With This Ring

By

Retta Michaels

Preface

Notes From Retta:

Dear Reader,

In a lot of my writing, I've never felt the need to write a preface. With this story, I want you to know what to expect. For me, the story is a mixture of a whole lot of truth and a whole lot of fiction.

For me to explain it, I must sit and tell you what my conceptual plans were for the novel

IN LIFE, we are not given a set list of directions and plans how to complete it. Some people don't like the unknown, so they don't take any foreign steps into different territories. With others, they know no structure.

Rather than having a nameless character out there who could sue the fuck out of me for even inferring they're a member of the mafia, I chose to go personal and use my own name. It's a lot less messy and a lot more friendly for my lawyer.

I am not a member of the mafia. I will not say I do not know a lot of the family members from several cities, but I am not a member myself.

I will state at one time I was with a man named Gino who headed a crime family. He's since passed and this story has been released with permission and editing done by his son who is still a dear friend of mine. (Thanks Dave.)

The names I've used in the story besides my own are fictitious. The names have been changed to protect everyone. Where names weren't important, I have not used them.

I have given enough references to who the person is so if you can read between the lines, you can see who they are. With that said, I will not say more about the characters.

The story is made up. It is totally ficticious. None of the incidents happened, and nothing of the sort ever occurred. If you choose to believe it did happen, and if you choose to believe it's true, then that's on you. I will state now if I receive an email asking me if such and such part is true, I'll be polite and refer you to the Preface and leave it at that.

The reason I'm writing this preface is because I want people to know when I write, I write fiction with an air of the style of writing used by the National Enquirer or the Sun. There's an air of truth in there someplace, but it's actually fiction. If you choose to believe it's truth, then do so...I've got about twenty acres of swamp land I'll sell you and someplace on that land is a complimentary Iphone. If you can find it, it's yours.

With that said, I'll now state the characters of this story will probably be used time and time again. I think I've found a niche in this style of writing. I'll tell you now, it's done in the style of Mack Bolan “The Executioner”, James Bond, or Scarface.

“With This Ring” is the first book of the saga. It shows how someone can go from leading a normal life wanting to lead a normal life to being thrown into a complex cast of characters which require him to be more and more of what he doesn't want to be.

I hope you enjoy the story.

Disclaimer:

If you are dumb enough to believe this story is true, please stop, shut off your computer, and go to the nearest mirror to repeatedly slap yourself back into reality. You'll thank yourself afterward, I assure you.

IF you are below the age of 18, please don't read the stories on here. Your presence jeopardizes those of us who do so legally.

Personal Disclaimer:

People, places, events, and locations in this story are fictitious. If you believe them to be true, please go to the first paragraph up under the disclaimer section and do so thrice.

Now, please enjoy.

With This Ring

Chapter Sixteen:

I hung up and hit the command to close everything up. Mr Bates was amazed at the transformation. We opened the door and went down the hall and up to the living room. When we got there, we loaded up the guys and we all rode to the warehouse. I directed them in and saw the truck was still there.

I said, “Guys, I'm going to get out and go up in that truck. It shouldn't be left there. We need to get those semis left back in.”

Steve asked, “Is it safe?”

“My security guy checked it out. He said it's safe.”

“Then delegate authority and get someone to get it. You've got questioning to do.”

“Ok”

We rode on up in the tunnels and as we drove down the tunnel, I pointed out different parts of the city we were in as we drove under them. When we got to the intersection where I'd gotten the guys, I asked, “Would you pull over for a moment. I want to look at things.”

They pulled over and I got out. I went over and took a look at things. I was about to walk back over and the door rolled up. Dave came walking through. “Hi hon.”

“You should have showed me how to do that.”

“Come here.”

He took me over to an access panel which was off to the side.

“There is the access. You open it up and it looks like a bunch of electrical wires. What you do is you pull on the panel and it pulls toward you and then slides to the side.. You crawl in and there's a short hallway which takes you over to the other access panel. You push and slide it and then open the door.”

“Simple”

“Yes, it's so simple no one thinks it being more than it is.”

“I'm glad you showed me. Now, lets go up and get that gate opened at the torture room.”

“You need to show me how that's done.”

“It's not as simple as that, let me tell you. What you didn't tell me was how to unjam the door and do they all work in that manner?”

“Yeah, and how you unjam the door is you take your master key and you put it into a key slot in that little tunnel. It'll unlock the door. If you turn the key back the other direction, it raises it and lowers it.”

“Do these doors have auto openers?”

“No, it's all done through central control.”

“So radio is required.”

“Yes.”

“Ok, I'm learning.”

He laughed and said, “I'll teach you if you teach me.”

“Deal. Where's Rose?”

“Up at the house.”

“How does she like it?”

“Fortunately, I took her through mine first and then I took her through yours.”

“Did you have the guys do a sweep?”

“Yeah.”

“Bug sweep?”

“No”

“We need it done. They might have more than we know there.”

“Ok”

We got in the car and Mr Bates patted Dave's leg. “Hi son.”

“Hi. Congratulations!”

“Thank you!”

Dave said, “It's been a long time coming.”

“I know, but I'm happy the way things have happened.”

We rolled up to the torture area and I got out. “Dave, come here.”

Dave came with me and I went into the access room. “Ok, here is the room. Over there is a bunch of stuff which looks like hydraulics which would have you thinking it's the control. IF you push that lever, what it does is it slams a door down in here and you're poisoned with gas. Over here are the real controls. You see that little red button?”

“Yeah”

“You push it and you have to hold it until you hear a great big giant clang. That clang is the trip lever locking the gate into place. Now, what I'll do is hold this while you see the thing go up. You be sure to tell those guys to stay clear of it because if it doesn't lock that trip lever and/or I let off this button, that thing is going to fall back down.”

“Oh man, this is antiquated.”

“Yeah, and works like a charm.”

“Can I update that with a key control?”

“I don't know. You'll have to ask Bob.”

He smiled and said, “You ok with him?”

“Hon, I'd hug you right now, but as you see I can't take my finger off this button. Yes, I'm super great with him. He's your family and needs to be introduced as your family. Lets mend and heal the stupidity. It's went on longer than it should've.”

He smiled and said, “Rhette, you know I do love you, don't you?”

“Yeah and I do you too. Now go out and see this thing go up.”

He went out the door and about fifteen minutes later, the clang happened. I let my finger off the button and went out. What I saw was another truck pulled up and several guys standing there with Bryon there in cuffs.

“Guys, let him out of the cuffs.”

“No!” Dave said.

“Dave, he's down here in the tunnels. He might think he's bad, but I know th man's weak spots better than he does himself.”

Bryon looked at me and said, “Hi Rhette.”

“Hi Bryon, this isn't a social visit. I'll let you know now I'm upset you were down here and I'm hurt you didn't ask permission.”

“It's not something I'm real happy about myself.”

“Come over here.”

I took him over and said, “Guys, stand clear of that damned gate, I'm going to demonstrate how to trip the son of a bitch to Bryon. Dave, come on over because I want you to see how this works and then, you'll get to go in and raise it.”

“You sure you want to do this in front of him?”

“Yeah, Bryon and I know each other. He knows I'm a decent guy.”

Dave looked at me strangely and I said, “Bryon, do me a favor. You see that square metal button there?”

“Yeah”

“Push it and hold it for ten seconds. When you do, the gate will fall and then we'll have it demonstrated.”

“You sure you want me to?”

“Yeah. It's ok.”

He went over and pushed the button and held it there. The gate slammed down crushing his hand in it. His scream of shock was long and lasting.

I turned to Dave and said, “Now you can go open the thing. I think you get my point.”

He nodded his head.

Steve came over and said, “Babe?”

“Hon, Bryon here is learning a lesson. He needs to know he doesn't fuck with me and mine. He needs to be taught it's an eye for an eye.”

Bryon was trapped by his hand. I hauled off and gave him an upper cut. He staggered against the gate and screamed in pain again.

“Bryon, we were cellies. I heard you talk time and time again about this place, but those who ARE really a member down here don't talk about it and brag about it. You had the description right, but you had your importance greatly exaggerated. I should know. I'm the head of this place.”

“I didn't know.”

“No you didn't because I never let on. Not once in there did anyone know, but you should have gotten a clue the day you got out when I went and made the phone call to get your ass out of that jamb. Instead, you chose to be stupid and come back to trespass on my turf. Tonight, a man got dismembered and you were seen walking away. Simply by the description of the way you walked and where you went up, I knew it was you. You see, I have a very good memory.

Now, who was the guy you dismembered and where is his body?”

“Fuck you man!”

I sucker punched him in his mouth. “Bryon, you taught me boxing. It's damned amazing because not once did you pull your punches. I learned by being black and blue. You thought because you were bigger than me that you could do it.

Well, let's say I'm remembering now you chose to teach by not pulling your punches. I'm not doing so either. I asked you a question and I expect an answer. I've got some electrical probes in there I'm going to put you your nipples and see if I can fry them off. I'd suggest you start answering questions.”

“The man's body is out over in the bushes by the Art Museum.”

“Who is he?”

“I don't know. He was driving the truck.”

“How'd you get him out of the truck?”

“The guy eats his lunch sitting there. I had a small pen light, so I flashed it. He didn't see it the first two times I flashed it, but the third time he did. He got out and that's when I hit him with the tazer.”

I turned to Steve and said, “Remember to look for tazer pin points on the man's body.”

“So you dismembered him there?”

“No, I just stabbed him in the guts and they came spilling out. When I was dragging him into the bushes, I got tangled up in them and I cut them.”

The gate lifted and I saw Bryon's hand was smashed flat in the gate frame.

“Bryon, we'll see to your hand in a moment. You can pull it out. I know it's you because I remembered you were left handed. .”

“Why'd you do that?”

“Huh?”

“Why'd you do that to my hand?”

“Bryon, you need to be taught lessons. We're not done.”

He looked at me and I said, “Come on over here otherwise I'll tell Dave to let go of that button in there and it'll come back down again. I don't know if it'd hurt more or not, but I'm willing to give it another go to find out if you don't move.”

He looked at me strangely.

“Bryon, let me tell you something. I'm good and pissed. It's a luxury you're now getting to see that you didn't in there. When I want to be, I can be a sadistic fuck like all get out. The only way I made it through boxing lessons was because I knew one day I'd kick your ass in return and I did. Remember?”

“Yeah.”

“But, later, I thanked you because you beat up little Larry in there. I knew if I could whip your ass, then I could whip his. That was a beginning of some lessons on how I learned who I could whip simply because I knew who they had whipped.”

“Why are you doing this to me?”

“You know, you've got a personality disorder. Living with you was pure hell.

You'd talk shit about being in the mafia, but that I knew wasn't true. You'd take it up the ass from me and then, you'd watch television and talk about all the women you'd rape and fuck hard to put them in their place.

One thing which is interesting is I remember one thing about having sex with you. You've got a habit of spitting when you cum. What I don't get is there are a number of women out there who have reported rapes on grocery store parking lots. They were abducted and taken to the woods to be raped. Each one of them reported the man would spit when he came.”

“You can't prove it?”

“I can. You might have wiped off your spittle with an alcohol pad. What you weren't careful about was me knowing you did it when you came and how much you talked about raping women. If I wanted to, I could get your ass locked up for the rest of your life.”

“Don't do that!”

“I won't because it'd be hell on the other person you were a celly with.”

“I'll do whatever you want me to do.”

