Journey by Danielle Steel Page A

learned what little more there was. No one had claimed responsibility for the explosion, but Maddy was sure there was more to the story, even if they did not yet know the details.
    “We got an anonymous call from someone who sounds like they knew what they were talking about,” the producer said to them. “They say the airline knew before they boarded the flight that there had been athreat. They might even have known as early as noon yesterday and they didn't stop it.” Greg and Maddy looked at each other. That was insane. No one could have let something like that happen. It was a U.S. owned airline.
    “Who's your source?” Greg asked with a frown.
    “We don't know. But they knew their stuff. They gave us a lot of fairly traceable details. All we know is that the FAA got some kind of warning yesterday and it sounds like they didn't do anything about it.”
    “Who's tracking that for you?” Greg asked with interest.
    “You are, if you want to. Someone's got a list of people to call. The caller gave us some pretty specific names and directions.” Greg raised an eyebrow as he looked at Maddy.
    “Count me in too,” she said, and they both headed for the assistant producer who supposedly had the list, as she commented on it. “I don't believe that. They don't board planes if there are bomb threats on them.”
    “Maybe they do, and we just don't know it,” Greg muttered.
    They got the list of names to call, and two hours later, they sat on opposite sides of Maddy's desk, staring at each other in disbelief. The story was consistent with everyone they talked to. There had been a warning, but not a specific one. The FAA had been told that an outbound flight out of Kennedy was going to have a bomb on it sometime in the next three days. That was all they were told, and all they knew, and an executive decision had been made at the highest level to tighten security but not to stop their outbound flights unless they foundevidence of a bomb or had further information. But there had been no further warning.
    “That's pretty vague,” Maddy admitted in their defense. “Maybe they just thought it was an idle threat.” But they had also suspected that the threat emanated from one of two terrorist groups, both of which had committed similar atrocities before, so they had reason to believe it.
    “There's more to this than meets the eye,” Greg said suspiciously, “I smell a rat somewhere. Who the hell can we call for a source deeper inside the FAA?” They had exhausted all their resources, and as they sat thinking about it, Maddy had an idea, and got up from her chair with a look of purpose.
    “What've you got?”
    “Maybe nothing. I'll be back in five minutes.” She didn't say anything to Greg, but she went upstairs in the private elevator to see her husband. He had been at the White House the night before, and with a threat of that magnitude, he might have heard something, and she wanted to ask him.
    He was in a meeting when she got there, and she asked his secretary to go in and ask him if he'd come out for a minute, it was important. He followed her out of the conference room with a worried look a minute later.
    “Are you okay?”
    “I'm fine. I'm working on the plane that went down. We got a tip that there was a warning about the bomb in a general way, but the flight went out anyway. They all did. I guess no one knew which flight the bomb might be on.” She explained to him quickly, but he didn't seem too upset or particularly startled.
    “It happens that way sometimes, Mad. There's not a hell of a lot anyone could have done. The warning sounds pretty vague, and could have been unfounded.”
    “We can tell the truth about it now, at least if there's a story here. Did you hear anything last night?” She was looking at him intently. Something in his eyes told her it was not an unfamiliar story to him.
    “Not really,” he said vaguely.
    “That's not a real answer, Jack, this is important. If they were warned,