Page 47 of Under Fire in Big Sky

Eli sucked in a ragged breath and glanced at the timer. Two minutes forty-five seconds. He’d disarmed a bomb in less, though not by much. They had plenty of time.

“Can you do this?” Trujillo asked, shining a light from his phone inside the economizer.

The helicopter lifted into the air, carrying Liv and the other agent away to safety.

Eli could do this. Or at least, he hoped that he could. “Yeah, I think so.”

Coming closer, Johnson shined an additional light from a different angle.

Eli appreciated the extra illumination as he took a closer look at the bomb. Definitely C4 and not Semtex. He was familiar with the design of the device with multicolored wires, and it appeared simple, but there was a wire he didn’t expect and didn’t belong. An orange one.

A foghorn of warning blared in his head at the sight of it.

He followed each wire to the timer. Five in total. Green, red, yellow, blue, and orange. He glanced at the timer.

Two minutes twenty seconds.

The red and blue wires were twisted together, but he needed to cut one of them without snipping the other. Carefully sliding the knife Olivia returned in between the pair, he lifted them apart, easing one aside for just enough separation.

Eli angled the wire cutter over the blue cord. Two minutes twelve seconds.

“Shouldn’t you go for the red one?” Trujillo asked.

“Never cut red,” Eli said. “Unless you want to detonate it. Here we go.” He cut it.

The device beeped, but instead of the countdown stopping, it accelerated.

Johnson looked at him, his eyes flaring wide in alarm. “What’d you do?”

Eli’s heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat urging him to flee—a natural instinct he’d learned to suppress. His feet stayed rooted to the spot and his hands were steady. “I must’ve triggered an anti-tamper mechanism.”

The clock flew from two minutes to one minute forty seconds in what felt like a heartbeat.

“How do we stop it?” Trujillo asked.

The booby trap he fell for made him question everything. His training. His gut.

One minute thirty seconds.

“I’ve got to cut another wire,” Eli said, his chest tight, the air growing thinner.

One minute ten seconds.

“But which one?” Trujillo stared at him. “You said to avoid red. So, is it green, yellow, or orange?”

One minute.

The orange cord taunted him. Stuck out like bait. “Definitely not the orange either.”

Fifty seconds.

“That leaves two choices, then,” Johnson said.

Green or yellow. Eli hesitated.

Forty seconds.

Trujillo sighed. “Only a few seconds before this sucker blows. Choose,” the FBI agent snapped.