Chapter 8: When It Rains, It Pours

August 3, 1987, Chicago, Illinois

"Mr. Adams?"

It was a uniformed Immigration Officer who had come over to the passport control desk.

"Yes," I said.

"I need you to come with me, please. Do you have someone to leave your son with?"

"Yes," I said, handing Jesse to Kara.

"Dada?" he asked.

"I'll be back soon, Jesse," I said. "Stay with Aunt Kara."

"What's going on?" Jessica asked.

"No idea. I'm sure I'll be right back."

I followed the uniformed officer to a small room where another man in plain clothes was waiting. I sat in the single chair on the other side of a table from the man in the suit, and the uniformed officer stood with his back to the door.

"What was the purpose of your trip to the Soviet Union?" the man asked.

"I went to a friend's wedding," I said. "Is there a problem?"

"Who did you meet with?" he asked, ignoring my question.

"My friend's parents, her husband, and wedding guests. There was also a tour guide and a couple of drivers. And clerks in stores."

"What does your friend's father do?"

"He works in their Foreign Ministry. He used to be the Trade Attaché to the United States. He invited me to his daughter's wedding."

"And how do you know them?" he asked.

I sighed and described how I'd met Tanya in Austria, and explained how we'd become friends. I tried to maintain my patience over the next fifteen minutes as I answered questions. Finally, I'd had enough.

"What exactly are you looking for?" I asked. "If you're FBI, then you KNOW all of this. If you're Immigration, then you can check with the FBI and know all of this. I know that I have the right to re-enter the United States as a citizen, so unless you're charging me with something, I'd like to go back to my wife and son and get home. If not, then I want to call my attorney."

"You don't have a right to an attorney here," the man in the suit said.

"Well, you've heard the last answer from me. Arrest me or release me. Those are your options."

The man closed his folder and got up. He left the room, but the uniformed officer stayed, standing against the door once it closed.

"Officer, am I under arrest?" I asked.

"No, but you aren't free to go, either. You haven't been admitted to the US, and we can keep you in custody as long as necessary."

"For what?"

"I don't know. I was simply told that your name was flagged. You'll have to wait for the FBI agent to return."

I cooled my heels for another ten minutes until the FBI agent came back.

"Mr. Adams, you are free to go. Someone may contact you in the next few days with further questions."

"Don't waste your time. Let me give you my attorney's name. Call him if you want to talk to me."

I wrote out Jack Switzer's name and phone number, and then wrote down the name of his firm, Allen & Baker. Once I'd done that, he let me leave, and the uniformed officer walked me back to where Jessica, Kara, and Jesse were waiting.

"What was that about?" Jessica asked.

"Later," I said. "Let's clear Customs and get out of here."

After paying the duty on the Russian tea set, we quickly cleared Customs. Once through the doors, I walked to the courtesy phone to call for our limo. I was told where to meet it, and that it would be about ten minutes. We pushed our cart with our bags to the spot and waited. When it arrived, the driver loaded our bags as we all got into the car.

"That was the FBI messing with me again," I said. "This isn't the first time."

"I think I missed this part of the story," Jessica said.

I told her about being followed by the FBI while I was dating Tanya and the questioning after the Walker Spy Ring had been exposed. The more I thought about it, the more I should have expected something like this.

"So, what did they want?" Jessica asked.

"Who knows?" I said. "It just seems like harassment at this point. But I'm sure they think I'm either a spy or somehow working with the Russians. As much as I agree with Reagan's anti-Communism, the paranoia is a bit extreme. It's not like I have access to any state secrets!"

"Do I have a file now?" Jessica teased.

"I'm sure you do. Heck, Jesse probably has a file now."

When we arrived home, my sister came out to greet us.

"Were you watching out the window, Squirt?" I chuckled, giving her a hug.

"Actually, yes! You're late!"

"The fucking FBI," I spat. "They decided to harass me coming back into the country."

"Still? Jesus. You aren't even dating Tanya at this point!"

"I know. But I went to Russia. And I have a file. So somebody decided that they wanted to talk to me. Let's get into the house."

"Mama!" Jesse squealed as Jennifer came down the steps to the sidewalk.

Kara put him down and he toddled over to Jennifer, who scooped him up in his arms.

"How is Jesse doing?"

"Jesse fly! Jesse dance! Jesse have fun!"

