10 SPIES YOU'VE PROBABLY NEVER HEARD OF

We've all heard of the famous (or infamous) Mata Hari, executed by the French in 1917 as a German spy. And Nathan Hale, the American Revolutionary War spy who said, "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country," right before the British hanged him in 1776 at age twenty-one.

But history is filled with spies whose names are virtually unknown.  In most instances anonymity is vital to success—an unknown name and an appearance that blends in with everyone else rather than the flamboyance of the fictional James Bond.

I read a brief mention about a female spy from World War II who died in August 2011 at the age of ninety-eight, someone I had never heard of, and that led me to a list of ten spies who are not household names.

1)  Nancy Wake:  Flirted her way through checkpoints and karate chopped a Nazi guard to death.

This is the female spy mentioned above who survived her World War II spy assignments and lived to be ninety-eight years old. In the 1930s, a young Australian journalist went to Germany to report on the rise of fascism and interview Hitler. The atrocities she witnessed changed her life forever. She settled in France and with the Nazi invasion in 1940 she joined the resistance movement, helping thousands of Jewish refugees and Allied servicemen escape to Spain. In 1943, with the Nazis closing in on her, she escaped to Spain and later to Britain where she convinced agents to train her as a spy and guerilla operative. In 1944 she parachuted into France leading a band of seven thousand resistance fighters where she coordinated guerilla activities prior to D-Day. She rose to the top of the Gestapo's most wanted list. She killed a German guard with one karate chop to his neck, executed a female German spy, shot her way through roadblocks, and biked seventy hours through enemy held territory to deliver radio codes for the Allies.

2)  Boris Yuzhin:  Used a camera concealed in a cigarette lighter to leak KGB secrets to the FBI.

In July 1975, the KGB sent Boris to San Francisco where he posed as a visiting scholar and later as a news reporter. His indoctrination said America was the enemy, but to his surprise he felt right at home and eventually grew to question his own country's policies. By 1978 he had become a double agent, supplying information about KGB operations in California to the FBI. His career as a double agent ended in 1986 when Aldrich Ames, the infamous CIA officer who had been spying for the Soviets, identified Boris which landed him in a Siberian prison for six years at a time when Soviet traitors were almost always executed.  Boris is still alive and living in Santa Rosa, California, north of San Francisco.

3)  Marthe Cnockaert:  Healed Germans to help the British during World War I.

In 1914, German troops destroyed the small Belgian village where twenty-two year old Marthe lived. Although sympathetic to the Allies, she was desperate for work to support her family. She found a job in a makeshift hospital for wounded German soldiers and earned the German Iron Cross for her medical services. A neighbor approached her about spying for the British, a role she soon embraced. For two years she coaxed secrets from German officers, arranged the murder of a German who tried to recruit her as a German spy, blew up a German ammunitions depot, directed airplane strikes and helped POWs escape. She was eventually discovered and imprisoned for two years. She was later honored by Winston Churchill and wrote a book about her wartime experiences.

4)  Eugene Bullard:  Spied on Nazi officers who visited his Paris nightclub.

Eugene Jacques Bullard was born in Columbus, Georgia, in 1894.  As a teenager, he stowed away to Europe and supported himself as a prize fighter and interpreter. With the start of World War I, he joined the French army and became the world's first black fighter pilot. He later married the daughter of a French countess, opened a nightclub in Paris, and socialized with Josephine Baker, Louis Armstrong, and Ernest Hemingway. He served his adoptive country again in World War II when he joined the French resistance movement. He used his fluency in German to spy on Nazis who frequented his nightclub. The Germans spoke freely in front of him, believing that nonwhites were incapable of understanding their language. He helped defend the city of Orleans, sustained serious injuries, and was medically evacuated to the U.S. along with his two daughters. While a hero in France, in the U.S. he finally found work as an elevator operator. He died in 1961 at the age of sixty-seven, just two years after France named him a Knight of the Legion of Honor.

5)  Anna Smith Strong:  Used laundry to arrange clandestine meetings during the American Revolution.

In 1778, George Washington instructed a young cavalry officer named Benjamin Tallmadge to establish a spy network to operate behind enemy lines on New York's Long Island. His spy group, the Culper Spy Ring, became the war's most effective spy operation. Anna Smith Strong became a vital link between agents on Long Island and Washington's headquarters in Connecticut. She would hang specific pieces of laundry on her clothes line at certain times to send messages and arrange meetings according to a coded system. [I saw a documentary about Tallmadge and the Culper Spy Ring—very interesting stuff. Also interesting that a man whose reputation was one of honesty—I cannot tell a lie, I chopped down the cherry tree—was responsible for the formation of our first spy operation.]

6)  Juan Pujol Garcia:  Helped ensure the Allies success on D-Day.

Juan Garcia, a Spanish businessman, earned the trust of high ranking Nazi officials who knew him by the code name Arabel. They were paying him to run an elaborate spy network which included a Dutch airline steward, a British censor for the Ministry of Information and a U.S. soldier in England, all of whom were gathering information that Garcia would transmit to Berlin. In reality, Garcia was a British double agent named Garbo who supplied the Germans with secrets designed to distract them from genuine military plans. June 9, 1944, was Garcia's most important moment of distraction. He sent his German contacts an urgent message saying the D-Day landings were only a diversion, that the real invasion would be at Pas de Calais. As a result, Hitler kept his best units stationed in the Calais area instead of sending them to Normandy as backup where the Allies were turning the tide of the war. [I saw a documentary about this man that was absolutely fascinating. He had the Nazi brass so totally believing his spy efforts that when he reported one of his fictitious spy ring members had died, the Nazis actually sent money for the fictitious spy's fictitious widow.]

