Chapter 26

Alesha came in a little after 4:30. Jeff met her in the hallway and told her about the "agents" and what they were doing there, then, "How did you get off early?"

"We're due more than a foot of snow with high winds. The manager lives in the hotel. He took over and told me to go on home before the snow got so bad I couldn't see to drive."

"I'm glad he let you off early. I just ran the plow down the mountain, but the snow has picked up and the wind has started to gust. Mountain weather report said the gusts would be up to forty miles per hour. Looks like we have a couple of 'agents' who will spend the night."

"Well, they shouldn't be too upset about that," Alesha laughed. "They get to spend a night in a beautiful place."

Jeff chuckled. "Yeah, I guess. Uh, is Jesse coming for supper?"

Alesha stopped as they reached the kitchen door. "No, he's pulling a double shift today."

"Okay, but you make darn sure he knows he's welcome — any time. He doesn't need an invitation."

Alesha touched Jeff's arm for a second. "I appreciate the way you and your family have treated me. I get to live in your beautiful home. I have a good job..."

"We didn't have anything to do with the job," Jeff laughed. "You got that on your own."

"But Jesse got the interview set up for me," Alesha quickly interjected. "Well, anyway, I feel like my life has turned around. He..."

" ... is a good man," Jeff finished for her. "But if he isn't the right one, you don't have to go any further than just being friends."

"I like him a lot; maybe too much. But my choices in men haven't been the ... best in the world," she managed with a sick laugh. "Now, I don't have to ... do anything to have a place to live, or stay out of the cold. Jesse said he would wait, and he hasn't pushed me at all."

"A good man won't push," Jeff assured her. "You be sure before you take the next step. If Jesse gives up, it will be his loss, but I suspect he'll stay the course."

"Thanks, Jeff," she said as she kissed him on the cheek. "I'm going to find the others and start dinner."

"Laura is already in the kitchen," Jeff said.

Alesha went on through the kitchen door, and Jeff continued on down the hallway. He would wait until the interview was over before calling the colonel about Fisher and Campbell spending the night.

Jeff and Bill sat in the hallway a short distance from the interview room. Jill came out, her face drawn and tear-stained. She looked in the wrong direction, then when she turned the other way, she saw her husband who had already gotten to his feet.

Jill ran the few steps and crashed into his chest, to be wrapped instantly in Bill's arms. Jeff heard the quiet sobs from Jill as Bill asked, "Did they mess with you in there?" his voice taking on an edge.

"No, no. They were very nice to me," she got out. "It's just ... I can let down now. Oh, reliving it was ... bad."

Bill blinked hard to keep back sympathetic tears. "Just let it go, Baby. I'm here. That son-of-a-bitch will never get you again."

Ingles sat in his office reading and rereading the fax from the detective agency. He had received a phone call, but the fax was a follow-up with all the details. Fuck, she would have to run to a place that I can't get to without alerting everybody. But she'll come out sooner or later. I'll wait a couple of weeks then have the bitch killed when she lets her guard down. Fuck you, Whore. Nobody runs away from me.

Diana and Kathy came out of the interview room and Kathy went to hug Jill.

"That was something ... I hope to never go through again," Diana said quietly into Jeff's ear, "and Kathy surely got a dose of what it means to have the responsibilities of a Queen."

Jeff sighed and hugged her. "She'll handle it. Oh, and to add to your problems, we have guests for dinner and the night." he finished as they watched Bill and his women, arm in arm, start down the hall toward their suite.

"Yeah, I thought we would when you got here so late. What happened?"

"Well, on the plane, we had to divert around a big storm, then we had to wait for the helicopter because of some type of mechanical problem."

"I assume you're not talking about commercial."

Jeff sighed, "No, a small jet, then the military chopper. The ride over the mountains was rough on the way out in the helicopter, and that was before the weather got bad. It would take a fool to try to come out in one of those beasts in this," he said, motioning to a window. The lights had come on outside, but it was snowing so hard they could barely see halfway across the back lot, the wind swirling the snow as the strong gusts blew it about in crazy angles.

"Alesha..." Diana started.

" ... is back. The manager lives at the hotel, and took over for her so she wouldn't have to drive in this."

"And Jesse?"

"Has to work a double, so he won't be here. Dave and Evie got in a few minutes ago, also. I'm going to tell our 'agents, '" he said with a grin, "as soon as they're through with whatever they're doing in there."

"You're going to have to tell me about these 'agents' of yours."

"Can't, and you know that."

Diana stared at him for a second. "Okay, I'm going to help with supper. Tell those two to pick a double suite that they like."

"And if they really like each other?"