"There you go, Jen," I said. "A seven word description of our trip to Russia!"

"How was it?"

"Fun, but a whirlwind. I really like Tanya's husband and his friends in the Army. Want to know the crazy thing? It was easier for me to get into the Soviet Union than back into the US!"

"Trouble with the FBI again?"

"Right the first time! Let me get our things inside and I'll tell you all about Russia!"

August 5, 1987, Chicago, Illinois

"It was really nice to have the day off together yesterday," Jessica said as we walked her to work. "But I'm going to pay for it with five straight 36 hours shifts with only twelve hours between. No day off and no shorter 24-hour shift. That's how I'm making up the hours."

"Sorry, Babe," I said.

"I agreed to go, even knowing what would happen."

"But you didn't tell us about it, Jess," Kara said.

"I didn't want to make Tiger feel guilty for asking me to go. I really wanted to go! And I really wanted him to go."

"You should have told me, Jess," I said. "And we'd have talked it through. Next time, tell me, please."

"I'm sorry," she said.

"It's OK, Babe. Let's have dinner if you can. Call me at the office and I'll call Kara. I'm going to work late tonight, most likely."

"Thanks. I love you!" she said.

"I love you too," I said.

"And I love you," Kara said.

We watched Jessica walk into the ER, and then Kara walked me to the office.

"I wish that she had told us about this," I said. "Doctor Barton talked to me about being a rock of support for her, and I wonder if this was what he meant, at least short term."

"I can't even imagine what kind of stress she's under," Kara said. "We'll just need to make extra sure that we're doing what she needs."

"What she's going to need is sleep. Lots of it. If you think about it, she'll be on until tomorrow evening, then off until Friday morning, then on until Saturday night, off until Sunday morning, and so on, through next week. The only good thing is that she's going to be home at night when she is home, so our sleeping times will match. But she's going to be totally exhausted by the end of next week."

"True. And not to change the subject, but don't you have a difficult situation with your new client that you have to deal with today?"

"I do," I said. "Julia, Dave, and I are going to see him this morning at 10:00am. The problem we have is that he's trying to dictate who works on his software. He wants me, which would mean delaying our legal software, and that's something that we simply cannot do. Even with the new guy, Greg, starting next week, and our intern starting in three weeks, it would delay our next release for months. I'm going to have to try to explain that to him."

"Is it worth it?" she asked.

"That's the subject of a meeting I'm having this morning with Julia, Dave, Elyse, Jamie, Joyce, and my dad."

We reached the NIKA offices, and Kara gave me a hug and kiss, and wished me a good day. I unlocked the door, went inside, locked it behind me, and went to my office. There was a sheet of paper with Penny's neat handwriting, welcoming me back and explaining what she'd worked on while I was gone. There was also a note from Dave attached to a typed sheet of notes from the meetings that they'd had with Dante, as well as Jamie's opinion on the contracts. I scanned it and set it aside, deciding that I needed to get a couple of hours' worth of programming done.

I'd been working better than two hours when Kimmy arrived to open the office. Penny came in a short time later.

"How was Russia?" she asked.

"Great! We had a good time."

"Meet any new Russian girls?" she smirked.

"A few, but I spent most of my time with Red Army officers."

"I didn't know you were into guys!" she teased.

"Very funny, Pretty Penny. You know what I'm into!"

"Not me!" she frowned.

"I thought Ned had that taken well in hand!" I teased.

"He's OK. He's not you, though."

"Don't EVER say that to him, Penny. He's just inexperienced. Give him some time."

"I'm not clueless!" she laughed. "I know how easy it is to hurt the fragile male ego, especially about things like that!"

I chuckled, "I wasn't THAT bad!"

"No, you weren't. Just that one time when you were stressed out, or whatever, and you couldn't..."

"Enough!" I laughed. "You start school in two weeks, right?"

"Yes. I want to work on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, plus Saturdays. Will that be OK?"

"So long as you keep your grades up, yes."

She smiled and turned back to her workstation just as Julia came to the door.

"Steve, I need you."

"You aren't the only one," Penny muttered under her breath, just loud enough for me to hear.

I ignored Penny and followed Julia to the conference room where Dave and Elyse were waiting. Dave was dialing the phone, setting up the conference call with Jamie, Joyce, who was in Georgia, and my dad, who was at home. He had everyone on the call a minute after I sat down.

