Chapter 12: New Intrigues

“Can I help you?” I asked as the two men got out of their nondescript blue sedan. They had pulled up in front of my machine shed, blocking the entrance into the bay I had my car in.

“Are you Paul Taylor?” The taller of the two asked. He had a dark suit on that did not really look comfortable in the summer heat.

“I am. And you are?”

They scanned the yard and then pulled off their sunglasses. “I’m Special Agent Michaels and this is Special Agent Samuelson. We’re with the FBI office in Chicago.” They both pulled out little leather ID cases and held their badges out for me.

I reached out for the badges, which seemed to surprise them.

“What are you doing?” Samuelson asked.

“I’ve never seen an FBI badge up close. I want to make sure they’re legitimate.”

He let me have his badge and was surprised when I turned and headed into the office. I was on the phone before they were both through the door.

“Jim, it’s Paul,” I said. “A couple of FBI agents just showed up at the shop.”

I listened.

“Special Agent Stanley Samuelson. ID number 1412327711. The other is...” I motioned for the other agent’s badge. He handed it to me without a word. “Special Agent Randal Michaels. ID number 5439866534. They said they are out of the Chicago Office.”

Jim told me to be polite and he would call right back.

I returned the badges to the agents and asked if they would like a soda. Neither accepted.

“We’d like to ask a few questions, Paul,” Agent Michaels said.

“Until I hear back from my lawyer who is verifying your credentials, I’m sorry but I must decline.”

Samuelson leaned away from the counter toward me. “Do you have something to hide that you need a lawyer?”

I knew he was trying to intimidate me, but I did not know why. I shrugged. “Under the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution I have the right to remain silent and not incriminate myself. I am also a legal minor and have the right to not be questioned without either a parent, guardian, or competent counsel present. The man I just called on the phone is my attorney as well as my step-father. My mother is away today. If you want to ask me questions, you are going to have to wait until he says it is alright. Are you sure you don’t want a soda while we wait?”

Agent Michaels laughed, which seemed to make his partner relax. “Sure, I’ll take a Coke.” I looked at Agent Samuelson as I reached into the refrigerator. He finally nodded and I handed them both a can of soda.

I asked how the drive down from Chicago was and tried to make light conversation until the phone rang. I picked it up before the second ring.

“Paul, you can talk to them about your patent portfolio and how you came up with your ideas. If they want to talk about any of your other research efforts, I need to be there with you,” Jim said without preamble.

“Okay,” I said neutrally, knowing they were listening to my side of the conversation. “Anything else?”

“If they push the issue, give them my card and drive down here. Tell them I’ll clear my calendar for them to talk with you. If they try anything else, invoke your Fifth Amendment rights to say nothing and call me back. Do you understand?”

“Got it. Thanks, Jim.”

I hung up the phone and looked at the agents. “My lawyer has okayed it for me to discuss any of my current patented, or patent pending inventions. Any other topic we need to have him present to discuss. Will that work?”

Samuelson scowled again, but Michaels nodded. “It’s a start. We understand you have eleven patents that you have licensed to several auto makers. Is that correct?”

I shook my head. “Right now, the portfolio is sitting at twenty-seven inventions either patented or filed for a patent. The automakers we have agreements with have rights to any invention in the portfolio. Additionally, Caterpillar and John Deere have licenses to them as well as the Big Three automakers.”

“And just how did you come up with twenty-seven inventions that would make you millions of dollars before your eighteenth birthday? It sounds a little fishy to us,” Samuelson said.

I looked at the two agents for a moment before answering. “I worked hard and thought logically. Something more people should spend time doing.”

I sat back waiting for the next question, knowing they expected a much longer answer.

Finally, Agent Michaels spoke again. “So you’re saying you had no outside partners in crafting these ideas?”

“Define partners? I had a lawyer and a girlfriend who helped with the filing of the patent applications. I had cousins who helped with some of the fabrication efforts on a few items. But the ideas and majority of the work is all mine. Perhaps if you told me what you were after, I might be able to better answer your questions.”

They traded a look.

