The Joe Brennan Spy Thrillers

by Sam Powers

  Had it worked? Chen saw it for just a split second, a glimmer of nervousness, the slight widening of Kwok’s gaze, the tip of the younger man’s tongue darting out for a split second, then a piercing stare as the diminutive, unassuming agent began working out options. ‘I have nothing to say without a representative of the United States diplomatic service present,’ Kwok intoned.

  The veteran officer knew if Kwok had anything useful on Tony Lo, he had to get to it relatively quickly. The intelligence service was already on route to question the American, and there was every possibility that once that happened, he would be unavailable to local law enforcement. That meant everything on the taps would wind up in Beijing, being handled by some government spook, instead of feeding valuable and potentially life-saving information to Hong Kong cops.

  ‘My detectives inform me you recorded two days’ of Tony Lo’s activities. Of course, you had no authority to do so.’

  ‘What happened to him?’ Kwok asked.

  ‘We’ll get to that,’ Chen said. It was an opening. ‘What do you know about Project Legacy?’

  Kwok hid his surprise. There was no way they’d gone through all of the recordings in just a handful of hours since the bust; they must have had ears inside, maybe even someone undercover. But the fact that Chen was asking meant they had no idea what Lo and Charlie Pang had been talking about.

  Or…

  They’d been there for more than just a proceeds-of-crime bust, which meant Chen’s real goal was to find out how much Kwok already knew. ‘Ask your inside man,’ Kwok bluffed. ‘I’m sure he can give you a first-hand account.’

  Chen maintained his pleasant demeanor, smiling gently. In an earlier age, when he was a younger and more competitive man, he would have enjoyed the prospect of jousting. But at fifty-seven, it merely made him tired. He did not intend to show it, however. He still had that much pride, at least.

  ‘I’m certain you are aware, Mr. Kwok, that we at the Hong Kong Police have a far more tolerant reputation than the people from Chinese state security. Unfortunately, I’m quite certain my department has been thoroughly infiltrated by them, as you might expect. We have no secrets from them, and you have already been in custody for two hours. It is two o’clock in the morning, which works to your advantage. But regardless, it means we do not have long to reach a more congenial accord…’

  Kwok ignored the implied threat. ‘Did one of your men shoot Tony Lo?’

  Chen got up to pace slowly, for dramatic effect. He wanted it clear he was in control, that Kwok’s decision to ignore his interrogation tactics had no impact. But he was tired; it had become harder and harder at his advanced age to pantomime a commitment to the dance, to the passion that makes men sing for their souls, or at the very least merely their safety.

  He stopped next to the American’s chair and leaned down to speak softly, unsure of who might be listening in, even in his office.

  ‘Mr. Kwok, it is entirely possible, as you have no doubt been instructed many times, that should the intelligence service spirit you off to Beijing or Chongqing, your family will never hear from you again. In very short order, you’re going to need a friend, and a good one. I’ve never claimed to be a politician or to have any great ambition except being a good cop. But I promise you, if you give me nothing, I shall see no reason to raise a word in your defense, and you shall disappear to some nasty, greasy shithole work camp in the back of beyond. The man Tony Lo met with is a gangster from Hunan, but a connected one, with friends high in the party. It seems more than coincidence you were staking out that apartment – and there are signs you had some help – unless you knew Charlie Pang would be there. So talk to me; help me now, and let me make this easier.’

  It was new information; that meant it was worth keeping him talking, keeping him trying, Kwok thought. He had nothing to offer, really. But Chen didn’t have to know that. ‘How long have you known they were planning to meet?’ he asked. The officer shot him a short, sharp look, but Kwok held up both hands in protest. ‘Hey, information is a two-way street. I mean, if you can tell me that at the very least, I know if I have something that can help you.’

