“This is highly irregular,” said
Captain Udaka, “and the US Marshalls may have something to say
about it. Personally, I’m glad you got her away. I hope you don’t
have any leaks. Exactly how many Interpol agents are there in the
US right now?” he thought to ask. “And why would your people get
involved with this?” the Captain added.
Jett leaned back in his chair and
crossed his leg over his knee before continuing. “We are all
volunteers, on our own time. This is not an official Interpol
operation as it would not be legal for us to operate within your
jurisdiction without some formal arrangement and standing. So you
can view us as concerned citizens and visitors with a helpful skill
set. Violence against women and the trafficking of young girls has
touched all of our lives. That’s the glue that holds us together.
Bringing down Kadyrov is a priority for us. As a group, we’re using
this as a test case. If we can help you bring him down with a
successful outcome in court, we will contact other police
departments in your country and repeat the process. Currently there
are a dozen of us here, though that number does go up and down with
need.”
Captain Udaka gave him a sharp look.
“I’m not sure how I feel about a dozen foreign off-duty cops
working undercover in my country without prior arrangement. It
smacks of vigilantism. If we nail these bastards and bring down
this organization, it will be worth it to me. Others won’t see it
that way, so you should tread very lightly. I expect you to keep
your people in line. I don’t want vigilante justice on my hands.
Everything goes through the courts.
“Now, getting back to these listening
devices you planted. The receiving station we set up a mile from
the club hasn’t picked up a thing. Why is that?” asked the
Captain.
“You have to put in a pass-code and
tell the device to transmit. Currently the pass-code is my
thumbprint. It’s one of the reasons it’s so hard to detect. It
doesn’t actively transmit data, it stores it up and then when we
tell it to transmit, it does. The best time is when the subject is
sleeping so he won’t notice. I think we should swing by the senior
Mr. Kadyrov’s house first, as he’s more likely to be asleep. Then
in an hour or so, we can drive by and download from the younger
Kadyrov. It’s what, two A.M. now?,” asked Jett.
“About that,” he said, glancing at his
watch.
The Captain stood and headed to the
door. “Well, let’s get started. I’d like to get home to my wife
sometime tonight. You and your brothers are strange men. You seem
bigger, stronger, and these gadgets you have…if I had time to think
about it, I’d probably be worried. As it is, I’m just glad you’re
on the side of the angels.”
Jett gave him a big smile. “Oh, we’re
definitely on the side of the angels; why, you could almost say we
have wings.”
At the farmhouse, the moon was nearly
full and the sky was clear, so they took the risk of having the
shuttle pod Jett had called for land in the backyard. Arjun had
faith in Jeze’s abilities to navigate a clear path. The jammers and
shields would hide them from the radar, sonar, and other
technologies of Earth. The holographic plating of the hull
automatically camouflaged itself, so eyes looking up would not see
a ship obstructing their view.
And as it approached closer to the
surface, the crew had scanned for any living entity greater than
fifty pounds, making sure they were unseen by anything larger. The
fact that Addie lived in such a rural area made it possible.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t remote enough for frequent
trips.
The Mackeys had arrived around ten
thirty with all of Gilda’s, Marta’s, and Heidi’s possessions.
Suzanna had already packed up her mother’s and her own things. Her
mother had kept very few things when she’d gone into the nursing
home. And Suzanna traveled so much that she mostly lived out of a
suitcase so she didn’t have a lot of personal possessions. Mostly
she and her mother had clothes, some jewelry and smaller items, and
a couple of old photo albums.
The Mackeys said hello to Heidi and
then left, wanting to get home. Arjun and Addie thanked them for
their work and made the first overtures towards a more permanent
relationship. They would need movers if and when they had more
women willing to immigrate to HeVan.
It was three am and the shuttle pod
had just landed. Addie was sitting in the kitchen with the women
while the men were out in the yard discussing how to load up the
pod to fit everything safely for transport.
Addie turned to them and said, “I
guess men are the same throughout the galaxy. I remember when I was
a kid and we’d be getting ready for the family vacation. My dad
would stand next to the open car with all the bags and things
around him on the ground while he figured out how to pack it all
in.”