7)  Elizabeth Van Lew:  Led a spy ring for the Union during the U.S. Civil War.

Even though Elizabeth was raised in a wealthy slave-holding family in Richmond, Virginia, she developed strong anti-slavery sympathies after attending a Quaker school in Philadelphia.  With the advent of the Civil War, she went on her own to visit captured Union solders, helping some escape and gathering information from prisoners and guards about Confederate strategy. In 1863, Union General Benjamin Butler recruited her as a spy and she soon became head of an entire spy network based in Richmond. She sent coded messages using invisible ink and hiding them in hollowed-out eggs or vegetables. In 1865 when Richmond fell to the Union forces, she flew the Stars and Stripes above her home.

8)  John Scobell:  Posed as a slave to gather information behind Confederate lines during the U.S. Civil War.

A former slave from Mississippi, John worked for Allan Pinkerton as an undercover officer. Pinkerton headed the Union intelligence services [prior to starting the famous Pinkerton detective agency].  John completed many top-secret missions, often playing the part of a cook, field hand, or butler. He also persuaded members of a clandestine slave organization to act as couriers and report on local conditions. Pinkerton specifically mentioned John in his memoirs, describing an incident when John was pretending to be the servant of a female Union operative. When Confederate agents opened fire on them, he single-handedly fought off the Confederates, killing several and saving the female operative's life and his own.

9)  Yehudit Nessyahu:  Helped bring Holocaust mastermind Adolf Eichmann to justice.

Yehudit was born in Holland in 1925 and moved to Israel as a young girl. In the 1950s she participated in a covert operation to smuggle Jews out of Morocco using the persona of a wealthy and eccentric Dutch transplant. In the 1960s she was the only woman on the legendary Mossad team responsible for capturing Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann who was living in Argentina under a false name. She died in 2003.

10)  James Rivington:  Printed a loyalist newspaper but secretly spied for George Washington during the Revolutionary War.

An English bookseller and publisher who relocated to New York's Wall Street after his London business failed. Was he a staunch backer of the British Crown or the American Revolution's most unlikely supporter? With the escalation of tensions between the colonists and the British monarchy, he denounced the rebels in his newspaper, Rivington's Gazette. In 1775, his articles incited a mob of revolutionaries to burn his house and destroy his press. Two years later he returned from a stay in England. According to recent scholarly discoveries, he had switched sides and worked as a spy for the revolutionaries. A coffeehouse located next to his rebuilt shop was a meeting place for high-ranking British officers. Documents from the period suggest the recent convert printer shared their secrets directly with George Washington.

8 WORST AMERICAN TRAITORS

Betraying the United States government is usually a bad idea, especially if you're an American Citizen. Sometimes we've been too hard on people who were forced at gunpoint to assist the enemy such as the case of Tokyo Rose, a Japanese American woman visiting a relative in Japan and trapped there when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. It was later shown that she had been forced to broadcast propaganda for Japan. But on the other hand, sometimes we've been too soft on willing collaborators. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were executed for providing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union yet others who did the same thing at the same time didn't even do prison time even though their activities were uncovered.

Here are eight Americans who let our side down, ranging from the Revolutionary War to present times.

8) BENEDICT ARNOLD

When your name becomes synonymous with the word "traitor" you can usually expect to have it pop up on a fair number of lists of famous traitors. You can also usually expect to have been executed by angry patriots long before you get to read any of these lists, but in Benedict Arnold's case, he was able to die peacefully in Canada at a safe distance from everyone who wanted to kill him. Arnold was actually on track to become an American hero of the Revolutionary War, scoring important victories at Fort Ticonderoga and Saratoga and often leading his men from the front lines. Unfortunately for him, his short temper and lack of understanding about the ins and outs of politics made him some powerful enemies and few friends in the political structure of the Continental Army. He was also deep in debt after paying for much of his soldiers' equipment out of his own pocket, so when he found himself relegated to military command of Philadelphia he developed contacts among Loyalist colonists and eventually started selling crucial bits of intelligence to the British spy service. When his handler was captured, Benedict Arnold officially joined the British Army as a brigadier general, leading several attacks on targets in New York before settling down in Canada, where he played a minor role in British military intrigues and shipping but was mostly remembered for being an incredibly bitter and unpleasant man. A foot note to his downfall has more recently come to light with the theory that it was his young and ambitious wife who actually led him into the world of espionage and ultimate downfall.

7) ALDRICH AMES

The most damaging mole in CIA history and believed to be the most damaging spy in American history in general (until the discovery of the FBI's Robert Hanssen several years later), Aldrich Ames first started working for the Russians in 1985. Nine years later, the CIA noticed that one of their analysts was a $60,000 per year desk worker who owned a $50,000 Jaguar and a $540,000 house, both of which he had paid for in cash, and credit card debt with a minimum monthly payment of more than his monthly salary. They belatedly realized that these just might be signs of a man with more than one source of income. After making sure that Ames hadn't recently inherited a fortune from some previously unknown relative, the CIA arrested him. He casually admitted that he had sold the Soviets information that had resulted in the exposure of over a hundred Western agents behind the Iron Curtain, several of whom had been executed based on his information. Ames pleaded guilty to dodge the death penalty and the American intelligence apparatus breathed a sigh of relief knowing that their worst leak had successfully been patched up…but that feeling of relief wouldn't last long.

