Chapter 5

Mike stepped out of the office after a slow day and looked around the parking lot trying to remember where he had parked his car. His boss, Dale Dawson, stepped out and stopped beside him. Pointing to the parking lot, he said, “I noticed this morning that I parked right next to your car.”

“Oh,” Mike said. He walked beside his boss towards a far end of the parking lot.

Dale said, “Did you know that there are four Internet Cafes between here and your new house?”

Mike almost stumbled on hearing the question. He looked over at Dale and answered, “No, I wasn’t aware of that.”

“Yes. There are four of them. One of them is owned by a Chinese gentleman. Nice fellow, but I don’t care much for the place. It just doesn’t feel very safe to me. I think it’s the one nearest here that he owns, if memory serves me correctly,” Dale said glancing significantly at Mike.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Mike said looking around.

“Do that,” Dale said. He looked over at the Indian approaching them and said, “By the way, I understand that congratulations are due. I heard that you’re having a baby.”

“That’s right,” Mike answered finding the sudden shift in conversation jarring. He noticed the Indian walking behind them.

“Are you hoping for a girl or a boy?”

“I don’t care. I’ll be more than happy to raise a boy or a girl,” Mike answered. It was true. He’d sit and have little imaginary tea parties with a daughter. He’d throw a ball with a son.

“I know what you mean. I’ve got two kids, a son and a daughter. They’re in high school now. The boy is going to graduate this year. He’s been accepted for West Point,” Dale said with more than a little pride.

The Indian dropped back and got into a car. Although there wasn’t a ring on Dale’s finger, Mike asked, “Did you go to West Point?”

“Nope. I am a Marine,” Dale answered. He looked around for a second before he said, “We have Marines because they can get the unpleasant jobs done.”

“OoRah,” Mike answered.

“Here’s your car. See you tomorrow,” Dale said walking on to his car. He looked over his shoulder and said, “By the way, did you hear that Donald Jones committed suicide the other night?”

Stunned, Mike answered, “No, I didn’t.”

Mike got into his car and buckled up. While starting the car, he decided that he’d keep an eye out for internet cafes on the way home. Two Marines had given him the same message; there had to be something significant there.

Leading Mike into his private office at home, Vince gestured to a leather chair and said, “Have a seat, Mike.”

“Yes, Sir,” Mike said wondering what his father-in-law wanted to discuss. This wasn’t the first time he’d been invited into the study, but it was a rare enough occurrence that he knew they’d be talking about something important.

The use of the word, ‘Sir, ‘ brought a smile to Vince’s face. Waving him off, he said, “Relax. I just wanted to talk to you alone for a bit about work.”

Mike settled into the leather chair. It was a very comfortable chair that fit in well with the very conservative looking office. Vincent didn’t have much, but he always bought quality. The office reflected that dedication to quality. Solid wood furniture, leather chairs, brass lamps, and fine wood bookcases occupied the room. He asked, “Whose work? Yours or mine?”

“A little of both,” Vincent answered cryptically.

“Okay,” Mike said not quite sure what to make of that answer.

The older man took a seat behind his desk and looked at Mike long and hard. He cleared his throat before he said, “An FBI agent came to my office this morning and asked about you.”

“I’m not surprised. They are doing some background checks on me. My new neighbor told me that they had been by our house asking about me,” Mike said. His Top Secret Clearance had been reactivated after joining the CIA, but there were follow up investigations that would be performed.

“This particular individual used to serve on my ship. He’s a Marine,” Vincent said. He used the present tense in characterizing the agent as a Marine on purpose. Once a Marine, always a Marine was an unofficial motto of the Marines. He wasn’t sure what was going on, but felt that his son-in-law could use a head’s up about the situation.

“A Marine?” Mike asked feeling that he’d been encountering a lot of Marines lately.

“Yes. He wanted to know if I thought you were trustworthy,” Vincent said. “It was a bit more than the typical FBI background questioning. He asked if I would trust you with my life.”

