Ultimate Escape Read Free

Vietnam was relatively safe, those with means often preferred to travel with assistance. This fact allowed Cruz to hide in plain sight, more nameless, faceless muscle to guard the ultrarich. Just as he’d expected when he and the team had put this plan into action.
    Through means he didn’t bother to question, one of his partners, Sam, had gotten hold of the flight manifesto and a picture of the person he sought. Now, all he had to do was follow her. The information had been vague, but what Cruz did know told him that his quarry was into a particularly dirty business, and though he wasn’t exactly sure which one yet, it was going to be his pleasure to put her out of it.
    Calm but excited to be this close, he waited outside Customs, taking in the boisterous family reunions, scurrying businessmen and party officials, the tourists and backpackers, letting his gaze linger for only a moment before moving on in search.
    Then he saw her.
    She was in her late twenties, average height, average-looking features. That she was African American with healthy, rounded curves made her stand out, but absent those two things, she would have been completely unremarkable, one of the flock of tourists who flooded the terminal.
    She was living proof of how deceptive looks could be.
    The woman looked left, then right, eyes wide and searching, face open but uneasy, and then she headed to an information booth. He watched her chat with an airport official, finding himself strangely drawn to her polite, shy smile and her gentle, almost timid demeanor. With a piece of paper Cruz presumed was a map clutched in her hands, she marched toward baggage claim, keeping her head down but her eyes moving quickly from thing to thing as she walked. Keeping her in his line of sight, Cruz waited a few moments and then followed, staying close, but not so close she would notice.
    The flights had been long, but even still, most traffickers didn’t bother with luggage. But the people he sought, the ones she would lead him to, were a cut above. And maybe that explained the conundrum that this woman presented. Wide-eyed, excited, shy, none of the furtiveness or suspicion he usually saw. She was doing the best impression of a clueless tourist he’d ever seen.
    After grabbing a piece of luggage that almost dwarfed her, she glanced at her map and then headed toward the rows of gleaming hotel buses. As she moved, she ignored the cyclo riders and taxi drivers that called out to tourists. A good thing for her. At best, one of those rides would end with her fleeced out of a few dollars, but at worst, she’d be airlifted to Bangkok, another victim of Ho Chi Minh City’s lethal traffic. Whether the city was called Saigon, referenced by its formal name, or shortened to HCMC, the result was the same. No matter what it was called, the traffic in the city was literally killer, and was responsible for more tourist injuries and deaths than anything else.
    She approached the shuttle driver and after a quick conversation, probably in English since the nicer hotels in the city—and based on the shuttle, hers was very nice indeed—tried to cater to Western tourists and account for the language barriers, she scribbled something on the paper and then headed to the bus, where she paused long enough to write down the license plate number before boarding.
    Cruz had seen enough that not much ruffled him anymore, but even he found this woman’s behavior notably surprising. She could have been in a State Department video that gave travel tips to new tourists. She’d taken down the bus license plate number, ignored solicitations for a ride, probably gotten the driver’s name, and Cruz had seen how she gripped her suitcase and handbag tightly, not letting either out of her sight for a single moment. This was Foreign Travel 101, not the graduate-level behavior he would have expected from a seasoned trafficker.
    And he also had his reaction to her to consider.
    To his immense displeasure, the