“A certain defense contractor has raised questions of how you developed a few ideas that are strikingly similar to their efforts in some classified projects.”

I nodded. I knew that I had advanced the state of the art by years. I was not surprised that something I remembered and re-invented already existed inside some DARPA or secret project. “I did draw some inspiration from the description of a military fly-by-wire system that was written about in Popular Science a few years ago, but I hardly have access to any classified materials. I’m a high school student for God’s sake, not some sort of spy.”

Michaels nodded, but Samuelson frowned.

“I still find it hard to believe you came up with all these ideas. You visited Europe last summer. Did you meet with anyone in their automotive industry during that trip?”

This was getting a little ridiculous. “No, and I had already filed almost a dozen patent applications before taking that trip, so it’s not very logical to think that I could have gotten the idea from someone over there, even if I did meet some spy.”

“So you met someone, but you don’t think they were a spy?” He asked, almost jumping at the stupid conclusion.

“No. I met no one that I discussed my work with while in Europe. Now that you mention it though, I’ll have to get Jim talking to Mercedes and BMW and maybe Fiat and Volvo. Those might be good markets for me. The Europeans have always been more fuel and safety conscious than the American auto industry.”

I grabbed my small notebook and jotted down a note while ignoring the two agents.

“Are you seriously going to sell out to the Europeans?” Michaels asked.

“It’s not selling out. It’s capitalism at its best. I’m going to get paid for my ideas and hard work. Thanks for the thought.”

Samuelson tried to get me to misstate stupid assertions a few more times before finally giving up. Michaels thanked me for the drink and my time and guided his partner out the door. I watched them drive away before going back inside to call Jim back.

“Well, Paul it looks like we’ve kicked a hornet’s nest,” Jim said after he gave Mom a kiss hello.

I smirked at them and then turned to give Jeryl a kiss hello as well. “Sorry, I wanted to follow your good example,” I said. Mom smiled and Jeryl laughed. Kelly just groaned.

“The difference is that’s how you greet a wife.”

“Or a girlfriend,” I echoed.

Jim shook his head and we all headed to the table for dinner.

“So, it seems a certain defense contractor wanted to use your ideas but didn’t want to pay for them.”

I frowned. “Did they even contact us?”

“Nope. We never would have known a thing, but somebody in their organization either tried to get too smart and discredit you, or they knew the company was breaking the rules and accused you of taking the idea from them to tip their hand.”

“And told the FBI?”

Jim nodded. “I don’t know if we’ll ever find out. My guess is some junior executive thought freezing you out of a big chunk of business or stealing your profits would make his company and him look better. Instead, we will be suing them for patent infringement.”

“Who is it?”

“General Dynamics.”

“Wow.”

“Wow is right. It’s their Land Systems division. They make a lot of military vehicles. Right now they are trying to get a new fighting vehicle procurement from the DoD. American Motors is their big competitor. They seemed to think your ruggedized drive-by-wire system could give them the edge over AMC. My guess is they want to incorporate it into some other things like the new tank they are building for the Army as well.”

“Wow. You know, if they had asked, I would have given them a pretty good deal on things. I don’t like the idea of making a ton of money at the expense of our soldiers or from taxes.”

Jim nodded. “We both know it, but those greedy SOBs didn’t. Now they can pay the piper. I’ll have a suit filed against them tomorrow.”

“Do we really need to? They will probably try to say it’s a logical derivative of the fly-by-wire work they did in the F-111 in the late sixties.”

“Then they should have filed the patent for it. You credited them with prior art in at least one filing. They had thirteen years to patent it. If we don’t protect your work, it risks all our contracts. Candace and I will be flying up to Detroit to get going on this tomorrow, no doubt about it.”

I nodded. “I guess so.” Then with a grin, “Besides, it’s time for you to get back to work after the honeymoon.”

Everyone laughed and the topic of conversation turned to more mundane activities from the day.

“Are you glad to be home, Jeryl?” my mother asked as she served us dinner. Jeryl had returned from her grandmothers the day before. I knew I was glad she was back. She and Kelly had been down in Bloomington with Jim all day during my adventure with the FBI.

