Firestorm
Page 35
She took Cal’s hand and pulled him away from the group so they could talk without everyone listening in. She glanced back and noticed everyone was watching, and pulled him deeper into the crowd.
“What do you think?” she asked.
He cupped her face, staring down at her with a look that turned her to jelly. “I’m scared to death because I know how much you’re willing to risk. But I also know you’d be brilliant.” He brushed his lips over hers. “I love you, Freya. And I will never hold you back from what you want to do.”
Emotion swamped her. “God, I love you.” She pulled his head down for a deeper kiss, then pressed her forehead to his chest, feeling the steady beat of his heart through his shirt. His arms wrapped around her, holding her tight.
Finally, she looked up. “You’re sure?”
He nodded. “A hundred percent. You’ll be amazing.”
She kissed him again, then took his hand and pulled him back to the table. Everyone—especially Morgan—looked at them expectantly.
She grinned. “I’m in.” She lifted her drink. “To the Monuments Women.”
Morgan let out a squeal of excitement, and everyone raised their glasses and said in unison, “To the Monuments Women.”
Author’s Note
There are many fascinating and heartbreaking books and documentaries available to readers interested in learning more about the Democratic Republic of the Congo. For documentaries, I recommend starting with Mission Congo and When Elephants Fight. For details on the collapse of Zaire and the First and Second Congo Wars, the book Dancing in the Glory of Monsters: The Collapse of the Congo and the Great War of Africa by Jason Stearns is a comprehensive account. For insight into how nascent governments descend into corruption and kleptocracy, I recommend Thieves of State: Why Corruption Threatens Global Security by Sarah Chayes.
The above ground description of Mobutu Sese Seko’s palace is based on photos and news reports. While there are accounts of tunnels and a nuclear bunker beneath the palace, the tunnels described in this book are completely fictional.
The problems of the DRC can feel insurmountable, but that is only true if we turn our backs and give up. If any part of this story has touched you, and if you can afford to give to those in desperate need, please join me in donating to a charity working to aid children in the DRC. Some suggestions are Save the Children, CARE, and Chance for Childhood (working in partnership with Street Child Africa).
Thank you for reading Firestorm. I hope you enjoyed it.
If you’d like to know when my next book is available, you can sign up for my mailing list or visit my website. If you follow me on Goodreads you can see what I’m currently reading (usually research material for my next book).
For a little added fun, visit RATinformant.com, a website companion to my Evidence Series (but you’ll find my other books there too).
Reviews help like-minded readers find books. Please consider leaving a review for Firestorm at your favorite online retailer.
Acknowledgments
As always, thank you to Darcy Burke and Elisabeth Naughton for our writing retreats and plotting chats. It is always a joy to have you physically and virtually by my side. For readers who are wondering if the references to Zagreus in this book are a nod to Elisabeth’s Eternal Guardians series, the answer is yes.
Huge thanks to Lola Famure who read this manuscript with an eye for sensitivity in writing a character with a different ethnic background from myself and set in a country ravaged by colonialism and wars. Any errors, misunderstandings, or misrepresentations in these areas are mine.
Thank you to Gwen Hayes and Serena Bell who helped me plot the beginning of this book, which was the jumpstart I needed. And thanks to Toni Anderson, who insisted I write this book next. You were right. You’re always right.
Thank you again to Gwen Hernandez, Gwen Hayes, and Toni Anderson for critiquing Firestorm and helping me to find the path Savvy and Cal take through Congo. I don’t know how to write without you anymore, so never leave me. Okay?
To my readers, as always, thank you for the wonderful emails, Tweets, and posts. It means so much to me to know my work brings you joy and that you feel like you’ve learned something from reading. Thank you for allowing my characters to enter your world.
Thank you to my children. I love you with all my heart and am so proud to be your mom.
Thank you to my husband for being my partner in this adventure. I love you.
Be sure to check out the other Flashpoint Series books
* * *
Tinderbox (Flashpoint #1)
Named to Kirkus Reviews' Best Books of 2017
2018 HOLT Medallion Winner
“The story kicks off with a bang, literally and figuratively, and Grant keeps the momentum going through a series of plot twists and well-staged action sequences that plunge the heroes into the path of a vicious warlord who’ll stop at nothing to consolidate his power in the region.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
In the volatile tinderbox of the Horn of Africa, Morgan Adler has made the paleoanthropological find of a lifetime. The discovery brings her to the attention of a warlord eager to claim both Morgan and the fossils, forcing her to make a desperate dash to the nearby US military base to beg for protection.