6) ROBERT HANSSEN

A computer and wiretapping expert, Robert Hanssen rose to the top levels of the FBI hierarchy even though he was actively spying for the Soviet and Russian Federation governments for all but the first three years of his career. His work compromised hundreds of American counter-espionage investigations and earned him over $1.4 million from grateful KGB and GRU agents. Using a system of code names and dead drops to exchange information and cash, Hanssen maintained a much lower profile than Ames and would have never been caught if his brother-in-law (also an FBI agent) hadn't spotted a gigantic stack of money on Hanssen's nightstand during a visit. When arrested in 2001 after twenty-two years as a double agent, Hanssen is reported to have said, "What took you so long?"

5) EZRA POUND

American expatriate Ezra Pound was a revolutionary poet and literary critic, a personal friend to nearly all the American and British writers of the time, and a proud and committed fascist. Pound blamed the international banking system for World War I, which disillusioned and embittered him, and he felt that the experimental system of "social credit" that was needed to replace the banks could only be implemented by a fascist government. After moving to Italy and meeting Mussolini, Pound began working less on his poetry and more on his economic and social lectures and pamphlets, where he increasingly replaced the term "international banking" with "international Jewry" and his articles or letters would end with the salutation, "Heil Hitler." During the invasion of Italy in World War II, Pound convinced the government of Rome to allow him to make propaganda broadcasts to American troops, which were of dubious value as his voice was described as "like the sound of a hornet stuck in a jar" and there were few poetry aficionados in the army at the time to know who he was. Arrested in 1945 by partisan troops, Pound endured harsh conditions in an American prison camp outside Pisa, an experience that allegedly drove him insane (or more than he already was, according to some) and left him unfit to stand trial. After his release from a Pennsylvania mental asylum in 1958, Pound returned to Italy to live out the rest of his days in bitterness and failing health.

4) FRITZ JULIUS KUHN

Born in Germany but living and working in America since 1928, Fritz Kuhn was the man in charge of the infamous U.S. Nazi group, the German-American Bund. An enthusiastic supporter of Hitler's ideas on racial purity and the fascist system, Kuhn was also a fan of Hitler's political style. Bund gatherings were known for dramatic outbursts of violence in a way America had never seen before. Ironically, Hitler wasn't much of a fan of Kuhn and his makeshift Nazi party—the dictator wanted Nazi influence in America to be powerful, but not so powerful that it might backfire and draw America into the war. The Bund's front-page antics weren't falling in line with that goal. Eventually, Kuhn was taken down by a New York City tax investigation that showed he had embezzled $14,000 from his own organization. When he emerged from that jail sentence, he was immediately arrested for being an enemy agent. Kuhn was released at the war's end and returned to Germany a bitter, broken man.

3) AMERICAN WAFFEN-SS VOLUNTEERS

One of the stranger details about Germany's Nazi-run Schutzstaffel (more commonly known as the SS) was that it formed a number of volunteer and propaganda divisions of decidedly non-German and sometimes even non-Aryan ethnicities. For years there were rumors of a so-called "George Washington Brigade" made up entirely of renegade Americans. The GWB turned out to be a myth, but it was a myth reinforced by the occasional discovery of SS troops with American accents or names, who often turned out to be not just naturalized citizens but born on American soil. It's impossible to know for sure how many Americans fought for the Nazis as records are unavailable after May of 1940.

2) MARTIN JAMES MONTI

One particularly noteworthy American SS was Army Air Force pilot Martin James Monti, who in October of 1944 hitchhiked and transferred his way to an Italian airbase, stole a fast reconnaissance plane and promptly flew it north into Axis hands to defect. Searching around for something to do, Monti made a few propaganda broadcasts under the name Martine Wiehaupt, but his radio voice was lacking and he eventually became an SS sergeant in the closing weeks of the war. Nobody is quite sure of Monti's motivation or why he chose to defect to a country that was clearly losing the war. He served a brief jail sentence before being released back into the Army, where he kept a low profile and managed to make sergeant by 1948 before the FBI caught up with him. He served the next twenty-five years in prison.

1) AARON BURR

Burr was vice president to Thomas Jefferson, back when the president and the vice president tended to be from opposing political parties. They spent a lot of time yelling at each other. He who shot Alexander Hamilton in that famous duel. What most school history lessons don't really cover is that Burr became so unpopular after essentially murdering his political opponent that he decided his career was over unless he did something really dramatic. He formulated a plan to take control of the Texas and Louisiana Territories with groups of armed farmers and the help of sympathetic army officers and possibly even invade either Mexico or Washington, D.C. if he could talk Spain into the deal. Unfortunately for Burr, Jefferson had been keeping an eye on his former vice president, and various state district attorneys were busy collecting evidence of the so-called Burr Conspiracy.

The hammer finally dropped after Burr's co-conspirator, General James Wilkinson, sent Congress the deciphered text of a letter Burr had written of a planned attack on several important Mississippi River towns. Upon seeing his treasonous letter published in full in a New Orleans newspaper including a reward for his capture, Burr abandoned his tiny army and attempted to hide in the vast marshes of the Louisiana Territory. Aaron Burr was eventually captured by troops from Fort Stoddard and delivered to Richmond, Virginia for his trial at the Supreme Court. Despite Jefferson's desire to have Burr executed, a stubborn Chief Justice John Marshall eventually threw the case out based on technicalities. The case became one of the earliest tests of Constitutional law and the limiting of the executive branch. Burr briefly exiled himself to Europe, but returned later under an assumed name to try and start anew. True to form, he was pestering various governments with plans to conquer Mexico and installing himself as governor, even under his new identity. He died hounded by creditors from both his old life and the new one.

