Burned: A Mind-Bending International Terrorism Psychological Thriller (Kat Beckman Book 3)

This is book three of the Kat Beckman series and sees Kat now married to Van, her former editor and friend, for a year, her son Jack now seven settled at school and their dog Woof, all living under one roof. She has had a few big stories in the past few years and thought she was finally recovering from the difficult choices she had to make to save the life of her mother-in-law, as her husband at the time betrayed her and her son was kidnapped, all to get her to release some secret information about a mission she was imbedded with as a journalist in Afghanistan. Now this blackmail event is about to come back and bite Kat’s future, leaving many more dead in her wake. One of Kat’s previous Army Intelligence contacts, Hannah Carter, calls her out of the blue to travel to Cambridge, England, to investigate a huge fire at Stratham Cathedral, where the US Army had a secret communications hub in its basement, being used by its many secret operatives on foreign soil.

She is to try and access the secret hub, to ensure nothing has been taken, in case the fire was a targeted attack on the Cathedral. There will also be a story in it for her, and she is a trusted but separate entity who should be able to fly under the radar. She eventually gets picked up in London by Henry Nash, who is high up in Scotland Yard’s Counter Terrorism Command (CTC). He accompanies her to Cambridge and they reach it just as news of a further three firefighters lose their lives after parts of the roof collapsed, to add to the two already killed in the dangerous building. There are still hotspots in the ruins, but the fire chief allows them in with some protective equipment and a warning to get out if anything sounds like it might start to fall. Nash calls in his former wife and colleague Bev Chittock, along with her sniffer dog Tyrant, to look and see if any accelerants or explosives were used to start the fire. Her dog Tyrant finds some evidence, not that Henry trusts the nose of a dog, for something he can’t see for himself!

Bev takes some scrapings and puts them into evidence bags, so they can be dropped off at the CTC forensics lab in the morning. Kat manages to find a hymn book with some strange markings inside and a small memory card on the floor of the Cathedral. Kat and Henry book into a hotel and Kat gets the sense of someone watching her! News from home of a dead SEAL linked to the Bluebird mission she went on years ago to kill a local chief and the piece of information she was blackmailed into releasing, soon starts the ball rolling on a series of deaths, some seemingly accidental, but all soon discovered to be assassinations. Of the five names on the list she was forced to reveal, one is dead and another follows shortly after. The locations of the three remaining men are sought, but one has gone missing in the UK. What they don’t know at the time is that he is actually doing a job for the CIA and the local contact he met with in Cambridge, tried to kill him. But Blake Watson was a bit harder to get rid of than the contact knew. He is presumed dead, killed in the fire at the cathedral by those behind this attack and now he is looking for why he was targeted and has gone black to keep himself safe.

Kat now gets to try and find Watson as well as keep herself safe, as she is also one of those on this list. An act of terror has been perpetrated upon UK soil, but the US have a large amount of skin in the mix. It is the men who accompanied Kat on that mission all those years ago, who looked after her and kept her safe, whilst still doing their mission, who have now been targeted and are being killed off, one by one! Kat is feeling all the blame should be on her shoulders for the decision she made to save her mother-in-law’s life and the guilt is beginning to push her back into PTSD and anxiety attacks. If she can’t get a handle on her guilt, she won’t be able to use her brilliant investigative skills to help the stop the killers. When someone who was not on the list Kat gave up, is killed, it throws a bit of a spanner into the works, until that person’s record is fully investigated and they were also involved in the mission, but not in such a direct manner. Someone is leaking information and getting servicemen current or past, killed. Innocents are also being killed, for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The number of bodies is growing, but Kat can’t go home and place her family members in danger.

Kat, Nash and Tyrant travel back to the Pentagon to try and find the leak and to keep the remaining mission members alive, including Kat. She has a very close call, somewhere she should have been safe and only a lucky addition saves her life. She is still a target, until they can figure to who is behind this act of terrorism on both UK and US soil. One of the killers has a massive endgame planned and Kat and the others need to work quickly to save lives. I loved the addition of Trevy, Blake Watson’s commander and a real teddy bear of a character! He is a commander who gets involved in all his team’s lives and will do anything to make sure they are safe and get home in one piece. He acts gruff and is very loud, shouting out orders and taking charge, but definitely someone you want on your side, especially if you’re in trouble. Another dangerous case for Kat to investigate and this time her own name is on a kill list! What started out as a simple trip to the UK, brings back a time she has tried hard to forget! This book is full of action and danger, with a seemingly straight forward fire for Kat to investigate, but so many other parts to it, such as Tyrant and Trevy add another dimension to the read. I look forward to the next book in the series, which seems to get better with each book. I received an ARC copy of this book from BookSprout and I have freely given my own opinion of the book above.

Kat is in it again. She is sent to investigate a fire to see if it destroyed a covert military facility. She thinks it will be an easy assignment. Then there is a terrorist plot, a hit on her, and a missing seal. This book has it all. Intrigue, suspense, and plenty of action. This book not only has it all but is presented in a way that keeps you guessing and on the edge of your chair. The characters are all have depth and are well written. There is not a dull moment trying to guess what will happen and then seeing how it plays out. Great book.

I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout and am voluntarily leaving a review.