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    A Pressing Issue of Murder
    A Pressing Issue of Murder
    A Pressing Issue of Murder
    Ebook97 pages3 hours

    A Pressing Issue of Murder

    By Linda Rae Blair

    ()

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    About this ebook

    A young hospital administrator is found dead only three months after the suicide of his predecessor. Press and the Virginia team come together with Detective Ross Graham of the Norfolk PD to resolve an issue of murder. Then Press's favorite coroner comes unglued when a small child dies unnecessarily. How these and more all come together is a very pressing issue of murder!

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherLinda Rae Blair
    Release dateMar 1, 2012
    ISBN9781466185647
    A Pressing Issue of Murder
    Author

    Linda Rae Blair

    Raleigh artist, Linda Rae Blair was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. She has used her knowledge gained during extensive travel throughout the United States and her passion for art, history, mysteries, and scenery to create compact novels with rich characters so real you'll miss them when they're gone and places you'll swear you've been. She has lived in Seattle, WA, Monterey Bay, CA, Cincinnati, OH, and retired five years ago in the Raleigh, NC area.Her love of history is well-earned. She is a direct descendant of John Alden and Priscilla Mullins of Mayflower fame. She is also descended from a strong line of Scots-Irish immigrants to America in the 1700s. She even had a great uncle who was robbed by the infamous outlaw Belle Starr.Her Scottish love story, “Elusive”, spans 200 years of Scottish history and intrigue via setting in 1700s Scotland and early 1900s Paris and Scotland.An avid reader who inhales novels by Nora Roberts, Sandra Brown and others in the romance/mystery genres, her imagination takes you to a variety of places and times all in the same story.Her travels to the beautiful southwestern states inspired her more modern historic romance combined with mystery, “100 Years of Brotherly Love”.Her mystery series, The Preston Andrews Mysteries now has 12 published entries, beginning with “Hard Press’d” which now claims over 50,000 downloads and, most recently, the softcover print version of the series in compilation form.Ms. Blair has spent many happy hours in Virginia Beach during off-season, when the winds blow cold and hard and the salty air whips at the weather-protected palms. This is the locale chosen for her Preston Andrews series. Locals and visitors alike find many familiar frames of reference in this series.Her homage to her love for Poirot is via her teeny tiny mystery, “The Board Game Murders”.Her newest series is aimed at a slightly younger and more female audience from that of The Preston Andrews series but begins in the backstory in “Pressing Reunion”.The Samantha Hartley, PI series is lighter and features a very young and not terribly experienced private investigator just beginning her career—with a slight assist from the Director of the FBI.One thing is for certain, she combines her passions into stories interesting to history buffs, travelers, and lovers of romance and mystery.

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      Book preview

      A Pressing Issue of Murder - Linda Rae Blair

      A PRESSING ISSUE OF MURDER

      Linda Rae Blair

      The characters, names, and events as well as all places, incidents, organizations, and dialog in this novel either are the products of the writer’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

      Published by Linda Rae Blair at Smashwords

      Copyright 2012 Linda Rae Blair

      All rights reserved.

      ISBN: 978-1-4661-8564-7

      This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      Acknowledgements

      For supporting and inspiring Indie Writers, you just don’t get any better than a Facebook site called Book Junkies or the website Indies Unlimited where many of we junkies make friends and hang out—virtually, that is.

      These sites give writers support, new ideas, solutions to problems—ranging from which program works best to design covers to What’s the word I’m looking for?—and marketing ideas. Oh, there are so many other things we talk about that one could never list them all here—nor should we, now that I think about it.

      Thanks to Evil Mastermind Stephen Hise and K.S Brooks at Indies Unlimited. The site publishes our blogs, gives us writing opportunities, as well as a place to show off our trailers and excerpts from our latest works of genius.

      Thanks to Grace Guerra who single-handedly runs the Book Junkies Library.

      We appreciate those on these sites who support us all so beautifully, even when we get a well-needed smack down.

      Last but not least, thank you, Hugh Ashton! Without you, this one wouldn’t be what it is today!

      To Jane and Marta who came to the rescue

      Chapter 1

      Andrews Mansion

      Virginia Beach

      March 2012

      The pain was so bad that she could hardly breathe. Sitting quietly so that he wouldn’t know she was awake, she fought the pain so that she wouldn’t moan. The last time he’d heard her he had beaten her again, and then, he had used that horrible device on her—no, she couldn’t think about it. Her fear would make her cry out—again.

      Suddenly, the room was tilting, and she was falling…

      Rach! Wake up sweetheart. It’s just a nightmare. Press pulled her toward him and wrapped her tight in his arms.

      Once her thrashing ceased, and she relaxed in his arms, he loosened his grip so that he could stoke her hair. He could feel the shudder that went through her system. He kissed the top of her head and hummed to her as he would to a small child. Finally, he felt her body go limp as she drifted back to sleep.

      Outside the bedroom door, he heard Jones moaning and circling to find a position of comfort again. The dog had obviously been at full attention during Rachel’s struggle with the nightmare.

      She hadn’t had one of the bad nightmares for several months. Press didn’t know what had brought them back, but he’d sure as hell find out. She was torturing herself about something.

      It was his job to protect her. He had failed her once, and it would never happen again if he could help it!

      Chapter 2

      Andrews Mansion

      Virginia Beach

      The Next Morning

      He watched her throughout breakfast—not in any way that she would spot, but he was careful to observe her expression—especially when she drifted into thought.

      You had a rough night last night. He took a sip of hot coffee and waited for her response.

      Did I?

      You don’t remember nearly cold-cocking me in the middle of the night? He grinned, not feeling the humor he tried to get his grin to represent.

      Oh! Did I really? She vaguely remembered having a nightmare, but couldn’t remember what it was. I’m sorry, sweetheart. I didn’t hurt you, did I?

      Fortunately you didn’t use any of those FBI self-defense tactics on me—but it was close. Again, he grinned trying to keep the conversation light. He grabbed another bagel and the honey-walnut cream cheese and began slathering it onto the cinnamon-sugar-crunch bagel, trying to maintain a casual approach. You remember what you were dreaming about? A case? He took a big bite as he waited for her answer.

      She put her fork down and finished swallowing a bite of one of Lizzie’s best omelets. No. I don’t remember a thing. Did I talk in my sleep?

      "No. Security is safe. Probst doesn’t have to worry about you giving

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