Chapter 9: Revelations

"Shove it." Mark yelled at the two. You want trouble, then you're about to find you have taken on a bigger load of trouble than you ever imagined. We'll give you way more than you can handle. Don't you dare try to threaten me or my mother or my fiancé.

"She and I can cause more problems for you than you ever knew existed. If you try to take that program it will be all over the Internet by two o'clock this afternoon, open source to everybody who wants it. There is no way you can draft Melissa or me. I'm out of here."

"How come you didn't get me?" Melissa stood in the door. "I took a cab so I'm not out of breath this time. "What's all this about? Are you and I being threatened again?"

"Hi, sweetheart, I wanted to let you sleep in. Your black eye looks charming." She frowned at him

Mark continued, "That creep threatened to draft us, unless we go to work for them. I told them to shove the whole mess and try something. First he offered us millions and then took back the offer in almost the same breath.

Hank rushed over to them. "Hello, Melissa, would you please ask Mark not to lose his temper?" He had begun to get an inkling how dangerous it could be to use threats against Mark or Melissa.

"Come on back in, please Mark? Let's listen some more." Melissa took Mark by the hand and walked inside the office.

"I'm afraid that unless you people can learn that we will not be pushed by any of you government pukes all negotiations are futile. We three refuse to kowtow to a bunch of political hacks and bumbling gumshoes." She looked right at the one agent who had opened his mouth and stuck his foot in it.

The other one said, "Now, now we ought to all be able to sit down and iron out our differences."

He got no further when Mark began to laugh. Melissa started to laugh and then stopped. "What are we laughing at?"

"That had to be the clumsiest good cop/bad cop routine ever." Mark shook his head. "Let's go home. We have some shopping to do. And I refuse to waste any more time with government clowns like these."

"You're not going anywhere," a flat sounding voice said from the doorway. The driver of the tan Ford blocked the way, filling the doorway completely.

Mark had put on a long sleeved shirt to hide the wand he had fastened by a rubber band to his forearm. A slight rub of his elbow and the wand would come free. He was angry enough to do some damage.

"Wait, Mark, let me have this one. You might injure him as pissed as you are right now." Melissa started to walk toward the big agent.

"Well, what are you going to do to him?" Mark asked her.

"Hurt him." she screamed and launched herself low between his legs on her back, head first. She kicked up hard once and came up behind him back on her feet. She screamed her personal war cry as she jumped into the air and kicked the back of his head.

"Ooh. I bet that hurt," she yelled. She grinned as she came back into the office after she stepped over the downed agent and stared steadily at the other two agents.

"Any more threats?" Mark asked.

"Please Mark," Hank said. "I believe that the two gentlemen were trying to better their bargaining position by using subterfuge and intimidation. Am I right gentlemen? Better tell the truth. You are in the presence of types rarely found in a lawyer's office, honest types."

"Hey." the one who hadn't said much started.

His partner grabbed him and said, okay, "Okay, no games. What will it take to get the program?"

"A favor and it's yours free." Mark told him.

His eyes narrowed, "Just what kind of favor?"

"Sweet Home Development Company is in the middle of a great land grab. They are almost ready to steal over a couple of hundred square miles of virgin mountain real estate up in the Wasatch Mountains.

"They've bribed someone high up in BLM through one of their subsidiary companies and another person in the Parks Department. To top it off they gave three million dollars to a senator to push a bill through that will give them virtual control of millions of trees.

They plan to cut and sell the timber to help offset their startup costs. We want them stopped and the people responsible put in prison. That senator must be arrested. Then we want all that land ceded to us for a game preserve and natural habitat in perpetuity."

Mark turned to Hank and asked, "Did I say it right?" Hank nodded yes but said nothing.

"You have any proof?" the agent asked. Mark sensed the condescending attitude.

He queried Teacher and then asked the agent, "Would bank account numbers and passwords to computer files be sufficient?" The agent's eyebrows raised and he cautiously nodded.

