Chapter 399

...”Fuck you. You’re standing there empty handed without enough sense to even put a coat on. You’re a fucking, arrogant idiot. Your money must have gone to your head. I guess it’s time we showed all of you that we’re serious...”

Whatever he intended to do was interrupted by a loud crunching, popping sound as both the kidnapper’s Glocks seemed to fall apart, the frame and barrel assembly dropping away from each weapon, leaving the two holding only the hand grips.

“Oh, shit,” one managed, but before either could get their faculties together enough to react, Kayla had closed the distance and hit the kidnapper in front of her with a hammer blow to his solar plexus – a move she had practiced many hundreds of times. She put everything she had into it, visualizing her fist coming out his back, her whole arm going numb after she slammed the base of her fist into his chest. If it had landed on his heart, the blow might well have stopped it, but as it was, striking his solar plexus with that much force, shut his nervous system down. Stunned, he couldn’t make his lungs take in air. Her next planned move was to kick him in the balls, but before she could follow through, he suddenly joined his partner in dangling by his neck.

Jeff stood quietly, his face totally devoid of expression, his invisible TK hands closed around their necks, holding the kidnappers well clear of the pavement. Struggling and kicking, they hung, their hands trying to grasp the invisible force that was cutting off their air and squeezing the life out of them.

“What were you going to do?” Jeff snarled, shaking the dangling men in front of him. “Were you going to kill Margaret to show us you meant business? Or was it going to be Jill, or maybe one of the men?”

Neither answered – couldn’t – even if they were focused enough to hear Jeff as the Sergeant gave the command and the Security team became visible with pulse rifles aimed at the kidnappers. Some part of Jeff’s mind noted that each of the team was positioned so that his or her pulse rifle fire would not hit any of the family members.

“Jeff,” Kayla said as she realized the men’s struggles were lessening, their faces already blue and darkening more by the second. “The General will execute them for what they did, but don’t you want to interrogate them?”

Jeff sighed, shook them once more with his TK force, their bodies flopping around, then released the two, both dropping to the pavement, limp and seemingly lifeless. But after a few seconds, both men gasped, then took in shuddering breaths, the one that called himself Hawkins throwing up on his own chest as he struggled to breathe.

“Good. They’re breathing,” the medic mumbled quietly, “I damn sure wasn’t going to give them CPR,” but most heard him anyway, and a chuckle went through the group.

Inside the fence, the construction supervisor had been on the way to the office trailer to requisition a part from headquarters. He stood staring at the tableau a hundred yards away. He couldn’t hear what was said due to the howling of the wind and the distance, but he had seen everything. He had stood spellbound as the men dangled in midair clawing at their throats as if invisible ropes were holding them up by their necks. Then with a suddenness that was just as startling, there were a number of the helmeted guards also standing there, all pointing those odd looking rifles at the two dangling men. He had even seen the Glocks disintegrate.

As the men dropped to crumble lifelessly to the pavement, the supervisor shook his head and marched purposely toward his office. I saw that. I know I saw that, but nobody will believe me. I’ve been with the company many years, and I thought I had been to some truly unusual locations, but this one takes the cake. What the fuck is going on around here? Is this another Area 51? It’s obviously military – there are military helicopters going and coming, and the guards that patrol our compound are just as obviously highly trained. They won’t speak other than a greeting, but their weapons look odd ... and scary. Now a whole bunch of them appear right out of thin air. Not to mention those two guys dangling a foot above the ground.

With one last glance over his shoulder, he saw the two men being carried on stretchers toward a Humvee that had just roared up. I want this job completed, and I do not want to piss these people off, he thought as he hurried inside his office.

The back door of the Retreat flew open and a crying Tina ran down the steps to slam into Wainwright, staggering him. After a moment of intense hugging and crying, she turned to Margaret and grabbed her, sobbing out, “They were going to kill you. They were going to kill all of you. I was so scared.”

Then after hugging Jill, Charlotte and Bill, she turned to Jeff. But he had realized what was going to happen and braced himself as she slammed into him, saying over and over, “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you,” as she practically climbed him to lock her arms around his neck and kiss him hard.

Turning a bright red Jeff loose, she grabbed Kayla. By the time she was finished with everyone and had started over, most of the group had tears in their eyes.

“Let’s get you people out of the cold,” the Prime told them. “I’ll be with you in a few minutes.”

Stepping over to the Lieutenant who was patiently waiting, Jeff put his hand on Mayfield’s shoulder. “Well done!” he started before Mayfield cut him off.

“Colonel, we didn’t do a thing. Hell, you crushed their weapons and held them by their throats a foot off the ground. All we did was pick up the pieces,” he finished with a chuckle while nodding to his people as they picked up what was left of the Glocks.