11 FAMOUS FEMALE SPIES FROM HISTORY

Mata Hari

My blog this week is about female spies from the Civil War, World War I and World War II.  And four of them were genuine celebrities—three of them were famous at the time and one became famous later. They were popular and well known for something other than being spies.

So, without further ado and in no particular order, here's this week's list of eleven female spies.

11)  Violette Szabo—World War II

Ever heard of the video game Velvet Assassin?  The game was inspired by her story as a Special Operations agent.  Born in France, she and her family moved to London where she married a French soldier. When he was killed in battle two years later, she joined the service.  As a secret agent, she parachuted into France and planned the sabotage of a railroad, disrupted enemy communication, and passed along strategic information.  She was captured by the Nazis, tortured, and sent to a concentration camp where she was executed at the age of only twenty-three.  Her story became a book and movie titled Carve Her Name With Pride.

10)  Stephanie von Hohenlohe—World War II

She managed to insert herself into high society wherever she went.  An affair with a member of the Austrian royal family resulted in her pregnancy.  She was quickly married off to a minor German nobleman.  After the marriage ended, she became a fixture in the London social scene and later was a go-between for the Nazi regime and high-placed sympathizers in England.  She was often called upon to offer advice and services to Hitler in spite of the fact that she was Jewish, a fact Hitler knew.  She followed a lover to the U.S. where she was considered so dangerous that she was detained until the end of World War II.

9)  Noor Inayat Khan—World War II

Known by the code name Madeleine, Russian-born of Indian and American descent, she served as a radio operator in the French resistance.  When the Nazis raided her communication headquarters, she avoided detection but was later betrayed and interrogated.  She was transferred to Dachau where she was killed at age thirty.  A book about her life, Spy Princess, is being developed into a movie.

8)  Belle Boyd—U.S. Civil War

Known as Cleopatra of the Secession, she ran a hotel in Virginia.  As a girl she began working to defend the South, charming secrets out of Union soldiers stationed near the hotel then delivering them to Confederate officials.  Arrested, then freed, she eventually ended up traveling around the country telling her stories of espionage.

7)  Virginia Hall—World War II

Educated at Harvard and Columbia with a goal of joining the Foreign Service…until a shooting accident on a hunting trip resulted in a partial amputation on her leg and a limp when wearing her prosthesis.  She signed up for the British Special Ops and later for the U.S. Office of Strategic Services (the predecessor of the CIA).  She discovered and passed along important military information and trained resistance fighters.  On one mission she was forced to escape to Spain in winter through the mountains on foot.  A book about her was released in 2008, The Wolves at the Door: The True Story of America's Greatest Female Spy.

6)  Krystyna Skarbek—World War II

After the Nazi's invaded her native Poland, she volunteered for British Special Operations.  Under the name of Christine Granville, using her expertise as a skier, she transported information between Poland and Hungary through the mountains.  And she could be considered the original Bond girl—Ian Fleming is said to have based several of his femme fatales on her.  After retiring from Special Ops, she worked on a cruise ship and was killed in 1952 by a coworker whose advances she had rejected.

5)  Marlene Dietrich (movie star)—World War II

German born, she became a U.S. citizen in 1939.  She volunteered for the OSS and, in addition to entertaining troops on the front lines as did many celebrities, she also broadcast nostalgic songs as propaganda to German troops who were battle weary.  She was awarded the Medal of Freedom.

4)  Josephine Baker (nightclub singer/dancer)—World War II

From St. Louis, Missouri, she moved to France to escape the racial prejudice she had been subjected to in the U.S.  She became a French citizen.  As a popular and much loved entertainer in France, she used her celebrity working for the French resistance.  The Nazis were so dazzled by her that they allowed her freedom of movement without thinking to check her sheet music where French resistance secrets were written in invisible ink.  She helped to break down countless barriers for African-American women in her adopted country and also in the U.S. [she was an important figure in the U.S. civil rights movement].

3)  Julia McWilliams Child (TV's The French Chef)—World War II

She wanted to join the WACs or the WAVES but was turned down because of her 6'2" height.  So, she went to work for the OSS in research and development at their Washington, DC, headquarters.  She helped develop a workable shark repellent used by downed flight crews and later for the U.S. space missions with water landings.  She also supervised an OSS facility in China.  She handled countless top secret documents prior to becoming famous as television's gourmet cook.

2)  Hedy Lamarr (movie star)—World War II

Born in Vienna, Austria, she made her film debut in 1933's Ecstasy.  She fled the approaching storm clouds of war in Europe, landing a contract with MGM studios.  But she was more than just a pretty face and an actress.  She was also a brilliant mathematician with a unique ability in problem solving. In addition to using her celebrity to raise millions of dollars in war bonds, she was an inventor.  She teamed with Hollywood composer George Antheil and invented a frequency hopping method for steering a torpedo. Today, her invention is the basis for frequency hopping used for wireless phones in our homes, GPS, and most military communication systems.

