Chapter 11

Alaska Air Flight 366 arrived on time, the wheels of the 737 touching down on the runway of Sacramento International's Runway 16R at precisely 3:30 PM. The aircraft taxied slowly to Terminal B and parked at the jetway at 3:38. First class passengers were allowed to deplane first although this did not do them much good since the baggage unloading process moved at its own pace. As such, it was almost four o'clock before Ken, waiting at the bottom of the escalator that brought passengers down from the secured area, spotted Jo coming down with a suitcase in her hand.

Jo was dressed in dark slacks and a loose fitting cranberry turtleneck. Her hair was pulled back in its usual bun. She spotted Ken just as she mounted the escalator for the trip down. She smiled and waved at him and then trotted down the moving stairs, rushing across the carpet to Ken's position. She dropped her suitcase to the ground and threw herself into his arms, kissing him on the lips and cheek.

"It's so good to see you, Ken," she told him, giving him a few more smacks for good measure. "I've missed you so much."

"I've missed you too," he said, hugging her tightly, feeling the nostalgic allure of her curves beneath her bulky clothing. "How long's it been? Almost eight months now?"

"Eight months too long," she said, giving him one more kiss on the mouth. Her tongue flitted out just for a second, licking at his lips, before she broke the embrace and stood back. She looked him up and down for a moment. "You look good. Very good, considering ... you know."

"Yeah," he said with a nod. "I know."

"Don't worry," she told him, smiling happily. "Trust in me and everything is going to be okay."

"Okay?" he asked. "What do you mean by 'okay'?"

"You'll find out tonight," she said mysteriously. "Just keep your mind open and everything will become clear."

He wanted to ask more questions—the primary one being: where is all this Zen Buddha shit coming from?—but a group of three people were walking purposefully toward where he and Jo stood. All three of them appeared to be in their early to mid-forties, too young for any of them to be Jo's parents. Nor was there any sort of family resemblance, not even peripherally. The woman had light brown hair and rounded facial features. The man walking next to her had reddish-brown hair and was somewhat stocky. The other man, who was dressed in an expensive looking Italian suit and trailing slightly behind the couple, had olive skin and dark features, bespeaking some sort of southern European or northern African heritage. Ken's first thought upon seeing them was that this could not possibly be the group that Jo was traveling with.

It was a thought that turned out to be incorrect.

"Ken," Jo said, "I'd like you to meet my parents, Harold and Gertrude Baxter. Mom and Dad, this is Ken."

Ken couldn't help but blink a little in surprise. He recovered quickly, however, and held out his hand to Jo's father. "Mr. and Mrs. Baxter," he said. "It's nice to meet you at last."

"How do you do, Ken?" her father said, shaking with him. His grip was firm and strong. "And call me Harold, please."

"Okay, Harold," Ken said.

"And I'm Gertie," her mother said, holding out her own hand.

"Gertie it is," Ken said, shaking with her. Her hand was soft and dainty.

"We've heard so much about you, Ken," Gertie told him. "I must say, you are quite the handsome specimen, just like Josephine told us."

Ken actually blushed a little, suddenly wondering if Gertie and Harold had any idea what actually went on between their daughter and Meghan and him. Most likely not or they wouldn't be standing there so politely. "And I must say that you two had to have been quite young when you had Jo. You hardly look old enough to her parents."

"We hear that all the time," Gertie said with a pleased smile. "We're actually much older than we appear."

"Yes," Harold agreed. "Good living keeps us young. Lots of good living."

"I guess so," Ken said, detecting a hint of amusement in the way Harold had said that.

"And this," Jo said, pointing to the man in the Italian suit, "is the gentleman I told you about on the phone. This is Richard Crow, a good friend of the family."

"Dick," Crow said, holding out his hand.

"Nice to meet you, Dick," Ken said, shaking with him.

"You as well, Ken," he said. "You as well."

Dick, in addition to a large suitcase, also carried a briefcase. He kept it close to his side, as if it contained nuclear secrets. "That's a very nice suit, Dick," Ken told him.

"Thank you," Dick said with a smile. "I know that air travel has gone mostly casual in these modern times, but I was raised by parents who insisted one always dress his best when flying. I guess it's kind of stuck with me. I understand you're a pilot, like Josephine?"

