Final Option (Oregon Files 14)

“MacD Lawless. Rescuer and all-around nice guy. To my friends, at least.”

“How do you know my cover is blown?”

“There was a leak at CIA headquarters. You and two other agents were compromised. That’s all Ah know. But they wouldn’t have sent me if they didn’t think it was serious.”

She threw up her hands in frustration. “All my work down the drain. I don’t believe this.”

“Believe it. Would Langston Overholt have given me your blown code if he didn’t think you were in danger?”

The mention of Overholt’s name seemed to convince her that she had no choice but to abandon her operation.

“Even if we take care of the three people with me,” she said, “there are half a dozen more killers waiting for us at the bottom of the mountain.”

“Ah know. You wouldn’t get twenty feet from the cable car station before they’d stuff you in a van and make you disappear.”

“So, what now?” she asked with a sigh. “You’re going to escort me down on the cable car all by yourself?”

“Not exactly. Have you ever been skydiving?”

“Twice. Both tandem jumps.” She turned to him and cocked her head in suspicion. “Why?”

MacD grinned. “Because we’ve got a flight to catch.”

13

Raven Malloy lingered near a trash can as she nursed the last of her water. The concourse of Maracanã Stadium was still fairly empty, but in a few minutes it would be full of people heading for the restrooms or food stands. Right now, other than the few who couldn’t wait for the break at halftime, the only people nearby were the ever-present police officers patrolling the grounds in teams of two.

She kept an eye on the closest men’s room door. The Mexican assassin had gone in two minutes before, and she was going to intercept him on his way out.

Raven and Linc had planned on waiting until the end of the game to make their move. With seventy-eight thousand fans leaving the stadium all at once, it would have been easy to get lost in the crowd during the exodus. Now with an accelerated timetable, they had to hope the commotion at halftime would provide them with enough of a distraction.

She looked at one of the monitors displaying the game for those people who couldn’t be at their seats. The clock was ticking down, with only three minutes left in stoppage time. López would be leading the other Mexican to the bathroom as soon as the first period ended. If the first guy didn’t exit the men’s until then, the mission would get far more complicated.

Raven hoped her target wasn’t having intestinal problems. Just thinking about the possibility made her gag.

She didn’t have to imagine for long. Seconds later, the Mexican emerged. In her mind, she dubbed him Feo because he was snaggletoothed and had a bushy unibrow. Although she was fluent in Arabic and Farsi, Raven only dabbled in Spanish, but she did know that feo meant “ugly.”

She threw away her water bottle, adjusted her tied-back shirt to ensure that it revealed some of her flat belly, and made a beeline for Feo.

When she reached him, she put her hand on his shoulder and said in English, “I saw you a few minutes ago and thought I just had to meet you.”

He stopped and looked at her in confusion because he didn’t know any English, so she gave him a high-wattage smile. Smiling was not her thing, so it was killing her to put on the act.

He looked her up and down and smiled back at her with Tic Tac–sized teeth that went in all directions. The way his hungry eyes ogled her body made her skin crawl.

Despite her discomfort, she continued the performance, pointing back and forth from him to her before making the universal gesture for taking a picture. She took out her phone to emphasize the point.

The idea of a selfie with a pretty girl—better yet, one who was wearing a jersey of his native national team—was too good for Feo to pass up, just as she’d hoped. He nodded and grinned even wider.

She indicated a spot under one of the team banners hanging in the concourse. It also happened to be only twenty feet from where two policemen were standing and talking to each other.

Feo nodded again and put his hand on the small of her back to guide her over there. She swore if his hand drifted down to her butt, she’d break every one of his fingers no matter how it affected the mission.

However, it did give her an excuse to reciprocate and put her hand on his back. She brushed against the pistol tucked under the waistband. With a casual motion, she lifted Feo’s shirt so it exposed the gun.

When they reached the spot for the selfie, she nestled in close to him, trying not to inhale the ungodly amount of nauseating cologne he was wearing. She held up her phone with one hand while she took a small ampoule of fast-acting superglue out of her pocket with the other.

She pretended to have some trouble taking the picture, but that was only to give her a little extra time. In the hand behind Feo’s back, she flipped the top off the ampoule. She squeezed a few droplets of glue onto the hammer of the pistol before dropping the shirt back over it and throwing the ampoule away.