Chapter 66

The coffee was just finishing when I walked into the kitchen. I needed a cup, desperately. I needed something for my head too; it was pounding this morning. I'd gotten back to the house last night after my ride and gone down stairs and put the suit on and had it out with Bud.

"Bottom line," I'd told him. "You need to figure out a way to be in the suit and still be in my head. You need to be with us the way you were before, or Harley and I are likely to kill ourselves with this power you have not yet completely taught us how to use."

He hemmed and hawed and sputtered but in the end Harley and I both told him to figure it out and get it done. If he hadn't figured out where we could get the suit charged while we were gone last night it might've been even uglier.

Harley had a complaint of his own, which I was glad to join in on, a bit sheepishly, since I should have been the first to be complaining about it. Harley thought it was ridiculous that we were so out of touch whenever we were in the cavern, and wondered why, if the suit was such an amazing piece of super-programmable electronics and beyond, that Bud hadn't figured out a way for it to receive our cell phone's calls, whether we were in the cavern or not.

It was a huge heaping load of 'what have you done for us lately', I suppose. That's the kind of shit you should expect to get dumped on you when you dump your team.

Still, that's not where the headache came from. That was caused by Harley and I pounding our heads against the wall of the dual lock problem until midnight when I finally called a stop to it and went to bed.

I'd done my morning run and workout and was eating breakfast when I got a call from ADT asking if they could come by this morning to discuss options for my security system. I told them I had a ten o'clock meeting, which might last an hour but not more. They offered to come by at nine and take no more than forty five minutes. I told them to come ahead then, in my best John Wayne impression. I don't think they got it.

I started another pot of coffee, having put the rest of the first pot in an insulated carafe so it wouldn't develop that over-cooked taste I hated. I looked at the clock and saw I had the time, so I found a package of 'gourmet' refrigerated cookie dough I had in the fridge and started a batch of snickdoodle cookies baking in the oven.

While the cookies were baking I did a little cleaning up. The kitchen was the only part of the house that really needed it. I got the dishes from breakfast and last nights dinner going, washed and wiped down the sinks and counter tops and went through the fridge looking for anything that looked like it needed to go in the garbage. There were a few wilted bits of romaine lettuce that I decided were past their prime along with some sliced tomatoes that I hadn't used fast enough, and those all went into the garbage disposal in the sink. There were a couple dried out dinner rolls left from a package I'd opened a few days earlier that I decided were beyond their prime as well.

All in all there wasn't a lot to do. I was not a messy person. Harley had a general inclination towards neatness as well, so between the two of us, we were pretty domesticated.

Once the cookies were done and cooling on a rack in the kitchen I moved to the living room where I had the TV on again, watching some local morning show out of Santa Rosa. The hosts were talking excitedly about the schedule of events for the upcoming Fourth of July holiday. I turned the volume down when the doorbell rang.

"Good Morning Mr. James," Bill Largent said as I opened the door. There were two men standing behind him. A tall, beefy specimen and a smaller, wirey one. They sort of reminded me of the Mutt and Jeff act I'd met in the B&B Saloon parking lot last night, except for short haircuts and clean shirts.

"Good morning Bill," I said, stepping aside and waving them in. "Come on in. Can I get you guys some coffee?"

"Sounds good to me," he replied. I closed the door behind them and led them towards the kitchen.

"We can meet in here around the kitchen table if that works for you," I said as I headed for the coffee pot. "Closer to the coffee pot that way."

"Fine," Bill agreed. " Mr. James, this is Thom Schenderline and Ken Spears," the big guy was Thom and the little guy was Ken. I shook both their hands.

"Thom is our electronic systems specialist and Ken is our external security specialist. They both have plans to present to you today, and a few questions as well."

"Sounds good," I said setting cups of coffee down in front of the three of them. "Help yourselves to the cookies, they're fresh out of the oven this morning. I'll be right back."