"Well ... yes," Ken said. "Although I haven't done any flying in the past five weeks."

"Perhaps you'll be flying again soon," Dick said, patting him on the back.

Ken, figuring that Dick had not been told about his terminal illness, said nothing further on the subject.

They walked as a group out to the parking garage across the street from the passenger terminal. Ken offered to carry Mrs. Baxter's bag but she politely refused. They piled into Meghan's Lexus SUV and Ken drove them out of the garage and out onto Interstate 5 to begin the thirty-minute trip to Roseville.

There was little conversation as Ken piloted the SUV south on the interstate and then back north on a state highway that led through the rice fields of Sutter County and into Roseville via a back door that only a local would know about. There were a few comments from Jo about the weather and the ground fog and a few observations from Dick about how the area had changed quite a bit since the last time he'd been here.

"When was that?" Ken asked.

"Oh, a number of years ago," Dick said. "Back when they were still looking for gold up in them there hills."

This caused a few chuckles from Harold and Gertie—chuckles that sounded very much like those given in response to some sort of inside joke that Ken wasn't party to—and then silence descended once again. This gave Ken time to ponder how strange this whole situation was. Jo, who had always gone to great lengths to avoid staying too long at their house (he and Meghan had always suspected it was some sort of social phobia), suddenly invites not only herself, but her parents and another person to stay there for some unknown amount of time.

"They want to stay with us?" he'd asked Jo that morning when she'd called from the departure lounge at Fairbanks Airport. "In our house?"

"We all would," had been her reply. "If that's okay."

"Well ... sure, but we only have one guest bedroom. Wouldn't they be more comfortable at a hotel? We'll pay for it if that's an issue."

"I can't explain right now, Ken," she replied, "but it would really be for the best if we all stayed in your house. Doesn't the couch in your office fold out into a bed?"

"Uh ... yeah, but..."

"Then it's settled," she said. "It doesn't have to be the Waldorf Astoria. We just need a place to lay our heads that's close-by you and Meg."

Something very odd is going on here, he thought as he turned off Highway 99/70 and onto Riego Road. It almost feels like we're being set up for something.

Little did Ken know, the odd things had not even really begun yet.

Ken parked the SUV in the garage and they all entered the house through the connecting door. This led into the kitchen, where Meghan, dressed in blue slacks and a yellow blouse, was just putting a pan of homemade stuffed mushrooms into the oven. Jo, seeing her, once again dropped her suitcase to the floor and made a mad rush, actually squealing as she took Meghan into her arms and hugged her tightly. Then, to Ken's astonishment, she kissed her deeply, the length and passion of the exchange leaving no doubt that tongues were intimately entwined.

"Jesus," Ken muttered, glancing over at their guests. Dick and Harold seemed not to notice anything at all but Gertie was looking at her daughter and Meghan with an expression that could only be affection.

"Wow, Jo," Meghan said a little breathlessly when the kiss finally broke. She was blushing furiously and casting glances of her own. "I ... uh ... guess you missed me."

"You have no idea," Jo said, kissing her again, a briefer kiss but still a little more than what casual female friends usually shared.

The introductions were made. All three of the guests seemed somewhat taken with Meghan. Harold kissed her hand like a French gentleman in an old movie. Gertie gave her a hug and told her she was delighted to meet her at last. Dick seemed a little tongue-tied around her and was only able to mumble a greeting.

"I have some hors d'oeuvres in oven," Meghan told them all. "They should be done in about twenty minutes. And for dinner we'll be having chicken Parmesan, salad, pasta, and garlic bread. I hope everyone likes that."

Everyone assured her that they loved it.

"Let me show you to your rooms," Ken said. "After that, maybe we can have some wine. We have a few bottles of Chardonnay chilling in the refrigerator."

Jo's parents and Dick all shot a glance at Jo when he said this. Jo nodded and then turned to Ken. "Actually, Ken," she said, "would it be too much of an imposition to ask that we refrain from alcohol tonight?"

"Uh ... well ... sure," Ken said. "Of course." He figured that someone in the group must be a recovering alcoholic—perhaps Dick?

Jo seemed to read his mind. "There will be time for wine later," she told him. "For tonight, however, it's probably best if everyone stays sober."

