Threat Level Alpha

by Leo J. Maloney

  “Please call me Peter,” he said.

  “Very well, Peter. Then you must call me Danhong. What do you have planned for us today?” she said.

  “A tour. Museums, a few other places of interest. I’ve been to Manila a few times but I seem to have missed most of the sights. And I know you have already seen the beach,” he said.

  “That sounds wonderful. Will there be a bus?”

  He shook his head as Amado approached. “Mr. Peter,” the older man said.

  “Amado, this is Danhong Guo, she is with our friends from China.”

  Amado bowed and fired off a quick greeting in what seemed like perfect Mandarin. She replied in kind.

  Conley had sorted out an itinerary with Amado, who was happy to have the extra work as their guide. He knew the city well, and he was able to borrow one of the hotel’s smaller vans.

  Conley had considered getting them tickets on one of the popular tour buses but he wanted something less noisy and more private. It was Saturday; they only had two days to spend together before the workweek started in earnest and Conley was determined to make them count.

  The streets were quiet, much more so than during the week. There were fewer people rushing back and forth, and there were no protestors. That was new.

  There had been a number of protests during the last week, mostly demonstrating against the current Filipino administration over charges of corruption and a laundry list of other misdeeds. Since the Chinese delegation had arrived, there had also been a number of anti-capitalism protests.

  Over the administration’s work with the Chinese economic delegation.

  The irony of that was pretty rich and Morgan would have enjoyed it.

  The protests were rowdy, but not usually dangerous. The protest culture had a history in this country. Or, more accurately, the protest business did.

  The reality was that many—if not most—protestors were paid by various interest groups. The system seemed odd but it wasn’t without its benefits. The rich, the middle class, and the poor lived remarkably close together in Manila. And for a number of the poor, their wages from protesting were often a significant source of their income. And because they were professional protestors—with often little or no connection to the cause they were demonstrating about—they were usually well-behaved. In these protests, violence always came from the true believers. The professional protestors didn’t engage in it because violence threatened their livelihood, and their neighborhood.

  Before lunch, they visited a contemporary art museum, as well as a toy museum and a “museum” that exclusively featured optical illusions. He was pleased to see that Danhong, like him, had an interest in almost everything. Conley was also surprised that she thoroughly enjoyed the illusions and had suggested the toy museum herself.

  Though still reserved by American standards, her appreciation of the toys and the life-sized toy replicas was almost childlike. Well, China was a serious place. And she was in government, perhaps the most serious corner of that world. And she was a woman in a profession and a culture was still overwhelmingly dominated by men.

  Amado recommended a small place frequented by locals for lunch but refused to join them, and Conley didn’t push the issue very hard. He was glad to have her alone.

  In the afternoon, on Amado’s recommendation, they visited the Quiapo Church. “It is my church,” Amado said proudly and accompanied them inside. It was beautiful. Most of the actual structure dated back to the nineteenth century. Given the assortment of people milling about, it was also clearly a popular tourist destination.

  However, the real attraction, he knew, had to do with the history of the site, which had held a church since the sixteenth century. Fire, war, and earthquakes had taken their toll on the churches built there, but they had always been rebuilt.

  And there was a statue inside that was said to have miraculous powers.

  Danhong was very quiet in the church, which he initially chalked up to Chinese reserve and her generally respectful nature. But the quiet lasted until they reached the van.

  Conley almost asked her if something was wrong but didn’t want to pry. She broke the silence. “My parents were religious, but they are gone now.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “Thank you,” she said. Then she seemed to visibly shake off the cloud that had settled on her. “Do you have plans for us for dinner?”

  “I was thinking to head back to the hotel for dinner at the bar where we met. It’s not fancy but it is on the beach,” he said.

  “Perfect,” she replied, almost before he had finished.

  When they arrived at the bar, Conley said, “Would you like a cosmopolitan, Dani?” Then he caught himself. “I’m sorry. Is it okay if I call you that?”

  Conley knew that the rules for diminutives of Chinese names were complicated. And the actual diminutives were almost always as long or longer than the original names.

  “No one has ever called me that before, but I like it. Dani. It is very American,” she said.

  Dinner was like the day, pleasant and relaxed. He was surprised by how comfortable he was around Dani. It was especially surprising given how different their backgrounds and cultures were.

  He wasn’t like Dan Morgan, a one-woman man—a family man. Then again, no one else he knew in their end of their business had managed the life that Morgan had created for himself.

  But Conley knew that a woman like Dani could change his mind. Perhaps if he’d met her earlier…

  “Would you like to dance?” he asked.

  She was already standing up as she answered yes.

  The next song was a slow one, and Conley was glad that his generous tip to the bartender hadn’t been wasted.

  They danced more closely this time and Conley liked feeling her weight against him. The next song was also slow and they danced closer still. He realized that he had been wrong about one thing the night before: Dani didn’t just smell good, she smelled wonderful.