* * *
Master Sergeant Pax Blanchard has orders to intercept Dr. Adler before she reaches the base, and in so doing saves her life. After a harrowing afternoon he safely delivers her to his commanders, only to find his responsibilities toward protecting the obstinate archaeologist have only just begun.
* * *
Morgan and Pax are forced to work together in the Djiboutian desert heat, but it is the fire that ignites between them that threatens to combust them both. For the Green Beret, involvement with the woman he must protect is a threat to his career, while for the archaeologist, the soldier is everything she never wanted but somehow can’t resist. When Morgan uncovers a mystery surrounding Djibouti’s most scarce and vital resource, the danger to her reaches the flashpoint. For Pax, protecting her is no longer a matter of following orders, and he’ll risk everything to bring her back alive.
Available now in print, digital, and audiobook.
Catalyst (Flashpoint #2)
2018 Booksellers’ Best Award Finalist
2018 Daphne du Maurier Award Finalist
* * *
“The second novel in Grant’s Flashpoint series offers intelligent romantic suspense that moves with the urgency of a thriller. The well-researched and timely plot finds the heroes confronting the realities of famine in South Sudan while unraveling a complex scheme to secure oil rights in the region.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
When a food storage depot in famine-struck South Sudan is torched, American aid worker Brie Stewart flees, only to land in a market where she’s the next item up for auction. Is the attack on the aid facility another assault upon the war-torn fledgling democracy, or has her family set her up as a pawn in their quest for oil rights?
* * *
Chief Warrant Officer Sebastian Ford crossed paths with Brie years ago when she was a shill for her family’s company, pushing a pipeline that threatened his tribe’s land. Determined to lead the rescue operation to save her, he won’t let her abduction—or the attraction that flares between them—get in the way of settling their unfinished business.
* * *
The Green Beret’s skills are put to the test in the flooded grasslands of South Sudan, where they must battle nature and dangerous factions who are after more than oil. Bastian and Brie put their hearts on the line as they find themselves embroiled in a conflict that extends beyond country and continent. Together they must douse the spark before it reaches the flashpoint and engulfs everything they hold dear.
Available now in print, digital, and audiobook.
Wondering what to read next? Rachel recommends Cold Blooded
by Toni Anderson
“I will read anything Toni Anderson writes. Her hero
ines are always strong and smart, heroes their swoon-worthy equals, the romance sizzles and the suspense top-notch! Perfect for Laura Griffin fans.” -Rachel Grant, award-winning author of the Flashpoint Series.
* * *
A journalist searching for the truth about her best friend’s death—and the FBI agent who needs her to stop.
* * *
Disgraced investigative journalist Pip West is devastated when she discovers her best friend’s body face-down in a tranquil lake. When cops and federal agents determine that her friend overdosed then drowned, Pip knows they’re mistaken and intends to prove it.
* * *
Special Agent Hunt Kincaid doesn’t trust journalists and has no patience for Pip’s delusions, especially since her meddling could reveal why the FBI is interested in her friend’s last days. The dead scientist worked at the cutting edge of vaccine research and might have a connection to a new, weaponized, vaccine-resistant anthrax strain that just hit the black market.
* * *
Pip is thrown off her game by grief and her unexpected attraction to the handsome federal agent. Hunt battles the same unwelcome pull, determined to resist the heat that threatens to consume them both. But the more Pip digs, the closer she gets to both the sexy FBI agent, and to a bioweapons terrorist who’s more than capable of cold-bloodedly sacrificing anyone who gets in his way.
“Toni's books will make your heart pound and leave you breathless as she takes you on a roller coaster of thrills and danger along with the characters.” Kaylea Cross - New York Times and USA Today bestselling author.
Available Now
About the Author
Four-time Golden Heart® finalist Rachel Grant worked for over a decade as a professional archaeologist and mines her experiences for storylines and settings, which are as diverse as excavating a cemetery underneath an historic art museum in San Francisco, survey and excavation of many prehistoric Native American sites in the Pacific Northwest, researching an historic concrete house in Virginia, and mapping a seventeenth century Spanish and Dutch fort on the island of Sint Maarten in the Netherlands Antilles.
* * *
She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and children.
For more information:
www.Rachel-Grant.net
contact@rachel-grant.net