"Uh ... okay," he said, sharing a quick look with Meghan. What the hell is going on here? was the message they passed.

No answers were forthcoming so they passed a mental shrug to each other. Ken led the guests out of the kitchen and into the living room. No sooner had they cleared the door than Hannah came running in excitedly, her tail wagging furiously, her eyes shining. Even though three of the guests were complete and total strangers to her—something she usually feared and cowered from—she seemed almost to be on sensory overload, as if she couldn't decide which stranger to greet first. She finally settled for Jo, whining happily at her and licking her fingers.

"Hey, Hannah!" Jo greeted, kneeling down to pet and hug the spaniel and kiss her on the nose. "How have you been, sweetie? Have you been keeping Mommy and Daddy in line?"

Hannah seemed to agree that she was doing her part to keep Mommy and Daddy in line. She then went to Gertie and whined happily at her.

"What a beautiful dog," Gertie exclaimed, kneeling down as well. She began to scratch Hannah behind her ears.

"Do you hunt with her?" Harold asked, bending over a bit and giving Hannah a few pets of his own.

"Uh ... no, I'm not much of a hunter," Ken said, astonished to see Hannah warming up to an entire group of people so quickly.

"A pity," Dick said. "It's what she's made for. When you let a creature follow its base instinct it will always be happiest."

Ken really couldn't argue with that logic. "I suppose that makes a lot of sense," he said. "Do you hunt, Dick?"

He smiled. "Oh yes," he said. "Hunting is something that is an integral part of me."

"I see," Ken said, a little disquieted by the way he'd said that. "So ... shall we head up?"

They headed up. Ken showed Harold and Gertie to the guest bedroom across the hall from their bedroom. They took their suitcases in and began to get settled in and unpacked. Ken then led Dick back downstairs and showed him to the office, where Meghan had already folded out the hide-a-bed and made it up with fresh linen.

"I wish we had better accommodations for you, Dick," Ken told him as he carried his suitcase and briefcase over to the corner of the bed and hefted it up. "You seem like a man accustomed to five-star rooms."

"Don't worry about it, Ken," Dick said. "I'm a man accustomed to hospitality, and you and your lovely wife have shown me a five-star level of that."

Ken nodded, unsure exactly how to respond to that. "Well ... uh ... if you need anything, just let us know."

"Will do," Dick assured him.

He and Jo left the room and walked back into the living room. Jo was still carrying her suitcase.

"Umm, uh, where should we put you?" Ken asked her, his voice almost a whisper.

She smiled. "The same place you always put me," she said. "Right in your bedroom."

He chewed his lip for a moment. "But your parents..."

"Know everything there is to know about me," she said. "They know that you and I and Meg are lovers."

"They do?" Ken asked, incredulous and embarrassed at the same time.

"In our culture, it's really not a big deal."

"What culture is that?" Ken asked her, not for the first time.

She smiled. "Pretty soon, you'll find out."

Thirty minutes later, the six of them gathered in the dining room for hors d'oeuvres and non-alcoholic drinks that Meghan prepared. Everyone exclaimed over her crab-stuffed mushrooms, her vegetable dip, and her bruschetta. The guests displayed a hunger for the food that bordered on the greedy at times and Ken could tell that Meghan was starting to worry that she hadn't made enough. And, in fact, when the feasting was done, there was nothing left of the tray except a few carrots and celery slices.

"You are a wonderful cook, Meghan," Harold told her as Ken gathered the plates to take them away.

"Hear hear," Dick agreed, raising his passion tea lemonade glass to her in salute.

"You simply must give me your bruschetta recipe," Gertie put in. "I don't believe I've ever tasted finer."

Meghan blushed and accepted their praise gratefully.

When Ken returned from the kitchen, he poured everyone a fresh glass of passion tea lemonade and then sat back down in his chair. When Meghan finished explaining to Gertie the particular combination of spices she used in her bruschetta, Ken spoke up, trying to turn things to a more serious topic. "So," he said. "I understand that there is ... uh ... some sort of important conversation that is to take place?"

The four guests looked at each other for a moment and then looked back at Ken.

"Yes," Dick said, answering for all of them. "The most important conversation you will ever have, I would venture. But it is not time for it yet."

"It's not?" Ken asked.

"It's not," Dick told him.