"So where are we?" I asked.

"Son, before we start, how was your trip to Russia?"

"It was great. We had a good time with Tanya and her family. Tanya's husband seems to be a good man, and I met his friends as well. I had a bit of a problem with the FBI when I came back to O'Hare, but we can talk about that later. Jamie?"

"Because Elyse didn't cash the check for the retainer, on my advice, you could tear up the contract now with no negative repercussions. He could, of course, try to sue, but he'd have no case. Courts rarely order specific performance, and in this case, there would be no possible monetary damages. He could make trouble, but nothing else. So, my opinion is that you have a free hand here."

"Did anyone make any representation to Mr. Puccini that Steve would work on the custom programming?" Joyce asked.

"No," Julia said. "We were very careful not to promise specific people, especially Steve, because he was going to be away and he's right in the middle of the next release of our legal software. Jamie can confirm that the contract doesn't name any names or even imply anything."

"Correct," Jamie said.

"Do you have a proposal, Julia?" my dad asked.

"We're meeting with him this morning at 10:00am. If we can't come to some kind of agreement, then I'll return the retainer check and have Jamie send him a letter terminating the contract. If we can come to an agreement, then I'll tell Jamie the terms, and he'll draw up an addendum."

"Are you sure this is worth the potential hassle?" my dad asked.

"That's a good question, Mr. Adams," Julia said. "The contract terms are reasonably favorable in terms of revenue versus costs. This really is our first difficult client, and I'd rather not walk away at the first sign of trouble."

"If you're going to go ahead with this," Jamie said. "You need to make sure that each and every thing you do is documented and agreed in advance, with clear and specific deliverables. He's going to be a stickler, so you need to be as well."

"Son, are you absolutely sure you want to do this?" my dad asked.

"I'm sure I want to talk to him. After that, we'll discuss it internally and decide. Jamie, what's our worst-case scenario?"

"That you start the contract, do work, and he refuses to accept it. If you've taken a retainer, he'll sue to get it back and you'll have to defend your work in court, and that's the last place you want to try to explain the ins-and-outs of technical issues. Your jury will be basically clueless."

"Isn't that true of any contract we take?" Dave asked. "In the end, anyone could sue us."

"True," Jamie said. "It's always a matter of calculated risk. The question you have to ask is whether the risk and reward balance properly here."

"And we don't know the answer to that just yet," I said. "We signed a contract, giving our word. I want to do everything we can to fulfill the promises we made. If we don't, then we risk our reputation, and you know how I feel about that. If I can't be a man of my word, then I'm not who I want to be. Dad, Joyce, I think we have to at least try. We'll work closely with Jamie to make sure that the contract is as ironclad as possible, along with any necessary addenda."

"Business isn't always as neat and clean as we would like, Son," my dad counseled. "I do understand your point. Just don't wreck your business on an ethical principle that relies on other people keeping their word. There will come a time when you'll have to decide between your personal ethics and your business. It happens to everyone. I'm not talking about breaking the law or cheating anyone, but about the standard you hold yourself to. Be very careful not to let those standards get you into trouble because other people don't follow or respect them."

He had a valid point, and it was something I knew that I was going to struggle with. I didn't like it, but there were plenty of people who didn't have the same exacting and consistent standards that I had. I also knew that there were plenty of hard-nosed businessmen who wouldn't think twice about doing anything necessary to further their business. I didn't want to be that kind of person, but I also couldn't let that kind of person have an advantage over us because they knew that I'd always stick to a specific principle. I just didn't know how to balance all of those concepts, or at least I didn't know yet.

"I understand," I replied. "We'll meet with Dante and find out what he's thinking."

We ended the call and Dave, Julia, and I walked to the house so we could get my car for the drive out to the suburbs to meet Dante. On the way, we talked about my trip to Russia and Tanya's wedding, and my run-in with the FBI. While I'd been gone, they'd received some important news.

"Julia's pregnant," Dave said.

"Congratulations! How far along?"

"About two months. We haven't told too many people — just our parents and our priest. We'd like to keep it quiet for a couple of months."

"Sure. How long do you plan to work, Julia?"

"As long as I can. I actually talked Dave into telling you early because I want to propose a paid maternity leave plan. We have quite a few female staff and they shouldn't suffer for having a baby."