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Chapters (53)
  1. BALANCE OF POWER
  2. Acknowledgments
  3. About The Creators
  4. ONE
  5. TWO
  6. THREE
  7. FOUR
  8. FIVE
  9. SIX
  10. SEVEN
  11. EIGHT
  12. NINE
  13. TEN
  14. ELEVEN
  15. TWELVE
  16. THIRTEEN
  17. FOURTEEN
  18. FIFTEEN
  19. SIXTEEN
  20. SEVENTEEN
  21. EIGHTEEN
  22. NINETEEN
  23. TWENTY
  24. TWENTY-ONE
  25. TWENTY-TWO
  26. TWENTY-THREE
  27. TWENTY-FOUR
  28. TWENTY-FIVE
  29. TWENTY-SIX
  30. TWENTY-SEVEN
  31. TWENTY-EIGHT
  32. TWENTY-NINE
  33. THIRTY
  34. THIRTY-ONE
  35. THIRTY-TWO
  36. THIRTY-THREE
  37. THIRTY-FOUR
  38. THIRTY-FIVE
  39. THIRTY-SIX
  40. THIRTY-SEVEN
  41. THIRTY-EIGHT
  42. THIRTY-NINE
  43. FORTY
  44. FORTY-ONE
  45. FORTY-TWO
  46. FORTY-THREE
  47. FORTY-FOUR
  48. FORTY-FIVE
  49. FORTY-SIX
  50. FORTY-SEVEN
  51. FORTY-EIGHT
  52. FORTY-NINE
  53. FIFTY

The realization that the mission had not gone exactly as planned.

FORTY

Tuesday, 5:49 a.m.

Old Saybrook, Connecticut

Sharon Hood couldn't sleep. She was tired and she was at her childhood home in her old bed but her mind wouldn't shut down. She'd argued with her husband, read one of her old Nancy Drew books until three, then shut off the light and stared at the patterns of moonlight and leaves on the ceiling for nearly two hours. She looked around at the posters that had hung there since before she moved out to go to college.

Posters of the movie Doctor Zhivago. Of the rock group Gary Puckett and the Union Gap. A cover of a TV Guide signed, "Cherish and Love, David Cassidy," which she and her friend Alice had waited in line three hours to get at a local shopping center.

How had she managed to be interested in all those things, get high honors in school, hold a part-time job, and have a boyfriend when she was sixteen and seventeen?

You didn't need as much sleep then, she told herself.

But was that really what made it all mesh? Time alone? Or was it the fact that if one job didn't work, she got another. Or if one boyfriend didn't make her happy, she got another. Or if one group recorded a song she didn't like, she stopped buying their records. It wasn't a matter of energy. It was a matter of discovery. Learning about what she needed to be happy.

She thought she'd found it with that multimillionaire winemaker Stefano Renaldo. Sharon had met his sister in college and gone home with her one spring break and had been seduced by Stefano's wealth and his yacht and his attention. But-ironically, now that she thought about it-after two years she realized that she didn't want someone who'd inherited all his money. Someone who didn't have to work for a living. Someone who people came to for investment capital while he, depending upon his mood, yea'd or nay'd their hopes and dreams. That kind of life-that kind of man-was not for her.