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them. Then the fun would begin in the interrogation hut. Until then, theymight as well play ball or take a nap. Their beepers sang out at the same moment.
     
    Travis Hughes was out pillaging and terrorizing the countryside on his Suzuki Hayabusa GSX1300R. The speed limit was 65 mph, but Hughes had not pimped out his bright red rice-burner to go 65. The Marine staff sergeant, a sniper team leader, wore a blue bandanna around his head, dark sunglasses, creased black leathers with an Outlaws patch, and biker boots. Long red hair flew behind him as he stormed back toward the base. The blonde at the bar had been with Marines before, and when the beeper stuttered on his belt, she knew he was gone. She walked with him outside and gave him a long wet kiss when he powered up his machine. She nibbled his ear and said, “Stay out of trouble this time, Travis.” Hughes revved up the bike. “Don’t think I can do that, darlin’,” he said and launched the motorcycle out onto the road, laughing into the sharp wind that whipped around him. He bent low over the handlebars and cranked it up to a comfortable 110, hauling butt back to the base.
    LONDON
    Television reporter Kimberly Drake was only two years out of journalism school and still a little fish, even within her Arkansas station. She wanted to be considered a serious journalist, not just a talking head, and sometimes felt that her good looks were no advantage whatsoever. Every station had a beautiful anchor or weathergirl, and she could no longer even imagine an unattractive woman hosting a television newscast. To break out of Little Rock, Kim needed some big stories, and once she had earned her spurs and boosted her reputation, she could jump to a bigger station or at least a cable network.
    Then, out of nowhere, the station management decided to send its own correspondent to the royal wedding, just like its big competitors, as part of the continuing battle for advertising dollars. Kimberly wouldhave happily either screwed or killed her news director to get the assignment but did not have to do either. Since the rest of the reporting staff was male and the female anchor was too pregnant to travel, nobody else even wanted the assignment! To the guys, it was just a wedding. Fluff, not like a Super Bowl or a war.
    The station gave Kim the job but put very little money behind the trip. Tom Lester, a veteran cameraman, accompanied her, along with a young engineer who would work as a soundman for the stand-ups. The shoestring budget meant they operated out of a small purple and white production van that the station had hired at bargain basement rates.
    Kimberly did not care. As she left the Royal Wedding Command Center Press Office in London with her new laminated credentials on a chain around her neck and walked toward the media production area in Kensington Park, she felt like a real reporter for the first time in her life.
    It was not until late that night that reality sank in. Because of her low status, Kim’s truck had been assigned a space far away from the parade route, on the very back row. From the camera position atop the van, she could overlook the vast media lot that had been cordoned off, and she was jealous that another purple and white van from the same company, rented by an Italian cable operator, had been given a slightly better spot about fifty yards away.
    She had never seen so many media types. British journalists were as aggressive as pit bulls, and reporters and television people from dozens of other countries were arriving, also wearing press credentials for the big event. There were hundreds of them around, many of whom she recognized, although they did not know her. The network people were right at the front! Media money was everywhere. Private residents had fled the city and rented out their apartments and homes at exorbitant rates. Restaurant prices doubled around the heart of the press operations because the reporters were on expense accounts.
    Kim Drake