"When?" Meghan asked. "I must say, I'm dying of curiosity. This whole thing is ... oh ... mysterious."

Harold looked at his watch—a gold Rolex. "It is just after five o'clock right now," he said. "Sunset here is at 5:55, right?"

Ken blinked. "Uh ... I suppose," he said.

Harold smiled. "It is," he said. "I checked."

Meghan was looking at him strangely. "Do you make a habit of knowing what time sunset is?" she asked.

"Yes I do," Harold told her, offering no further explanation than that. "In any case, we will hold off on our discussion until after dinner. That is at six o'clock, correct?"

"Right," Meghan said. "Just like Jo asked."

"Excellent," Dick said. "We have some other guests who will be showing up at around six-thirty."

"Other guests?" Meghan said, alarmed. "I ... uh ... wasn't counting on more than six of us when I made dinner."

"They won't be eating with us," Dick said. "It is their job to be here. They're kind of a security team, if you will."

Ken's eyebrows went up about as high as physically possible. "A security team?"

"It's just a precaution," Dick said. "Nothing to be alarmed about."

Ken and Meghan shared another look with each other. They then turned their looks toward Jo. What in the hell are you getting us into? the looks said.

She gave them a reassuring smile in response. "Don't worry," she said aloud. "I know things seem a little strange right now, but they'll start to make sense after dinner. I promise."

The doorbell rang precisely at 6:30. Ken, who had just finished carrying all of the dinner dishes back into the kitchen, went to answer it. He wasn't sure exactly what the so-called security team would look like—maybe a couple of mafia types in trench coats with large caliber handguns in shoulder holsters—but he certainly wasn't expecting what he got. Standing on the porch was a young, dark-skinned black man dressed in a pair of denim jeans and a CSUS sweatshirt. His face was pleasant and friendly. He had a large black plastic case in his hand. Standing next to him, carrying a laptop case, was a shapely, petite blonde woman in her early twenties. She too wore a pair of denim jeans although her sweatshirt came from UC Davis. The two of them looked about as intimidating as a herd of butterflies.

"How are you doing, Mr. Patterson?" the male of the duo said. "We're the security team. I trust you're expecting us?"

"Uh ... yeah," Ken said. "Come in."

They came in, both of them taking a quick look around the formal living room.

"Thank you," the male said. "I'm Ralph Kroger and this is my wife and partner, Martha."

"Call me Marty," Martha said. "Martha is such an old-fashioned name."

"Uh ... sure, nice to meet you both," Ken said. "And you can call me Ken."

"Thanks, Ken," Ralph said.

"Do you ... uh ... have a business card or anything?" Ken asked.

Both of them laughed. "You're a funny man, Ken," Ralph told him. "Where are the others?"

"Uh ... right," Ken said. "They're in here."

He led Ralph and Marty into the dining room, where everyone was still seated at the table. He made the introductions. Gertie, Harold, and Dick all nodded politely at the security team but did not rise from their chairs or shake hands. Jo, on the other hand, did both.

"Thank you for coming," she told them.

"All part of the job," Marty assured her. "Is this where you plan to have the discussion?"

"Yes," Jo said. "Is it okay?"

She looked around for a moment, seeming to pay attention to the blinds and the cordless telephone more than anything. "It should do," she said analytically. She turned to Ralph. "What do you think, hon?"

"Assuming everything else checks out, should be fine," he said. "We will have to put a noise source in that window, of course."

"I figured that," Jo said. "Do you want us to bring in a radio or something?"

"We have our own," he said. "It's a satellite radio and we'll tune it to an obnoxious hard-rock station."

"Or maybe Howard Stern?" suggested Marty.

Ralph chuckled. "I don't think we need to get quite that obnoxious. In any case, since the radio is ours and is linked to the satellite radio in our van, we'll know it's not transmitting anything. And the noise it makes will eliminate the possibility of anyone using a laser mic on the windows."

Ken was quite wide-eyed again—or still. "A laser mic?" he asked. "What's that?"

"A stand-off listening device," Marty said. "An adversary could fire it at a window from down the street and hear what we're saying by the way our sound waves vibrate the glass. The extraneous noise from the radio will prevent that."

"Adversary?" asked Meghan, her eyes just as wide. "What adversary? Who would be listening?"