"I even have access to a movie made by the French of the crooked senator in a compromising position with an employee of the French Embassy in Washington, DC. They have used it to blackmail him and he still keeps going back to their female agent, even after he found out who and what she is. He also has an account with Hanover Bank. The bank can give you a record of the French Payments and some others." You want that one too? The agents seemed to vibrate.

"It will be on its way to you as soon as you give me an email address to send it to. Us computer whizzes are resourceful."

"Scary, too." The one looked at his partner. Then he turned back to Mark "You got anything to add?"

"Oh yes, there is a survey crew up in the mountains right now laying out a town site. They are protected by rent-a-cops with rifles. It would be nice to make them go away. They have been threatening people with their guns. Now if you agree to give us what we want, I'll be available at times, or Melissa or my mother for consultation. Most of the consultation will be free. But it had better be important or no dice. Do I get the land?"

"Our land," corrected Melissa.

"Uh, sorry, our land. Now I can't tell you how important this is to us, but believe me, none of us will make a single dollar on it. We can generate all the money we desire by coming up with new programs.

"Right now I have an idea for a replacement for Windows that won't be expensive and will work much better. We can make millions off of that one and sell it at ten dollars a pop instead of in the hundreds Bill Gates charges. It will seamlessly interface with all MS programs."

"First, we're going after Sweet Home Development and the parent company. You get them for free."

Melissa, resentful of Mark's take-charge attitude, wanted to get the last word in. "What's your email addy?"

One agent looked thoughtful as he handed her a business card that included an Internet address. She nodded and they left. The downed Agent, still groggy, followed.

Mark asked Hank, "Where can we get two large motor homes?"

"You mean for the proposed trip to New York City?"

"Not proposed. We leave in two days." Mark was seventeen, not quite considered an adult.

The last few days had changed him. He was positive he'd probably top out at six-four like his father. Already he began to make decisions as if he had legal authority to do so. It took Melissa to wake Mark up.

"Sweetheart, don't you think you ought to consult the others who are involved before you make decisions for all of us?"

She linked with Mark and said, "Don't go so fast. It's off putting and people like to make their own decisions. It's also pissing me off to the extreme."

"Oops, sorry. You're right." Mark hadn't realized how much he had started to take over until right then.

He turned to Rachel and Hank. "We need a full time lawyer. Mom and I want it to be you." Rachel was startled. She gave Mark a strange look, but kept quiet.

Mark continued, "Melissa likes you too. Now there are two ways to do it. Either you expand your office and hire more help or you close down and come with us. Either way you will need to need a staff of at least another three full time assistants just for starters. Once you see how big this is, you'll agree."

"Look, I love your mother and want to marry her..." Mark interrupted him.

"She wants to marry you too." Rachel smacked her son's shoulder.

Hank continued as if Mark hadn't interrupted, "The thing is, before this goes any further, I demand to know more about what I'll get myself into if I go along with you. I don't like to jump off into the great unknown blindfolded. I'm not a sucker bet gambler."

He looked back and forth between Melissa and Mark; "Also, I was in the green beanies and can handle myself against about anyone I meet. In addition I have been trained in many disciplines of hand to hand and have studied Oriental martial arts styles." He looked directly at Melissa and said, "Your style of fighting is a little like Northern Tai chi and Jeet Kun Do. Yet, it is also way different from anything I have ever seen. Another thing, Melissa, you move so fast you are almost a blur when you go into action."

She shrugged and said, "After my so-called father ordered me not to see Mark the first time, I studied Martial Arts under Master Kiang for a year."

"That's what I mean. I know Master Kenneth Kiang and he does not teach anything but Jeet Kun Do and Northern Tai Chi. He is a real Shaolin priest. He does not teach what you do."

She grinned and answered, "That's what he told me. But after I took out his two most advanced students he has helped me to develop my own style."

Hank threw his hands in the air, "Damn it. That's what I mean. You are a sweet looking teen-age girl, yet you fight like a seasoned ninja warrior. Now either I get some answers I can live with or I am definitely out of here."