“I am, but given how many notes Paul had for us to go through, maybe I should take a vacation more often. He had three months of notes, instead of the three weeks’ worth I was expecting.”

Kelly laughed. “Lord knows he didn’t do anything besides work while you were gone,” she said. “If I wasn’t coming up here to check on him, I think he would have lived in the shop.”

I blushed. “It wasn’t that bad, but I had a lot of things come together that I needed to check out. I think the lithium-ion approach for batteries could be used in a lot of other applications. I wanted to get those written up while they were fresh. Also, the carbon fiber fabrication method looks promising. I think we need to focus some efforts there before school starts.”

“What do you mean?” Jim asked.

“Well, while you are flying to Detroit, I think I should be heading down to Texas to meet with the team. They are on a good track, but I think we can streamline the approach they have and increase yields if we tweak a few things. I need to see their set up and talk to the folks on the ground. Papers aren’t doing it for me.”

Jim nodded. “It makes sense. Do you want to take anyone with you?” He hid his smile well.

I glanced at Jeryl. “I think Jeryl should go to help keep the new notes documented and organized. Since you want to take Candace with you, that leaves either Mom or Kelly to go as a chaperone, which I’m certain Jeryl’s mother will want.”

“Texas in the summer. Ugh!” Kelly said. Mom nodded with her.

“Hey, nobody said this job would be all fun. Besides, summer is when I can get free for a trip during working hours. I hate the idea of them wasting time until school starts and then having to meet me on a weekend.” I decided to change topics while I let Mom mull over the idea of me taking Jeryl on a trip.

“Speaking of work, I think we need to have a board meeting and change a few things.”

Everyone looked surprised. “What did you have in mind,” Jim finally asked.

“I think we need to review and institute salaries. Mom not wanting me to pay her a regular, fulltime salary I can understand, since she insists she is just a figurehead until I turn eighteen, but I don’t think we’re being fair to Kelly, Jeryl, or you, Jim. Candace and I are the only ones being paid enough to file income taxes on right now. You guys are working just as hard as I am.”

Kelly snorted. “Not hardly, but I wouldn’t mind a raise.”

“Not just a raise. I think we need to make everyone an employee and have benefits and regular paychecks. Our cash flows will support it and frankly, we could use the expenses to offset some income. Right now, we are doing nothing to drive down our corporate tax rate and we should be.”

Jim nodded. “I agree, but I also caution us to not pay ourselves too much now and have the well run dry in the next couple of quarters.”

“We can be prudent, but I think a living wage for us all should be the goal. With the latest contracts and GM and Ford both starting royalty payments, we have the cash flow for a much larger company. We’re funding research and grants, but not paying ourselves.”

Mom frowned at me. “I don’t know if paying you and Jeryl full salaries is wise...”

“Mom, it’s no different than if I increased the cattle herd and then cashed out. Right now, the money is just sitting in an account. The salary will as well, for the most part, but that’s not what this is about for us. It’s about being able to save and have a legitimate employment record. It’s about all of us having health insurance and not being caught out-of-pocket in an emergency. As employees, we can have before-taxes benefits.”

“I’m sure Janet and Jerry have good insurance,” Mom said.

“They do, but I think I understand what Paul is really getting at,” Jeryl said. “Right now, if I slipped and broke my arm in the shop, Mom and Dad would have to pay for my care. I could technically file for workers comp and I’m sure Dad’s insurance would look to the company’s liability coverage to defer the cost, but in the meantime, everyone involved would be stressed and possibly hurt our relationships.” I nodded in agreement. “If I were a full-time employee with insurance, that would be reduced.”

“And, God forbid, but if Jim or Kelly or you had a real disease, cancer or something, I’d like to know that we had coverage in place to take care of things, not have to take it out of savings or profits.” I added.

“I just think it is a prudent thing for us to do as a business,” I concluded.

Jim was nodding and seemed to catch my mother’s eye. Finally, she sighed and nodded. “I guess it’s just another sign of you growing up that I don’t like seeing, Paul.” She reached over and patted my hand. “So, okay, I’ll agree to salaries and insurance.”

