Countdown to

Breaking Point

7/11/05

1 day (and counting to Breaking Point, in stores, tomorrow, on July 12th)

Quote of the day:  "I like you, despite your attempt to pretend to be the lowest scum-sucking, slime-eating, godforsaken worm on the face of the earth."  Molly to Jones, from Out of Control

Excerpt Day!

  Note from Suz: It's time for our next-to-last countdown page -- and excerpt number three!  

But first, I've gotten quite a bit of email about the shrink-wrapped Max-Mobile.  (Which, interestingly, when the back doors are open, says, "AKING POINT. <g>)  I'm not exactly sure how the shrink wrap was done, but it involved big sheets of plastic-ish material upon which the artwork was printed, that were then carefully applied to the car by a Boston-area business that specializes in this sort of thing.  (They're all really nice and very artistic!  They did such a good job!)  After we return from the book tour, we'll take the minivan back to the same gang, and they will remove the shrink wrap -- pretty much by peeling it off.

(And by the time we return from tour, after having driven across the United States and back, there will be bits and pieces of the bug-splattered shrink wrap flapping a bit in the breeze!  LOL!)

Okay, on to today's countdown page...

The winners (and we have two!) of Trivia Quiz # 3:  GEOGRAPHY are:  

Jules from New Jersey and Shay

Jules and Shay both answered all the questions correctly, as well as picked the exact tie-breaker number!  They'll both receive a signed copy of their choices of Taylor's Temptation, Get Lucky, The Admiral's Bride or Identity: Unknown.

Congratulations!

Here are the answers to...  

Trivia Quiz # 3:  Geography

1)  What was the name of the island where Molly and Jones first met?
Parwati Island

2)  True or false:  The island where Molly and Jones first met was in Indonesia.
True.

3)  True or false:  The island where Molly and Jones first met was fictional. 
True

4)  When Max comes face to face with Gina in Florida, she's wearing a T-shirt advertising what vacation location?
Jekyll Island  (GTF, pb, pg. 223)

5)  Name the restaurant jazz club and the city where Gina plays a gig during Gone Too Far. 
Fandango's on Siesta Key (or Sarasota), Florida  (GTF, pb. pg. 247)

6)  In which state did Jones grow up?
Ohio  (OOC, pb. pg. 154)

7)  What was Molly's home state? 
Iowa  (OOC, pb. pg. 219)

8)  Where do Max and Gina first meet?
At the Kazabek airport, in Kazbekistan

9)  What does Gina have in common with Alessandra Lamont, the heroine of Suz's book, Body Guard? 
They both came from Long Island.  (And we accepted They both came from New York as an answer, too!)

Now, on to the excerpt!

Those of you who don't like to read excerpts...

consider...

yourselves...

warned!  <g>

Please note:  This excerpt is the final scene of Chapter One.  If you haven't read the excerpt from the beginning of chapter one, you should probably read it now.  The date/location line at the top of this scene reads:  

FBI Headquarters, Washington, D.C.
June 20, 2005
Present Day

Peggy Ryan was in talking to Max.  Jules could hear her, laughing at something their boss had said, even as Max shouted, "Come in."

They both looked up as Jules opened the office door, as he stepped halfway inside.  "Excuse me, sir."

And just like that, Max knew. 

It was a little freaky, but Jules saw it happen.  Max looked at him, glanced down at the document Jules was carrying, then looked back, hard, into Jules's eyes, and he somehow knew .

He'd been leaning back in his chair, but now he sat up, holding out his hand for the news that he already knew was coming, his face oddly expressionless.  "Gina?" he asked, and Jules nodded.

There was no way Max could have known that Gina was in Germany, let alone anywhere near that car-bombed cafe. 

And although Jules admired the hell out of his boss and thought the man brilliant, highly skilled, and capable of outrageous acts of bravery as he employed his frontline method of leadership, Jules was firmly grounded in reality.  Despite popular belief, he knew that Max was not capable of mind-reading. 

Which meant that Max had been waiting for this. 

It meant that every single day since Gina had left, he'd been waiting for -- fearing and dreading -- this very news. 

What a hell of a way to live.

Peggy Ryan was oblivious.  In fact, she was rattling on about some case she was working on, even as Jules handed Max the dreaded list of civilians killed. 

Jules turned to her and cut her off mid-utterance.  "Ma'am.  You need to leave." 

She blinked up at him in shock, her expression rapidly morphing to outrage.  "Excuse me--"

"Now."  Jules grabbed her and lifted her out of her seat. 

"What are you doing?  Get your hands off me, you... you freak," she squawked as he pushed her out the door. 

George was out there, by Laronda's desk, waiting to flag him down, cell phone to his ear.  "Her body's in Hamburg," he told Jules.

"Thanks.  Fill Peggy in," Jules tossed the order past the woman and shut the door in her angry face. 

But then he wondered if he himself weren't on the wrong side of that door.  God, but he couldn't bring himself to turn around and look at Max. 

Who was stone-cold, dead silent. 

It would have been better if he were shouting and breaking things.  Punching a hole in the wall.  Max rarely lost his temper, rarely lost control, but when he did, it was an earthshaking event. 

"Can I help you, sir?" Jules whispered, still facing the door.

"Has her family been contacted yet?" Max asked, sounding remarkably normal, as if he were inquiring about nothing more troublesome than the usual morning traffic on the Capital Beltway.

"I don't know, sir."  He slowly turned around. 

Max was sitting behind his desk.  Just sitting.  Jules could read nothing on his face, nothing in his eyes.  It was as if Max had shut himself down, made his heart stop beating. 

"But I'll find out," Jules continued.  "We're also making inquiries as to why Gina was in Hamburg, why she left Kenya, what she was doing, where she was staying...  I'll get you that information as soon as I have it.  George just told me that her body is..."

His voice broke.  He couldn't help it.  Her body.  Gina's body.  God. 

"Still in Hamburg," Jules forced the words out.

"Have Laronda get me a seat on the next flight to Germany," Max said, still so evenly, so calmly.  But then he realized what he'd said, and for a moment, Jules caught the briefest flash of the emotion the man was hiding.  "Fuck!"  But Max just as quickly caught himself and was back to calm.  Smooth.  "Laronda's not coming in today."

"I'll do it, sir."  Jesus, what a day for this.  Max's assistant Laronda would know exactly what to do, what to say...  Such as, Sir.  Are you going to Hamburg to identify Gina's body and bring her home, or to locate and decimate the terrorist cell responsible for that bombing?  Because that second thing might not be such a good idea unless you're looking to end your career. 

Jules cleared his throat. "Although, maybe you shouldn't go there by yourself--"

"Get me Walter Frisk," Max ordered.  "And find Gina's parents' phone number.  Laronda's got it somewhere on her computer." 

Still Jules hesitated, his hand on the doorknob.  "Max, God, I'm so, so sorry for your loss."  His voice broke again.  "Our loss.  The whole world's loss."

Max looked up, and it was eerie to be stared at with such soulless, empty eyes.  "I want that plane reservation on my desk in two minutes."

"Yes, sir."  Jules closed the door behind him and got to work.

(End of Chapter One!  But don't immediately leapt to Chapter Two when you go to read the book.  BREAKING POINT has a prologue that hasn't been excerpted here!)

That's all for now!  Be sure to come back for tomorrow's final installment in the Countdown to Breaking Point!