My Kind of Town
>> Royal Hawaiian Hotel Time for a three-way
Returning to his room after an early morning run down the beach and around Kapiolani Park, Lt. Col. Chuck Ryan glanced at his watch. The target should be on the ground. The volunteer agent Sandy, who had come to them with tales of a plot against America, would be picking him up at the airport. And then their work would really begin.
Ryan was just stepping into the shower when his secure-line cell phone rang. "Looks can sure be deceiving," agent Tom Davidson said. "If you didn't know better, he looks like a businessman, carrying a laptop."
That, of course, was his cover. Muhammed Resurreccion, owner of five internet cafes spread around Mindanao, was in Honolulu ostensibly to attend an electronics seminar at the Convention Center. Military intelligence officer Chuck Ryan and his people knew better.
"Where is he now?"
"Waiting at the baggage carousel, chatting with Sandy."
Of course Sandy was not what Muhammed Resurreccion would have called her. Sandy was the name given to Wilhemina Orlando when she came to them out of patriotic duty to her new country. Her cousin Rey had recruited her to be part of a plan. Rey was short on details, except that he needed her to rent a van and pick up Muhammed Resurreccion at the airport.
>> In a suite two floors up from Ryan's room, Lily Ah Sun was thinking she'd never known her friend Shauny Nakamura to be the jealous type. But she sure sounded jealous when Lily phoned and said that she'd run into Chuck Ryan at the Royal last night and that he and Shauny's identical but very different twin Fawn appeared to be an "item."
"How did that happen so fast?!" Shauny said. She almost always spoke in exclamation points.
"After they dropped you off," Lily replied.
Long story short, the three girls were working out at the Honolulu Iron Works, and so was Ryan, and Shauny liked his looks and asked him to join them for lunch, during which Lily and Shauny got schnockered on pink merlot. Too drunk to drive, Lily called her cousin Quinn to rescue her, while Fawn drove Shauny home to Pearl City and Ryan followed in Shauny's car.
"Chuck said they went to tea at the Kahala and then for a moonlit walk on the beach," Lily continued.
"That is so un-Fawn!" Shauny said. While Shauny had worn out a number of bedsprings in her career of fun, Fawn was still a virgin at 27 and intended to stay that way until her wedding night.
"Hey, it's time for a three-way!"
"Shauny!"
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek.
His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin
with weekly summaries on Sunday.
He can be emailed at dchapman@midweek.com