Chapter 73

Present – Bernie and Liz – The next day

Liz whistles in the shower this morning - compared to last night she’s in an excellent mood. She even comes over, gives me a hell of a kiss and grabs my ass. I smile at Liz and carefully comment, “You’re in a great mood today.”

She grins at me and says, “Why shouldn’t I be since we’re going out for retail therapy today. I searched a little bit online last night and they have the cutest maternity fashions ever. After I’m finished I’m going to look so much better than Samantha.” I want to caution her this isn’t a fashion show but know better than to spoil the day.

I take a quick shower, we get ready to leave, head out to the Jeep and start toward Denver. The closer we get to Denver the better Liz’s mood becomes. She reaches over to the GPS, programs in the first address and it starts giving me directions on where to go...

Present – Ben – Solving the problem

We get back to the hotel, I take a room for myself, put Mira and Ira in one room, and planned on putting Alexi in one room and Zarika, Safia and Yasmeen in one room. As it has many times been said, ‘the best laid plans of mice and men, often go awry.’ Alexi, is totally dysfunctional – no it’s worse than that, he’s a babbling idiot who pisses and shits himself. I’m not sure what the fucking sex traffickers did to him, but he’s in no shape to take care of himself, and I’m certainly not going to take care of him. Thankfully both Zarika and Safia demand to stay and ‘take care’ of him. I figure since he’s knocked up both of them, (I have determined that the little shit raped Zarika) he can’t cause too much more damage to either of them. I have carefully observed both of them and while there is some animosity, it’s much less than I thought it would be. They both seem intent on improving Alexi’s mental health.

We get our rooms and I order, “You have twenty minutes to shower and change clothes, then we are taking a trip to get your fucking feminine supplies.”

They begin to complain and I nip it in the bud, “If you don’t like my orders then we will just forget the feminine supplies and stay here.” They grumble as they head into their rooms.

I dash to the front desk and inquire, “Do you by any chance have underground parking?”

The concierge replies, “We certainly do, and at no additional cost. Let me assign you a parking place.”

She comes back and says, “Just place this on the dashboard of your truck. Might I say that was an interesting group of people you brought into the facility.”

I smile at her and admit, “They have had a very rough and bad time so I would appreciate it if you forgot that you ever saw them in their previous condition.”

She smiles and says, “Well, they sure look better now, except for the pregnant lady whose clothes are too small.”

I look out the window, see that everyone is ready to go and that I seriously misjudged the size of clothes Mira needed. Her stomach sticks out of her shirt like a beach ball.

I prepare to leave and the concierge asks, “Are you planning on staying here awhile?”

I think for a moment and reply, “Yes, I would like to stay here for a week if that’s possible. Would you like me to pay now?”

The concierge replies, “It looks like you’re going somewhere so why don’t you pay when you get back.”

I remember something and ask, “Can we turn off the pay per view television for each of the rooms?” The last thing I want is the little shits running up a fucking huge bill watching pornography.

The concierge replies, “Certainly, I will do that immediately. Would you also like us to disable the gaming functions on the televisions?”

I sure as hell didn’t know they had that so I answer, “Hell yes.”

I get ready to leave and the concierge says, “By the way, I really loved your wedding. Will we be seeing Jennifer here anytime soon?”

Shit, she recognized me! I should have known it - hell most of the world watched our wedding. I quickly come up with a plausible lie, “Our cabin was destroyed in Leadville and my lovely bride (I really meant this when I said it) is taking care of getting it fixed.”

The concierge replies, “Yes I saw that on television, it was such a shame.”

I walk out the door and say, “You don’t know the half of it.”

Everyone gets into the truck, Alexi and his two bitches in the back, the others in the front and of course Mira complains, “Ben, my...”

I stop her immediately, “ ... If you continue to say what I think you’re going to say, I will cancel this trip.”

Yasmeen whines, “Mira please! I really need some supplies.”

Ira even surprises me when she orders, “Mira stop annoying Ben. I also need my supplies.”

I state, “I know Mira, your shirt is too small. We will get one that fits when we get the supplies.”

She smiles at me and says, “Thank you Ben. While I like the world to know I am gestating our baby, this shirt causes extreme discomfort.”

I fume at the comment about my baby so I can’t wait to find out the real truth. But I wisely keep my mouth shut.

We arrive at a local store, I look at Ira and say, “Ira, I trust you with the cash to purchase everything because you’re not hyped up on hormones.”

I hand her a huge wad of cash and Ira replies, “Have no concern Ben, I will control the hormonally challenged hoard.”

They all leave the truck, placing Alexi inside a shopping cart, and walk into the store.

I lean my head against the steering wheel and am simply overwhelmed. Dammit all to hell! A few tears trickle out of my eyes. How in the fuck did things ever get so messed up. I pull myself together and begin to search for a paternity clinic on my mobile phone. I can’t fucking believe my eyes when they head back to the truck with five full shopping carts.

Zarika and Safia begin to complain, “Ben, Ira wouldn’t let us purchase the things for Alexi that he needs.”

I’ve about had my fill of those two.

Present – Thom and the crew – At the warehouse

The TSIFFTS crew had no problem transporting the four of us to whatever location we requested. I asked them to slowly spool up the rotors and prepare to leave. If we can sneak out of here without that Stacy bitch knowing, all the better. But if she does find out I’m not too worried since our chopper is much faster than hers.