I turned and said, “Steve, you heard enough to convict him?”

“Yeah.”

I turned back around and said, “Bryon, you see this man? He's my lover and he's the police commissioner. I've got enough on you and he does to convict. All we have to do is to take you in and prosecute to get you a nice long term.

I imagine with the number you've done, they'd put you away for life under that predator law. You apparently want me not to do that right?”

“Yeah, I'll do whatever you want?”

“You couldn't even pull your fucking hand out of the frame when I asked you to. I know you're a liar and now, you're telling me one thing and not doing it.”

He pulled his hand free and looked at it. “It doesn't hurt. It's flat, but it's not hurting.”

“Sudden shock does that. It'll hurt like a motherfucker when it's cut off.”

He looked at me with a look of question.

“There's no saving it. I could hit it with a sledgehammer and the bones would break and need to be fused, but the hand would still be there.

You'd have a fucked up time the rest of your life with it, but something like that, they'll take off since all the vessels are all mashed into the bones and muscle.”

I went over to Steve and said, “Come here for a moment.”

We walked a short distance away and I said, “Hon, this is good cop bad mafia guy. I'll build him up and ask questions and get answers. Each time he doesn't give the answer I want, I'm going to make it painful to him.”

“Ok”

“About halfway through, I'm going to broach the subject of killing him and tell him all the ways it can be done. When you hear it, it's going to be time to have you do the good cop and start building him up to get answers.”

“What are the answers you want?”

“He's involved in this take over. This isn't a case of him doing this on his own and it just coinciding with a takeover attempt.

I believe he was there to take the truck to get in and pick those guys up. I believe they wanted into the boat room for a reason, I need to know why. I want to know how this all ties in together with St. Louis and what he knows. You following me?”

“Yeah.”

“He's cased the guy in the truck. He knew the guys pattern and routine. What you see there is a guy who is bi-sexual, but a sexual psychopath against women.”

“He's cute.”

“I know. He can be damned sweet when he wants to be and it's serving his purpose to get someone into bed.

I'll tell you now we had a lot of sex in that cell. We were cellies for six weeks and the whole time I was studying this guy because he's exactly that...a sexual psychopath.

You read about them in psych books, but unless you go to a state mental facility, you don't ever meet one. This one landed in my cell for stupid shit and I just knew it wasn't over when he got out.”

“Did he really do those rapes?”

“Hon, there are about thirty of them which were reported. You know and I do most of them didn't come forward.

What's interesting is he chose a pattern which he mentioned in the cell. I imagine if you stripped him, you'd see he's shaved from the face down so no hairs are left. I imagine if you really asked those women, you'd find out he smelled like he was freshly bathed to the point he scrubbed any hope of loose skin flakes off.

I'll get to that in my questioning, but what this is, is a teaching lesson for you because he's not walking out of here.”

“Ok”

“He killed one of my men. He promised it wasn't over and thought he could walk away to be a problem another day. Well, that day isn't coming. The only problem he is to me now is a waste of the time it's going to take to get the answers from him.”

“How are you going to do it?”

“Pain. Lots of pain. You're going to see me inflict pain on top of pain.”

“Ok”

I heard the clang of the gate and went over to Bryon, “Come on, we have business to do in here.”

We went in and the Bates guys followed.

I showed Bryon the control on the Police Commissioner who was asleep. “Watch this Bryon.” I flipped the lever and the vibrators began humming.

“This man told me to fuck myself over the telephone. You see that telephone shoved up his ass?”

“Yeah”

“It's now being used to teach him a lesson. We'll leave this run for a bit.”

I went over to one of the Bates guys and asked, “Do you know Fat Cat Wilson?”

“Yeah”

“You know where he lives?”

“Vaguely.”

“Ok, go pick him up and bring him here. I'll give him a call.”

“He a member?”

“No, but he probably will be. The things he knows how to torture people really should be implemented in here. He pulled that shit with enough people in prison.”

“I knew he was in prison.”

“For raping a woman with a ball bat. The problem is she thought it was a ball bat. The man has the biggest dick I've ever seen on a human being.”

“Ok, I'll go get him.”

I flipped open my phone and called main control. “Yeah”

The voice was different.

“Hi, I need a person called by the name of Fat Cat Wilson. His name and number should be in our files. It better be, I gave it to Gino directly.”

“What do you want me to tell him? It's in here.”

“Tell him Rhette Michaels needs him and I'm sending someone to come get him. Tell him I'll make it well worth his while. The trophy I'm giving him is going to be amazing.”

“You want me to use those words?”

“Yeah, he'll know if it's me calling him it's for something worthwhile. I never did him wrong in there.”

“Ok”

I hung up and went over to Bryon. “Ok, we're going to go in here.”

“Why?”

“Because unless you were lying, you said you'd do anything I wanted. Well, it's time to start paying up. You don't think I'm going to forget. Do you?”

We went over and I took him into the sauna.

“Why you want me in here.”

“Bryon, I want you to strip naked and give me the clothes. I'll take them and they'll be right out here.”

“Why?”

“Hold on a second. I'll be right back.”

I went out and got the cattle prod. I walked back in and stunned him. I leaned over him and said, “When you come back up off that floor, you give me the fucking clothes. That's the last lie I take tonight and believe me it gets worse from here.”

He looked at me with glazed eyes..

I went back out and said to the Bates guys. “As you can see, this is our torture area. A lot of devious shit goes on in here. It's wide open and you can see it as you drive by. We've nothing to hide.”

“How do you keep them from running away?”

“Our control center has monitors in the ceiling which have weaponry to see they don't make it far. They know it's not going to do them any good to even attempt to run.”

“What do you do this for?”

“Questioning. Intimidation. And Understanding. If I don't get questions answered, then they need to know they'll be intimidated through painful moments to get us to understanding each other.”

“You do this a lot?”

“It's been a long time since I've been down here. There's a guy whose job it is to do this for his job. I'll tell you now the guy is really a pro at what he does.

He should be called in to do these, but the guy in the sauna is someone who is personal for me to do. That police commissioner is about to be handed to Fat Cat to do. I'll tell you now, Fat Cat is going to really have that guy in a different area of his mind when he's done.”

“Fat Cat isn't nice!” I heard one of them say.

“No, and isn't nice which gains an understanding down here.

I'll be honest, if you make it to this room, nice things aren't going to happen to you. If it gets to this point, you're going to be lucky you walk out alive. If you do, you walk out a changed person determined never to be in this room again.”

“What are you doing to that guy over there?”

“That man is a police officer who saw a murder. He needs to forget he saw it happen.

That man over there is the ex police commissioner. He's going to discover telling me to fuck myself isn't something I'll take from someone who is that well paid by me. His job is history and his life will be drastically changed when we're done.”

“And that guy you whose hand just got mashed?”

“That man is going to be questioned until I get answers about this attempted coup. He was a part of it and killed one of my truck drivers. Down at the entrance you saw that black truck. In that truck, he spelled out a message in the man's intestines and then thought he got away. Guess what? He didn't.

Now, he's going to find out what happens if someone kills my men because when it's over, he'll be dead.”

“What are you doing to him now?”

“Well, he's in the sauna. He's been stunned with that cattle prod and he's going to get his clothes off so he can steam in there a while.

Since I used the cattle prod on him already, he'll be leery of it so I doubt if I use it again, but with a sheen of sweat on him, the shock it delivers goes all over rather than to a specific area.

What we'll do is we'll steam him and then do a cold shower which will throw his system into shock. When he comes back out of it, we'll ask some questions. If he fails to answer, then we'll do it again followed by that tank over there which has chilled water. He'll be dunked in it until he thinks he's drowning and then, shock will set in. We'll pull him out and we'll do it all over.”

“Man!”

“It's time consuming, but I'll give you a pointer. That hand of his is going to really start letting him know he's in hell. That warmth is going to not be an issue, but that cold is going to be where he'll start really wanting something for pain. I'll promise it if he agrees to answer questions.”

“Do you give it to him?”

“I'm not a doctor. I don't prescribe medicine!”

He smiled.

“It's about selling a dream in here. They find out if it's a dream or a nightmare. What is a nightmare to you might get another guy off. It's some strange business, but as strange as it is, we use this place all too regularly.”

“What for if you're not at war?”

“There's always a business owner who thinks he's slick and wants to fuck us. There's always someone who thinks they can threaten to call the cops when they're in shit with us.

Those people need to know we're not going to run. They'll find out they can be forcibly taken down here and taught lessons which will make things easier on us from there on out.”

Mr Bates said, “I don't get it. I paid you guys faithfully because I knew if I had problems, I'd have help there before the police arrived.”

“Yeah, and what I take from it is an honest commitment.”

“Gino helped me out once. I had a guy who thought he could stop meat shipments simply because he wanted to screw me with some bad meat. I refused delivery and then waited for Gino to come and eat his lunch.

When he got there, I let him eat and then asked permission to speak with him. I told him the problem and he asked to use my telephone. He called the man's company and told them to radio him to get down here and he ordered it.

The man arrived and Gino went out to the man's truck. He opened up the truck and climbed up in it and found the bad meat. The man told him it was the meat he always delivered to niggers.

Gino threw the man out of the truck and down onto the street. It was like a four foot fall. He then walked in and forced the man to sit at a table while he went into the kitchen and fixed the meat on the grill with all sorts of vegetables and sauce.

When it was done, he came out and put it in front of the guy and told him to eat every last bite of it. The man did and then Gino told him the moment he ever delivered a bad product to our restaurant again, he'd have him killed. He then ordered the man to give me a fifty percent discount on the rest of my orders.

He did and since then, what I've done is I took the amount I would have normally paid for that meat and gave the difference to Gino. To me, it was worth it because I saw he treated me like a human being and not some color.”

I went over and hugged him. “I never knew.”

“I've not told anyone. My boys thought me a fool, but they never knew because I had that secret with Gino.

Let me tell you the man refused it time and time again. Finally one day, he told me he'd protect me at all costs and the only reason he was doing it was because he'd heard some thugs were planning on coming down to destroy my business.”

“I've got that in the files. I read itt one day. The group who was doing it was a bad group. We found out they were doing it to a lot of minority business owners, black, Asians, Mexicans, all over the city. Gino got their main guy called in one night and told him it was over and the guy called Gino a wop and that he'd have him killed. Gino brought him down to this room and had the guy really rung out through the paces.

When he died, he had the guys head cut off and delivered to the man's second in command telling him to stop it and if he didn't, both their heads would be delivered to the next down the line until it got stopped. Let me tell you it got stopped damned fast.”

“What happened to the group?”

“They went up to New York and eventually got killed. They were stealing cars and stripping them. Big John's bunch found out it was going on under their noses and went in and ran the whole bunch through car compactors.”

Marlon said, “That's bullshit.”

“Yeah, but even then, Gino's hands were tied to a point. He protected your dad, but the fall out from it would have been awful had he been found out.

What happened was it became the biggest open secret in the city for us in the under ground. Everyone got told to watch the place and to frequent it with our dollars. I know I went there before Gino and I were an item with Tony.”

Mr Bates nodded and said, “The day you came in with that guy and told me he was your lover and you weren't with Gino was strange. I assumed you two were an item even then, but didn't say anything. When you came in with that other guy, it really threw me.”

“I imagine.”

Marlon asked, “SO you weren't together, but you were with Gino?”

“We were friends. The attraction was there for both of us, but because I was with Tony, there wasn't a chance I'd do anything with Gino. Instead, we formed a friendship and I decorated the house and the grounds.”

