Recap: Gary convinced the CIA director that they should use the mole to swap for Penny, who is still stuck in Xi’an.
Chapter 15 Roommate with Benefits
Col. Tao agrees to fly to Singapore personally to meet Gary. He tried but mostly failed to surveil her two decades ago when she was stationed in the Chinese embassy in DC, so their identities are known to each other.
“The CIA must be desperate to put you in charge of this. Didn’t they know I beat you last time?”
“Oh, of course. They gave me an office job exactly because I was too clumsy. Look at this belly.”
“How come you didn’t go through the State Department for the swap?”
“You know the drill. We still want to keep the option of disavowing Lin. We do this swap as a courtesy to her. But you should know the US government is definitely not responsible for whatever shit she pulled in China in the last few months.”
“This could have worked if she hadn’t raised the stakes that high. What’s her plan anyway? Putting Dr. Wei on a boat to Hong Kong? And then what?”
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