Free Death by Denim by Linda Gerber

supposed to be protecting me, but you don’t mind if I do something that might get me hurt.”
    “Oh, I mind,” Ryan said. “But I wasn’t joking when I told you I thought you’d be an asset to the Agency. You need to have the experience of an op to see what it’s all about.” He grinned again. “Then you’ll be hooked.”
    I gave him half a nod. What he didn’t understand was a lot. He really thought it was going to help me to think that my mom was willing to leave me and my dad because being an agent was just too thrilling to give up? Maybe that was his incentive for sticking with it, but I would never believe it was hers. I couldn’t.
    I turned from him and closed my eyes. His words chanted in my head with the rhythm of the wheels on the tracks: You’ll be hooked, you’ll be hooked, you’ll be hooked. No, he didn’t understand me at all.
     
    I woke sometime after midnight. The sway of the train had changed; we were slowing down. With a jolt I realized I was leaning against Ryan’s shoulder and I quickly sat up. “Are we there?”
    “No. We’ve only just crossed the border.”
    “Maybe they need to check our passports.”
    “They don’t do that within the EU. Once you’re in, you can travel anywhere.” He checked his watch and peered out the window. “We shouldn’t be stopping. Sit still. I’m going to check and see what has happened.”
    Ryan ducked out into the aisle and I rushed to the doorway to watch him go. At the end of the car, a man in a conductor uniform stood talking on a two-way radio and gesturing wildly with his free hand. Ryan didn’t even talk to the guy; he just stood there and listened, and then he came back to report to me. He ushered me back inside the compartment.
    “You’re not going to believe this; the train ahead of us hit a cow and several cars derailed.”
    “No way. A cow?”
    “That’s what the man said. Line’s closed from here to Omegna until they can clear it off.”
    “How long will that take?”
    “Emergency crews have been summoned, he says, but no telling how long it will be until they arrive.”
    “So what do we do?” I tried to sound calm, but inside the panic was rising again. The whole operation could be thrown off if I wasn’t on my mark by morning. Caraday had said that The Mole hadn’t found the Mulos yet , but I didn’t doubt that he would, and that he would hurt Seth’s family if I wasn’t there as the sacrificial lamb.
    “First thing we do is clear the train. They’re ordering everyone off.”
    There was nothing to be done but to join the rest of the grumbling passengers in our car filing down the narrow aisle and out the door. A uniformed train worker stood on the platform, directing people into the station. If his haggard face and drooping posture were any indication, he was as tired as we were and just as irritated by the inconvenience.
    Apparently, the station itself was not prepared to accommodate travelers in the middle of the night. The lights were on, but nothing was open—not the ticket booths or the stationmaster’s office or any of the small shops that lined the perimeter. The only place to go was into a small lobby area, where there weren’t nearly enough chairs for everyone to sit.
    I wasn’t worried about the seating arrangements, though. I kept glancing at the huge round clock on the far wall, calculating and recalculating how much time we had left before showtime. Impatience buzzed through me. I paced. The room was too small, too crowded. I was suffocating. And I had to get to Varese.
    Ryan wandered over to the ticket counter and grabbed a train schedule printout. He brought it over to me and we scanned it together, looking for an alternate route or some other alternative that would get us to Varese on time.
    And then I smelled it. The strange sour stench I noticed every time I caught the Marlboro Man following me. My heart lodged in my chest like a chunk of ice. I turned slowly, scanning the crowd. I couldn’t