Mr Bates said, “Some day, we'll go there and you'll get to see that place. That house is beautiful.”

I said, “I'd take four of you guys to be my guards there, but I don't want it seen by visitors thinking I have you as servants. The moment it would ever happen, I'd probably be so offended I'd have my guest down here in this place.”

Steve said, “Hon, you're looking at it wrong. You told me they weren't seen in the house. To these guys, it'd be a status symbol job.”

I looked at them and asked, “Do four of you want to do it? I mean, it's going to require a lot. You'll be bored out of your skulls, but when I go out on rounds, I have to go to a lot of places and you'll have to be trained for my personal security.”

Three of the younger guys said, “We'll do it.”

I nodded and said, “Ok, but things are going to be different. The way it was, there was a room upstairs they stayed in and they lived up there. You can live there, but I want you out in the open. I don't ever want my kids thinking you're someone other than their uncles. You got that?”

They smiled and Mr Bates said, “Rhette, you're like a son to me already. For you to take them in and treat them like family would be great.”

“My son over there will think he has to eat more.”

He laughed and said, “What's he doing over there?”

“I don't know. I imagine he's pretty tired.”

I went over and said, “Robert, what's going on?”

“Just thinking and waiting on us to go home.”

“What you thinking about?”

“Dad, can I come on the road with you and have Aaron there with me and be taught?”

“Why?”

“I want to feel close to you. What you said to me tonight hurt because my own dad wouldn't let me be a part of things. I thought you would be different. You told me it'd be different and I signed on thinking it and now, you want to change things so it's nothing but the same.”

“Ok, let's ask, but if you want to go home and get sleep, I'll have some guys go with you.”

“No, I've got to get used to things.”

“Hon, there's something you need to understand. My body doesn't require sleep like you. You sleep x amount of hours and for you to get less isn't going to do you any good. Me, I sleep about two hours a night and then, I'm good to go for a day. With your dad, I sleep longer and it amazes me. I've slept a goodly number of hours this week and probably could be up for forty hours without a wink.

Why don't you go on down there and take some one with you? How about taking the younger guys and having a sleep over?”

“There anything to eat in the house?”

“Hon, you know where that walk in refrigerator is. That and the freezer are always kept full. You'll learn restaurants send things over complimentary all the time. I bet you'll see a lot of things in there to scarf on. Just use the microwave and heat things up and leave the dishes in the sink.”

“I'll rinse them and put them in the dishwasher. Are there any paper plates?”

“Not in THAT house there isn't. Gino insisted upon the finest china, so we only used china...just don't break a plate because they're like three hundred dollars.”

“Man!”

“Yeah, it was nothing but the best because he was so poor for so long.”

“Why were they poor if they were head of the city?”

“Hon, things were different. There were bosses of all sorts of things. Each person got a cut of the pie.

Gino's dad was over them all, but even then it wasn't a real good living like it is today. Yes, in terms it's a damned good living, but what he started was survivor benefits cost a lot of money because we pay that man's wife's bills for the rest of her life. That cost a lot and it took a lot of the money from Gino.”

“So when did it change that he wasn't boss over the bosses, but the only boss?”

“It wasn't until about 1984. As they died, he didn't replace them and finally, he told the remaining ones he wasn't going to replace them when they died and if they didn't like it to step up. They didn't. So, when the last one died, he had the whole city.”

“Why didn't they step up?”

“Because he went in and managed them better than they had been managed before. He made them more money and in turn, he got more money.”

“Money did that!”

“Hon, I'll tell you what. If you were making fifteen thousand a year working for someone and someone else came in and asked you to give it a shot with him for two months and in that time, you got three times your amount of pay checks, would you stop wanting him to be your boss?”

“No, but couldn't he take the money away?”

“It doesn't work that way. You take it away, they feel fucked and that's when they will rise up and bite you in the ass.”

“So delivering what he promised got him the city?”

“Yes, and that's what I do too. That's why when some of those guys get replaced, they're not going to like it because they've got the old way of doing things under them.”

“Won't that start a war?”

“It could, but did you see our arsenal down there?”

“Yeah”

“Thats one of several. Tonight, I learned there are tanks down here. We saw the boats and I heard we even have submarines. “

“Why?”

“Because it's mighty impressive to roll out and fight with. I'll tell you now, those cities which have all the bosses under the bosses don't have the money and firepower we have. It's because everyone is taking it for themselves.

We invested it rather than taking it for ourselves.”

“So what do you get paid?”

“I don't. You see what I get paid. I get free jets, helicopters, houses, food, and all the things I need. When you have it all, you don't need things.”

“Then what do you do when you want to order pizza?”

“You whip out a credit card they give you to pay for those things. It's their money, but you use it like yours.”

“You're telling me you don't get paid, but live like a millionaire.”

“Billionaie...yes. Because in our accounts, we have it and as long as I make them money, they have money in the accounts for me to spend.”

“Is that what my dad did?”

“Yes, but what your dad did was he invested badly and he spent the money too fast for things besides what he needed. His income wasn't as big as Kansas City's, but if he'd invested it better, it would have been.”

“So not all the cities are as rich as you.”

“No, but down in Miami, they're richer. I'm sure New York is richer. What you'll have to do up there is you'll have to get used to things being different. I'll do all I can to change things, but we'll be fighting a system which has done them pretty good.”

“Then why fight it?”

“Because it's like a car that only has part of it's engine running and is pulling a huge parachute behind it. It's being drug down and it's not performing up to it's full potential. If we change things, it's like cutting the strings on that parachute and it suddenly can go faster, but once you get everything into place, it's going full speed.”

“How do we get them to change?”

“Very carefully. You kiss a lot of asses, but you also fight a lot. Thats the part I don't want you to see.”

“Can't you get killed?”

“Hon, my life is always in danger. That's why I have guards. Bryon over there knows how to box. He could take me by surprise and have me killed with one punch. That's why I took care of that hand.”

“I thought you were just being mean.”

“No, you have to think strategically. Even before I got him to put his hand in there, I was psyching him so he thought things were good between us.

He knew when they went and got him he was in a world of shit, but to be honest, I think he thinks things are still fine. I'll tell you they're not.”

“So you don't let him know and you get the answers.”

“Yeah.”

“Dad, I don't want you to die.”

“I don't either, but if something should happen to me, you need to know I did my best to make you a better world and get you everything so you wouldn't know the bad parts.”

“If I don't know the bad parts, how am I going to go up against someone if they choose to fight me?”

“Hon, the key to that is trusting your people to do their jobs. You promote your people and you do your best for them and they'll be their best for you.”

“Do you think I did good with Aaron?”

“Hon, it's a gut choice. I make them all the time. I've made a bad one with Tammy, but I think she's going to be good where she's at?”

“Where is she?”

“She went up to little John's mom's house. Little John likes her, so I think it might work if she and he get together.”

“What if she gets back on drugs?”

“That's a chance she takes. I don't want it for her, but she needs to know she's in a position now she can get what she wants if she'd just stay off them.”

“What do you mean?”

“People want to be loved. She's got a man who will do it. She has kids and he'll work to get them back for her. He'll help her and them so they get along and she has help raising them. For some people, that's what it takes to be happy. I think it'll be good for her. If not, I'm sure he'll give her what she wants if she'll just ask.”

“I hope that will happen. I don't trust she'll stay off the drugs.”

“If she doesn't she's let herself down and him.”

“What will happen then?”

“I think he'll be patient to a point, but after that, I don't know.”

“I'm going to go see if the guys want to go to the house. I hope they have pizza there.”

“IF they don't, take some of this money and buy you all a pizza each and give the guy a nice tip.”

“How much of a tip.”

“If he gets it there hot, give him 25%. If he takes a long time, you give him 15%. If it's cold and he takes forever, you call the restaurant and tell them I'll be calling them and finding out why. Then, you call me....well, just call me when the thing is ordered and if it takes a long time, you get a call to me and I'll have someone find out what the hold up is.”

“There soda there?”

“Hon, I'll tell you now there's going to be every kind there with a lot of ABC rootbeer.”

“I like that.”

“Good, it's one of our companies.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Really. That same company owns the company which makes those snack cakes and pies. I'm sure there are a bunch of those in the fridge too.”

“Oh man!”

He ran over to the other boys and they all got permission to go to the house. My guards went with them and they all walked down the course way to the elevator. I called control central and asked if the power was all turned back on.”

“Yes. We've got everything back on.”

“Keep a note someplace I want video in the basement, main hallway, living, and upstairs hallways installed there. Also make a note I want panic buttons which look like the old fashioned push button light switches. Tell them I expect antique brass for those buttons because the ones in the house are the old bakelite.”

“Ok”

“Thanks”

I rung off and went over to the Bates guys. “Ok, guys, here's the way it's going to go. I'm taking up your time and I know it. Those of you who are opening tomorrow, go ahead and go home. Those who have an early shift, go ahead and go. Those who work tomorrow night, stay and I'll do what I can to see you're relieved when Beck's people get here.”

Dave walked over and said, “Rhette, send any home who want to go. We've got our guys here from South Carolina.”

“They here in the tunnels?”

“Yeah, we're doing sweeps of all those areas and inventories to see if anything is missing. It's pretty easy, so I doubt if anything is missing.”

“How do you do easy inventory?”

“Easy. Everything has a spot. Each weapon has it's own rack. Each boat has it's own rack. Each vehicle, tank, track, tractor, or whatever has it's own parking spot.”

“Dave, I'm going to make a request here and now.”

“What?”

“The limo.”

“I'll get them to slow down.”

“Thanks, but that's not it.”

“Ok, what?”

“Measure the door and see if a HUMVEE which is armored can fit in there. I want one.”

“OK”

“You're listening too soon. You need to know how I want it.”

He smiled.

“I want the thing to have a raised roof section towards the rear with steps that fold down. I want to walk up and into it and stand before I sit rather than bend over and get in. If I can do it on a plane, I should be able to do it with a vehicle on the ground which costs that much.”

He nodded and said, “I never thought of it, but I'll get several of them that way. Maybe it'll start a trend.”

“It ought to. It makes sense. I don't mind if the security guys have to get in like a normal truck, but we can have sky lights like those Vista Cruiser Oldsmobiles or something.”

“What color?”

“It doesn't matter, I like White. I like Black. And, I like the gold they had on the 1999 Ford Pickups.”

“How about White with the Gold Striping.”

“Ok”

“That was my favorite bedroom in that house.”

“That's Robert's first pick.”

“It really looked rich with all that gold.”

“It's nice. I wanted a dark blue ceiling, but your dad wouldn't go for it.”

Dave laughed and said, “I'll tell you why. He once told me you wanted it and that he could just imagine Gold fish up there swimming and all the weight of that water coming down to crush him to death.”

“It does sound cool having it for a ceiling though. I would have done that if he'd mentioned it.”

“I really wish you could have been here during the last six months he was alive. He was a different man. He talked more openly and honestly than he ever did before. He told me what he really thought and it made us so much closer it was amazing.”

“I should have been here. No one called and I had no idea.”

“You were in prison.”

“And like that could have stopped him!. I think if he'd made the right phone call, he could have gotten me house arrested to that house.”

He smiled. “He would have felt the same as you then because he said being home all the time was terrible.”

My cell phone buzzed. “Yeah”

“Dad, no one will deliver. They all say it's too late.”

