Chapter 371

The Retreat

The cold wind seemed to knife right through Ada as her wheelchair rolled into the couple of inches of snow that had accumulated since the plow's last trip. Pulling the coat's hood over her head, the icy wind almost taking her breath, she exclaimed, "Oh, my goodness. I guess I didn't expect it to be this cold."

"Told you it would be quite a change," Charlotte said to her mother. After they had moved a short distance away from the ramp, she casually commented, "Look behind you, Mom."

As Ada turned, she was flabbergasted to see a perfectly normal building where they had just been. "But..." she stammered.

"Jeff told me that it's positioned so that anyone who sees them come out here will think they are going to or coming from a building."

"Well," Ada responded as she stared at the illusionary building that seem so solid, "I realize that our medical technology has advanced in the last few years – I get to see plenty of it at the doctor's office – but I certainly didn't know that science had progressed until a building like this could be..." And Jeff reached over and opened the door ... Opened a door to an illusion.

Ada stopped in mid-sentence. Not only had he opened the door, but she could see a foyer and a hallway extending into the building that she absolutely knew weren't there, either.

She sat quietly as Jeff pushed her to the Escalade, helped her inside, then folded the wheelchair and put it in the back.

As they turned around with Jeff driving, he waved to Arlene, Ann and Selina as they came out of the illusion and hurried to the second Escalade. The Hummers were already in the parking lot of the Retreat near the garage entrance.

A couple of minutes later, Jeff came to a stop inside the garage. The women helped Ada from the vehicle and up the stairs, then seated her in the wheelchair as the troopers came in with Ada's and Charlotte's things, dropping the camouflage as soon as they were inside.

Art hurried ahead in search of his wives as Susan pushed Ada on into the building with Charlotte walking beside her mother. Diana and Jeff stood aside as the troopers followed the three women. Arlene, Ann and Selina got out of their Escalade and, talking among themselves, hurried to follow. When the door had closed behind everyone, Diana turned to her husband. "They both know too much..." she began before being interrupted by Jeff.

"Yep," he agreed. "They know too much and there was no time or a way to preclude that happening if we were going to prevent Ada from being killed."

"But how could these people, whoever they are, know so quickly? You said that you had Ship shut down communication shortly after Charlotte gave Art the gun. I know that you said you felt you should hurry to Ada's, but surely this ... person had no way of knowing that Charlotte didn't shoot Art."

Jeff sighed. "But the bastard did. We were mere minutes ahead of the assassin at Ada's. Not only did this guy know Charlotte had not been successful, he must have had someone already stationed to kill Ada." Jeff hesitated for a second before going on. "The only way I can think of that the sequence of events could happen would be if he has an informant up here somewhere that reports regularly. Knowing that Charlotte had the weapon and that we had scheduled a tour with the supervisor, this guy must have been waiting for a message from the informant. Or ... it could even have been a routine company business update that always went out at a set time, and by my shutting down communications, the message did not go out. Maybe I triggered the events myself.

"When the message didn't come, he must have assumed that something had gone wrong, and activated the assassin. There are probably other ways to do it, but that's my guess off the top of my head. Whatever the method, he seemed to have found out, was pissed and decided to punish Charlotte by killing her mom. Hell, with this guy, he might just have been clearing up loose ends, whether she was successful in killing Art or not. Art is sure he knows who this is, and if it is the person Art thinks it is, he's going to be darn hard to take out without collateral damage ... as we've discussed before."

"By collateral damage, you mean killing innocent people, right?"

"Yeah, Babe. Without killing innocent people. The General has the supposed original blueprints of the compound this asshole lives in. If they're accurate, there's no way we could go in there and take this guy out without endangering women and kids in the compound. And I am not going to get my team killed by giving them unworkable orders. So, we don't go in until we have a reasonable chance of completing the mission – well, unless something very, very drastic happens to cause me to reconsider."

There was quiet for a moment before Diana responded, "So, what now, and what do we do with Ada and Charlotte?"

Jeff let out a frustrated sigh. "We brought this onto the two of them when we took Art in with this asshole trying to kill him. Because of that, we're responsible for them now. No other choice; they have to be part of us, else this bastard will have them killed just to make a point."

Diana grinned at her husband as she changed the subject. "I haven't been able to get a good look at Charlotte's figure so far, because of that thick sweater and probably a couple of pairs of pants or some other type of cold weather gear under her outer clothing. Ada is all bundled up in her coat, so I couldn't see much of her, either. But she will come out of the coat as soon as she's in her suite, and Charlotte will probably shed a few layers as well. And by the way, Ada is not much older than Mom. You could have two more wives when Little One is through with them..."

"No," he said, breaking in as soon as he realized what she was saying. Raising his hand slightly to forestall her response, he went hurriedly on. "No way. Di, don't even start. I have fourteen wives now and everything is going superbly. I am not going to push my luck. There's Art, and if not him, then there are other Alphas here with a lot fewer wives than I have. Besides, it's time for someone else to step up..."

