Mistress-of-the-Game - By Tilly Bagshawe Sidney Sheldon Page 0,34

As Jamie's fortune and reputation grew, so, too, did his brother's bitterness and envy. The years passed, and Ian passed this loathing on to his own son, Hamish, who in turn bequeathed it to Gabe's father, Stuart, like some sort of terrible genetic disease.

When Gabe was growing up, just to speak the name Jamie McGregor was to invoke the devil. Over the years, other names were added to the family's roll call of hatred. Kate Blackwell. Tony Blackwell. Eve Blackwell. Robert Templeton. Gabe's grandfather, Hamish, devoted his retirement years and every penny of his meager savings to a doomed lawsuit against the mighty Kruger-Brent corporation. Time after time the case was thrown out of courts from Glasgow to London to New York. Each time the judges were more scathing.

Frivolous.

Greedy.

Entirely without foundation.

Hamish McGregor died a bankrupt, bitter man. Twenty years later, the same fate befell his son, Gabe's father. Gabe was sixteen when his dad died, his mind corroded with drink and hatred, his body broken from the long, backbreaking years on the docks.

Despite everything, Gabe had loved his dad. He tried to remember the good times they'd had together. Playing on the beach at Elgin when he was three or four. Watching Celtic play at Parkhead, screaming their heads off in the terraces. Dancing around the tree at Christmas, all three of them in the front room, Mam, too, before Dad had started to hit her, before the bitterness got too much.

Two weeks after his father died, Gabe left home.

His mother was worried.

"Where will you go, son? You've nae qualifications. You'll nae find work in Aberdeen, nae now the shipyards are gone."

"I'm not staying in Scotland, Mam. There's work down south. Plenty."

"You mean London?"

Anne McGregor couldn't have sounded more horrified if Gabe had said he was moving to Beirut.

"I'll phone you as soon as I'm settled. Do not worry, Mam. I can take care of myself."
Chapter Ten

PETER TEMPLETON SAT IN THE PRIVATE WAITING ROOM AT Mount Sinai Medical Center, staring at the wall. This was where he'd lost his beloved Alex. Even the smell of the place, a mixture of disinfectant and cheap vanilla candles, was gruesomely familiar.

How much more tragedy did the gods have planned for him?

When would it end?

Mindlessly, he picked up a frayed copy of New Woman magazine.

I don't want a new woman. I want my old woman back.

A few doors down the hall, Agent Andrew Edwards was still in surgery. The man had been a hero, according to his partner. Astonishingly brave. After the second bomb, he'd run into the blazing building, looking for Lexi. He never gave up.

It should have been me in that mill, not him. If he lives, I will reward him for his courage. He can have anything he wants.

If he lives.

Something had gone terribly wrong. The FBI believed they were taking on a small group of armed kidnappers. They'd expected a shoot-out. Instead they stumbled into a series of sophisticated booby traps, triggering bombs powerful enough to wipe out entire villages. Captain Barclay and his men never stood a chance. The first explosion killed three of them outright. By the time FBI reinforcements arrived, all five were dead, entombed in what would soon be the charred wreckage of a fire so catastrophic it could be seen from fifty miles away.

Early indications were that the kidnappers themselves had escaped. In the confusion, and desperate attempts to find Lexi, valuable time had been lost. If they had gotten out, they could be anywhere by now, scattered to the wind.

If they'd gotten out. The fire was so intense, it would be weeks before a final determination was made on all the human remains. It didn't help that nobody knew exactly how many bodies they were looking for.

Peter overheard the fire chief talking to one of the surgeons.

"It's a miracle anyone made it out of there alive. Agent Edwards is a lucky guy."

Second-degree burns to eighty percent of his body, two shattered legs and severe internal bleeding? thought Peter. I'd love to meet an unlucky guy.

"Dr. Templeton?"

Peter looked up. A pretty woman doctor was talking to him.

"You can come in now. Your daughter is awake."

Lexi blinked, taking in her surroundings.

She was in a hospital. Even if the nurse hadn't been standing at the foot of her bed, she'd have known it instantly from the smell. She remembered it from the time she'd had her tonsils out last year. That and the fact that they let her have ice cream for breakfast. I wonder if I'll