“Call Mama's over in the district. You tell the night manager I'm going to have one of my trucks pull up and he's to run them out to him. You also....fuck it, you call in the order and I'll call them. We'll get it done for you.”

Dave smiled...”Having kids is going to drive you insane.”

“I love it. You know....” I got tears in my eyes. “You know him counting on me and thinking I'm great is a gift which just doesn't match up. I'll move heaven and stars for him to see he's happy. I see Steve the same way and its just amazing the way we are with it.”

“I can tell something's changed.”

“Dave, a lot has changed. I've realized some things and one of them is how much Steve loves me.”

I can tell by the way you two look at each other now. It's went over to that adoring look.”

“Thanks for telling me that. Hang on a second, I've got to get my kid some pizza.”

I went to open my phone and it rang. “Hello?”

“Dad, they said I'm nothing but a kid and they're not going to take that big of an order and it doesn't matter who my dad is, I'm to quit calling and leave them alone.”

“Did you tell the man what you wanted?”

“Yeah, but I don't think he wrote it down.”

“That's ok, those pizzas are about to be free. We'll get you what you want there pronto.”

I hung up and called Mama's. “Good Evening, Mama's Pizza, How may I help you?”

“This is Rhette Michaels. I expect those fucking pizzas made, and there to my house in fifteen minutes or I'll personally be down there to make your life hell with not only the day shift manager on your ass, but me who owns that motherfucker. You got me!”

“I'm sorry, but I know nothing about who owns this place. They didn't hire me to give them away and take prank calls from jerks.” He hung up.

I called the store manager. A tired sounding voice answered the phone. “Hello”

“Rhette Michaels here. I need you to call your employee down there and tell him I've got the pizzas I ordered coming free. If I have to go down there, my phone call will be again with you and we'll be making pizzas all fucking night.”

“What's going on?”

“The kid you have working there refused to deliver, which I think is rather stupid on your part since no one else delivers.”

“They get robbed.”

“Then use my trucks as your security. IF the robbers start getting killed when they rob my drivers, they'll start figuring out to leave them alone!

Now, the guy got a healthy order from my son ordering pizza. I gave him fifteen hundred dollars so I know he's got the money. Instead, the kid there said he wasn't going to take an order that big and told my son not to call back. I called and got treated rudely. Now, do you want to take care of it? Or, do you want to take care of it with me?”

“I'll go down there to see it's done properly.”

“No, just call the kid. It's his job.”

“It's right downstairs. I can give an ass chewing more effectively in person.”

“Ok, but don't fire him or you'll be up all night cooking.”

She laughed. “I usually do that anyway since he doesn't show up half the time.”

“You need to get rid of him and get someone who will represent the business better.”

“I know, but the people don't want to work all night.”

“I'll try to find you someone. Let me see what I can do.”

“I'd appreciate it.”

“Just see my kid gets his pizzas is all I ask.”

“Ok, I'll get off here now. Thanks for calling Rhette.”

“No prob.”

I hung up.

Dave smiled and said, “Who you going to get to make pizzas?”

“I've got a police officer over there who likes to slap phones out of my hands. Maybe he'll need a different line of employment.”

“He what!”

“You heard right. They came into the restaurant in response to the murder report. The one asked questions and when I refused to answer and call the commissioner, he slapped the phone out of my hand. My guards put him at gunpoint and then I gave him a knee to the groin and one to the face and told them to bring him down here.”

“Oh man.”

“He got told he'll never see his retirement and his uniform again by me. When I did call the commissioner, he told me to fuck myself, so I told them to get him down here and shove the phone up his ass. That's why it's there.”

Dave chuckled. “What you going to do about him?”

“Fat Cat Wilson is on his way down.”

“Why does that name sound familiar?”

“A dick the size of you wouldn't believe. It's like twelve inches soft. Hard, it's like sixteen. I've seen it in the shower at prison.”

“Man!”

“Yeah, so anyways, he's done me a few favors in prison and I've done him a lot. He's a guy who is straight up with you and you can trust a year long. What I think is he's a natural for this job because he's just that mean. What you don't know is underneath all that facade is huge teddy bear of a guy.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I'll tell you how I found out. The guy got really hooked on one of his boys. I mean head over heels hooked. The kid went home and told him he'd write. He waited and waited and waited for a letter and I kept telling him he's write because I really thought he would....but, after six weeks, we finally figured out the guy wasn't going to write. Then one night, after mail call, he was really down and I went to see him. He was all pissed off and had already whipped his celly when I'd walked in. I told his celly to leave and then told him to stand up. He stood and I went over and hugged him. You'd have thought I hugged a piece of paper the way he crumbled. We stood there hugging and I told him he'd find someone some day who wouldn't run away.”

“Did he?”

“Yeah, we had a homosexual who came into the wing which hit on anyone who had a big dick. He saw Kevin in the showers and made a beeline for him. He'd no sooner made the come on to him when I got there and put his head into the concrete wall of the shower. When he came up, I said, “That's mine. You think about it again, I'll kill you.”

Then, he went through guys like you wouldn't believe because he was going through quantity instead of quality. I finally had seen enough and went over to tell the guy he needed to grow the fuck up and settle with someone. He told me no one satisfied him.

Well, I thought about it and I told Fat Cat. He said he'd be ok with it. That's when I went back to the guy and told him I had someone but if he fucked him over, that I'd beat the daylights out of whatever Fat Cat didn't. They hooked up and life was grand for the both of them.”

“What happened?”

“The dumb fuck got out and then went to a Taco Bell and robbed it with a fucking cap gun. His problem was the police officer who got him coming out of the store had a real gun. One two three, he was six feet under.”

“What a dumb ass.”

“Yeah, so you have Fat Cat out here with a dick so long people run from it and it being attached to a guy who is a real sweetheart when he wants to be. SO, the commissioner is now programmed to want to only please Fat Cat.”

“You used one of those pills again, didn't you.”

“Hon, it makes things a whole lot faster that way. Steve and I worked on him a whole fifteen minutes and he was ready for to RTBO..”

“RTBO?”

“Ride The Big One!”

Dave laughed and said, “I think those people are secretly that way and you just release it. There have been times it's been used to get people to do things and they won't do it.”

“Interesting. Who would have thought sexuality was that far in the subsconsciousness?”

“It's interesting.”

“What other experiments have you used with it?”

“Everything.”

“Can it make that sexual psychopath into a productive human being?”

“I don't know.”

“Let me have one of them.”

“You use up yours?”

“You gave me one. I used it. Little John gave me his. I used it. Now, I'm wanting to go try it on Bryon and see if it will help him be something better.”

“What are you going to do with him?”

“Dave, he's damned good looking. If he was focused in the right direction, he could sell shots of Icy Hot on the beach at noon and people would line up.”

“Ok, here it is. I want to see this work.”

“Ok”

I went over and went into the sauna. Bryon was sitting up. “I need something for pain. My hand is killing me.”

“I've got it here. I figured you'd need it.”

“I dont' have anything to take it with.”

“Hold on, I'll go get you something.”

I went over and got a cup from the side wall which we use to splash people in the face. I went over to the chill tank and dipped it and then went to the sauna.

“Here you go.”

He took it and I sat there with him. “Bryon, I'm not sure what we're going to do here. Part of me wants to turn you in and another part of me wants to just kill you. The only thing saving your ass is because of all the sex we had.”

“Rhette, what made you have sex with me?”

“You're a good looking guy. You're damned sweet when you're trying to get into someone's pants. You got there with me and to be honest, your ass drove me wild.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. The other part was fine, but you spitting on me when you come just irked the shit out of me.”

“I can't help it.”

“You could try keeping your mouth shut.”

He started talking with his mouth shut. Dave looked at me and nodded.

“Bryon, I've got some questions to ask and then, we'll get you better. Ok?”

“Mmmm hmmm”

“You can talk, just keep your mouth shut when you're cumming.”

“Ok”

“Bryon, who all is in the set up which was to take me over?”

“Ten guys besides myself.”

“There were eleven in the tunnels tonight.”

“One of the guys didn't know if he could make it.”

“Who did this?”

“Some guy from St. Louis. He's pissed because the leader of Kansas City threw him out. He wanted vengeance for his brother's killing.”

“And how did he get all this done?”

“He's related to two of the guys. He called them and promised us all a million each.”

“What went one with the truck driver?”

“He and I were having sex regularly at that spot. He had his lunch break there and he'd eat it on the steps. Then, we'd go to the bushes and he'd fuck me.”

“Why'd you kill him?”

“They wanted the truck, so I told them I'd get it to do my part.”

“Are you gay?”

“Yes”

“Why do you rape women?”

“It just comes over me that I want to do it.”

“Ok, from now on, you only want men to have sex with you. Women are good and women are to be your friends, but nothing sexual happens ever again.”

“Ok”

“Bryon, do you understand me?”

“Yes.”

“In the future, you're going to find you're right handed and everything is easier to do with your right hand.”

“Ok”

“You want to do good. In return for doing good, you'll be a member of our organization. We'll find a position for you and you'll do it with the utmost of your abilities. You'll lead a productive life and you'll find someone who you can be partners with whom you'll want to please and satisfy in all ways.”

“Ok”

Dave said, “That police officer. Tell him he'll work at the pizza shop with that police officer.”

“Hang on. The guy won't be a police officer in the pizza shop.”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot.”

“Bryon, I'm about to introduce you to someone. That man will be your life mate and partner until you die. He'll feel about you as much as you feel about him. Ok?”

“Ok”

You sit here and I'll be back in a moment. While you are resting, you won't feel pain in that hand.”

I went out and said, “Ok, wise guy, how the hell we going to meet them up if you don't have any more of those pills?”

“I'll get some. Hang on.”

He walked off and my cell phone rang. “Yeah”

“Dad, the pizzas just got here. The bill had no charge on them. What do you want me to do with the money?”

“Save it. Do you have plenty to eat and drink?”

“Yeah, they have crème soda here too!”

“We have crème soda. It's our house.”

“Oh yeah. I forgot. The guys and I are having a good time. There's a tv in the room and we're watching it.”

“Ok, don't stay up too late.”

“Dad, I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“Tell Dad I love him too.”

“Ok Good night.”

I rung off and the phone rung in my hand. “Hello”

“All the guys said to tell their dads they love them also.”

“Ok”

I hung up and went over to the guys. “I've got a message from your sons to tell you all they love you too. They're eating pizza and watching television.”

Mr Bates said, “Rhette, do you think you can get by without us? The guys are getting pretty tired.”

“Sure, I appreciate what you did.”

I went over and hugged each one and told them not to worry about their sons.

They got in the cars and headed off. I made a mental note to find out more about each one of them and see they all got nice houses to live in. If they thought my house in Overland Park was nice, they really needed to get places like it because it's nice, but it's dated.

As I was walking over to the commissioner, my cell rang. “Hello?”

“We're fifteen out.”

“Ok, we've got people waiting. You're all going to be placed in my houses. You can either come to the tunnels or go on to the houses. It's up to you.”

“I'll send the guys to the houses and bring my guards on there.”

“Ride on to the house and then have someone show you how to get to the tunnels there. It's less than three block walk from the elevator at the house to where I'm located, so it's a decent bet you'll find me.”

“Sounds like a set up.”

“You'll like it.”

“I'll let you go.”

“You feeling better?”

“Yeah, they did something with the air and made it better.”

“Good.”

I rung off and went to the commissioner. I adjusted things on him and saw he'd orgasmed several times all over himself. He was still asleep.