That did not go well with his Clan Queen. "Ohhhh, 'step up, ' is it?" she broke in with emphasis, making Jeff realize he had just stepped in it. "Are you saying that having fourteen wives is such drudgery? Maybe..."

He could see the doghouse coming. "Wait, Baby. Now you know damn well that's not what I meant..."

"It sure sounded like that's what you said," she continued, pulling her hand back from his. "You just mentioned that those women were our responsibility, and I personally like Charlotte even in the short time I've known her. I'm certain she wouldn't have been promoted to operator, or whatever her title is, on that big machine unless she had something on the ball. She's obviously intelligent. Ada has a pretty face, too. And we both know you're going to have Little One heal her. Do you think she's just going to say thank you and give you a kiss on the cheek before going her merry way, sans arthritis and age? She obviously has arthritis, Jeff, and just as obviously has the crippling kind. She's going to be beside herself with joy when she wakes up in the morning, gets out of bed and is able to stand without pain, and that's before she looks in the mirror and finds out that she looks thirty. You're the one who rescued her..."

"But Art was there doing his part..." Jeff tried.

"Bullshit, Husband. Whose ship is that out there? Whose team rescued her? Whose home is this?" Before Jeff could even get a word in, she went on, "Besides, Charlotte couldn't keep her eyes off you while we were eating, and she blushed every time she looked at you on Ship. She even blushed again just as she walked through this door," she finished, motioning to the door where they stood talking.

"But I don't need..."

"Then I suggest you kill that bastard before he sends someone else out here."

"But..."

Diana grabbed his neck to pull him down for a hungry kiss. "I love you, you big oaf. Now let's go make sure Ada and Charlotte have what they need to get settled in. Besides," she added as Jeff opened the door for her, "I want to see what they look like dressed in different clothing. Can't ever tell, they might have some big titties hiding under all that thick cloth."

Jeff certainly wasn't going to tell her that he already knew that Ada had what appeared to be some very nice ones that her thin blouse had clearly shown back in her home in Nashville.

"Uh, I guess I've already told her she would be able to walk normally before nightfall."

Diana turned to him with a grin. "Well," she said with a flourish, "I guess that means you and Little One won't be sneaking into her bedroom at two in the morning, huh? So, now she'll know without a doubt just who healed her. Good luck telling her bye-bye after healing her. She'll be on you like sticky on gum," she finished with a chuckle.

"Sticky on gum? Where did you hear that one?"

"I didn't. I just made it up, and you're not getting away with trying to change the subject."

"Di..." he almost desperately said as he followed her on into the hallway where Diana hung her coat up. Before Jeff could go on with their conversation, they met the troopers coming back, and stopped to thank them with Diana hugging each of them before they hurried out.

"What's going to happen to the two prisoners?" she asked as he tried to come up with a reason for pawning the women off on another Alpha without encountering his Clan Queen's wrath.

"I imagine the General will send them to the base for questioning. After that, I can only guess, but you can bet their punishment will be based on what he learns from them about their crimes – present and past. And before you even think it, yeah, he's circumventing civilian justice to apply his version of military justice, but we and he can't afford to let our secrets out. The absolute last thing we need is an investigative panel of some kind looking into the General's secret base. Plus, he takes care of his own. Art falls under that umbrella. This guy has tried to kill Art, and the General will punish the assassins for their part in it, and any other major crimes they have gotten away with. Judging from the casualness the guy exuded as he stepped through the door with that silenced pistol in his hand, he's done this thing before."

Since Ada was in a wheelchair, Susan had said she was going to put the women in the double suite nearest the living room, which would make it easier on Ada to get around. As Jeff and Diana stopped in front of the suite's door, Diana went on, "When are you going to have Little One cure her?"

Jeff sighed. "Whenever I get the balls to tell her I have an alien Healer riding my back. Trust me, this lady may be a partial invalid, but she covers every inch she stands on, uh, sits on," he said, thinking of her wheelchair as he wound down with a blush. "Oh, hell, you know what I mean. Ada has had several things thrown in her lap today, and she's taken them well. But people tend to be a bit squeamish the first time they see Little One flow out of my collar, and Ada hasn't had any contact with the whole family, yet. I'm not even sure she's fully realized that she has actually been on a spaceship, no matter that Ship talked to her. Just imagine what she's gone through in the last hour. She really doesn't need any more shocks just yet, but I did say she would be walking by nightfall, so I have little choice but to do it now."

Arlene stepped out the door of the suite in time to hear his last remark. "Toss Little One in her lap and apologize later. I'm sure she'll curse you out for curing her arthritis," she teased. "By the way, they're wondering where you are. Might want to go kiss your new wives," she finished with her tinkling laugh.

"That is not funny," he groused.