  ‘The clock is running, Mr. Kwok,’ Chen said. ‘You know that much must be true…’

  Kwok was enjoying the joust. He’d been stuck with the impersonal duty of various wiretaps for most of his two years in Hong Kong; it felt like real work for a change. ‘Inspector let’s not kid ourselves: any decision about what is to be done with me will be made well above our pay grades. Given how hard your team hit that apartment, it’s clear you’re aware of the implications of Legacy already. It’s clear you know why a guy of Charlie Pang’s repute would want in.’

  Was he fishing? Chen recognized the signs, each question ducked or responded to with one in return, building on things he’d already said but offering absolutely nothing back. It had been naïve, perhaps, to expect someone with intelligence training to roll over easily. ‘The potential for embarrassment for your nation over this incident is, of course, considerable. Those in authority will, in return, look for a scapegoat. If you help me now…’

  ‘You’ll what? Protect me? What happened to Tony Lo and Charlie Pang, superintendent? I heard the shots. I didn’t see them come out with the rest.’

  Chen looked down at his desk. He’d been told by his deputy chief that an officer on the scene had been surprised by both men upon inspecting the apartment kitchen, and had returned fire, killing both.

  ‘They are being interrogated as well, Mr. Kwok, and so far, they are being far more helpful. But then, their involvement is direct, while yours appears to be merely observing. Again, I accept that. The intelligence service will not.’

  ‘You’ve got Charlie Pang in one of these rooms?’ Kwok gave the officer his most doubting look, as if he couldn’t believe the gall. He still had no idea who Pang was, but if Chen knew he was a gangster from Hunan, he might know more.

  ‘You find that hard to believe?’ Chen said. As far as he could tell from the network, Pang was a mid-level player peddling muscle and girls. His file had suggested he was from Kowloon originally, so perhaps he’d known Lo from earlier days. But their man inside hadn’t heard much else of the conversation – just a snippet or two about Project Legacy while hovering by the kitchen door.

  ‘I find that hard to believe.’

  ‘Because Legacy is too big for a small-time player?’

  ‘Sure. And, like you said, Tony Lo is a major figure, superintendent. Why would he…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘… why would he discuss something that important with a nobody?’ Kwok stared the older man down as he asked the question.

  ‘Billions of dollars…’ Chen said. In reality he had just the two snippets of information from his inside man.

  ‘Millions of lives…’ Kwok retorted. ‘Why didn’t HKPD take this to a higher level earlier, given the ramifications? I didn’t see any outside agencies represented at the building.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean…’

  ‘If they’d been watching, they’d be here already, picking me up.’

  Chen took a deep breath. Kwok was working hard; given how little information the superintendent truly had, it almost suggested the agent knew nothing of Pang’s presence. Had the Americans really just been there for Tony Lo? ‘As you say, Mr. Kwok, I suspect they won’t stay away for long. And the decision will be made high above our pay grade on where you go from there.’

  The superintendent took out a packet of cigarettes, withdrew one and lit it. ‘Totally off limits in the office, of course, but when you’re on nights, nobody’s paying much attention. Anyone working is usually out, or burrowed in an office trying to kill time until morning, or to finish a mountain of paper work. It’s usually just me and my deputy roaming around.’ He blew out a plume of smoke, then flicked the ash into the small office garbage can beside his desk. ‘Would you like one?’

  ‘Never been my thing. But apparently I’m going to share yours…’

&
nbsp; Chen’s eyebrows rose. ‘Really? An indignant and politically correct spy?’ He exhaled again. ‘What is the world coming to? You make me feel old, Mr. Kwok.’

  ‘Keep smoking,’ Kwok said. ‘It’ll pass.’

  - chuckled a little at that. ‘My wife says the same. She smokes too, but she’s full of self-loathing about it. She’s younger than me, you see.’

  He took a deep drag from the cigarette. ‘When you talk about her, do you get the urge to smoke?’ Kwok asked.

  Chen’s eyes went cold, his mouth grim. ‘I am attempting to be cordial, Mr. Kwok.’

  ‘It’s all you have control over, at this point,’ Kwok said. ‘Either they do as you suggest, and I disappear, or they make me go home, and I’m on the beach in San Diego in a few days. Either way, I’m already done in Hong Kong. I have nothing that can help you.’