And probably the most famous (or infamous) female spy of all time:

1)  Mata Hari—World War I

A spy legend so evocative that the mere mention of the name says it all.  James Bond certainly falls into that category, but he's a fictional character.  Mata Hari was real.  Born in the Netherlands as Margaretha Geertruida Zelle.  She responded to a newspaper ad seeking a wife, married an older man, and moved to Indonesia.  An unhappy marriage and a fascination with the local culture turned her into a performer named Mata Hari.  After her return to Europe, she became a sensation in Paris with her exotic dancing, skimpy costumes and sexy demeanor…wildly popular with some and scandalous with others.  During World War I she traveled freely throughout Europe and was ultimately accused of being a German spy.  She was arrested and executed by a French firing squad in 1917.  She claimed she was spying for the French, not the Germans.  Neither accusation (French spy or German spy) was ever conclusively proven but current theory says she was working for the French who decided she had become a liability.

Jack The Ripper Finally Identified!

After all these years of speculation about his true identity, it seems that Jack The Ripper finally has a name.

It will be 132 years this November since the world's most famous—perhaps infamous is a more appropriate word—serial killer murdered and mutilated his fifth and final victim. Mary Kelly was only 25 years old when her body was discovered on November 9, 1888, in London's East End Whitechapel neighborhood.

For over a century theories about his identity ran rampant, including such candidates as a member of the royal family, a prominent surgeon, a famous artist, an American doctor, and a Polish immigrant living in the neighborhood. One case was even made for Jack The Ripper being a woman. I had always thought the Polish immigrant was Jack The Ripper. However, after seeing a documentary about the search for Jack The Ripper's true identity, I started leaning toward the American doctor as the culprit. Francis Tumblety was an Irish-born American medical quack who earned a small fortune posing as an East Indian herb doctor throughout the United States and Canada. He was in England at the time of the murders and when he returned to the U.S., the London murders stopped and a similar series of murder started in the U.S.

I find it interesting that most images of Jack The Ripper, whether drawings from that time or modern depictions, show him dressed in formal gentleman's attire including a cape and top hat. A man dressed like that on the streets of Whitechapel at night in 1888 would definitely have stood out to anyone living in the area as someone who didn't belong there.

Thanks to modern forensic science, a DNA match shows that Jack The Ripper is Aaron Kozminski, a Polish Jew who fled to London in the 1880s. He died from gangrene at the age of 53 while incarcerated in Leavesden Asylum. Kozminski was one of the names on the list of strong suspects from the time of the murders, but the police never had enough evidence to arrest him.

Russell Edwards, author of Naming Jack The Ripper (published in 2014), bought a shawl in 2007 at an auction. Even though the shawl came without provenance, he was told that it belonged to Catherine Eddowes, the Ripper's fourth victim, and had been found near her body. After the auction, he obtained a letter from the previous owner claiming his ancestor had been a police officer who was present at the murder scene and had taken the shawl.

Edwards handed the shawl over to Dr. Jari Louhelainen, a world-renowned expert in analyzing genetic evidence from historical crime scenes. He tracked down a descendant of Catherine Eddowes and a British descendant of Kozminski's sister, both of whom agreed to provide DNA. With a DNA match from the samples, the doctor stated that Aaron Kozminski was Jack The Ripper.

The evidence has not yet been independently verified.

FATED ENCOUNTER—release date Monday, April 20, 2020

My next release, available Monday April 20, is FATED ENCOUNTER, an adult romance novella that's the latest addition to my Encounter books published by The Wild Rose Press. The book is set in Seattle, Washington, and on Bainbridge Island across the bay from Seattle. It tells the story of Shaina Thomas, a graphic artist/illustrator from Phoenix, Arizona, and Brody Danvers, an entrepreneur who owns a radio station and an upscale restaurant in Seattle.

A chance encounter a year ago set fate on a course for the future

G-Excerpt #1:

“You don’t need to cover for me, Jeannie. Totally my fault.” A spontaneous laugh accompanied the man’s words. “Time got away from me. I came sneaking in the back door hoping for an unobtrusive arrival.”

The smooth masculine voice sent a rush of excitement darting through Shaina’s body. Something familiar about it, something stuck in the back of her mind…something from the past. She turned to see who possessed the mesmerizing sound.

First surprise, then confusion hit Shaina’s senses. Just like the sound of his voice, he looked very familiar, but from where? How could she not remember the identity of Mr. Incredibly Sexy and Desirable, all six feet one inch of him with his thick light brown hair and piercing blue eyes? A dynamic man who appeared to be maybe four or five years older than her thirty-two years? She had just moved to Seattle and didn’t know anyone. Where would she have encountered this very handsome and enticing man?

As soon as he looked in her direction, his face lit up. “Shaina Thomas? Is that you?”

“Yes…” She searched her mind for any hint to his identity. He obviously remembered her, which confirmed they had met, but it only increased her bewilderment. Where and when?

He flashed a devastatingly sexy smile as he held out his hand toward her. “What an unexpected pleasure running into you. It’s been…what—” He wrinkled his brow in a moment of concentration—“a little over a year ago that we met? The party at Kent and Patti Blanchard’s house.” He gave her a teasing grin. “You were with a date and left before I had a chance to get you alone and ask you to have dinner with me, followed by a totally indecent proposition.”

“Yes…” The memory suddenly popped into her mind. “I remember now.” She accepted his offered handshake and extended a friendly smile. His touch sent an instant arc of desire coursing through her veins. No man had ever sparked such an immediate and intense response in her. Not until now.

A sparkle darted through his eyes. Had he experienced the same jolt of excitement as a result of the physical contact? “You’re Brody…” She visualized the party scene where they had met but couldn’t recall his last name.