Trying to relieve the tension, Mike jokingly said, “I hope you told him no.”

Vincent chuckled and said, “I told him that I trusted you with my one and only little girl.”

“Was he satisfied with your answer?”

“He knows how much I care about my daughter. Like I said, we served together on my ship,” Vincent said. Leaning forward, he asked, “Is there anything going on that I should know about?”

Mike frowned and looked around. The curtains to the room were closed. Nodding his head, he answered, “No.”

Vincent didn’t know how to react to the mixed messages that Mike was sending him. Rather than follow up on it, he asked, “How’s it going with the house?”

“It’s going fine. I checked it out for termites before putting up the drywall and the house was clean. You know, those termites are sneaky little things. They come up from the ground and attack the wood. You never know they are there until you look for them,” Mike answered.

Vincent’s eyebrows rose when he realized what Mike was saying. He said, “Thanks for reminding me. We have a service that comes out once a year. They spray the basement to help keep out spiders. While they are here, they inspect for termite damage. You might consider hiring a service to do the same thing for your house.”

“I’ve planned on it,” Mike said.

Karen and Mike drove up to their house ready for another day of hard work. They were surprised to find two cars already parked in front of the house. Mike said, “I guess Tim and his friend are here already.”

“It looks like it,” Karen said noticing that the door of the house was already open. She was pretty sure that she had locked it before leaving the other night. She frowned at the idea that Tim and some stranger invited themselves into the house. She growled and said, “What are they doing in our house?”

Hearing the anger in her voice, Mike turned to Karen. In a serious voice, he said, “Don’t make an issue out of it.”

“I don’t like it that they went in without us being there,” Karen said.

“Please, don’t make an issue out of it,” Mike repeated.

Surprised by his attitude, Karen turned to argue. The serious expression on his face brought her up short. Frowning, she asked, “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know, but I’m not going to do anything that could create a problem,” he answered gesturing towards the house. He added, “They are Marines. Remember our motto, Semper Fi.”

Karen knew that Semper Fidelis meant always faithful. It was used to convey that Marines were always faithful to duty and country even after leaving the service. Mike wouldn’t use that if he didn’t think he could trust them. She nodded her head and said, “I won’t make a big deal out of it.”

The couple entered the house to find Tim and a very large man examining the box containing the bathtub. Looking up at the couple, Tim said, “This is one heavy bastard. I’m not sure that three of us are going to be enough to carry it into the bathroom.”

The big man kneeling beside Tim laughed and said, “I’ll carry it.”

Tim rose from a squat and said, “Mike, this here gentleman is Jack Lancer. He’s my buddy from over at the NSA.”

Extending a hand, Mike said, “Nice to meet you Jack.”

“Good to meet you,” Jack said with a friendly smile. His firm hand engulfed Mike’s hand, but there wasn’t enough force in the handshake to hurt.

“This is my wife, Karen,” Mike said.

“It’s a real honor to meet you, Ma’am. I heard that you are the daughter of Captain Vincent Dougherty,” Jack said without saying how he knew that little fact about her.

“That’s right,” Karen said looking at him with suspicion.

“I served with him back about twelve years ago. How’s he doing?” Jack said.

“He’s doing well. He’s at the Pentagon,” Karen answered. It wasn’t the first time that someone who knew her relationship to her father had said that he had served with him. It seemed to her that everyone knew her father.

“He’s a good man,” Jack said as if his seal of approval was significant. He looked over at Mike and said, “You’ve got a good father-in-law.”

“Yes, I do,” Mike said.

“We had better get started on that bathroom. It’s going to take all day to wrestle this bastard in there,” Tim said.

Karen and Mike returned home exhausted from fixing up the bathroom. After a quick shower, they joined her parents at the dinner table. After loading their plates with food, Karen said, “Daddy, I met a guy by the name of Jack Lancer today.”

Vincent sat back in surprise. He whistled and said, “Jack Lancer. Wow is that a blast from the past.”