Steve came over and said, “Hon, I'm going to the house. I'm getting tired.”

“Ok, Beck's going to be there in a few minute...well, more like thirty minutes. She'll come to the house and need to be shown how to get down here.”

“How do I get down here in the elevator?”

“Damn, I forgot to tell Robert. What you do is there's B 1 2 and 3 buttons. The house has no attic as the servants rooms are up there. What you do is you push B and 2 at the same time. It'll bring you down here.”

“Ok, I'll check in on them and show him.”

“Show him by himself so everyone doesn't know.”

“Ok”

He came over and kissed me. “Hon, I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“Don't be too long.”

“I won't be. Things are lining out fast here.”

“You sure?”

“Those pills which Dave has make a world of difference. Let me show you.”

We went over to the sauna and I opened the door. “Bryon, you can come out now.”

“Ok”

“How's the pain in your hand?”

“What hand?'

“Ok, you're not feeling any pain, are you?”

“No, is this the guy I'm meeting?”

“No, he'll be along shortly. This is my boyfriend.”

“Oh, hi.”

Steve said, “Hi”

“Bryon, what are women to you?”

“They're my friends and they should be respected.”

“Good. Bryon, go over there and look at that wall. See how many pores you can count in the rocks.”

“Ok”

He went over and intently began looking at the rocks.

Steve asked, “How long does that last?”

“I don't know.”

“Man, do you know how much more productive society would be if we had those pills instead of prisons?”

“Hmmm, that's interesting. What I'm wanting to see is if an addict would lose their addiction with it.”

“Hon, see if Dave can get some. We'll try them.”

“You can't let anyone know you're doing it.”

“No, but if we could drop crime in the city, it'd be amazing.”

“Yeah, can you imagine having a city which went from high crime to no crime?”

“That'd be nice. The budgets would go a lot further.”

“You know, if we did it for both St. Louis and here, the state budget would have to lower the operations budgets for the prisons because they'd be empty.”

“There that many from the cities?”

“Oh yeah, these two and Springfield are all three the main ones. When you're at Fulton Reception and they bring in the bus from Green County, it's like seventy or eighty at a time and that's like two or three times a week.”

“That's about ten thousand a year.”

“Yeah. One prison full.”

“Man, that's like fifty million a year in a budget.”

“We need to talk to some judges and see if they'll let us work with alternative therapy like this. Then, we could put them into jobs which would be really good.”

“Hon, let's talk to your friend and see if he'd let us try it and then, we'll see it working on a lot more.”

“We'll see. It'd be interesting.”

We heard a truck pull up and then, we saw the guys pulling a couple of people out of the back. One had been beaten quite savagely it looked. The other was Lenny.

“Here are McKay and Lenny.”

“Ok, I appreciate it. Stand here while we get them locked into those ice boxes.”

I turned to Lenny and said, “I promised your mama a trial. I'll tell you now you're a dead man.”

“I've got nothing to say to you.”

“Good. Remember that and the trial will go a whole lot faster. I'll be relieved to put an axe in your skull.”

I turned to 'no brains' and said, “You'll see death too. If you didn't deserve it for what you did, you certainly deserve it for putting that fucking bomb on the Mayor. You're not only an embarassment to this organization, you're an embarassment to your family, and to your species.”

An elderly lady walked up and said, “I spoke with you on the phone.”

“Hi! Thanks for getting them to me.”

“You don't have to give no trial. His father said a trial is too good for him. He's disowned from our family.”

“Ok, I gave my word to you, not your husband. What do you say?”

“It makes no matter to me. I've washed my hands of him. The other one's mom wouldn't even speak to him much less lay a finger on him. To her, he's already dead.”

“To me they are too. It's sad to say, but I've got another one of theirs in my hold and I think he'll be allowed to live.”

“Why?”

“Ma'am, come here.”

I walked with her over to Bryon who was still buck naked staring at the wall.

“Bryon, what are you doing?”

“Counting the holes on the wall like you told me to.”

“How many are you up to?”

“Six thousand four hundred and ninety eight.”

“Go on counting.”

She looked at me and said, “Good looking guy. Nice package too.”

“Did you see his hand?”

“No, why?”

“It's mashed. What we did was a reprogram of his mind. He now is doing what he's told and he's going to be a productive citizen.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, all it takes is one little pill and suddenly, they're a person who wants to do good and be a better person.”

“Would you try it on my son?”

“Let me think on it.”

“If you can do it with my son, and give him another chance, I'd appreciate it.”

“Your son is going to have to be completely devoted to the organization from here on out if I do. That means he'll be your son, but he's going to be working, living, and breathing this organization.”

Without batting an eye, she said, “OK, you just make sure it gets him to thinking straight and respectful of us.”

“Ma'am, what about your husband?”

“I'll have him talk with you. Would you do that?”

“At the memorial service on Friday. I'll speak with him. If he doesn't wish to pursue it, how will you handle it?”

“Can I give him one of those pills?”

“How about if I give both of you one. Then, you'll not remember I have the pills. I'm not supposed to be telling you these things because they're still experimental.

My partner and I were just discussing us using them on inmates brought into the jails instead of prosecuting them to see if we could make crime drop and drug addicts not want them. He's so excited about it he wants to speak with the governor.”

“What would it do?”

“Ma'am, over twenty percent of the state's budget is prison systems. If we, St. Louis, and Springfield all didn't have people going into prison, you'd see your taxes go down that much or education or roads being improved that much.

What you don't see as benefits is your home owner's insurance would lower due to the city having a better crime rate. You'd see prices drop in stores because shoplifting would be down. It's something you don't think about which is a huge ripple effect and all it takes is a thirty cent pill rather than a thirty thousand dollar a year cost per inmate.”

“Oh dear! It costs that much?”

“Yes, and then some because you've got a lot of other costs there. Missouri has a prison population which is one of the largest in the country. If it went down, I can't help but think we'd have a state which would be doing more for our people.”

“You need to do that!”

“Yes, but can you imagine all the other people who could use it? You would be able to use it on mentally ill and physically violent people.”

“Oh man!”

“Yeah, you think about how much those people cost the state and their employers and you really begin to see what you and I paid out in taxes for all those people.”

Dave came up and said, “Hello.”

“Hi David, how are you?!”

“Well, and you?”

“Quite well. Rhette and I were just discussing those pills. I think everyone should have one.”

Dave smiled at me and said, “I only have three right now.”

“Dave, how many of them do we have?”

“I'm not sure. I know this is a test batch. I can get a bunch, why?”

“Steve is interested in trying them as an alternative therapy to prosecution of those who are arrested.”

“Hmmm, that's interesting.”

“Yeah, I was telling her about the social ramifications of crime and telling her how much it costs taxpayers in added insurance and costs at stores besides our taxes to house them.”

She said, “I had no idea.”

I said, “What she would like to do is have one and then, I'll give one to her son and then another to that cop. That'll be three, but I'll need another for Lenny.”

“You thinking about reprogramming them?”

“Yeah, I told her that her son would have to be completely committed to the organization afterwards though, but he'd have family time and be the ideal son.”

He looked at me and I asked, “How do you feel?”

“Part of me says no and the other part says to give it a shot. We could use him in a lot of ways.

I say give it a shot because I think I know where you're going with this.”

“Probably.”

Dave turned and looked at Bryon. “What is he doing out of the sauna?”

“Counting holes in the wall.”

He smiled. “Buck naked?”

“She doesn't mind. She's fascinated with how he's being.”

“Ok, let's give it a try and then, if it doesn't work, she'll report back to us ok?'

She smiled and hugged him. “I'll do that.”

Dave handed her one and said, “He has a glass for water. I'll get it for you and then, if your son chooses not to take the pill, he dies. Do you understand?”

She nodded. “Yes, because if he doesn't want to be better, then I don't want him.”

Dave said, “In regards to the other one. He'll have to be here longer. I don't have a pill for him. These I have are all called for.”

“Ok, I'll tell his mother.”

I went over to the cop and said, “Dave, would you help me a moment?”

“Sure, what do you need?”

“Get that cup of water and when I yank, you put it in his mouth with that pill. He'll swallow or he'll drown.”

Dave gave me a look like he couldn't believe what I was doing. He got the cup of water and the woman came over. I took the cop's testicles and yanked. He screamed out in pain and Dave dropped the pill into his mouth and then poured in the water. He swallowed and Dave checked. “Man, that worked like a charm.”

She said, “If my son doesn't want to take it, you do that to him.”

I smiled. “Ok,”

We brought out 'no brains'. Dave smiled at his condition. She noticed and said, “Rhette said to beat the dog fuck out of him and then bring him to him, so I did!”

Dave laughed and said, “Rhette does get results, doesn't he!”

I started questioning her, “Ma'am, the Mayor said you and your sister work for the city in some manner,. Is that correct?”

“Yes, we're custodians down there.”

“Do you like your job?

“Yeah, except they really don't have all the right equipment. They need to get us things which work. They expect us to do the whole building with two vacuum cleaners and fourteen people to run them.”

“I wasn't aware of that. I'll speak to him and get them. I'm sure I can buy a few of those.”

“They have to be Hoover Commercial ones. Those last the longest.”

“Really? My mom has an Electrolux which has been going for twenty five years.”

“Those are nice, but so expensive.”

“If we got some of those, could you use them?

“Oh dear, I'm afraid they'd get stolen.”

“How about if I ask they be spray painted at the factory some color which would make them easily identifiable?”

“You could mount them in huge concrete blocks and then, you'd know they'd not get carried out of the building.”

“Is that what happened to the others?”

“No, they buy these cheap things whoch don't last a year. The Hoovers have lasted five years so far and that's because my sister and I take care of ours.”

“Interesting. What do you do different?”

“We keep the cups clean and we keep the cord up off the floor and don't run over it. Some of those people expect to sweep the whole place and never dump the cups!”

“I'll have to do something for them which will get them a long lasting vacuum someone dumb can run.

How long have you worked for the city?”

“Oh, going on forty years. I graduated high school and my sister and I went to work for them at the same time. It wasn't as much money back then, but we sure learned a lot!”

“As in political stuff?”

“Oh yeah. Them folks leave a lot of things laying around. We learn plans of what they're doing before they even get taken to the city building officials.”

“I bet you hear where they're going to build streets and highways well before anyone else knows.”

“Yes, there's one man who does that job. I find it fascinating because we as taxpayers need to know where they're going to do it.”

“I think so too and I bet Dom would too.”

“Who's Dom?”

“He's going to be the new guy over the city. I'm getting promoted.

“Is he Gino's brother?”

“Yes.”

“I remember him. They were identical looking.”

“Yes.”

“What do you think of the Mayor?”

“Lazy.”

“Nothing more?”

“Snobbish”

“Do you think he treats you good?”

“No”

“Would you take a look at your right foot?”

She looked down.

“Your foot is stuck to the floor and you can't lift it, can you?”

“I can't!”

“I didn't think so. I think you can now. Give it a try.”

She raised it.

“Yes”

“Ok, what I would like for you to do is I'd like for you to want to join our organization. I'd like for you to call Dom when I give you his phone number and tell him all the latest things you learn at city hall. Ok?”

“Yes”

“In regards to your son, you're to report to us anything he does which isn't right. But, if it's something which hurts your feelings, then you're to tell him it hurts your feelings and he'll mind you. Ok?”

“Yes”

“I would like to meet your husband and give him one of these pills too. Until then, you be as loving and faithful to him as you can be. Make him feel like he's a newlywed again and you feel like one also. Ok?”