“Danvers…Brody Danvers.” He continued to clasp her hand, his touch playing havoc with her senses as he steered her away from the front door and out of the main flow of customers coming and going. “Would it be presumptuous of me to hope that your presence here means you moved to Seattle?” As he released her hand, he took a blatantly obvious close look at her ring finger. “And you’re unattached?”

A bit of a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. Very straight forward, not even a pretense at trying to be subtle. I’m not sure if he’s arrogant or a breath of fresh air. “Guilty. I just moved to Seattle a week ago and will be starting my new job in another week. I’m still unpacking and getting settled into my new apartment. I saw the information for the radio station's game weekend and immediately signed up. I love games. I thought this might be a good way to meet people. I understand the pre-game social get together always takes place at this restaurant.”

“Yes, upstairs in the banquet room. I coordinate the activities—decide what the game will be, see that newcomers are made welcome and introduced to the other participants, keep everything on track, organized, and under control…things like that.”

She won't be owned by any man. He's determined to make her his.

Blurb:

Seattle restaurant owner and entrepreneur Brody Danvers met the woman of his dreams a year ago at a party in Phoenix…her and her fiancé. When a chance encounter brings her—minus a ring on her finger—back into his life, he’ll do whatever it takes to keep her there.

Graphic artist Shaina Thomas has moved from Phoenix to Seattle to get away from a controlling ex-fiancé who refuses to accept the end of their relationship. Seeing the man she’d nicknamed Mr. Incredibly Sexy and Desirable and not forgotten is an unexpected but complicated surprise. She’s seriously attracted to him, but he seems to possess the same controlling traits as her ex. And then there’s the beautiful restaurant hostess who has her sights set on him…

FATED ENCOUNTER, an adult romance novella by Samantha Gentry from The Wild Rose Press.  www.thewildrosepress.com  

Available in ebook at:

Amazon   www.amazon.com/Fated-Encounter-Samantha-Gentry-ebook/dp/B0867J9YJJ

And other online vendors.

Excerpts and other information available on my website:  www.samanthagentry.com 

FATED ENCOUNTER—A Character Interview with Shaina and Brody

FATED ENCOUNTER by Samantha Gentry is an adult romance novella from The Wild Rose Press scheduled for release Monday, April 20, 2020.

A chance encounter a year ago set fate on a course for the future

Let me introduce you to Shaina Thomas and Brody Danvers. Their story is one of fate stepping in to help two people find true love and happiness. How a one time chance meeting from a year ago set the stage for a lifetime.

Good morning Shaina and Brody. I know you have busy schedules. I appreciate you taking the time to be here today and share your story with my readers.

Shaina:  It's our pleasure, thanks for inviting us.

Brody:  (loving glance toward Shaina as he squeezes her hand). I'm always happy to talk about this lovely lady.

My first question is where and when did the two of you meet? Which one of you would like to go first? Brody…Shaina…

Brody: I'll take that. It was a little over a year ago. I was in Phoenix on business checking out a radio station for sale. The attorney negotiating for the station owner invited me to a party at his house that evening—a party attended by Shaina…and her fiancé. The moment I laid eyes on her, I was instantly captivated. I had the opportunity of chatting with her for a little bit and found her intelligent and very personable. (slight frown wrinkles his brow) Her fiancé, however, was a different story. I simply didn't understand how this intelligent, lovely lady could be engaged to such a disagreeable and unlikable man.

Shaina: (laughs) I think I'd better jump in here. In my defense, I did call off the engagement about three months later. As soon as Jerry and I became engaged, he instantly changed. It was like flipping a switch that changed the man I thought I knew into someone I didn't recognize—a controlling personality, an objectionable person. He started making my decisions for me, telling me where I could and couldn't go, determining who my friends should be—things I found totally unacceptable. After three months of trying to figure out what happened and telling him I objected to his behavior, I broke off the engagement. Unfortunately, his attempts at controlling me continued. He refused to accept that I didn't want to see him. I didn't feel physically threatened and didn't see any reason for a restraining order. I finally decided I had no choice but to move away from Phoenix. I picked Seattle because it was about fifteen hundred miles away from Phoenix and totally different from the desert where I had lived all my life.

So, from the night of the party in Phoenix, we fast forward one year to an evening in Seattle.

Brody:  A night that truly changed my life for all time. It started out as a typical Friday evening at my restaurant, with the social get together for the participants in the radio station's monthly game weekend.

Game weekend?

Brody:  Once a month my radio station hosts a game weekend. Participation is limited to the first 100 people who sign up via the website. The weekend activity can be board games such as Clue® or Monopoly® with several game tables set up. It could be a scavenger hunt. Or sometimes we do a movie marathon with a theme, either a genre of movie or a specific star. Friday evening is the happy hour social gathering of the participants where everyone has an opportunity to meet and greet. Saturday is the actual game event and then Sunday evening is an informal awards ceremony for the winner.

Actually, that sounds like it would be a fun weekend. How long has your radio station been doing this?

Brody:  I've been conducting the monthly weekend game for about two years.

You do this personally?

Brody:  Yep…it's something I enjoy. I'm currently considering expanding it to twice a month. The game weekend has become more and more popular, lots of people trying to register to play after the limit has been reached. Twice a month will allow more people to participate. I'll probably work some of the radio station's on-air personalities into a rotation of hosting.

Shaina:  It was the game weekend that grabbed my attention as soon as I moved to Seattle. I hadn't even finished unpacking my belongings in my new apartment yet. I immediately signed up. I thought it would be a great way to meet people with whom I would instantly have something in common.

