Page 22 of Going for Gold (Sweet Cravings 3)

I grabbed my stuff out of my locker and noticed that my phone was blinking to signal I had a new message. I turned it on and a message popped up from "My Favorite Athlete."

Who the hell is that? I didn't remember ever putting anyone in my phone with that name.

I clicked on the message to bring it up. "Make sure you don't miss the highlights tonight. Operation Red Rip - Success."

Bryce! That sneaky little bastard had put his number in my phone, and I guess also stolen my number.

"Why do you look so happy?" asked Kristen.

I turned my phone so she could read the text.

"Ah, I should have known it was your new boyfriend."

"He's not my boyfriend!"

"Suuure. You even have him in your phone as your favorite athlete. And here I was thinking that I was your favorite athlete." Kristen made a dramatic sad face. "By the way, did you ever figure out why it was called Operation Red Rip? I mean, I know you froze some guy's underwear, but what does that have to do with the color red or the word rip?"

"Right, since all of their codenames make so much sense," I said. "Pink Ocelot probably named the mission."

"Pink Ocelot," said Kristen with a laugh. "What a weirdo." She looked strangely happy about him.

"Oh my God, do you like Ocelot?"

"What? Psssh. No." Kristen turned away from me so I couldn't see her expression. "What time do the highlights usually come on?"

I checked the time on my phone. "I think around now. Let's see..." I clicked on the ITA broadcast app on my phone and Owen Harris popped up.

"We have some new developments in the Yao Kai incident, but first let's take a look at the updated medal count."

Yao Kai incident? Is that the guy whose underwear I froze?

A chart popped up on the screen. The US had 19 gold, 13 silver, and 19 bronze, for a total of 51. Brazil had 20 gold, 16 silver, and 16 bronze, for a total of 52. It didn't matter if they ranked it by gold medals or total medal counts. Either way, Brazil was ahead.

"The US had a strong showing today in wrestling to pick up a pair of golds and a bronze, but Brazil had an even better day, racking up a total of 10 medals and bringing their total ahead of the US for the first time in these games. To analyze the significance of this, let's bring in our medal analyst, Chip Nickels."

The shot panned out to show Chip sitting next to Owen at his desk.

"Well Owen," said Chip, "I don't think anyone saw this coming. I know I didn't. And the sports books in Vegas certainly didn't either. A few weeks ago you could have bet on Brazil winning the medal count with 30 to 1 odds. If Brazil can keep up this performance, Vegas is going to be paying out a lot of money to a few very lucky people."

"Do you think Brazil will be able to sustain this success for the next few days?" asked Owen.

"You know, I actually think they can. I just looked at a list of events that they could still medal in, and they could potentially get 50 or 60 more medals."

"Right, but most of those athletes are only in because Brazil is the host nation and got automatic qualification for all the events."

"Well, regardless of how they got in, the Brazilian athletes are really performing at these games. As a sports geek, I'm kind of hoping that they continue to do well and end up tying the US in overall medal count so that we can see our very first tiebreaker."

"Can you walk us through the rules for the tiebreaker?" asked Owen.

A new graphic popped up on the screen and slowly started scrolling up.

Article IV, Section 8 - Medal Count Tiebreaker

1. At noon GMT of the final Tuesday of the games, the committee will calculate if it is mathematically possible for two or more nations to end up with the exact same number of gold, silver, and bronze medals based on the current count and the number of athlete's still yet to compete.

2. If a tie is possible, the host nation will have 24 hours to choose a tiebreaking event. The event can be any event that is not currently featured in the 2016 games. The host nation must specify if it is a men's, women's, or coed competition.

3. The top five nations in overall medal count at noon GMT on Wednesday may select one (or a team, if required) of their current athletes to compete. Only athletes that have competed in the games are eligible.

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