"Probably no one," Ralph said. "But paranoia is the name of the game tonight."

"Why?" Ken asked, exasperated. "Who are we worried about?"

"Anyone who might show an interest," Ralph said. "Now, Ken, can you show me where all the phone extensions and computer connections are? We need to unplug them all."

"Unplug the phones and the computers?" he asked.

Ralph nodded. "We're going to shut off every electronic pathway into and out of this house," he said. "Every visual and auditory one too. Meghan, would you be so kind as to pull all of the blinds? And after that, if you could close the fireplace flu as well?"

They did as Ralph and Marty asked. Meghan tightly closed every blind in the house while Ken led Ralph through the house, showing him where every phone extension and every fiber optic data cable from Roseville Telephone entered the house. Ralph made sure every cord was pulled from the back of every computer and then pulled from the wall socket as well. He shut down and unplugged Ken's wireless router in the office. He unplugged every phone extension and then unplugged and removed the back-up batteries from the wireless phone unit itself. He then collected every cellular phone from every person, shutting them off and removing the batteries.

"Anything else in the house?" Ralph asked Ken once all this was done. "Do you have any satellite radios, HAM radios, CB radios, or wireless network systems?"

"No," said Ken, who was feeling a little like Alice emerging from the rabbit hole. "I think we got everything."

"Well, let's go back in the living room and have a look. By the way, where is your dog?"

"Hannah?" he asked. "She's out in the backyard for the night. Jo suggested we put her out there before you arrived."

Ralph nodded in approval. "That will work," he said. "She doesn't have any sort of GPS locator on her collar, does she?"

"Uh ... no, just the identification chip."

"It doesn't transmit?"

Ken shook his head. Did this guy really think Hannah might be a spy? "It doesn't. The vet or animal control can scan it, but that's all it does."

"I'll probably go run a scanner over her just to make sure," he said.

"Uh ... okay," Ken said. "How did you know we had a dog?"

Ralph gave a little laugh. "That damn mutt of yours almost gave us away several times while we were surveilling you. I thought she was going to run right over to me last night."

Ken looked at him sharply. "That was you in the park?" he asked.

"Me last night," he confirmed. "It was Marty the other two times."

He felt his unease and discomfort deepen considerably. "You were watching us?" he asked Ralph. "For the last few weeks?"

"It's our job," Ralph said with a shrug. "We had to make sure you're who you say you are."

Ken had just about reached his limit. "What in the hell is going on here, Ralph? Is this all some sort of joke?"

"No," Ralph said simply. "No joke. And as for what's going on ... well, you'll be finding that out as soon as I'm done making sure the house is secure."

"But..."

"It's not my place to tell you anything," Ralph said. "That's your friend Jo's job. Now let's go back and finish up, okay?"

Ken allowed himself to be led back out to the dining room. Jo, Gertie, Harold, and Dick were still sitting around the table. Meghan and Marty were sitting on the small sitting couch across the room, where Marty had opened up her laptop and was looking at the screen intently. Several devices that looked like antennas and satellite dishes were connected to the peripheral ports on the laptop.

"How's it looking?" Ralph asked Marty.

"Still getting four different stray signals," Marty said. "Three of them are from wireless routers belonging to the neighbors—two unsecured and one secured. The fourth is coming from somewhere in the south part of the house, bottom floor, but outside."

"Hmm," Ralph said. He looked at Ken. "Is there anything else in or on the house that would be transmitting a radio signal?"

Ken shook his head. "Not that I can think of."

Ralph looked at Meghan, who also shook her head. "Nothing I know of either," she said.

"It's a low-power transmission," Marty said. "Two point four-three gigahertz. Some kind of wireless device, obviously."

"I'll go take a look," Ralph said. "I need to give Hannah the mutt a quick scan anyway."

"You need to scan Hannah?" Meghan asked.

"Just as a precaution," Ralph said. "I won't hurt her." He opened up his large briefcase and removed a wand-like device. "Which way to the back door?"

Ken simply pointed in the general direction. Ralph seemed to find the way without a problem.

"Why is he scanning Hannah, Ken?" Meghan asked. It was apparent that she was more than a little upset by the happenings in her home.

"He's afraid Hannah might be selling nuclear secrets to the Iranians," Ken said.