“Oh, come on, Lieutenant. Your hostage plans were flawless. Without my grandstanding, you would have killed them in another heartbeat. The General...”

“I just had the Sergeant send him the video, Sir, prefaced with a message that everyone was okay – well, other than the kidnappers,” he finished with a chuckle. “As soon as they’re able to speak, we’ll interrogate them, but I doubt they’ll know a lot. Moreau is too smart for that sort of thing. He screwed up once and let agent Hanes see his face, which started all this, but I doubt that they had any direct orders from him. He would have used a go-between for their orders, but who knows? Maybe he screwed up this time.”

Jeff sighed. “But the bottom line is that he’s surrounded himself in that compound with a group of innocents. If the FBI gets a warrant and storms the place, or if we storm it – even invisible – innocent lives might well be lost. He has to know that he’s gone too far with his vendetta toward Art, but the bastard just won’t give up.”

“He’s nuts,” the Lieutenant said with a sigh.

“As you know, Ship maintains probes that constantly watch the compound. When he ventures out, which he is bound to do sooner or later, she’ll know and grab him with a tractor beam. Once he’s here, we can deal with him.”

“Still, I wish I could take a team in. Invisible...”

“Even invisible, we risk innocent lives, though. If we have to do it, we will, and I’ll lead the team if we do, but not until then, Lieutenant. The General has vastly curbed Moreau’s effective control over his enterprises. We’re costing the bastard money, and I suspect the General is siphoning off profits into his own coffers to further aggravate Moreau. Those coffers pay your command’s salaries and expenses. Let’s just wait until Moreau makes his fatal mistake. Maybe the disappearance of the two kidnappers will push him the last little bit and he’ll come out of his sanctuary.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“But this was a hair-brained scheme at best. Moreau had to know it wouldn’t succeed, but I suppose he thought the kidnappers might kill a couple of us before we killed them.”

Bill interrupted with, “Jeff, we passed a couple of SUV’s sitting on the side of the road after the first turnoff this side of Martha’s restaurant. The limo driver got on the phone with someone as we passed. Might just be a coincidence...”

A glance passed between Jeff and the Lieutenant who turned away as he communicated with someone on the radio. Turning back to Jeff a moment later. “I sent a couple of attack copters to check it out.”

“Let me know.”

“Certainly, Colonel.”

Jeff stood watching as Lieutenant Mayfield stepped into one of Security’s SUV’s and followed the limo driven by one of the troopers as it started around the slope toward the front and the driveway off the plateau. The troopers had already put the group’s luggage just inside the mudroom before they left. The women had gone into the building with only Frank and Bill remaining outside with Jeff.

Frank cleared his throat, obviously embarrassed. “Don’t even bother to say it. I fucked up and almost got us all killed. I should have listened to you. I guess I fell into the thing about ‘that’s the way I’ve always done it, ‘ and so forth. Stupid of me.”

“Well, those two were good at it,” Bill injected, trying to ease Frank’s conscience a bit. “They surprised me just as much as they did you, I imagine. That fake guard was every bit as professional as the guards the service regularly provided, and that goes for the limo driver, too.”

Frank let out a sigh as they all started for the back door while he continued, “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but the fact remains that Jeff has been trying to get me to use part of his Security force while I go back and forth, but I was just too fucking hard headed to listen.”

“Now me,” Jeff said, slapping Frank on a shoulder, “well, I’m always perfect – in hindsight, that is,” he finished with a laugh.

As they stepped inside, Eileen and Jill were waiting for Bill. “Say thank you, Husband,” Jill said with a grin as Bill was hanging up his coat.

“Uh, thank you, but why?” he hesitantly asked.

“Because I thought to ask to find out where Kathy is. She’s lying in one of Ship’s couches dreaming she is at the academy doing who knows what. So, if you hurry, you can be there when she wakes up, and you can tell her about the kidnapping. Or ... would you rather one of us told her?”

“Oh, hell no. I’ll do it,” he said as his strides lengthened.

Jill and Eileen, grinning, hurried to catch up.

In seconds, Jeff was surrounded by crying women. “But I was never in any danger,” he said, but that went over like a lead balloon.

“It would only have taken a flip of their wrists and those guns could have been firing at you,” Diana almost snarled as tears trickled down her cheeks.

“But what was I to do?” he asked. “I knew I could destroy their weapons before they could fire them.”

“Don’t try to use logic,” Diana snarled. “We were worried.”

Jeff had long since learned that sometimes there wasn’t a correct answer where a worried wife was concerned, and the closest thing was a very sincere, “Yes, Dear.”

“And ... Arlene and Ann are going to be pissed when they get back,” Diana added.

“But...” Whatever he was going to say was interrupted as his tearful wives grabbed him to practically drag him toward their suite and the big bed there. Not daring to grin, he allowed them to hurry him along.