"Then tell them to pick a single suite that they like," she said lightly punching him in the stomach. "Supper in thirty minutes. I'm starved."

Shortly, "Agent" Fisher walked out of the sitting room they had used to interview Jill. "You look bushed, Fisher," Jeff said.

"I am. God, I hated to do that to that woman. Uh, Major, I need to talk with you. Do you have a room that is secure?"

Jeff nodded toward the door. "What about your buddy?"

"He'll be a while."

Jeff stuck his head in the door for a minute, anyway. "When you're done, meet us in the living room. It's down the hall a ways on the left. You can't miss it. It has a window that's probably bigger than any you've ever seen."

Closing the door at Campbell's nod, Jeff turned back to Fisher. "This way."

A few minutes later, in Jeff's office with the door locked, Fisher took out a small instrument from her case and began checking the room. "I know that if you say it's secure, then it is, but I have rules to go by," she apologized.

Jeff just leaned back in his chair and propped his feet on his desk. If Little One said the room was secure, then it was, but he couldn't tell Fisher that.

Finally, she put the instrument back in her case, and the case on a nearby chair. Standing in front of his desk, she started to say something, when Jeff motioned to a comfortable chair.

"Sit, Fisher. Why so formal? You know that I'm ... retired, yet you insist on calling me 'Major.'"

Fisher ignored his question; instead she said, "Sir, I want to go on this mission. I know I'm young, but I finished college early and the FBI recruited me. I had no idea they had any use for an anthropologist, and maybe they didn't. I guess I'll never know, because I only worked for the FBI for a little over a year before my boss called me in. First thing I knew, I was working for an organization that doesn't exist. The FBI thinks I was recruited by the CIA.

"I've only gone on a few missions through the portal, and most of them just recon of old cities," she downplayed, "but I'm hooked. Hearing about what happened to Mrs. Madison, and this ... this... person who did it to her ... well, I want to be part of the team. I know you don't have any use for an anthropologist on a mission like this, but dammit, Sir, I can help box up his chemicals or something. I'll do anything you need done. I want to go."

Jeff looked at the young woman who was so intense she was sitting on the edge of her seat. "Fisher, I'm not in charge of this mission. I only brought the story to the colonel. He's picked someone to lead the mission, and it surely isn't me."

"But, Sir, I was told that Lieutenant Richardson and Sergeant Gomez are going. I know they were part of your mission when you brought the ship back. I thought you would be in charge of this. I still think you will be."

"Look," Jeff said, "the weather has gone to shit. No helicopter to pick you up tonight. I've got to call the colonel and tell him you two are here until the weather breaks. I'll discreetly ask if he would consider your being on the mission. That's all I can do."

"Sir?"

At Jeff's raised eyebrow, "Sir, I don't quite know how to say this. But I know he'll take your recommendation. I mean, you're a ... legend..."

"I'm a what?" Jeff snapped.

"Sir, Sergeant Gomez says you have a gift. It's a rarity when someone on a team you're in charge of dies. Even then, you bring everyone back — every time, and you always accomplish your mission; usually more. And they only give you the most difficult missions. Sir, they're using your missions for training. I've studied hard. I've excelled in everything they taught me at Quantico, and at the training at our base. I can shoot with the best of them, and I'm in the best physical shape I've ever been in, in my life. I have some experience with one other planet, but no combat experience. I'll never get it interviewing rape victims. Sir ... I don't mean to nag, but I want to help get this ... piece of shit."

A legend? Jeff thought as he looked at the intense face of the young woman sitting up so straight in front of him. A fucking legend? These people don't have anything to keep them busy, or something, if all they have to talk about is me.

"What else do they have to say about me, Lieutenant Fisher?" he asked, the sarcasm leaking through despite his best intentions.

"Oh, you mean about your wives?" she innocently asked.

"Oh, shit," Jeff said as a muscle twitched in his jaw. "And just how many people know about that?" he got out as he clamped his jaw down hard to stop the twitch, but the end result with the knot of muscle now standing out, was more noticeable than before.

"Well, uh ... I guess everybody. I did say you were a legend."

"Well, whoopee fucking shit," Jeff groused. "I thought we worked for a secret agency."

"Well, we do, Sir. No one could talk about it to an outsider, but we can talk among ourselves at the base. Everyone knows you're a genius and have sold an invention that has reaped millions for you. I mean, crap Sir, they use your missions for training, and give tests on your logic. Sir, there's not much we don't know about you."

Oh, you're wrong there, Jeff thought as Little One and the Alphas crossed his mind, then grimly, The general and I are going to discuss this ... this training bullshit. "And what about, what's his name, Campbell?" he said aloud, trying to redirect his thoughts.