Jim nodded. “What else?” I had thought he was going to get into details of the salaries.

“Well, I think we should get corporate cards for full-time employees. I know you and Kelly and Candace are spending your own money driving around. It would be better for travel as well. Candace and I already have them. You guys should as well.”

“Okay, I can see that. What else?”

“I want to get you, Kelly and Candace corporate cars. I think we should be using our own products, but right now I’m the only person driving a car that has any of our work in it. I hate the idea of anyone getting hurt in an accident when we are patenting and selling safety improving designs.”

This time Jeryl squeezed my hand. It felt good.

Jim shook his head. “You know, that is something I should have thought of with all my years working for State Farm. Anything else?”

“Nope. I think that’s enough for now. Do we want to have the board meeting tonight, or do you want better numbers before we approve things?”

“I think we need to approve it tonight and then get the salary and corporate cards and what-not sorted out before we scatter traveling. As president, Beth can handle any paperwork while Candace and I fly up to Detroit. You’ll have to sort out with her and Jeryl’s mother the idea of a trip to Texas.”

“If we’re going to be on salary, I suppose I can go even in the middle of summer,” Kelly added with a grin at Jeryl and me.

“I can’t believe we are finally going to be spending the whole night together,” Jeryl whispered as she slipped into the airline seat next to me. We were flying into Dallas and then driving down to Austin with Kelly being the “legal” driver on the rental car. We would be meeting with one of our research teams on Tuesday and Wednesday and then going home Thursday.

“Me, too. I’ve missed you this summer.” We had been out on dates twice since the wedding for some sweaty sex in the back seat of my car, but no extended private time together.

We had been up before dawn to catch the small plane flight from Bloomington to St. Louis and were now settling into much more comfortable first class seats on American to Dallas. Kelly was in the row behind us.

“Thanks for booking us first class, Paul.” Kelly said as she settled in.

“No choice, but you’re welcome.”

“What do you mean?”

“To get down there today, it was first class or not get into Austin until nearly midnight. I made an executive decision.”

Kelly laughed. “I guess it’s good to travel with the chairman of the board, then.” The stewardess gave me a look at that comment and then proceeded to ask if we wanted a drink before take-off.

Jeryl teased me during the first thirty minutes of the almost two-hour flight whispering naughty thoughts in my ear and stroking my leg through my khaki pants. I thought of making an offer the help her join the mile-high club, but was afraid she might actually take me up on it, so thought better of it. I did make use of the light blanket covering her to stroke my way under her skirt and tickle her pussy a little. Once she realized I had no intention of actually letting her cum, she decided we needed to behave ourselves. I relented with a kiss and pulled out the team’s latest research report to review once again. Jeryl pulled out a set of my notes and began summarizing them. We hardly acted like two teenagers.

The remainder of the flight was uneventful, but we landed to learn we might be stuck in Texas for longer than our planned stay. Evidently the Air Traffic Controllers had walked out on strike this morning sometime after we took off from St. Louis.

We were thankful to be leaving the airport by car rather than flying out, as we looked at the mass of stranded passengers at the gates and ticket counters. A lot of people would not be happy. I called our travel agent to make sure our hotel reservations could be extended. I vaguely recalled this crisis from my past and knew it was not going to end quickly.

The drive was about three hours, but we broke it up with a stop for lunch and one rest stop break, so we all felt fairly fresh when we arrived in Austin. We managed to find the Hilton downtown with little trouble and were soon checked into three rooms. Jeryl and I managed to have an adjoining door, while Kelly was one floor up from us. She gave us a look and then decided to be blunt.

“Okay, you two love birds, we need to have a chat.” Jeryl frowned at her and I just shrugged.

“What’s up, sis?” I knew she still got a kick out of me calling her that.

“I’m the chaperone. I know you two love each other and I know Jeryl is safe, so I don’t really care what you do behind the privacy of your own doors.” Jeryl grinned. “But, I’m also not going to just sit around while you two play house. We’re here for work first and private time second.

“Yes, Mom,” Jeryl chided. I just smiled.

