Although December was a cold and wet month for San Francisco, the days were still warm enough and roads never had to be shoveled; Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) secret agent Amanda Xu had become too accustomed to this California climate. Originally she was thrilled to have been set up with an American husband living in sunny California for her cover, thought she would never have to shovel snow or drive through snow storms; yet today here she was driving a jeep rented under her cover identity of Lily Ng on the way to nearby Lake Tahoe in the north for her mission. She left very early in the morning and planned on returning to her husband and children by late night, having made the excuse that a friend was visiting from China who only spoke Mandarin and she wanted to spend time with her.
Along the way, she reminisced about how the MSS set her up with a fake online profile with an international bride agency that connected her with her now husband. He was an established and educated research director with a small but profitable technology startup, and she was to marry him to obtain legal immigration into the United States, whereupon she would only be assigned to limited industrial espionage activities while starting a family with him to solidify her cover. At first, she dreaded the mission, but did so out of patriotic loyalty to her country; however, when she got to know her new husband and taught him how to pleasure her in bed, she then really enjoyed her cover life.
More and more she despised the petty missions the MSS assigned her to, especially that with each mission the risk of her being exposed and caught increased exponentially. The fact that this particular mission was to get close to a technology startup genius to learn everything she could about his advanced quantum computer prototype during the winter holiday season when she could have been at home with her children made this mission extra frustrating, but she wanted to help her country in any way she could.
So after frustratingly driving through the snow with winter tires on the rental jeep, which she deliberately picked with an all-wheeled drive, she managed to pull into the Lake Tahoe ski resort late morning. She quickly checked to make sure no one was watching then attached her black wig with blonde highlights over top of her natural black hair and put a snow hat on top, then made her way to the ski rental area. After she put her skis on, she went to the lift to get to the top of the slope, and with binoculars, searched and found her target, a young man wearing a dark blue ski suit and orange goggles, who was skiing like a novice, just like the dossier she received on him said.
On the other side of the slope, unbeknownst to Amanda, former Navy SEAL turned CIA deep cover operative Malcolm Cheng spied on the skiers, looking for the target of an MSS operation. His current cover was that of an MSS handler for their agents in the San Francisco Bay Area, working out of the local China consulate pretending to be an intelligence officer there, which he used to leak information to his CIA handler. He was hoping to intercept and identify the deep cover MSS operative during this ski mission so he could end his assignment, so he kept his eyes on the MSS target, hoping he would not ski behind the trees, and began skiing after him.
She carefully started down the slope, controlled her speed by skiing down in a large 'S' pattern, and when she saw him, used her MSS spy training to slow herself down enough to not hurt him, then bumped into him so that he would gently fall just behind a tree and out of the way of much quicker incoming downhill skiers. She then turned around and made her way up the slope a little to help him, feigning concern but getting to him quickly to be the only person around him.
Unfortunately for Malcolm, he skied past the target and lost sight of him as he had to move fast to avoid hitting other skiers, plus he didn't want to make it too obvious he was tailing someone. Things happened too quickly and he was unable to even get a glimpse of the skier that hit his target, so he decided to wait in the parking lot and follow the target's car instead.
"Oh my! I'm so sorry! I am new to skiing!" she exclaimed in a perfect American accent, with no hint of her native Mandarin accent at all. She adjusted her hat deliberately to let her wig come out and leaned close to his face to show she was a woman, smiled, and adjusted her fake glasses so he could see her eyes.
"I'm OK. Thanks!" the young man said pleasantly, at first likely eager to avoid confrontation with her as the dossier said he was already wealthy so likely wanted to avoid lawsuits, but as he gazed at her beautiful face, with her light golden Chinese complexion glowing in the sunlight, he began to smile and stare mindlessly at her like a lovestruck fool, exactly as she had hoped he would. Only as a last resort would she beat or torture the information out of him.
"Let me help you up," she said, and she pulled him to his feet while gazing carefully through his orange goggles to both feign interest as well as confirm he was her target, then held him as he put his skis back on and grabbed his poles.
"What's your name?" he asked, upon which Amanda smiled as she knew she had him hooked now.
"Lily," she replied, giving her cover identity as a Stanford University student to him.
"Shane," he replied, though she already knew his name was Shane Austin, a young Ph.D. who graduated from Stanford University's computer engineering program and the founder of an unicorn (a startup technology company valued at one billion USD) that had developed an advanced quantum computer, which the MSS wanted to get the architecture of. She also noticed an erection forming in his snow pants.
"You look a bit stunned Shane. Can I help you get somewhere to rest a bit?" she offered coyly.
"I rented a private cabin just down the road from here," he blurted out, confirming what the report had told her.
She grabbed on of his ski poles, held it and hers in one hand, then held onto his arm with the other, and guided him down the hill slowly, while making small talk with him at the same time as showing him some skiing pointers. As she was careful, they took a while to get down, which gave her the opportunity to firm up her rapport with him, return his skis and poles, help him into the passenger's seat of her rental vehicle, and then drive him to his cabin, listening and following his directions despite already knowing the location; she always did her research before approaching her mark.
Meanwhile, Malcolm sat patiently in his car, watching the departing visitors, hoping to spot Shane with the MSS agent disguised as a skier. He had staked out Shane's car for over an hour while watching other cars in the parking lot. Disappointed that he had yet again missed an opportunity to identify the elusive MSS deep cover operative, he decided to stake out Shane's rented cabin on the way back to San Francisco, thus he started his car and drove off.
After helping Shane inside, at which point she was certain he was alright and just faking disorientation to monopolize her attention, Amanda locked the door and closed all the curtains, while he prepared some hot chocolate for them. She removed her ski wear, underneath which she had on a tight green Christmas sweater with a line of red Santa hats across that clung to her breasts, and tight black yoga pants that showed off the lean musculature of her legs and buttocks; when she pulled off her snow pants she made sure to have her back turned to Shane as she bent over, and could feel his eyes on her rear as he approached with her hot chocolate.
"Here you go," he offered her the mug of steaming hot chocolate, which contained some marshmallow cubes within.
Amanda took the mug to her nostrils and sniffed for any drugs or alcohol added, then took a tiny sip to verify; although she was sure it wasn't drugged or laced with whiskey or rum, she walked over to the couch and put the mug on the end table beside it, and patted on the cushion beside her.