Uriel: The Inheritance (Airel Saga Book Five)

Chapter V

Glasgow, Scotland—Present Day

ELLIE FOUND JOHN RIGHT before he boarded the charter C-37. She missed him in Glasgow, but planned to listen to his thoughts on the ride back to the U.S. and find out what happened to the woman he was hunting and if he found the Bloodstone.

John looked out the small window as the English countryside slid by under the wings, giving way to the icy waters of the North Atlantic. "I'm going home. It feels so good, really, to fail at this kind of stuff."

Nothing had gone according to plan for John Cross. He hadn't been able to find much at all on one Eve Crawford back in D.C. using the Web, so he figured he could get something locally once he was on site in Scotland. Maybe talk to some shopkeepers and landlords, work the streets for better information. "That proved to be a rather ill-advised roll of the dice. I didn't think I was gambling on that score, but apparently I was."

Ellie let him think. She found a seat in the back where she could close her eyes and try to get a little rest.

"Eve Crawford was a shell identity. But why go to all that trouble?"

John kept trying, unsuccessfully, to block out of his mind the idea that he or his family might have to pay a serious price for all this. He imagined the displeasure this turn of events would produce in PILLBOX, let alone MAGICIAN, whoever that was.

She could tell he was glad not to have another murder on his hands. But he was sad he had missed Christmas with his family. Again. "I told myself this wasn't going to keep on happening, especially after what went down in Kigali. And in Potosi. Rwanda. Bolivia. Hostile situations. I got out with barely more than my own skin intact. It's a tough business, dealing in force with backstreet thugs, and I swore more than once I'd had enough of it. The only times I sleep well are in my own bed, by the side of my own wife, my arms around the one woman I love."

As the C-37 reeled off the miles beneath, John briefly allowed his mind to go, to haunt the depths of depravity and think on what might happen if worse came to worst. What would MAGICIAN do to him now that he'd failed?

Would there be a second chance?