  It wasn’t really contempt, Chen understood, just the ruthless realism of youth.

  Even though Kwok had also concluded neither knew anything else about Project: Legacy, it still struck him as part of the job to walk away with the upper hand, to let this local policeman know he worked at a higher level. He was still going places, after all.

  Or at least, that was how it felt. Kwok eyed him, expression neutral, neither happy nor sad, a picture of analytical poise. ‘Perhaps they won’t come until tomorrow…’

  ‘Unlikely.’

  Chen knew he was right. And part of him wanted to bare his teeth, challenge the younger man, prove to him why and how he’d survived so long in law enforcement. But he was tired, and it was the dead of night.

  There was a tap on his office door.

  ‘Well. That resolves that question, I suppose.’ Chen held up both hands. ‘Any last requests? Anything else to share before…?’

  ‘It has been nice meeting you, superintendent.’

  ‘Come in,’ Chen said loudly.

  The door swung open and a young man with dark hair leaned in. ‘Superintendent Chen?’

  ‘Yes?’

  The man stepped into the room, his movement so deft and deliberate that neither men had time to react as he raised both arms, a different pistol in each hand, both suppressed. He shot Chen three times in the chest and Kwok three times in the chest with the other hand, their bodies snapping and convulsing, the recoil muffled to a loud popping, like New Year’s firecrackers. Then he methodically shot each man once in the head. He placed the pistol from his gloved right hand into Kwok’s open grasp, closing the dead agent’s fingers around the grip and slipping his forefinger into the trigger guard, before repeating the procedure with Chen, then letting his hand slump naturally off to the side of his chair, the gun falling realistically to a spot beside him.

  The young man in the dark suit left the office and closed the door behind him, turning off the light. The deputy superintendent, a lithe man with a wispy beard and prominent front teeth, was standing in the center of the common area, near the empty detectives’ desks, one hand on his pistol holster. It wasn’t a big station, but the late hour accentuated how deserted it seemed, with just the two of them there.

  ‘It’s done,’ the young man said. ‘The security camera file?’

  ‘Dealt with,’ the deputy superintendent said. ‘How long…?’

  ‘Just wait until I’m out the front doors. Longer than that isn’t necessary. After all, this is a matter of national security, deputy. No one will see this for any more than it appears.’

  ‘What about Const. Wu, the undercover officer…?’

  ‘An unfortunate accident at his apartment. A gas leak. The other American has also been handled.’

  The deputy stared down at his feet. He knew where his loyalties truly lay, but he had been with the department for a decade. These people were colleagues and friends.

  ‘Your exemplary service will be noted,’ the young man said. He turned on his heel and headed for the main doors, leaving the deputy alone with the shadows of the long turn toward daylight.

  Less than a city block from the station house, in the back of a hole-in-the-wall bar, a thirty-something Australian signals intelligence officer arrived coffee in hand. He had no expectations from yet another shift in what was quickly turning out to be a terrible career move, and he was hungover, finally accepting the advice of his colleagues from Britain and Canada, that being posted to Sig Ints in Hong Kong was about as valuable as a hot beverage in the outback. Take advantage of the expense account, they’d said; eat, drink and say bugger it to the home office, they’d said.

  He sniffed deeply as he closed the office door behind him, his sinuses still hurting from the mild dehydration. He walked over to the plain wood-grain office desk and moved the mouse, bringing the computer screen to life; he was technically relief, but he was late, and the officer on the evening shift had long since gone. It was no big deal; no one paid much attention to Hong Kong Station.

  He sat down and put on the pair of headphones; the station was tasked with the most basic of signals intelligence: direct interception, using equipment stationed near government offices and police stations. It was broad-scale intelligence gathering, but everyone did it; countries that routinely co-operated and shared intelligence also spied on each other and looked for every advantage they could get, in trade, defense or whatever suited the policy requirements of the day.