“Yes.”

“What do you really think of that guy over there staring at the wall?”

“He's hot! He's got a nice body and his cock is nice. He's got the most beautiful eyes and when he talks to you, he really looks like he likes you. I think he's gay.”

“What would you do if you found out your son was gay?”

“That'd be fine with me. He doesn't know it, but I've caught him a few times with his cousin. I thought it was a childhood thing, but when they kept doing it and kept staying around each other, I thought things were suspicious. Then one day, I saw them kiss out in the car before they came into the house.”

“I need for you to bring your husband to us on Friday. Tell him about the pill and tell him it really makes you feel good and younger. Treat him like a newlywed and he'll want to come in and take one.”

“Oh I feel younger!”

“Yes, and you'll start caring for yourself like you were younger too.”

Dave said, “Tell your sister about the pill and have her come in too. She wants to look and feel young as you do too.”

“Yes.”

“When I give you permission, you forget about your husband for a moment and you go over to Bryon standing at the wall and see if you can get him to be attracted to you.”

“Ok”

“Go!”

She walked over and said, “Hey good looking, where you been all my life?”

“Standing here staring at the wall.”

“Don't you want to come with me and have a good time?”

“No thank you, I respect you but all I'd like is friends.”

“You sure, I can be more than friends.”

“No thank you.”

“Ok, come back over here.”

Bryon and she both turned and came over. I said, “Bryon, put on your clothing.”

He went over and put on his clothes like his hand didn't hurt at all. When he ws finished, I said, “Bryon, you're going to the hospital and tell them you mashed your hand in the underground warehouse working. Dave will take care of all the other details, but it's what you're to tell them. When you're released to get out of the hospital, you go to Mama's pizza and put in your application. That job is one you dream of having and want to work your hardest doing.”

“Yes”

“Please go back over and count the holes in the wall until I tell you to come back, ok Bryon?”

“Ok”

He went over and I said, “Ma'am, you remember now you are married. You don't remember what happened earlier with Bryon.”

“Ok”

“When you go home, you will sleep and rest the best you've rested in years. From now on, you'll sleep peacefully the entire night.”

“Ok”

“When you get to be a member of our organization, you'll work for us and obey all of your oaths.”

“Yes.”

“When I count down from three, you'll awake and feel refreshed. Three two one”

She looked at me and said, “I feel good!”

“Well, thank you. That man tho brought you in the truck with him will now take you home.”

“Ok, Thank you.”

She went over to the truck driver and I said, “Take her home. She's through here.”

He nodded and I turned to the cop. “Can you hear me?”

“Yes”

“What happened at the Ox tonight?”

“You were disrespectful to me and were going to get me in trouble, so I smacked the phone out of your hand.”

“You're terrible sorry about that, aren't you?”

“Yes”

“And you realize there was no murder tonight there also.”

“Yes”

“Are you single?”

“Yes.”

“I'm going to unfasten your restraints. When I tell you to stand up, I'm going to ask you to walk. With each step you take, you're going to find yourself being attracted more and more to the man standing over at the wall and staring at it.”

“Ok”

“I want you to walk one hundred steps and with each step, I want you to feel more and more attracted to men, but not just men, but one man and that is Bryon who is standing and staring at the wall. As you go higher in number of steps, the thought of anything sexually appealing you had for women diminishes until when you're at 100, you're only consumed by one man and that's Bryon.”

“Yes”

“You want to be in a relationship with him and you want to only satisfy his wishes. Satisfying him is appealing to you and anything he does for you is rewarding and fills you with more and more love for him.”

“Yes”

“You also know you don't want to be a police officer any longer. You find you can only find satisfaction in life if you work with Bryon at Mama's pizza restaurant. You want to work hard there and you want to work any shift you can so they will find satisfaction with your work. Ok?”

“Ok”

“You will be come a member of our organization and you along with Bryon will want to excel at everything you do for us.”

“Yes”

“You and he will move in together and you'll live the rest of your lives in perfect harmony with each other. There are no arguments, and only peace You love him and he loves you.”

I went over to Bryon and said, “Bryon, when a man comes over and taps you on the shoulder, you're going to fall hopelessly in love with him. You'll love him until the end of your days and only want to give him satisfaction. His satisfaction is your satisfaction. You'll live in harmony and not argue. You'll be the perfect person for him and you'll gladly admit your love for him in front of all others and not care if they have any issues with it. Ok?”

“Yes”

“Stare at the wall until he taps your shoulder. You will awaken when I count backwards from three. Three two one Awaken”

I went over to the cop and said, “When you reach Bryon, you tap him on the shoulder. You know that love you feel for him is in that tap and you feel completely helpless with that need to be loved, so you'll tap his shoulder.”

“Ok”

“You will awaken when I count to three. One two three.”

He awoke and then got up. He stood and then, he looked at the wall. His eyes were riveted for a second and he started to walk but continued to stare. As he walked, he began to walk faster and faster in circles until he was right behind Bryon. He tapped his shoulder and Bryon turned around. They locked in an embrace and began madly kissing each other.

I went over to Dave and said, “I think it's how you tell them to do it. If you tell them that step thing where they leave the attractions of one sex in steps to the other, it works.

Now don't count me as the expert, but I've found it from personal experience as well as this here.”

He nodded and said, “We didn't do that. It's interesting and makes sense to me. They sure are into each other.”

“Yes. Let's hope that works, I'm willing to forget things if they are.”

We heard another truck coming up the coarse way. It stopped and both Dave and I turned. The two guys got out of the truck and went to the back. They lowered the hatch and they began getting someone out of the back.

Dave asked, “You expecting anyone?”

“Fat Cat, but one of the Bates guys went to get him.”

“They're lifting this one out. That's not him because if that dick is to heavy he needs help, we're all in trouble.”

“No, this one is old. I'm not expecting anyone of that age.”

I went over to the truck and saw who they were assisting. I didn't recognize him.

“Who it this man? He doesn't belong here.”

“He said he wants to see you.”

“And you guys can't call me to make the meeting place more appropriate?”

“He said not to bother you.”

“He doesn't give the orders down here. You two need to leave the truck parked here. I'll call Security.”

They looked at me strangely and the man spoke. His Italian dialect was heavy heavy. “Hello Rhette Michaels.”

“Hi, I don't know who you are, but we've got to wait. My men aren't following their secure protocol.”

“They followed mine.”

“I'm sorry, but you don't give the orders down here. I do.”

Dave came up and told the guys, “Bob is on his way. I'll tell you now when he gets here he won't be happy. You pull this shit so close to us having our security violated down here it's ridiculous.”

“David, they followed my orders.”

David turned and said, “Who the fuck are you because we give the orders here.”

“You can call me Sam.”

I looked at him and said, “Sam, I'll tell you now, you have no weight down here.”

“I've come to make a deal with you guys.”

“Sorry, I don't sell my soul for prices I don't owe.”

I turned to Dave and said, “Keep him right where he is, I'm going to make some calls.”

“Bob's already on his way.”

“Good, but I'm going to check on someone else.”

I called little John. He answered in a very sleepy voice. “Hello?”

“I want to know what's up with Sam Giancanna being down here in my tunnels.”

“I don't know. He should be in Italy.”

“All I needed to hear, we'll be telling him to go back there.”

“Hold up, hear him out. For that man to leave Italy says he knows about our plan. He's probably looking for me to kill me.”

“Nope. I've got him down here and we'll hold him until he's safe.”

“Rhette, don't pull anything stupid.”

“I'm not. He'll be a guest of honor.”

I snapped shut my phone and walked over to Sam. “Little John says he doesn't know you're here. That tells me his life is in danger. So, I'll kindly take you for him.”

“Rhette, I'm here to talk with you about your plans. I want to help.”

“Tell me what you can do to help me that I don't already have and can't gain.”

“I have the rest of the world.”

“With an outdated system which bogs down. Why do you think little John is snapping off pieces and handing them to me?”

“I don't know.”

“I'm not pledged to him and all the other cities think I am. That means I'm not pledged to you and I can go outside of the organization and start my own.

He's so fed up with the way the old men do it over in Italy, he's going this way. Now, that's the plan and I'm sticking to it. You have a problem with that, get used to these tunnels because you'll stay here and die here if he ends up killed.”

“Rhette, I agree our organization needs new management styles, but going outside the organization is not how it should be done.”

“Then you need to take the opportunity Friday and tell everyone we've got to change it. They'll all be here for that memorial service and the cities which don't show are going to be looking for new managers when I get there. Some of them are already being replaced.”

“What are you doing different?”

“We're bringing it above the table. The days for use to stay under are over. We make so much money we've got to go legit in order to do it.”

“By rights, those assets are mine.”

“Bullshit. Try touching them and I'll blow Italy off the fucking map.”

“Gino was pledged under me.”

David swung around and said, “He hated it. Your management styles left when my grandfather died.

This city was broke when Dad had it until Rhette came along. You want two hundred grand a year, I'll tell you the check got lost in the mail. All the rest of this you see was what Rhette built with my father. Not you.”

“We allowed him to do it.”

“You allowed nothing. I'll tell you nothing. He would have bargained with you for things he wasn't happy with. He didn't because no phone calls came. So, now you are being threatened, you want to come and spin deals. I'll tell you it's too fucking late.”

“What if I give you the organization?”

I asked, “You co signing the deal I have with little John?”

“What's that?”

“I run it my way. We take the states over to the new style and we allow in women and minorities.”

He looked surprised and said, “Do you think it will work?”

“I've got one woman now. I'll be so kind to tell you she's standing over to the side there with her pistol pointed at your head. She's a damned crack shot and she's saved my life once and ended a life at my orders. I know she'll do the jobs I require.”

He didn't even acknowledge the implied threat.

“What about the minorities?”

“What about them?”

“Their factions are too many. Even on your news I see so many. Crips, Bloods, Vice Lords, Knights, Tongs, Imperials, East Coast, West Coast...the list goes on and on and on.”

“You're correct, but until they're accepted by us, they're also going to find themselves fighting us. We're fortified and we've got enough ordinance and weapons to hold our own against any gang in any city taking it to the streets of that city if need be. If the day ever comes, believe me, they'll sign up along side me or die.”

“And then take you over?”

“Hardly. You apparently don't know my style of management. The way it goes with me is if you can show I'm so wrong as I have to step down, I'll give you the whole thing. Then, I'll step up behind you to teach your way to all my guys.

What you don't see is me having a style which is so vastly different it will bring a whole world of difference We've built up our city's assets using that style and we've now got five states and like it or not, I just took another one tonight.”

“What states do you have?”

“Florida, Missouri, Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, and Ohio.”

“What are your plans for New York?”

“Honestly, to go very slowly and carefully. To go in and snap up minority groups and become stronger than them so when I start going in and nabbing parts of the city, they can't do anything. By the time I'm done, I'll have it. BUT, if you'd like to tell all of them Friday to step up behind me, I'd appreciate it. “It'd save a lot of lives.”

“I'm here because of those lives lost in St. Louis.”

“St. Louis was mine. Michael was told he was being transferred to Tampa. He chose to go home and lie after lying to me repeatedly. He gathered himself a little army but couldn't gather strength because I was smart enough to pull Jimmy Michaels and little David down there too. Little David and his brother Pete got their own cities and little Jimmy is going to end up with something, I just don't know what.'

“So you split apart the factions by giving their own power in other cities.”