"What?" Meghan said.

"Ken, Meg," Jo said from the dining room table. "I know this all seems like a bad dream, but there is a reason for it. Just keep trusting me, okay?"

They both nodded, but only reluctantly.

Ralph came back in a few minutes later. Some of Hannah's hairs were now clinging to his pants. "The dog is cool," he said. "And I found the wireless device. It was a temperature sensor mounted on the eaves of the house just outside the kitchen window."

"Oh yeah," Ken said, remembering now that it was mentioned. "It's a thermometer that transmits the outside temperature to a readout in the kitchen."

"An easy thing to forget about," Ralph said. "I pulled the battery out of it and set it on the table just inside the back door." He turned to Marty. "How we looking now?"

"Just the neighbors' router signals," she said. "Nothing outgoing."

Ralph nodded in satisfaction. "I guess that's about as secure as we're going to get." He looked over at Jo. "The ball is in your court now."

"I guess it is," she said with a slight smile.

"We're going to take up positions," Ralph said. "Ken, Meghan ... enjoy your talk and listen well, okay?"

"Uh ... sure," Ken said. "We'll do that."

With that, Ralph headed out of the dining room to the front door. Marty gave them one last smile and headed to the back. Once they were gone, Jo asked Ken and Meghan if they would come sit back at the table.

"It's time to tell you what this is all about," she said.

Ken and Meghan sat together at the head of the table. Jo sat next to them, just around the corner of the table. Gertie and Harold sat across from Jo. Dick sat at the far end. The table itself was clear of everything except their drink glasses and the pitcher of passion tea lemonade. All eyes were on Jo.

"Okay, guys," she said, her voice a little nervous. "The first thing I want to ask of you is that you keep your minds open, okay?"

"Open?" Ken said.

"Open," Jo confirmed. "I'm about to tell you things that you will not believe. You will think I'm crazy, that we're all crazy; you will think I'm schizophrenic or delusional, that all of us are. I want you to hear me say, right now, that we are not. All of us are perfectly sane, what I'm about to tell you is true, and, furthermore, I will prove to you that what I say is true."

Ken and Meghan shared another cautious look with each other. "Ummm, okay," Meghan said doubtfully.

"A partial reason we are here," Gertie put in, "is to help Josephine show you that she speaks the truth. We are here to support her and to support you through what is to come."

Ken licked his lips. "What is to come?" he asked. "Are we in some sort of danger here?"

"Not at all," Jo said. "All of the security measures you just saw are to protect us and others like us."

"Others like you?" Ken asked.

"We'll get to that," Harold said. "What Josephine is trying to say is that you are about to be told a secret. This secret may alarm you, may even terrify you on an instinctive level. We just want to assure you that we are all here to help you, not to harm you. What you've been taught and told will seem contrary to this, but we mean you no harm."

Ken and Meghan's hands found each other, his right grasping her left. "You guys are kind of scaring me," Meghan said.

"We know," Jo said. "Dad was trying to tell you that we understand and appreciate your fear, but that it is groundless. You must trust me."

They nodded, although both were a little slow to do so.

"That being said," Jo said, "let me get this started." She took a deep breath and looked at her parents for a moment. She then looked back at Ken and Meghan. "What would you two say if I were to tell you that I can save Ken's life?"

Meghan swallowed audibly. Ken looked into Jo's eyes to see what the joke was—the tasteless, inappropriate joke. Jo's eyes, however, were not joking. "I'd say," Ken said, "that you were..." He stopped, Jo's words: you will think I'm schizophrenic or delusional echoing in his head. " ... that you were mistaken. My life is beyond saving."

"But it's not, Ken," Jo said. "It's not beyond saving at all."

Meghan was shaking her head. "Jo ... hon, I love you dearly but this ... this is not funny or inspirational or ... or whatever it is you're trying to make it. It's offensive."

"It's also true," Jo said. "I have the ability to save Ken's life, to make his cancer disappear from his body forever."

"She is telling the truth, Ken," Gertie said. Harold and Dick both nodded.

Meghan opened her mouth to say something but Ken squeezed her hand, signaling for her not to. He fielded the ball instead. "Okay," he said. "I'll play along for a minute here. Just how do you propose to eliminate my cancer when modern medicine says that is impossible?"