“I’m serious, Jeryl. I’d love to have fun and relax, but we’re all being paid now and we need to get what we came here for done. That means Paul has to focus on the research and production aspects and we need to support him. Acting like a flighty blonde or his girlfriend in front of these folks won’t make his job easier. We need to be professional.”

Jeryl seemed to sober. “We will be.” She couldn’t resist a grin though. “I’ll only jump his bones tonight and tomorrow morning and then outside working hours, alright?”

Kelly scowled at us both. “And I don’t need to hear about any bone jumping, unless you find me a good looking cowboy first.” Then she gave us a quick hug and grabbed her suitcase. “Let’s meet in the lounge at five and decide what to do for dinner.”

That would give us almost two hours to “unpack”. Jeryl and I took it.

I still reveled at the feel of her naked body against mine. The fact that we were more classically intimate did not diminish how much pleasure we took from exploring and pleasuring each other over the next sixty minutes. Jeryl managed to coax two large orgasms from me while enjoying four or five of her own. By five minutes before five, we were both freshly showered and in the elevator going down to the lobby. Jeryl had a happy smile on her face and I felt incredibly honored to have such a beautiful girl on my arm as we greeted Kelly in the lounge.

I was surprised to see her with a gentleman. She wasted no time introducing us to Special Agent Johnson from the FBI field office in Dallas.

“And what brings you to Austin,” I asked as we all sat down and Special Agent ‘call me Sam’ waved to the waitress.

“You do, Paul.”

“Uh-oh. Maybe we should get Jim on the phone.”

Sam laughed. “Kelly already did and I spoke to the man myself. This has nothing to do with the suit you filed against General Dynamics last week, other than that case brought your amazing portfolio of work to our attention.”

“Our being the FBI?” I asked. I had no idea why the FBI would be interested in my inventions.

“Well, not directly the FBI. I happen to be doing a rotation with another government agency and a few of us got to brainstorming how some of your work might get applied to other areas. That led us to look a little deeper at what areas of research you are looking into. Your work in batteries is what sent me down here to try and meet with you.”

I took a sip of water and thought about his words. “So, NSA, CIA or DOD?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Are you rotating at the National Security Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency or the Department of Defense? Those are the only government agencies other than NASA that might be interested in this line of research. NASA would just wait until we published. The others might want a technical edge. So which is it?”

Sam gave me a shrewd look and then nodded. “I guess I should have known you would figure it out. I’m doing a tour in DoD.”

Of course, I knew that did not exclude the NSA since it was technically a part of the Department of Defense. I could imagine an FBI agent working at NSA for a tour much more easily than in the regular DoD establishment.

I decided to accept his fiction at face value. “So what specifically are you interested in?”

He seemed to relax once it was clear I was not going to probe more on his background or reasons for meeting us.

“We’re curious on what sort of operating regime and power density profile you were targeting.”

“I don’t have a specific target set for this team. I’m looking for enough of a breakthrough to make good enough batteries to act as an accumulator and storage facility for a car right now. I believe the same technology will enable high-power capacity for a large number of portable electronics as well, but again, I’m not targeting something specific.”

He nodded, accepting my own statements at face value. “So what sort of power density will make a solution viable for your needs?”

A smart question. I might not have a stated goal, but he knew I had some sort of threshold in mind.

“A typical starter battery needs 2.6 Mega Joules and weighs about thirty pounds. Its specific energy works out to about 0.17 Mega Joules per kilo and an energy density of 0.34 Mega Joules per liter. I need something in that range for specific energy after a seventy percent drain.”

He looked like he wanted a calculator.

“To be feasible for my needs, that works out to about a 0.5 Mega Joules per kilo and a density of about 2 Mega Joules per liter.”

He nodded. “So these will be relatively small.”

“Relatively. I plan on packaging them for greater capacity, which is what most of trip down here is about.”

“Packaging?”

“I need a lightweight but strong system to put a large number of high capacity batteries into a car in a safe manner. Lithium based batteries have a good safety margin, but it’s not zero and I need to ensure safety in a car or on an aircraft.”

He nodded again. “And you’re looking at carbon fibers to provide that?”