He turned to Rachel and said, "I'm sorry, my dear, but there is too much that is too scary and I need answers I can accept. Please."

"Well? Shall we?" Mark asked Melissa.

Her thought came right back, "He is honest and he loves your mother. He will have to know the truth some time. Do it."

"Okay, but you jump in if I flub things."

"With pleasure." [Mental image of Mark with his foot in his mouth.] He snorted and turned back to Hank.

"See this golden band on my forehead?" He nodded and Mark continued, "Under that mop of hair on Melissa's head is an identical band. We can communicate with each other telepathically."

Hank looked at Mark and grunted, "Yeah, uh huh."

"I'll prove it," Mark told him.

"How?" Hank waited for the expected con job.

"We'll leave the intercom between your office and out here in the reception area open. You go in there with Melissa and give her a law book to read. She will look where you point and I'll read it through her eyes. Is that fair?"

Hank nodded, when he could find no room for trickery. He turned on the intercom in the reception area. He and Melissa went into his office and closed the door. Mark linked with Melissa and began to recite the words on an invitation to a party. Hank took out his wallet and showed her a picture of a young girl. "Is that your Daughter?" Mark asked.

"Ah no, my niece." Hank was convinced. They came back out. "Okay, if that was a trick, it was a good one. What else you got?"

"That's it for now. You know we have a huge load of gold. Melissa can move faster and fight harder than anyone you have ever met. I have a weapon that paralyzes. You sampled that.

Both Melissa and I can do things with a computer that no other man, woman or child on this planet can even come close to doing. Then Melissa, Mom and I gave away a gold statue and a priceless shawl to Melissa's mother to pacify her. Either you're in or you're out. Right now."

"Rachel?" He looked at her begging for direction.

"It's all real, Hank. There is no fakery anywhere. I love you but you must make your own choice."

Finally he sighed. "Okay, I'm in. I'll have to get one of my partners to fill in for me on a few things. I'm pretty certain I'll be ready to go in two days."

Melissa spoke up, "This afternoon, if you can get away, we'll show you one last thing. I have a hunch about you. If I'm right, you'll fit right in."

"What?" Mark asked her.

"Your mother is very attracted to him. She wants his baby. Mark, I have a hunch he's of our bloodline." Mark thought a moment and agreed.

Melissa gave him a final warning, "Hank, what we plan to show you this afternoon is a secret. If you try to use it in any way that is improper, it will become a fatal secret. However I am almost positive you are incapable of misusing what we plan to show you."

"I feel the same way, dear." Rachel told him. "I feel you belong with us."

Mark was still uncomfortable with all the romantic talk between his mother and a man not his father. Yet, he was realistic enough to know he could do nothing to break it up. He decided it was better to bow to what he couldn't change. Mark felt a part of his past had just slipped away from him.

"Hank, we need to buy two used motor homes. Do you know anyone who might have two at a fair price?"

Hank took his eyes away from Rachel and answered, "Yes I do. I recently defended a man on a drunk driving charge and got him off with the understanding he would attend meetings and not drink. So far, he's stuck with the program. His car lot is over in Murray. If he doesn't have anything, he'll probably know where to get something. It's almost lunchtime so let's go."

"Where's your secretary?" Melissa asked.

"She quit yesterday after all the excitement you brought into my life. I had planned to begin interviews for a new one this afternoon. I'm afraid that's off, now." He shook his head.

They trooped out. Melissa and Mark both saw someone attempt to get into the van. "Sic 'em!" Mark yelled at Melissa. She gave her now familiar cry as she bounded across the parking area and knocked the now failed thief to the pavement. They recognized this one as one of the two agents who had followed them in the tan Ford.

"Don't kill him," Mark told her, "He's a federal cop. You know that's seven years bad luck." Mark thought he'd made a joke, until he saw her face. Melissa was enraged.

"You better have a good reason for trying to break into our van. You got a warrant?" Mark had fast become angry himself.

"He doesn't need a warrant." the one Melissa took down in the office door said from behind them. Mark turned around and saw the gun pointed in their direction.