“I’m still having trouble coming to
grips with the fact that everything my grandmother’s been telling
me for the last couple of years about the Nephilim and aliens has
turned out to be true,” said Marta in a dazed voice.
“Are you unhappy about having to leave
Earth? We’re sending Gilda and Heidi because it’s the safest place
for them. I don’t want you to feel that decisions are being made
for you,” said Addie.
“No, I want to go. I want to stay with
grandmother and have a chance to get to know Suzanna and Great-Aunt
Carol. Anyway, you said they’d bring me back if I asked,” said
Marta.
Just then there was a knock at the
door. Suzanna got up to answer it. She instantly recognized the man
standing on the other side. “Jeze,” she whispered.
He took a step forward and she snapped
back from her daze in time to take a step back and then close the
door after him.
All of the other women in the room had
gone quiet, watching the tableau unfolding before them.
“May I?” asked Jeze, holding out a
hand.
At Suzanna’s nod, he reached forward
and slowly drew her into his arms until he was holding her tightly.
“We never believed…after all this time…to actually hold you in my
arms…”
He was having a hard time finishing a
sentence in his joy at seeing her and realizing she was real.
Suzanna reached up a hand and wiped the tears that had fallen from
his eyes.
“I’m real; I can’t wait to meet your
brother, too, and spend time alone with you,” she said. “When did
you find out about me? Arjun only told me this morning.”
“There have been no communications
until tonight. I found out then; I’m still in shock. Tyr and I had
a slight disagreement about which of us would pilot the shuttle pod
tonight,” he said with a sheepish look.
“Please don’t tell me you fought over
me,” she said, even though it gave her a little thrill thinking it
might be true.
“I’ll just say we settled the matter
with a little physical exertion, alright?”
“From now on we’ll be together so it
won’t matter,” she said. Then without thinking of anything else,
she started to rise up, but he was too tall for her to reach.
Realizing what she meant to do, he picked her up, as he brought his
own head down. Their lips came together as if they’d been lovers
for years. Suzanna wove one hand through his hair while the other
held on. Her legs naturally wrapped around his waist as his hands
went down and cupped her, squeezing her bottom.
Who know what would have happened next
if Carol hadn’t jumped up and begun hitting him across the back and
shoulders.
“You let go of my daughter right now!
How dare you attack her like that!” she shouted, while she
continued to strike him. The other men came running in when they
heard the noise and the room became quite crowded. Seeing what was
happening, all except for Rapha stepped back outside. They all were
aware of Carol’s illness and didn’t wish to frighten her. Suzanna
and Gilda would calm her with Rapha’s help. They were laughing at
Jeze’s predicament as they went back to loading the shuttle
pod.
It took the combined efforts of
Suzanna and a laughing Gilda to make Carol understand what was
happening.
“Well, I suppose it’s alright, if
they’re going to get married. We never carried on like that in
front of others when we were young ladies. Young people these days
have no morals, Gilda. Where did I go wrong?” mourned
Carol.
“She’s a fine girl, Carol. You didn’t
do anything wrong. And just look at the fine looking man she’s got
there,” Gilda added.
By this time, Jeze’s face was beet
red. He excused himself and Suzanna said she’d be out soon. Rapha
left with him, as he saw that Carol no longer needed him. She also
needed a little cooling off. They were both red in the
face.
“Now, where were we before I
interrupted everything with my scandalous behavior?” Suzanna asked
with a smile at her mother.
“I was asking Addie if I would be
allowed to come back to Earth if I asked,” said Marta.
“That’s right. And yes, they’ll bring
you back if you ask any time before you get to HeVan. The current
law on HeVan is females aren’t allowed to leave the planet. And I
haven’t decided if I’m going to change that one or not when I get
there.” Addie gave them a minute to let that sink in. Then she
turned to Heidi and asked, “Heidi, did you get a chance to look
over the real estate parcels I bookmarked?” asked Addie.
