Last Chance to Die by Noah Boyd (good books for 8th graders TXT) 📕

on,” Langston said, opening the car door. “Did you see the way he was looking around? You could convict him on body language alone.”

“A suggestion, Bill,” Kate said. “I’d let the surveillance people handle this. Nobody is around. If he sees us, especially the way we’re dressed, he’ll make us in a heartbeat.”

Langston looked down at his suit and then at Kalix. “You’re probably right. We’ll wait here.”

The three of them listened in silence as the agents hidden in the woods described every move Dellasanti made. “Subject has crossed the bridge and then stopped.He’s looking around . . . coming around the end of the bridge . . . squatting down . . . reaching under. . . . All units, be advised the subject has the package.He’s put it inside his coat and is starting back across the bridge.”

Langston held up the mike to his mouth. “All units, this is Assistant Director Langston. We’ll take him when he gets to the parking lot.”

“Ten-four.”

Langston opened the door and grabbed a handheld radio. “Let’s go.” Kalix and Kate got out. Langston and Kalix started walking quickly toward the path that Dellasanti had used to enter the park. More agents were pulling into the lot, getting out of their cars, and feeling the excitement of catching a spy red-handed; they hurried to intercept him. Kate leaned back against the car and let her mind drift off, wondering what Vail would do if he were there.

“The girl isn’t going with them!” The two men sat up straight in the same black SUV a hundred yards outside the parking lot, watching the activity through a small spotting scope.

“Patience,” the passenger said, and took the scope. “As the Americans say, ‘There are numerous ways to skin a cat.’ ” He flipped a toggle switch on the radio-transmission box sitting on the seat next to him, and a small red light lit up, indicating that it was armed.

As soon as Dellasanti stepped into the clearing, Langston barked into his portable radio, “Take him!”

The large man sitting in the passenger seat watched carefully through the scope as the agents started to rush at Dellasanti. Calmly he pressed the button.

Kate was still leaning on the car when the package under James Dellasanti’s coat exploded, cartwheeling his body through the air. All the agents charging at him dove to the ground as if expecting more detonations.

Kate ran to Dellasanti with her gun drawn, searching the perimeter for any further attack. She reached him first. He was facedown and motionless. She holstered her weapon and carefully rolled him over. A huge hole had been ripped through his overcoat. The blast had gone in the opposite direction as well. The left side of Dellasanti’s rib cage was gone, and Kate could see into his body cavity. There were bits of currency around the periphery of the wound, plus some kind of cloth that had been in the package. She checked his carotid artery for a pulse and then pushed up his eyelid. He was dead.

Suddenly realizing the extent of the brutal execution she had just witnessed, Kate collapsed into a sitting position on the ground. Her adrenaline subsided as quickly as it had risen, and her mind fell into a stupor. It took all her strength not to vomit.

Although Vail was at the off-site reading some of the missing-analyst reports that Bursaw had discreetly copied for him, his mind kept straying to the Calculus case. He tried to shrug the thoughts off, but still something in his subconscious was sending up a small flare of protest. He stepped over to the wall covered with the details of the case and started tracing the intricate web of clues that the Russian had left.

The phone rang. It was Bursaw. “Denise just called. Our guy came back.”

“Is he there now?”

“Have we ever been that lucky?”

“Your voice sounds like there’s good news in there somewhere.”

“She got his plate.”

“I hope you’re calling from your car.”

“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

When Vail got into Bursaw’s Bureau car, he took a moment to read his friend’s face. There were tiny creases of excitement at the corners of his eyes. “I guess you think this is your guy.”

He pulled away from the curb. “My guy, I don’t know. But the guy who killed these prostitutes, yeah, I think this is him. As far as him being responsible for Sundra, it’s a leap from hookers to middle-class FBI analysts, even if they are all black. But I’ve got nothing else going right now.” He looked over at Vail. “Besides, this is like a time machine, you and me on the street, at night, freezing cold, trying to find some animal that has a million places to hide.”

“I think you’re remembering only the good parts.”

Bursaw laughed in disbelief. “Tell me you don’t miss it.”

“Not enough to reenlist.”

“So you’d rather be a bricklayer?”

“You sound like Kate. She thinks I should do something more meaningful, but I have no complaints. I’ve tried to figure out why. The way my old man shoved it down my throat when I was a kid, hating it would make more sense.”

“ ‘Having no complaints’ is a long way from being passionate about something,” Bursaw said.

As Bursaw slowed the car and started looking for the address from the plate Denise Washington had supplied, Vail said, “There’s our van,” pointing to the vehicle the prostitute had described.

Bursaw drove a block farther and turned around. “That’s a nasty-looking apartment building it’s parked in front of.”

“Are we going in?” Vail asked.

“We’d have to get real lucky to find him in there. The apartments won’t be marked and the bells never work. And no one in there is going to help the po-lice.” Bursaw checked his watch. “It’s after midnight, too late for him to go cruising. And I’m not going to sit on it all night.” He put the car in park, got out, and went to the trunk. Vail watched as he walked toward the van, a pair of pliers in one hand and a wire in the