And that's where the two of you ran into each other a year later?

Shaina:  Exactly. The moment I saw him at the restaurant, I knew I had met him before but couldn't figure out where it was, especially considering Seattle was new to me.

Brody:  I knew exactly who she was the moment I saw her. Ever since that evening in Phoenix, she was never very far from my thoughts. I also knew I wanted a true relationship with her. (a soft chuckle escapes his throat) It was a totally off the wall thought. I wasn't even sure exactly where it came from, but I knew it was real. It was just a matter of convincing her.

Shaina:  And to that end, he almost destroyed any possibility before it got started.

What do you mean by that?

Shaina:  (shoots quick sideway glance toward Brody including a tender smile) I have to admit that it was probably my fault…at least more my fault than his. On the surface, he seems to be the perfect guy—intelligent, charming, successful, well established, attentive…I mean, he actually listened to what I was saying rather than simply waiting for his turn to talk. He had all the qualities of that elusive Mr. Right. Except…

Brody:  Except I didn't understand what I said or did that occasionally elicited a flash of anger from her. It didn't last long, but the dynamic kept repeating, and I couldn’t figure out why. The only thing I knew for sure—she was absolutely worth the effort to figure out what was going on, what was causing her confusing behavior.

Shaina, would you care to share with us what was behind this…uh…unusual behavior?

Shaina:  Well, let's just say that not all of the baggage I brought from Phoenix to Seattle was tangible belongings. It included what was apparently some emotional baggage as well.

Brody:  Compounded by the evening her ex-fiancé showed up at her door—

Shaina:  Not to be confused with the afternoon his restaurant hostess—

Ah Ha—now we're getting into the heart of the matter. So, what happened?

Brody:  I can't give away all the secrets or reveal all the obstacles we encountered. I'm afraid you'll need to read the book.

How about you, Shaina. Do you have anything you'd like to contribute?

Shaina:  Only what Brody said—you'll need to read the book.

That's it? If I want to know anything else, I need to read the book?

Brody:  Yep.

Shaina:  (laughs) You'll have to read the book.

Well…apparently I have a book to buy. Thank you, Shaina and Brody, for spending some time with us.

BLURB:

Seattle restaurant owner and entrepreneur Brody Danvers met the woman of his dreams a year ago at a party in Phoenix…her and her fiancé. When a chance encounter brings her—minus a ring on her finger—back into his life, he'll do whatever it takes to keep her there.

Graphic artist Shaina Thomas has moved from Phoenix to Seattle to get away from a controlling ex-fiancé who refuses to accept the end of their relationship. Seeing the man she'd nicknamed Mr. Incredibly Sexy and Desirable and not forgotten is an unexpected but complicated surprise. She's seriously attracted to him, but he seems to possess the same controlling traits as her ex. And then there's the beautiful restaurant hostess who has her sights set on him…

PG-Excerpt #3:

“Do you need to rush away? I thought we could have a drink or get something to eat and catch up.”

She glanced at her watch, then out the window at the rain. “Well…”

“Good.” He immediately took control as he steered her toward the door. “We’ll find a quiet corner downstairs and grab something to eat. This, however, does not count as that dinner we’re going to share”—he lowered his voice to a sexy whisper—“although it could involve that totally indecent proposition I mentioned.”

Shaina instantly bristled. She stopped walking and stood her ground. How dare he make her decisions for her, tell her where she’s going and what she should be doing. He didn’t even do her the courtesy of asking if she’d like to have something to eat.

“You, uh, seem a little pushy. Did it ever occur to you that I might not be hungry?” She tried to keep the level of irritation out of her voice but without much success. Her break-up with Jerry happened nine months ago, long enough that it shouldn’t continue to be an issue with her, but that logical thought didn’t stop the intrusion of the emotional baggage attached to her ill-fated engagement.

A hint of confusion darted across his face. “Excuse me?” He shot her a curious look. “It certainly wasn’t my intention to offend you. Perhaps we could have dinner some other time.”

An instant hint of guilt jolted her thoughts.

His brow lifted as he tilted his head to one side, a look bordering on something akin to a challenge. “When do you think you might be hungry?”

She stood in stunned silence for a moment, not sure what to say or do.

FATED ENCOUNTER, an adult romance novella by Samantha Gentry from The Wild Rose Press.  www.thewildrosepress.com  

Available in ebook at:

Amazon   www.amazon.com/Fated-Encounter-Samantha-Gentry-ebook/dp/B0867J9YJJ

And other online vendors.

Excerpts and other information available on my website:  www.samanthagentry.com  

9 DANGEROUS SCIENTIFIC WORK LOCATIONS

When you hear the word 'scientist,' it usually conjures an image of a sterile room with a person in a white lab coat surrounded by test tubes, Bunsen burners, and beakers with bubbling lab experiments. But in reality, there are many scientists working in various fields of discovery whose 'lab' is far removed from that stereotypical image--scientists who do their work in the field. I read an article about scientists who work on location rather than in a lab…the ones whose labs are out there, in dangerous places and situations where most of us would never go.

So, in no particular order, here are nine of these dangerous scientific work locations.