“Yes, I went through them this
afternoon. Kylan helped me with the computer. If it weren’t so far
away, the land in Alaska would be ideal. As it is, I’d choose one
of the parcels in Wisconsin. I checked online and the population
density is less than one person per square mile. If you bought up a
large enough parcel of land, you’d be assured of privacy. I was
thinking that if you need a cover story, I’d set it up as a woman’s
retreat and farm collective. I made a list of the ones I liked
best, there are even parcels right on the lake,” finished
Heidi.
“Would any of it work as farm land? Or
ranch land? The Space Station is going to need to be re-supplied
and it would be good if we could meet some of their needs. They can
grow things in the arboretum, but they don’t have access to meat
proteins like chicken, beef, pork, or venison. Ideally, I’d like to
be able to provide those from here. However, it may not be feasible
to do so and remain hidden from the government,” said
Addie.
“If the Station is so big, couldn’t
they do chickens?” asked Marta. “Free range chickens could run
around the arboretum place. You said it was huge.”
“You have a point, Marta; for all I
know, they may have small protein animals that I didn’t see. Why
don’t you and Heidi look into that? You know what we have to offer
here on Earth. And talk to your guys about the delousing
procedures; we don’t want to accidently send some harmful insect
from this world to HeVan. You know how gardeners are always
complaining about Japanese beetles that accidentally got imported
to the US on wooden pallets," said Addie.
Then she turned back to Gilda. “I
apologize for the late hour; we couldn’t bring the pod down when
people would have been able to see it.”
“Don’t you worry, my dear, I’m an old
woman now. I don’t sleep much anyway. And this is so exciting. That
doctor, such a nice young man. My face doesn’t hurt at all anymore.
Tell me, is he married? My Marta, she’s still too young to marry.
When she’s ready, she will need a young man like that,” said
Gilda.
“Miranda, our matchmaker, has already
matched him and his brothers to a young lady doctor who’s out of
the country right now. She’s in the Peace Corps,” said Addie. “Of
course, they aren’t the only doctors on the Station,” she added
with a smile.
“Aunt Gilda, when I brought you those
two envelopes and the velvet pouch and the metal box, you thanked
me and put them in your lap. I know it’s rude, but I’m dying of
curiosity here,” said Suzanna. “What’s in them?”
Addie clapped her hands. “I’m so glad
you asked. I didn’t have the nerve.”
Gilda put them on the table and looked
around; everyone was trying not to look at the items sitting in
front of her. For a minute, she looked at the objects as if she’d
never seen them. She shook it off and smiled at them all. She
turned to Suzanna. “With everything that happened, I forgot about
the box. I couldn’t have lived with myself if I’d lost it. Thank
you so much,” Gilda said.
“As to these other things, I’m not so
sure. We’ll have to look,” she said.
She picked up the velvet pouch, untied
the strings and opened it. She poured the contents out into her
hand for the others to see. They were loose stones, mostly
diamonds, of all sizes and cuts. What they had in common was the
quality. They were all of the best color, cut, and clarity. She
sniffed a little, and with a sigh, put the jewels back in the
pouch, re-tied it and set it down. She picked up the first
envelope. Opening it, she reached inside and pulled out a pile of
papers. Looking at them, she saw that they were Bearer Bonds.
Putting them down on the table, she reached for the second
envelope. When she opened that one, she found stock certificates.
She now had ten-thousand shares each of International Business
Machines, Westinghouse and 3M. She put the shares down on the
table.
“This explains so much.” Gilda said.
“My husband—he was much older than me. His family lost almost
everything when the banks crashed. He was just a child at the time,
but it had a huge impact on him. He never trusted banks and he was
always stashing money around the house. I thought I had found it
all after he died. This explains the empty savings account. He was
in a lot of pain towards the end and forgot to tell me about the
gems. These stock certificates are over fifty years old. Who knows
when he bought them; they wouldn’t have cost much then. Here,
Marta,” she said, handing the stocks and Bearer Bonds to her. “Now
you can go to any college you want.”