It was my turn to nod. He paused and took a sip of his drink. I was curious how much more he would probe.

“So if you were looking at storage capacity of ten Mega Joules, you want weight to come in below twenty kilos and volume to be about five liters?”

“I would put that sort of battery in my car tomorrow, so long as I can package and configure it to deliver at least 40 kilowatt-hours. That makes a hybrid electric-combustion vehicle viable. 60 K-watt-hours gives me a decent commuter car with no engine required.”

“Impressive. Are you close?”

I sat back and looked at him. “We’ll have to see.”

He chuckled. “Well, you’ve been more than forthcoming, and I appreciate it. Any chance I could tag along with you on your visit up the road to the campus?”

I smiled and shook my head. “I’m sorry, Special Agent Johnson, but I’ll have to say no. We’re going to be working up there, not just looking around. If you want to have a serious review of my work, I’d be happy to come to Dallas or Washington, or wherever to have a talk. But not during this trip.”

“Fair enough. I’ll talk to a few sponsors and see what they have to say. I’ll be in touch.” He stood and shook my hand before nodding to the ladies and leaving the lounge. I watched him walk out of the lobby, glad he was not heading toward the elevators. I did not like the thought of him staying here and following us around.

“That was weird,” Jeryl said.

“It was. He was fishing for something and it was not just battery specs.”

Kelly nodded. “Dad said he was legit, but I agree it was strange. Should we postpone our meetings?”

I shook my head. “No. Just keep an eye out while we’re talking. Two encounters with the FBI in two weeks makes me think someone is more interested in us than I ever thought possible.”

“It’s not like we planned the air traffic controllers’ strike, mother,” Jeryl said with more than a little exasperation in her voice. “If we can’t get a flight tomorrow, we have tickets on the train Friday and should get home Saturday.”

I smiled as I listened to one side of the conversation she was having. I’m sure it would have been an entirely different topic if her mother could see her stretched out on her stomach, naked on the bed with one foot bouncing over the edge as she spoke. We had been working hard until this afternoon.

We had spent two days at the University of Texas talking with one of the research teams we were funding looking at the process of making carbon nanotubes. I almost always said carbon fiber to outsiders, but Kelly and Jeryl knew this process was much more than better yields for carbon fiber. This was about creating significantly stronger materials that had some very interesting electrical properties. They would revolutionize batteries and electronics in thirty years if I could not re-invent them decades ahead of time.

Finally, we had a little breakthrough and took the afternoon off as the researchers started a new batch using a slightly different process. Kelly was proofing the revised process for a patent application that Jeryl had drafted from my notes and descriptions. I had read through it briefly, but was too keyed up to focus.

Jeryl had dragged me back to the hotel and given me something else to focus on, namely her and multiple orgasms. Despite having regular sex, or rather sex on a regular basis for the past three days, she made our afternoon session as wild and vividly carnal as she could. I was totally spent when she decided it was time to call home to update her folks.

While she and her mother argued over our travel plans, I tried to recover and settled for just admiring her firm backside and sleek back.

“Yes, mother. We have our own rooms and Kelly keeps a close eye on us.” She glanced my way and caught me admiring her. She grinned and rolled on her side so I could admire her breasts and tight stomach as well.

“Kelly is in her room proofing a patent application Paul and I finished drafting today. No, I’m not going to go get her so you can talk to her. I’ll have her call you when she’s done. Do you have any idea how dense some of these filings are? If Paul didn’t take the time to go over them with me, I would not have clue what they were describing.”

Jeryl scooted closer to me and reached out to cup my penis through the sheet I had pulled up to my waist. She smiled wickedly at me. “Mom, it’s not like Paul and I are down here on a wild spring break. We’re working. I’m being paid a good salary to be here on company business, not roll around with my boss just because he’s my boyfriend.”

I almost choked trying not to laugh at her rolling eyes.

“If we can’t get a flight tomorrow, I’ll call to let you know. I love you too, Mom.” She hung up the phone and then bounced up and pounced on me. “God, I hate having that talk with her. Hopefully it’s the last time I’ll do it before we go home.”

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