  In the middle of the song she lifted her head to look at him and then they were kissing.

  The next song was faster and they reluctantly parted. “Thank you, that was very nice.”

  It was nice; the day, the dinner, the dancing—all of it. But he didn’t want it to be over.

  “I am free tomorrow,” she said.

  “Then I hope you will spend it with me,” he replied.

  “I would like that,” she said.

  “I will walk you to your room.”

  “So soon? I thought, perhaps you might like…”

  “Not at all,” he said. “We could still…”

  “Perhaps you could show me your room,” she said evenly.

  To that Conley only smiled. They headed back inside at a brisk walk. Frankly, it took a genuine effort for him not to break into a run.

  * * * *

  Morgan scanned the road. Route 6 was reasonably free from traffic, which was important for a couple of reasons. He still had fifty miles to cover before they crossed the Cape Cod Canal, which separated the peninsula from the mainland.

  It wasn’t that the bridges were much of a barrier—the canal was less than 500 feet across—but they were a bottleneck. And if you were trying to run someone down, they were an excellent choke point.

  Morgan cursed himself for putting them both on a peninsula that was virtually an island. Then again, he wasn’t on a mission. He was with his wife.

  On vacation.

  Their first real vacation alone together since their honeymoon.

  Once again he thought, there were rules, even in this business. Families were off limits.

  This wasn’t the first time Morgan’s work had put his family in danger. It wasn’t even the second time. But with his rising anger came a determination that it would be the last time—at least for whoever had sent the Russians.


  When they were less than ten miles from the Bourne Bridge, the traffic started to slow. That was normal enough. Weekly summer rentals were usually from Saturday to Saturday. It was eleven o’clock now, which meant the weekly exodus from the island would last about another hour. To be fair, it could have been worse. It could have been Sunday traffic.

  In less than a minute, the traffic went from slow to a crawl. Morgan growled.

  It was worse.

  “It’s okay, traffic report says there’s a car fire,” Jenny said.

  Morgan didn’t like the sound of that. It was normal enough. In a given year, Morgan would see a car fire or two on the street, and he couldn’t remember the last time he had seen one.

  But the normal traffic and a reasonably normal fire were conspiring to keep him on Cape Cod, where he had just run into two idiots who had meant him harm. Those two things together barely rose to the level of a coincidence.

  Yet if Morgan had learned one thing it was that there was no such thing as a coincidence on a mission. And as soon as he had seen those two punks at the fabric show, this had become a mission—to get his wife to safety.

  They came to a complete stop.

  “One lane is closed,” Jenny said.

  Morgan did some quick calculations in his head. Traffic this heavy, funneling to one lane with the added bonus of people slowing to gawk and even take pictures at the burning wreck meant that Morgan and Jenny would be exposed for exactly too damn long.

  The Mustang was fast and had a few tricks up her sleeve, but most of that wouldn’t be useful if they were stopped dead in traffic. The thought galled him. Besides the danger to himself and Jenny, for this car to be stuck in traffic—to be trapped—was unthinkable.

  Another thing that pissed him off today.

  Morgan made his decision. He put the car in reverse to a little distance between the Mustang and the car in front of them, and then pulled onto the shoulder. He could see the exit less than half a mile up ahead.

  He decided to accept Bloch’s offer of a safe house. He knew the local roads pretty well—very well, actually. If it was just him, he might have waited until whoever was running this operation got here and taught them a few things about the rules of the game…and basic manners.

  But he had Jenny to think about and decided to play it smart. They would hole up until Bloch could get a Tach team to them—by helicopter if necessary.

  He’d let the team do some of the work. He was on vacation, after all.

  Up ahead, Morgan saw a flash of black—two flashes, actually.

  Two large black SUVs were barreling toward them. Cadillac Escalades. It was too far to see the plates, but he had no doubt they were from New York.

  The coincidence meter in his head shook and then exploded.

  Morgan cursed himself again. He had been lulled by the sheer incompetence of the two Russians he’d encountered earlier. Their mission had likely only been reconnaissance.

  Two cars ahead of him had gotten tired of the traffic and were making for the exit on the shoulder. Morgan veered to the right and passed them on the grass. Then he was back on the shoulder and flying toward the exit.

  His peripheral vision told him the SUVs had turned onto the median and were crossing it to get to them. Well, the traffic jam they had created with the burning car would work against them now. It would take them some time to get across the clogged westbound lane, and the local roads Morgan would soon hit were reasonably clear.

  Finally. This was the kind of work the Mustang was built for. But the fact was that reinforcements had come up from Brighton Beach, they were driving a better class of Cadillac than the two morons, and Morgan had no doubt they had brought the big guns.

  * * * *

  Conley woke to see that Dani had gone. He understood.

  The men in her delegation would be out most—if not all—of the night. But if she wasn’t in her own room in the morning they would notice and would count it against her. It wasn’t fair, but he knew it was so. He checked the clock, just past six. He would see her again in less than three hours.