  That was mostly over the young officer’s head. He sat down and put on the headphones, then started taking meticulous notes. He didn’t expect to hear anything, so the first series were just observations, conclusions about how little of use was floating out there in the Kowloon ether.

  It took two hours before he reached the digital recording from the shotgun mike just a few blocks away, at HKPD Station House Six. He’d set it up, along with the other police mics, in the hopes of shaking something loose on smuggling or drugs, something that would impress the higher-ups back in Canberra. It angled from an opposite rooftop, directly through the front window of Supt. Winston Chen’s office.

  The agent fast-forwarded through hours of silence before there was a blip on the computer screen’s sound wave form, a few peaks and valleys suggesting conversation. He backed up the recording slightly and hit play.

  After a few moments, his eyes widened; he snatched for the phone as if his life depended upon it.

  4/

  Day 2

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  CIA deputy director Jonah Tarrant was in full flow by seven in the morning, and he paced the carpet of the National Security Council’s narrow corridors with a purposeful gait, like a golfer trying to stay ahead of the next foursome. Senior Agent Brandon Mah was having trouble keeping up with him as they headed for the main conference room.

  ‘What do we have?’ Tarrant asked.

  Mah was looking over a traditional paper file, printed off from an encrypted report by his assistant an hour earlier. ‘What we have is a pretty solid stream of information coming in from our Australian friends. They’ve been running a ground tap for some time in Hong Kong, and it hit on something last night. We’re fairly certain in turn that it relates directly to what the authorities there are calling a murder-suicide involving a part-time U.S. consul security officer and a police superintendent.’

  ‘One of ours?’

  ‘Yes, Adam Kwok, an agent assigned to the consular staff. He was keeping surveillance on a gang house when all hell broke loose. He was picked up by Hong Kong PD and they’re claiming at some point made a go for his arresting officer’s gun, if you can believe that. In the hours after that happened, there was a flurry of intelligence traffic coming out of the mainland, and from what our monitors could pick up, Chinese intelligence is in a heck of a state about something called Yichan, or Project Legacy. From their heightened state of excitement and a few stated fears, we’re left with the impression that it involves a high-ranking or highly placed operative within the United States.’

  They passed the busy central hub of the office, where staff officers were already hard at work poring over data, analyzing it,
looking for value. ‘So what’s the gist?’ Tarrant asked. ‘Give me the broad strokes.’

  ‘Those were the broad strokes,’ Mah said. ‘We know nothing about it other than what we’ve learned overnight from Hong Kong. Kwok was almost certainly a professional hit, along with the cop. So, it’s someone or some group with contacts and money. Maybe the Chinese; certainly, we have no idea who might be involved or what any potential targets might be. It’s just too early.’

  ‘Then why the excitement?’

  ‘Two reasons: first, we believe the North Koreans launched an ICBM toward Japan this morning.’

  ‘Jesus H.’

  ‘It was a test for their latest guidance program. Satellite evidence suggests the missile ditched just off the coast. Whether that was deliberate, to keep this to a provocation while suggesting it could have reached the mainland, or another failure of their tech is unsure.’

  ‘What now?’

  ‘The President has a battle group steaming to the Sea of Japan and our NSC liaison with the forces suggests he’s not kidding. He wants to send a message.’

  Tarrant shook his head. ‘That’s a hell of a start to the day. What was the other reason? ‘

  ‘A sig ints officer picked up a conversation in a police station prior to the alleged-murder suicide. It sounded like our guy stumbled onto something of significant magnitude,’ said Mah. ‘Statements like ‘America’s economy collapsing’ and ‘billions of dollars lost’. And this on the same day as the North Korean test? It doesn’t seem coincidental.’

  ‘That’s bad.’

  ‘It gets worse. The tap picked up what sounded like both our man and the police superintendent he was talking to being executed.’

  Tarrant stopped walking for a second, just to absorb it. He kept his game face on as they resumed their pace. ‘Do we have anything official from the Chinese yet?’