I go to the door where only Jennifer and the crew can see me, notice the Stacy bitch is still busy getting her nose fixed and motion for them to come quickly and silently. Linus understands my hand commands and they slowly slip out of the building. We hightail it to the chopper and we’re off...

The pilot asks, “What’s the destination?”

I reply, “Ben’s truck was seen last in the 300 block of West Colfax Ave. If we could circle the area perhaps we can locate his truck.”

The pilot responds, “We can get to the 300 block of W. Colfax, however because of the Denver Mint, the Denver capital building and Denver county courthouse the airspace is restricted. Also there are no known viable landing areas in the vicinity.”

Rats! Double rats! And triple rats! Leave it to my Ben to find someplace that’s not easily accessible. I ask the pilot, “Is there anywhere close we can set down?”

We began to circle the area around the 300 block of West Colfax and my heart skips a beat when I think I see Ben’s truck. I say, “I think that’s his truck, can you land this thing?”

He orders the copilot, “Bud, find us a landing zone that won’t get us tossed in the slammer.”

He begins to consult the charts and says, “The closest place I can see is an open field at the Bennett Community center, it’s at 1100 West Colfax. We could get in trouble for this.”

I am worry like hell until the pilot says, “Just watch me. He calls on the radio, connects to Denver Police and says. This is flight 4592 declaring an emergency, we seem to be having fuel issues and I’m going to attempt a landing in the field at the Bennett Community center 1100 West Colfax.”

Denver police dispatch replies, “Emergency situation acknowledged, with all the historic places in your area please try your best to make it to the field.”

The pilot grins and says, “That works every time, sorry I can’t get you closer than 8 blocks but we’re lucky as hell to find anyplace to land.”

I answer, “Thank you for getting us this close, we will run the rest of the way.”

The copilot announces, “We’ve got company.”

The pilot swears, “Shit, it’s the chopper from Stacy Summers outfit and also a KUSA news chopper. Strap yourselves in, I’m going to need to make this look more realistic than I really wanted to.”

We strap ourselves in, the pilot makes it over the field, cuts the engine and says, “Time to autorotate this landing.”

We get close to the ground, the pilot flairs the chopper up, we hit the ground hard enough to rattle my teeth and even bounce a couple times.

Thom is out of his gear and says, “Let’s haul ass and find Ben.”

We jump out of the chopper and I can’t resist giving Stacy’s chopper the finger as we take off running...

Present – Stacy and Samantha – Following Jennifer

Our pilot announces, “The TSIFFTS chopper just declared an emergency and is requesting permission to land in a place called Bennett community center.”

I ask, “can we land their too?”

The pilot replies, “Sorry, most of the airspace is restricted around here so there’s no way we can land.”

Our pilot continues, “Damn, he’s lost his engine and it’s going to be a hard landing.”

We watch as the chopper hits the ground and bounces a couple times. The bitch and her crew jump out, she smiles at our chopper and I can’t believe it when she flips us the bird, then takes off running toward the East.”

Present - KUSA News report

“Hello, this is Adele Arakawa in the KUSA news chopper, what you have just witnessed is an excellent display of piloting skills by the pilot of the helicopter carrying Jennifer Blaine and her entourage. We still don’t know if there are any survivors, wait, we see them coming out of the chopper and, and - well I can’t believe it! Jennifer Blaine looks directly at the Summers Industry helicopter and shows them the inappropriate digit. We have heard rumors that Jennifer and Stacy Summers did not get along, especially because Miss Summers wore a wedding dress to Jennifer and Ben’s wedding, but we had no idea the feelings ran this deep and were this volatile.

Jennifer and her crew begin to run east on Colfax Ave. while Stacy seems to be looking for a place to land.”

We will continue updating this story.

Present – Bernie and Liz – In Denver

We’re flipping the radio dial and find KOA news just in time for special report: Jens’ helicopter crash lands in a field and thank God no one appears injured. Bernie chuckles when the reporter talks about Jens flipping off Stacy’s helicopter and remarks, “There sure is no love lost between those two.”

I frown at Bernie and answer, “Bernie that’s going to mess up Jens’ good girl image. We need to forget about the maternity clothes for right now and check in on Jen.” I change the GPS coordinates and we begin heading toward Jens.

Bernie complains, “Damn, you can’t get anywhere in this city in a reasonable amount of time, the traffic is terrible.” He’s correct, we’re not making very good progress...

Present – Jens and the crew – ‘Ben’s’ truck

We haul rear to the parking lot where I saw Ben’s truck while Stacy’s damn helicopter is following us like an annoying fly. I wish I could shoot it down and be done with the problem.

We arrive in the parking lot, I look around and son of a sea biscuit! It’s gone! I take out my phone, call Gretchen, and hope and pray, “Gretchen, we found what I think was Ben’s truck in the Big Lots parking lot, but it’s gone now. Please tell me you were able to track it.”

Gretchen apologized, “Sorry Jens, but all the traffic cameras were reallocated to observe your crash landing and not a single one of them picked up Ben’s truck. I have no idea where he is.”

I sit on the ground and began to cry. Thom (of all people) comes over and comforts me, “Don’t worry Jennifer, if he was here, that probably means he’s staying someplace close and we will find him.”

I begin to stand up then we’re accosted by a swarm of police cars and even a SWAT van. They pull into the Big Lots parking lot and order, “Place your weapons on the ground.”

Thom suggests, “Let’s do as they say and I will smooth things over.”

We place our rifles on the ground, the officer orders, “All your weapons, including your handguns.”