground transportation.

It was just a glimpse at the edge of his field of vision, that sudden darting movement near a bank of vending machines and kiosks, as a slender figure in a hooded sweatshirt darted through the congestion of travelers. It was quick and too familiar, and enough to tighten his gut.

Instinct—that all the weeks in hospital then rehab, along with the requisite line-up of painkillers hadn’t dulled—uneasy in crowded places, always looking for that individual that didn’t fit in.

Paranoia? Battle fatigue? PTSD? Everyone had a label for it.

In the crowded airport it wasn’t the movement so much as the way the person moved, slipping out from beside one of those machines, darting among passengers, stopping, looking around, then moving again—cautious, determined, the dark sweatshirt with the hood pulled low, slicing through the crowd on a direct track.

He glanced across the terminal, saw the target that hooded figure made and tossed down his cigarette, already on the move.

The blow came from behind and slammed into the back of Kris’s shoulder. She stumbled and almost went down, a hand snaking around and locking over the strap of her shoulder bag. She held on.

A woman nearby screamed, then someone shouted a warning over the noise and confusion. She felt that moment when her attacker hesitated, a glimpse from the shadow of the hood,then he suddenly let go, cut past her, and disappeared into the surrounding crowd.

A hand closed around her upper arm and she was pulled back to her feet.

“Bloody fucking parasites!”

That hand locked around her upper arm—long fingers, the worn cuff at the sleeve of the leather jacket, and a glimpse of a tattoo.

“They’ve gotten bolder and airport security already has their hands full with everything else. But I doubt that one will bother you again. He’s off in search of some other victim, unless airport security grabs him first.

“Are you all right, then?”

It was faint, that way of ending a question with ‘then’ or ‘aye.’ When in Scotland...

That hand steadied her.