  He was in the lobby a full fifteen minutes before nine, but Dani was already there, chatting with Amado.

  “Mr. Peter,” Amado said.

  “Good morning Amado, good morning Dani,” Conley said, nodding to both of them. That was as intimate a greeting as he dared give her in the lobby. This was, after all, a working trip for her, and other delegates could be around.

  “Peter,” she said, returning the nod.

  Conley had told her to dress for adventure and she had worn denim shorts, tennis shoes, and a short-sleeved button top.

  She looked fresh and, well, amazing.

  Despite his attempt at reserve for sake of her career, Conley realized that he was grinning like a fool.

  “If you are ready,” he said, and they headed to Amado’s van.

  They had breakfast in another spot that Amado recommended, and then it was a short drive to the bay where their guide introduced them to his friend who had a small boat—a long one with traditional pontoons on each side.

  Conley had wanted to keep their destination a surprise for as long as possible, and was pleased when she got into the boat without hesitation. With an expression of almost childlike excitement, she asked, “Where are we going?”

  Peter waited until they were on the water a few minutes when he pointed to an island up ahead, one that looked a bit like a mountain with its top sheared off.

  “Is that a—” she began.

  “Yes, Taal is a volcano,” Peter said.

  “Is it active?”

  “Of course,” he said.

  “And we’ll see it up close?” She was clearly excited.

  A few minutes later their captain was guiding the small craft to the beach, through surf so rough that it had Conley holding tightly to his seat.

  Dani, however, took the trip in stride and was the first to jump off the boat. She put on the surgical mask that would protect her from the volcanic ash without hesitation.

  On their hike to the rim, she was very interested in the occasional volcanic vent holes they came across, which gave off white smoke and heat. She was also undaunted by the over ninety-five-degree heat and very high humidity.

  At the rim she gazed down at the mouth of the volcano; inside which was a large volcanic lake. It was impressive, and Conley had seen his share of natural and man-made wonders.

  When they got back to the mainland it was late afternoon.

  “Would you like to go back to your room to clean up before dinner?” he asked. He liked that it was understood that they would have dinner together. It was Sunday and her grueling work schedule would start up early enough tomorrow morning. Until then, he was determined that they make the most of it.

  “Or I could clean up in your room?” she asked casually.

  Peter liked that idea. He liked it very much.

  They didn’t get around to ordering room service until almost nine.

  As they sat in their robes and ate, she became uncharacteristically uncomfortable and quiet.

  He could see that she had something to say, something that was difficult for her. That surprised him. As far as he’d seen so far, she wasn’t afraid of anything.

  “I have really enjoyed our time together,” she said.

  “As have I,” he replied, and saw there was more she wanted to say. He could guess what. She was initiating her version of “the talk.” They were caught up in a vacation romance, perhaps the most impermanent of all new romances.

  The fact was that he was American and she held a relatively high rank in the Chinese Ministry of Finance and would have little or no opportunities to travel after the conference was finished.

  Very likely, after tonight, they would never see each other again. Clearly, she felt the need to say it, though Peter would
have been content to avoid the issue for a bit longer.

  “It’s okay,” he began.

  “I need your help with something, a favor,” she said, her face strained and uncomfortable.

  That was a surprise. Now Conley was interested. “Don’t worry. The answer is yes. Just tell me what it is.”

  “I want to leave my country, to come to America. I want to defect,” she said in a burst. Then she collected herself. “I told you that my parents were religious. They were Christian, probably only moderately religious by American standards but they belonged to a church that wasn’t one of the three state-sanctioned ones and that made them criminals in China. When I was eight, they were arrested for refusing to “conform their religious beliefs to the requirements of the Socialist state.”

  Conley knew there were many tales like Dani’s in China, especially twenty-some years ago. Even today, he knew that for all of the lessening of economic control, social control had been slower to loosen. And control over religion had been slowest of all.

  “Did you find out what happened to them?” he asked.

  “Yes, I was informed that they died in custody when I was in college,” she said.

  “I’m very sorry, Dani,” he said.

  “Will you help me get out? For them? For me? I just want to leave. I have no family they can retaliate against—they have seen to that.” She hesitated and said, “I do need your help, but I don’t want you to think that my interest in you—”

  “Shhhh…” Peter said. “I know someone in the American consulate here. He’s a good man. We can make arrangements and have you on American soil before you know it.”

  Conley did some calculations in his head. If they moved her at night, a military transport could have her in Hawaii before she was missed in the morning.

  It wouldn’t even be difficult. Diana Bloch could arrange it in minutes. As a high-ranking member of the Ministry of Finance, Dani was a very valuable asset.

  She squeezed him tightly. “Thank you, Peter. Thank you.”

  Peter realized that he had flipped a switch in his head and was already thinking like an agent. But that was not what Dani needed right now. She was about to leave everything she knew. And she had come to him.