1)  Inside Volcanoes

When you think of geologists your first thought is usually the study of rocks and various landforms, something safe and basically stable. But for the branch of this particular science known as volcanology, things are definitely less stable and a certainly a little hotter. Having been to Mt. St. Helens, Washington, not long after the explosive eruption and viewing the devastation first hand, I'm very familiar with the story of David Johnston, the thirty-year-old volcanologist who was on duty at the time and was one of the fifty-seven people who died in the eruption. Volcanologists study the intense heat and chaos inside active volcanoes, and recently a team of three researchers descended inside the Marum Volcano on Ambrym Island off the coast of Australia to study lava flows inside. Wearing a heat-resistant suit, one of them descended 1200 feet into the volcano’s crater to capture video footage of the lava's movement. Normally, scientists use robotic cameras mounted to small helicopters or drones to do this extremely dangerous work.

2) Tornado Country

The movie Twister gave us a good look at what storm chasers do, and those who live in the part of the U.S. referred to as Tornado Alley see the results of their work on the news when the storm conditions are present that produce tornadoes. Collecting data on storms is a tough process. Getting close to a tornado is risky on a good day, and self-proclaimed storm chasers run that risk all the time. Even with technology such as Doppler radar giving us the overall picture of a severe storm, some scientists claim there is some data that can only be gathered at ground level. One of the most noted tornado researchers, Tim Samaras, routinely drove in front of tornadoes to place cameras and pressure sensors to record the velocities of objects swept up by the storm. Unfortunately, in 2013 Samaras, his son, and another storm chaser died in an Oklahoma tornado.

3) Biosafety Level 4 Labs

All the news these days is about the Coronavirus which has been elevated to the status of a pandemic. Laboratories that deal with germs and diseases that can be dangerous or fatal to humans are given a biosafety rating from one to four. Facilities that deal with Level four are where the really bad stuff happens. One of the most notable is the NIAID (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases) integrated research facility located at Fort Detrick, Maryland (pictured here). The laboratory is housed in a three-story office building—an airtight, pressurized environment restricted to only a select number of researchers. The facility has airlocks that separate it from the outside world and anything that leads outside the building, such as light fixtures or electrical outlets, is sealed in epoxy to prevent even a single germ from escaping. Scientists are given a seven-minute showering with virus-killing chemicals before they leave.

4)  Underwater Caves

The ocean is a massive mystery to humanity, covering the majority of the Earth’s surface. Even though it's part of our planet, we seem to know more about outer space than we do the depths of our oceans. One of the most interesting areas under the ocean's surface are what are known as blue holes, underwater caves that can reach as deep as six hundred feet below sea level. These caves have difficult topography. They vary in size from massive, sprawling caverns to holes barely big enough to admit a human. Diving there can be very dangerous with unpredictable currents. Despite the dangers, scientific rewards are huge with both biological and archaeological finds waiting to be discovered.

5)  Tree Canopies

Forest ecosystems are made up of distinct layers, each with its own climate and variety of plants and animals. It's a simple task to study the layers nearest the ground, but botanists have lots of questions about what's happening up above. And that's where canopy research comes in. Scientists at Humboldt State University climb to the top of trees that can exceed 350 feet in height, anchoring their bodies to the trunk. From that risky perch they can observe the canopy ecosystem…as long as they don't lose their balance. At the top of the trees, researchers have discovered a whole ecosystem of moss, lichens, and even whole new trees and bushes growing from dead stumps.

6)  Amundsen-Scott Station

Originally built by the United States government in 1956, the Amundsen-Scott Station sits squarely on the south pole. With temperatures ranging from minus 13.6 degrees Celsius (minus 56.48 Fahrenheit) on a nice day to minus 82.8 degrees Celsius (minus 181.04 Fahrenheit) when winter is in high gear, it's one of the most inhospitable regions on the planet. Even though blizzards and intense winds are common, astronomers spend months at the station because the six months of total darkness during winter makes Amundsen-Scott a perfect place to observe the night sky. Other researchers study the movements of the Antarctic ice sheet—the station itself moves about thirty-three feet a year as the ice drifts.

7)  Aquarius Lab

Operated by the National Oceanic and Aeronautic Administration, this deep-sea science station comes with a little twist. The human body is only capable of staying underwater for a short period at a time because decompression sickness (commonly referred to as the bends) can cause incredible damage when gas bubbles form and disrupt tissue. Some scientists have long-term research projects that need to happen in deep water, so they do it at the Aquarius Lab. This facility rests on the sea floor outside of Key Largo, Florida at a depth of fifty feet. Researchers spend up to ten days underwater at a time, studying the nearby coral reefs.

8)  Inside Hurricanes

Here’s another meteorological condition where some scientists like to get a little too close. The National Oceanic and Aeronautic Administration employs a number of flight meteorologists who take airplanes into the eyes of hurricanes to gather data on the storm's strength and direction. They use two planes—one is a Gulfstream G-4 that has the easy job of circling the storm's funnel, the second is a smaller propeller plane that actually penetrates the fast-moving wind to fly right to the eye of the storm. In addition to using Doppler radar on the plane's tail, they also release a device called a dropsonde that transmits pressure and humidity data.

9)  Outer Space

And finally…there is literally no environment as hostile to the human body as the vacuum of space. Long-term weightlessness has negative effects on muscle tone, bone density and the immune system. Exposure to radiation in low-earth orbit comes at levels ten times higher than the normal dose on the Earth's surface. And there's also the fact that outer space doesn't have any of that oxygen stuff our bodies need to function. Experimentation in outer space has led to a number of fascinating discoveries in fields as diverse as astronomy and cancer medicine.

And there you have a sampling of dangerous locations some scientists refer to as their lab (minus those white lab coats, of course).