“Yes.”

“You're brilliant. I don't need to fight you because you've already killed yourself. You sent them into cities and created more factions.”

“Nope. You see, that's where you're wrong. What you fail to see is I'm head strong enough that I'm not going to live peacefully along side factions which split off from me. Rather than do that, I'll kill them and have it over with. Life's too short to be looking over my shoulder.

That sir is why I'll tell you to your face. You've been offered twice to speak in front of the organizations to hand it over to me. If you fail to do so on my third offer, I'll go to my original plan and you'll be a guest of mine down here for quite a while.”

He smiled. “Rhette. What's your plan.”

“Hold up a second. I'll show you my plan since you'll be down here. Over there is someone who was given a pill. Over there, someone was given a pill. That guy was and two just left here who were. It's mind altering and I can reprogram you with it.

Dave there has ordered the factory which makes them to get me enough for each one of our leaders. I'll go by their hotel rooms with my guys and pay them visits. I'll give them pills and get them to take them. Then, I'll tell them to go to the memorial service and await my direction. When that direction comes, I'll take command of our country lock stock and barrel without firing a shot.”

Dave said, “Sam, I'm going to tell you something. One of the first directives I'm going to take is going to be to go over there and blow that whole valley off the map. I know your policy of not meeting until the meeting spot is built. I'll see to it there is nothing there to build upon as it'll be a huge pit.

Your organization is so antiquated you're already a few years behind in the requests which come from the United States. I imagine by the time you figure out how to rebuild, you'll be about seven years behind. By then, I'll have a satellite into space which will beam a fucking laser down and kill anyone who walks into that zone.”

Sam looked at him and said, “It's known about your experiment with lasers. I'm also aware it was a failure.”

“That sir is what I put out to your guys when I knew them to be snooping. Let me make a call and I'll show you how it's a failure.”

Dave called and said, “Send our guys into Palermo. Tell them to kill every man above ten years old with our new weapon. Start with Sam's family.”

Dave turned to Sam and said, “you have about ten minutes. I've had a group of guys waiting for this moment for the past two years....since you snooped on me.”

He turned around and pulled his pen from his pocket. “Rhette, go get me those traitors.”

I went in and brought Lenny out. “You stand there and don't move. I might be able to save your life.”

I brought out 'no brains' said, “Guys, you may kiss each other as I'm not sure which direction this will take. Know it might be the last kiss you could have.”

They looked at me shocked. “Either announce your love or don't. It doesn't matter to me.”

Lenny leaned over and kissed 'no brains' and whispered, “I love you”

Dave aimed the pen and fired it. Lenny went down. He then took the pen, held it and used it as a light sword to slice 'no brains' from head to groin. He fell over in two halves.

He turned to Sam and said, “Sir, if that's a failure, then your family will be treated to my failures damned quick. I've got light technology which goes from these pens to satellites orbiting the Earth. You want to see a failure, ask the government who is slicing up their security netting all over the planet and they can't tell you.”

Dave paused and said, “Fifteen minutes and counting.”

Sam pulled out a cell phone. He called and spoke in Italian. Dave nodded and said, “He's asking if anyone is walking into the valley.”

He's telling them to allow them to enter and take their weapons. The men will hand over their rifles and then kill their guys with our light shooters.

“Sam's telling them we have pistols which shoot lasers.”

“Sam, it's time to get off the phone or I'll jam that thing.”

I pulled out control central and said, “Shut off the cell phone service down here.”

The phone service shut off because Sam pulled the phone back and shut it off.

“Sam, you're not going to direct a war against my men under my nose. I'll tell you my men are smarter than yours because yours are now looking for pistols. You told them that. These are ink pens. Your men won't look for those until it's too late.”

Sam's phone rang. He answered.

“I'll make the deal. Your men just killed all of my elite guards with those things.”

Dave opened up his phone and called the guys. “Congratulations, I hear you won.

Send me a report and I'll get you special commendations from Rhette.”

He dialed again and said, “Sam just made the deal with Rhette. Did you hear on the phone?”

“Yeah, it'll hold up at trial then.”

Dave held out his phone and said, “I'm sorry, I had someone eavesdropping. All he needed to do was hear the deal confirmed and now he's preparing a media display for our memorial service.”

Sam asked me, “What do you want me to say?”

“Sam, let's go over here so I can sit down on the back of this truck.” I rolled him and the wheeled him around so I could face him. “What I want you to say is we, Dave, little John, and I are going to be leading this. Each of us are powerful as the other and you're supporting the management style and changes we're implementing.”

“What are you going to do about us?”

“Here's the nice part. For your deeds and continued loyalty, we'll install you and them in as one would might see a board of directors in a corporation. You'll be advisors, but you're not going to be calling the shots.

It is my thought that if you retire in good standing with our organization, you should be able to have some ability to affect some decisions we make.”

“You just said we'd be lame ducks and now you say we'll have some power.”

“Yeah, you won't call shots in the organization, however I think it'd be nice if you have roles on the boards of the companies we own. You'd see to it our interests were being met and have some prestigious positions.”

He smiled, “I've heard you've been buying companies.”

“Which ones have you heard?”

“Hospitals.”

“You've heard wrong. I've not gotten any bought yet. I hope to, but what I'm buying are airlines right now. If you rode commercial, the chances are you probably rode in mine.”

“It's a bad business, there's no profit in it.”

“I'll take the gamble what I'm planning for them will work. Dave's came up with some ideas and I have which will get us sponsorships and defray the costs in exchange for advertising on the planes.”

“That'd cost them millions of dollars.”

“Yes, and that's what he's going to ask for.”

“It might work then.”

“I hope so, from what it sounds like, I've bought a major and at least two minors with a bunch of the others all throwing themselves at us.”

“They're all hurting.”

Their problem is they have to answer to share holders. When we buy these, they only have to answer to us. I'll make it so we make money.”

“How?”

“If you'd been good leaders, you would have gotten us oil fields and companies. Now, I'm going to get us refineries here and buy up the oil rights on a lot of different fields. What we're going to do is we're going to start producing the stuff with enough being made we can undersell them by about fifty cents a gallon and run them all the way into the ground with the production.”

He smiled and said, “You fight wars like they need to be fought.”

“It's that way. We don't have to answer to shareholders. They do. When it looks bleak, their shareholders are going to dump the stocks. I'll buy buying them.”

“Let me know. I'll get you our country and the European block. Because we are over there, they think they don't have to deal with us. They'll deal with China and Japan, and the US, but they won't deal with us. If we have someone who will come in and do that to them over there, you'll lock up the market.”

“I'll get it done. I'll need a country in which to build refineries.”

“I've got plenty of land, it's you getting the refineries built.”

“Ok.”

Dave came over and said, “Fat Cat just entered the tunnel. Central control still isn't used to that car.”

“Sam, you're about to see one of the first few guys in our group who are not Italian. You don't think they will work, but one of them is from a prison and the other is from a prosperous world famous restaurant family here in the city.”

“Bryant?”

“No, Bates.”

“Interesting. I've heard of both.”

“On Friday evening, we're going to take a bunch of our people there. Would you like to go?”

“My wheelchair would slow you down.”

“Hey, you don't worry about it. My guys are all huge. I had one tackle me tonight and he's not light.”

“Why'd he tackle you?”

“My son killed a man tonight. My guard didn't know it was he doing the shooting, so I got tackled.”

“Your son?”

“Yes, my partner and I are adopting Gino's great nephew.”

“Interesting. I didn't know he had a great nephew.”

“Gino's brother's grandson.”

“Gino's brother is banished.”

“He's reinstated. He'll be heading Kansas City.”

“You're going to contradict what another boss ordered?”

“If it's a stupid decision I will. That man chose to try to tell his son who he could and couldn't love. IF he'd been smart, he would have embraced them and brought the two cities closer together. Instead, he tried to drive a wedge between a man and his heart. A damned stupid move.”

“You're sentimental.”

“I'm senti but not mental.” I laughed.

He smiled. “You know, I really like you. I've not met you previously, but I think little John's chosen wisely. I don't like how he did it, but I understand his frustrations.”

“One thing I'm going to do is I'm going to make the bylaws of the board of directors who the decisions they make are done so in an expedient amount of time. I'll probably get a timer and give them an hour to make their decision and have their vote locked in before it doesn't count.”

“Smart. We have some who think they must rethink the wheel in order to give decisions.”

“It's holding up progress. I just cost you your entire organization.”

He nodded and said, “I don't think it cost us the organization. I think it just made our organization better. I'll support the changes and tell everyone to get them made.”

“Sam, what I'm going to ask is this. When you make that speech, I want you to tell each leader they're to decide they are under us and get the factions broken before I have to come in and break them up.

Their bosses under them need to give up their positions. I'll not tolerate fighting. If they attempt to do so, the moment it happens, I'm putting death warrants on their heads. I'll come in and kill the bosses to gain their soldiers. They will figure out I'm going to take no prisoners.”

“I hear you did that in Miami? How's it working?”

I looked over at Beck. “Beck, how's things going in Miami? Sam here wants to know.”

“Things are still a bit rocky, but considering we just started afresh, I imagine they will be a bit rocky for the next few weeks. Then, as they get used to the idea, we'll start picking up speed.

With Rhette coming in and doing it as he did, they had no choice but to either sign on or die. He demonstrated he'd kill them in a cruel manner, so they chose to live. Now I think they'll appreciate the decision because they see we're doing things so drastically different.”

Sam asked, “What are you doing different?”

I turned to Beck and said to Sam. “Sam, I'm asking her because she's the head of Miami now. She's here because I sent out the alert earlier we were going to be at war.”

“Hmmm, and she made it up here that soon?”

“My airlines.”

He smiled. “That was damned smart. I never thought of using a commercial venture for a tactical use.”

Beck said, “What we had down in Miami was an elite system where no one knew anything and all were told to work and be slaves to the system. The elite were the elite. Their upper henchmen were there for life and no one got promoted.

Where they were was in an old warehouse where everyone could walk by and see the business being transacted as they kept the garage door open. They made drug sales there, and they killed people there right in the open.

Now, we've got condos in high rise buildings which I now know we own. Little John might have been slick with having a real estate lady sell them to us, but I know they're ours.

The condos give the guys a sense of being up out of the gutter and can point to something with pride. I don't know how many have told me they like it and think it's a better decision to go to them.

What we've also changed is our supervisors. Rhette chose them and from how I heard he did it, it's damned amazing because each one of them is working out excellently. They've all found a purpose for themselves and they're now proud to be working for us.”

Sam asked me, “How'd you pick them?”

“Sam, it's so simple you'd be amazed. I learned in college you could have a whole class full of kids, but only certain ones would ask questions. Everyone would be thinking the same things, but they'd ask the questions. Later I looked and those kids took leadership roles in their fraternities and in organizations around campus. They're natural leaders and that's what I looked for.

When we had the pledge meetings, I told them to feel free to ask questions. As you know, only a few asked questions. Those are the ones I called to stay after and gave leadership roles to.”

He smiled and said, “Damned smart. I like that.”

“As you can see, she's happy but how I chose her was because I'd met her husband earlier and insisted upon meeting her so she'd know what they as a couple were getting themselves involved.”

“Why?” he asked.

“Because if she won't sign on with him, then she's not going to support him and raise their kids to be supportive and wanting to be future members. He'll be a pariah in his own house.

I'll not let a man in because of that as I sure don't want to be giving a woman survivor's benefits if she's going to down talk me.”

