Chapter 7: Friday, September 29, 2017 to Saturday, September 30, 2017

Friday started out like most other days. We got Riley off to school on the bus, and Kelly loaded Seamus in the Sienna to take to day care at Matucket State. The big difference was that we dug out all the luggage. While she was at class, I packed all my formal stuff in a hanging bag, with the rest in a suitcase. As soon as Kelly and Seamus came home, she grabbed her stuff out of the closet and told me to start packing, while she packed everything for the kids. It became a mad rush, since I didn’t pack everything perfectly, and she needed to repack, and then we threw it all in the Sienna, along with Boxie and his stuff. From there it was over to Kelly’s folks’ house, and then on to the airport.

This would be only the second time I had flown in a small jet. The first had been when we flew to Washington to receive the Medal, but there had been no return flight. We had done a few small trips in a turboprop, but after that it was commercial flights all the time. We were flying in a Gulfstream G-IV like the one we had taken to Andrews, but this one was nicer. I immediately reminded Kelly about some inflight action and was just as immediately shot down. She also informed me that if I really had a red cape, I could fly her around without the need to use an airplane.

I took us just a bit over three hours to fly from the Matucket County airport to Denver. A small limo was waiting for us and took us to the Four Seasons downtown. Jack and the Raiders wouldn’t fly in until Saturday afternoon, so we had about twenty-four hours to kill. That was taken up with dinner in the restaurant, followed by a couple of drinks in the bar. Then Kelly decided to take pity on me for not fulfilling my fantasy earlier in the afternoon. Or maybe she was just happy to be away from the kids for a few days. It turned out that she had purchased a couple of new nighties and wanted to try them out without worrying about being interrupted by our offspring.

Kelly’s nightgown that first night was sheer, lacy, and white, and you could see her jewelry through it. It was so interesting, in fact, that Saturday morning we were seriously delayed getting out of bed. We ended up having a brunch rather than a breakfast when we went down to the restaurant. Then we did a little sightseeing. We wanted to see the Mint, but they were closed on weekends, so we ended up with a short cab tour.

The strangest thing we saw, right before we had to head back to the Four Seasons, was a marijuana store. They were all over the place! Several were within walking distance of the hotel, and Kelly and I walked over to one and looked around. It was a very strange experience. It seemed as if half my job was about drugs, and here they had stores on street corners. There were buds in jars, all with cute names, and food and other ‘edibles’ packaged and ready to sell. A very pleasant and helpful clerk asked my preferences and I simply answered that we were just looking. Her nod and smile gave me the impression we weren’t the first tourists overwhelmed by the experience. I looked at Kelly and said, “Is this weird or what?”

“Think we’ll ever see this in Matucket?” she asked.

“Yeah, right after the second coming of Christ!”

“So, you’ve never...”

“Kelly, are you for real? When would I have ever done pot? High school? Remember Coach Summers? If he even thought we were doing something like that, we were dead.”

Kelly laughed. “He also didn’t want you drinking, and I remember you doing that.”

I snorted out a laugh and smiled back. “Yeah, well, that’s different. Anyway, then there was the Army, and then the MPD, and random drug tests. What about you?” I asked. I already knew the answer.

Or did I? Kelly blushed and averted her eyes. “Kelly?”

“Remember back when I was a freshman at Vanderbilt?” I just stared at my wife in disbelief. “Remember how I told you I kind of colored outside of the lines every once in a while?”

“I remember how you got arrested for pepper spraying Candy Pants Holden. I thought that was the extent of your criminal behavior.”

She blushed and said, “So maybe that wasn’t my only minor transgression.”

“Minor transgression? Oh, this just keeps getting better and better.”

“Sarah and a few of the girls and I would sometimes goof off on weekends.”

I just covered my ears with my hands. “I don’t want to hear this!”

Kelly laughed. She nudged me with an elbow, and then leaned in. She whispered, “Know what? It makes you horny!”