“So you know him?” Karen asked surprised by her father’s reaction.

“Yes. He was stationed aboard my ship and I got to know him a little. I remember picking him up after one of his missions. I’ve never seen such a beat up bunch of Marines, but they took the hill, metaphorically speaking, thanks to him. He received the Congressional Medal of Honor,” Vincent said. He didn’t know what their mission had been, but when he’d seen that boat full of shot up men he had known it hadn’t been a stroll in the park. It was so bad that the boat sank even while they were unloading it.

Although he had worked with Jack all day, Mike was impressed by that fact. Smiling at his father-in-law, he said, “I guess that means that you salute him even if you outrank him.”

“That’s right and I’d be proud to do it,” Vincent answered with a curt nod of his head.

Karen sat back in her chair and looked at Mike. In hind sight, it was good that he had insisted that she not make a scene over them entering the house. She wondered how he had known. Shaking her head, she said, “Semper Fi.”

Vincent looked at his daughter and asked, “What was that?”

“Nothing. I was surrounded by Marines all day. It kind of rubs off on you,” Karen said.

After church Sunday morning, Mike entered the house alone. Karen had dropped him off before heading out to the hardware store to pick up the tile for the bathroom. They wouldn’t get to tiling the bathroom until the next weekend. He went into the bathroom and checked the work they had done the previous day. The bathtub was in place, but they’d have to wait until the tile was down to install the sink and toilet.

He went over to the bedroom to get his toolbox. Opening it, he checked out the contents. To his surprise, he found a USB drive sitting atop the tools. He picked it up and examined it. It was just a plain USB drive without any special markings on it. With a frown, he said, “That’s odd.”

He slipped the drive into his pocket and closed the toolbox. While carrying his tools to the bathroom, he considered what he was going to do with the USB flash drive. It was obvious that Tim or Jack had left it there for him to find. Although curious as to what was on it, he knew that it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to run off to a computer right away.

He got out the laser level and started laying out the lines for the tile. The laser level made it very easy to perform that task. It took a quarter of the time that he thought it would take to scribe the lines on the wall. He was done well before Karen arrived home. Smiling, he said, “Isn’t technology wonderful?”

There wasn’t much else to do in the bathroom until the next weekend. It would take two days to do the tiling. He left the bathroom and went into the kitchen. That was the second room that required immediate attention. He stood in the middle of the kitchen trying to figure out what needed to be done first. Bathrooms were pretty simple compared to a kitchen.

He was still considering what to do when Karen came storming into the house. She threw her purse down on the floor and said, “Damn it!”

“What’s the matter?” Mike asked knowing that when she got angry she had a tendency to swear.

“I’m tired of going to the store and finding that I can’t speak to the sales person. I grew up in this country and now I can’t go shopping because I don’t speak a God Damned foreign language. Why can’t they have someone who speaks English working in the store?” Karen said. She was furious.

Mike went over to calm her down. He didn’t know whether it was normal anger or hormones from her pregnancy. It didn’t matter, she was furious and it was up to him to deal with it. Hugging her, he asked, “What happened?”

“I was at the hardware store looking at the tile. I finally catch one of the people who work there to help me. It’s some Mexican who can’t speak English. After spending five minutes trying to get across that I wanted ten cases of tile, the bastard walks off shouting, ‘no comprende.’ What in the hell is that? He’s working in an American store as a salesperson and he can’t fucking speak English,” Karen said. She was waving her arms like the conductor of the Boston Pops.

“What happened next?” Mike asked afraid to learn the answer.

Karen frowned and crossed her arms. She said, “I grab another salesman who can’t speak English. He says, ‘no comprende’ and walks off. I’m furious by this time. I walk around the store and find one person who can speak English. There’s a line of twenty people waiting for him. The poor bastard is overwhelmed by a line of pissed off customers and four fucking Mexicans are standing around with their thumbs stuck up their asses laughing at him.”