In the Grey

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Authors: Claudia Hall Christian

Tags: #military, #action thriller, #mind control, #strong female character, #alex the fey

BOOK: In the Grey
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IN THE GREY

 

 

CLAUDIA HALL
CHRISTIAN

 

 

Cook Street Publishing
Denver, CO

 

BY
CLAUDIA HALL
CHRISTIAN

 

ALEX THE FEY THRILLERS

(
AlextheFey.com
)

The Fey

Learning to
Stand

Who I Am

Lean on Me

In the Grey

 

THE DENVER CEREAL

(
DenverCereal.com
)

The Denver
Cereal

Celia’s Puppies

Cascade
Cimarron
Black Forest

Fairplay

Gold
Hill

THE QUEEN of COOL

(
TheQueenofCool.com
)

The Queen of
Cool

 

SETH AND AVA MYSTERIES

(
SethandAvaMysteries.com
)

The Tax
Assassin

 

Copyright © Claudia Hall
Christian

Licensed under the Creative
Commons License:

Attribution – NonCommercial
– Share Alike 3.0

 

You are free:

  • to Share – to copy,
    distribute, display, and perform the work

  • to Remix – to make
    derivative works

 

Smashwords Edition
Licensing Notes:

Thank you for purchasing
this ebook and welcome to the Alex the Fey thrillers! You are
welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced,
copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the
book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoyed this
book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by
Claudia Hall Christian. Thank you for your support

 

ISBN-13 :
978-1-938057-05-2
Library of Congress
:
2013900614 (print)

 

PUBLISHER’S
NOTE:

This is a work of fiction.
Names, characters, places and incidents either are either the
product of the author’s imagination or are used
fictitiously.

 

First edition © March,
2013

Cook Street
Publishing
PO Box 18217

Denver, CO 80218

303-242-5391

CookStreetPublishing.com

For all those living in the grey.

TABLE
OF CONTENTS

 

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER
THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER
SEVEN

CHAPTER
EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER
ELEVEN

CHAPTER
TWELVE

CHAPTER
THIRTEEN

CHAPTER
FOURTEEN

CHAPTER
FIFTEEN

CHAPTER
SIXTEEN

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER
NINETEEN

CHAPTER
TWENTY

CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER
TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER
TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER
TWENTY-NINE

CHAPTER
THIRTY

CHAPTER
THIRTY-ONE

CHAPTER
THIRTY-TWO

CHAPTER
THIRTY-THREE

CHAPTER
THIRTY-FOUR

CHAPTER
THIRTY-FIVE

CHAPTER
THIRTY-SIX

CHAPTER
THIRTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER
THIRTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER
THIRTY-NINE

CHAPTER
FORTY

CHAPTER
FORTY-ONE


The color of truth is
grey.”
André Gide, in
Autumn Leaves

PROLOGUE

October 15 – 2:15 a.m.
China Standard Time

Dzungarian Alatau Mountain
Range

Xinjiang Province,
China

 

With her knees tight
against the flanks of the horse, she pointed to her right and
pulled her micro-compound bow from the sling on her back. The horse
flew up the dirt track. She laid the bow across her lap and leaned
back to see if her younger brother had made the turn. Close behind,
his hair flashed white when the quarter moon appeared from behind
the scattered clouds.

She hadn’t expected to
make it this far. She thought they would be stopped at the border,
but in the frigid dark, the border guard had given their passports
no more than a cursory glance before returning to his kerosene
heater. His partner had pawed through their backpacks before waving
their rental car through.

They had driven a few
winding miles into the border mountains until they reached the
turnout where they’d met another American couple. His hair was not
as blonde; she was not quite as thin; otherwise they’d looked
enough like them to swap passports. They’d traded their rental car
and tourist backpacks for the couple’s jeep, black clothing, and
the micro-compound bows. They’d left the paved road in
four-wheel-drive. Her brother had driven the jeep until the track
ended at an old farm where they had picked up a stocky pair of
nearly wild Dzungarian horses.

Sure footed and steady,
her horse hurtled up a barely visible track under Mount Kertau and
the Tian Shan mountain system. She clung to the back of beast. Up
ahead, she saw the flickering apparition of Sergeant Jesse Abreu,
her best friend who had died with his head in her lap, waving her
forward.

On the first of October,
she’d arrived at her office at Buckley Air Force Base to find a
handwritten note sitting in the middle of her desk.


If you would like to
retrieve the package hidden by the Fey Special Forces Team, you
will be standing at 45°44'39.93"
N
and
82°29'36.21"
E
at 3 a.m., October 15. Bring only
one other.”

The note had been
analyzed, fought over, worried about, and researched. When no human
DNA or fingerprints were found on the note, forensic specialists
had tested the composition of the paper and ink. The paper could be
found in any office around the world and the ink came from a black
Bic Stic pen. Forensic handwriting specialists found that an
individual with extensive calligraphy experience had written the
note. Security experts had shared their sage advice and dire
warnings.

The bottom line was that
she wanted the package. She was going to be standing in the meadow
next to the abandoned Buddhist monastery on the border of
Kazakhstan and Xingjian province, China, on October 15.

She’d gathered her team
and flown to the other side of the world. She’d tapped her little
brother to come with her. He was an expert in martial arts, and a
decent shot, but more than anything, he knew her well. He would
watch her back and keep her ego in check. She’d left the rest of
her team at a resort on the Caspian Sea. She and her brother had
set out across Kazakhstan in a small rental car. As if she could
see the satellite monitoring her progress, she looked up into the
night sky. At this altitude, the sky was ablaze with pinpoints of
light.

Her horse turned into a
protected valley and continued to climb. In the distance, she saw
the crumbling ruins of a Buddhist temple. The temple had once
served as a destination for wealthy travelers of the Northern-most
portion of the Silk Road. Protected by the high cliffs and deep
valleys of the Dzungarian Alatau mountain range, the temple had
withstood conquering invaders, cultural change, and religious
intolerance, only to fall to ruins during the famine brought by
Mao’s Great Leap Forward. The last surviving monk had walked the
Silk Road to deposit the temple’s most precious artifacts into one
of the sacred Buddhist caves of Mogao.

Her martial arts teacher,
and the head of a US Army covert black ops group, Steve Pershing,
had told her that the monk was buried in the cave along with his
treasures. She had no idea if that was true.

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