“Kelly!”

“Don’t worry. I took care of the problem myself.”

I just stared at her and shook my head. “You know, you think you know somebody ... Well, this totally blows my chance to get into the Police Hall of Fame. You know that line on the application form where I have to fill in, ‘Does anybody in your family have a history of minor transgressions?’ Just gone to hell now!”

Kelly laughed. After a few minutes more, we went back to the hotel. Just standing in the store probably brought my THC levels in my blood up enough to become illegal! Very strange!

We had a late lunch, fooled around a bit more in the room (Kelly described how she ‘took care of the problem’ very graphically) and then cleaned up. Jack and the Raiders were flying in sometime mid-afternoon and would be at the hotel by 1600 or so. Well, they’d be there by four. Kelly still teased me about my use of military time, but it worked well with the different shifts I occasionally worked. He’d call when they were checked in.

That call came at about four-thirty, to my cell phone. “We’re here”, he said.

“Great! Want to go out or something?” I asked.

He laughed. “It doesn’t really work that way. You’ll need to come here. Go down to the lobby to the front desk and tell them who you are. Security will bring you up.”

“Security?”

“Don’t sweat it, Grim. We’ll explain when you get here.” With that he hung up.

Kelly looked at me curiously. “Something wrong?”

“No, just weird. He said we had to go down to the lobby and Security would take us to him, and ‘we’ll explain’ when we get there, like there’s a group or something.”

“The lobby? Like we can’t go there direct?” I nodded. “Who’s the ‘we’? Is Teresa with him?”

“I don’t think so.”

She shrugged. “Well, let’s go find out. Think this is good?” she asked, indicating her outfit. She was wearing skinny jeans and a glittery top, and three-inch heels. I was wearing khakis and a sport shirt and had a sports coat in case we were going out. Now I wasn’t so sure.

“I think so, but if there’s a problem, we’ll just come back and change.” I grabbed the room key and Kelly grabbed a small purse, and we left the room.

We went down to the lobby and at the front desk we were directed to a man down at the end of the reception area. He looked professional, in a suit and tie, but I noticed he had an earbud in his ear, and his suit jacket was concealing a weapon. When I introduced ourselves to him, he simply thanked me and motioned another man over. This guy was dressed identically, and he escorted us over to the bank of elevators. They had a professional security outfit running things. A third identical man was at the elevators, and he used a special key to activate one of them and let us on. He rode with us to a floor higher than we were staying and let us out. Another member of the security team was waiting for us and led us down the hallway, knocking on a door when we got there. I was almost expecting to be frisked before they let us inside, but Jack opened the door and gave me a big smile.

“Grim! Kelly! Good to see you guys! How was the flight out? Come on in!”

We stepped inside, to find Jack wasn’t alone. Two other men were inside, neither of whom I recognized. “What’s with the security, Jack? I thought we were going out to dinner?” I looked around and was surprised that he wasn’t in a fancy suite. His room looked like a basic hotel room like ours.

He smiled. “Dinner, yes. Going out, no. We’re on lockdown.”

“Lockdown?”

“I’ll explain later. First, I want you to meet a couple of people. Grim, Kelly, I want you to meet our head coach, Jack Del Rio, and Mark Davis, the team’s owner. Mister Davis, Coach, this is my brother, Grim, and his wife, Kelly.”

We all shook hands, and Coach Del Rio said, “We wanted to talk to you about what Jack has in mind, Mister Reaper. Let’s sit down.” There weren’t enough seats around the small table in the corner, so Jack sat on the edge of the bed.

Davis started, saying, “My understanding is that you plan to come to the game in uniform, wearing your Medal of Honor, and kneel with the team while the anthem is playing. Is that correct?”

I glanced at Jack but shook my head. “Not quite. I won’t be kneeling. That will never happen, but I will be standing at attention, saluting, while they kneel. It’s their protest, not mine, but I will support them.”