“What are survivor's benefits.”

“Let's say you're my soldier and you go out and get killed in a war like these guys did. Under your management, you say, “So sad” to the wife and then tell her “Drop dead bitch” when she's doing hard because you took away her husband. To you, she's disposable.

To me, she's raising our future soldiers. To me, she's a future soldier herself. To me, I'll pay her what he'd be making annually so she'll raise those kids to still think good about this organization.”

He smiled and his eyes were glistening. “You know my mom raised us without my dad because he got killed doing something for us in a war. We starved on rations and they didn't do a thing for us. The only reason I became a member was because all the jobs in our town were with them. I did, and I did exactly what they ordered. I learned their ways and always thought it was wrong.

For what you are doing, I really want to thank you. You're changing an injustice in our system and I really like it.”

“Thank Gino's memory. He started it. I'm just carrying on the tradition. I think it's damned smart and I'll use it because I know it gains us support with single moms and the kids. You might not think about it, but kids know who puts food on their table.”

He nodded and said, “IF I had seen that with my mom, I'd be loyal to them. I am to this day, but not in my heart with those memories.”

“That's why we're having the memorial service. When we have a war, everyone celebrates when we when, but those families didn't win. They lost someone dear to them. That's why I've got to be there and uphold them.”

“You want me to hand over power at a memorial service?”

“Yes. Because it's going to be a memorial service of us winning our way over the old way. We're now going to be taking our way into St. Louis.

The people here have been under the management style for at least the last 30 years, but really about the last twenty. They don't realize the style they've been managed is totally different than the way everyone else is managed.

They know we're prosperous, but they don't know it's because we manage different.”

Dave said, “It's because of the decisions you made with my dad we're prosperous.”

“You dad ultimately made the decisions. I might have given my opinion, but he chose to make the decision.”

Dave turned to Sam and said, “Rhette came up with the idea. He told my dad and my dad trusted his opinion. He got us the factory which makes those jets and the fighter jets.

Us getting thet factory and getting it under control is what got us the docks in San Diego. Yes, Rhette's uncle owns them, but I'll tell you San Diego wasn't doing a thing for him except squeezing him dry. We went in out there and we made the pitch of putting our name on the line and they gave us the chance, BUT, it was Rhette who got our foot in the door because they didn't want to trust we were different.

Yes, I'll tell you we're different because we don't sit around with bloated egos and all take credit for our successes. He passed it to my dad and you'll see him pass things right on to me. He fails to realize without dollars, I can't invest them to make more money.

He did it and that's why I'll give you the two hundred grand a year that my dad was bringing in before he came along, but I'm going to give Rhette that 4 trillion we made last year. It was his money compounding, not yours.”

Sam asked David, “Rhette wants you, little John, and he to run this. What will you do if you're in that leadership.”

“Whatever Rhette wants me to do. He's my boss, not little John.”

“In my eyes, he'll be little John's boss too. I'll agree you three can manage, but I definitely one person to come to me and speak for you three.”

He turned to me and asked, “Why are you choosing little John as a leader along side you?”

“I'll explain it. David here is the brains. He knows business deals that I just don't. Me, I'm the muscles. I'm not afraid to go in there and fight. He gets me artillery and ordinance you can only fantasize about.”

“I've seen that.”

“Your question was about little John. I'll tell you now, little John is connections. That man knows people all over the planet and if you let him manage them, he does a damned good job.

What I like about him is he's got people heading in directions so when I get there, they're already there waiting on me. It's like his brain is just a little bit faster and we sync up perfectly. He lets me do my thing and I let him do his.”

“Do you think it'll stay like this?”

I looked at Dave and said, “With communication, it'll be better. Right now we're just learning our positions. So it's not going to be like this, but better.

Do you think I can continue to work with the three of them? Oh yeah, they're great and we love each other. Where one of us stops, you see the other merge and blend.”

“Where's he at now?”

“At my house.”

Sam smiled and said, “Good question, and trick answer. You have houses all over the country.”

I smiled and Dave said, “UP above here in Kansas City.”

I was surprised, but not.

“I'd like for him to come down.”

Dave said, “I'll call him. I'm surprised he's not already here.”

I looked down the coarse way and said, “The damned man is wheeling himself up here.”

Sam turned around and asked, “What happened to him?”

“He got shot in the war in St. Louis. A bullet ricocheted and got him.”

“Damned lucky.”

“His head was too hard. It had to pick his leg.”

Sam giggled. “I'll agree.”

Beck ran down and pushed little John up to us. “All of your guards are asleep in the kid's room.”

“Don't be upset with them, they've worked all day and this is their first day. My others are all dead because they fought in the uprising. These guys all stepped up because I called them. I'm not going to get rid of them over it.”

He nodded and turned to Sam. “You should have told me you were coming.”

“You could have told me what you were doing too.”

“It wouldn't have went well with me and would've taken three years for you to be told. Rather than to continue butting my head up against a wall over there, Rhette pointed out he wasn't pledged to me. That's when we made the agreement for me to gradually give over power.”

“He could have easily killed you and taken it for himself.”

“No.”

“You are a fool. They just had their men walk in and kill all of our elite guards over there with their laser weapons. Bullets aren't holding a thing against them.”

Little John looked at us with shock. “You never mentioned this!”

“It wasn't necessary as long as you were being friendly. Now, we're friends, so there's no need to intimidate you.”

He smiled. “Let me see it.”

Dave pulled it out said, “You have a pulse shot trigger there and if you turn the clip around, you have a light sabre trigger. The pulse shot gets you about three hundred shots and the light sabre gets you about a minute of it.”

“What does it do to people?”

Sam pointed up there. “Go take a look. They just sliced that guy in half.”

Dave went up with little John.

I said, “That research and development we have is Dave's baby. He'll not share it with anyone. He's got tricks up his sledves which have us three steps ahead of the government in sub technology and is going to have me revolutionizing our country and the world with how we produce power.”

“What do you mean?”

“You know our gallon paint cans?”

“Yes, they're three litre over in our country.”

“A generator that size can power about four homes. Several of them power an electric submarine. The best part of it all is it works on water.”

“Water!”

“Yes, it's amazing. The thing doesn't leach radiation and doesn't produce heat. You can hold it in your lap and be safe.”

He smiled. “My thoughts are many with what you could do with it.”

“Mine too. It'd revolutionize the way things are. What we have to do is harness it to make money for our organization and not let it out.”

“How are you going to do that?”

“Here's how. What we'll have is our people being given these things. The way it goes, the companies here have to buy home produced power from individuals. What I'm going to do is I'm going to get these things installed and then on one certain day, I'm going to have everyone kick on our generators and put the electric companies off the grid. They'll be so busy paying us, they'll not have to produce their own power.

What we'll do is we'll have them by their testicles financially because it's their job to produce it, not to buy it. They'll find they're going to attempt to sell it only to find everyone has a glut of it. We'll continue to chug along producing until they're really hurting financially and then, I'll buy them up and have them. We'll pull some of them off line and move those over to other countries so we end up producing the power for the planet.”

“It's a nice thought, but China is going to be doing their own.”

“Ok, then what we're going to have to do is we'll find and exploit another of their weaknesses.”

He smiled and said, “Always thinking tactically.”

“I'm always pecking to see where the weak point is. With most men and countries, it is greed. I'll make them happy they met me with money, but they'll realize they're weaker than me and always going to be less wealthy.”

“Weaker?”

“What do you do when you get money? You go out and spend it. Where on your rankings list does fortifying and strengthening your position come? You don't even think about it.

With us, we take a portion of each dollar and spend it on our research and development. We'll also take a portion and upgrade our weapons.

Dave has subs which fire lasers. Him having that, I know he's got tanks which do the same thing. I'm willing to bet he does have that satellite orbiting because I've heard about the research and development and I'm way impressed.”

“You aren't even told?”

“I'm told on an 'as needed' basis. He knows I'll take something he shows me and go out plotting how to rule the world with it. That's my nature to exploit something for greater gain.”

He nodded and said, “So you three work together to make it work.”

“It's interesting because together Dave and I worked to get to where we were. Then, my respect for little John got us to talking and I threw at him his weakness of not having me pledged because he thought he'd flex his muscles with me. He was told I'd never pledge under him and I'd take my guys out on my own. He couldn't fight me because I've got more firepower than anyone. I've got more advanced weapons and I've got an attention to details most people don't.”

He nodded and said, “So you had him mentally back down before a war erupted.”

“He saw it as his out with you guys. I'll tell you the lack of management over there really hurt that man's feelings time and time again. You do that enough times, and when something looks better to a person, they take that other option.

He did and since then, he's breathed a lot of sighs of relief about how easily I make things look.”

“You've done this to the point it's perfected.”

“Not perfected, because there's always room for improvement, but I've done it enough to know what works and doesn't.”

“I'm going to throw a question at you to see what you'd do instead of me.”

“Ok”

“Over where we head things, what would you have done to defend us better.”

“Not told you how we are going to defend you is number one. Number two is I would have had sentries on that road stopping people. Number three is to have absolutely no one getting in with a weapon of any sort. Number four is to never pull a weapon off the person even when they think they're all pulled.”

“So there are weapons trained upon me?”

“Turn your head and look at that pod sticking out of the ceiling. You see it?”

“Yes.”

“Now, either that thing has a die pack in it which will have us finding you in a crowd, or it's got a 50 caliber gun in it, or it's got a heat seaking missile in it. At this distance, if my man in main control chose to, he could shoot you with that die pack and it'd kill you. Instead, he would probably use the fifty caliber one or two blocks up the street.”

“He can see from all of those?”

“Yes. I used them earlier to fight our war from a safe location elsewhere. I killed those guys and when it was safe, I made it so my guys could come in and do any searches for hidden people. Dave's not gotten any calls, so I know there are none.”

“You work that close to each other you know what the other is doing?”

“Not necessarily. Dave's now showing me the money side of things, but I don't question where he spends it. I trust he's doing good with it because I know we're well off into the accounts for me buying these airlines.”

“What will you do with the airlines?”

“I'm going to make a super airline. Then, I'll give people a better way to go and we'll get off the jet propulsion.”

“What do you mean?”

“Dave doesn't know it, but I know he's using those generators on a pulse technology which gets those submarines around quieter than anything and more efficiently. I figure if he can do that under water, he can do that above land. I'll give him the challenge to get it done and he'll take it to research and development. When we go without any fuels for our planes, you're going to see us suddenly get competitive with costs. I figure if we charge $20 a person and then all those taxes, we'll have full planes because people can fly from New York to Paris for $50 for a ticket. A hundred gets you round trip. Now, how much will that boost economies when a man wants to take his date to the Paris opera for the evening?”

“Oh boy! I like that.”

“Yeah, most people will suddenly start planning those trips by air in my planes and then, we'll have tons of people going to either Disney, or New York to see Broadway shows. You'll have kids going to see rock concerts in cities way far away and the cost won't be that much.”

“You have me thinking it will work. You're brilliant with this thinking.”

“All you have to do is be given one thing and suddenly you can see a whole new future with it. Dave's not told me about that generator or that pulse propulsion and yet, I've got a whole new future for everyone. Interesting, isn't it.”

“Oh man, you own the factory already so it's going to be easy to get them talked into it.” He said smiling.

“Yeah and now, I'm using their weakness in this downturn to buy them up and form this super company. Give me a chance and I'll have a car manufacturing company making cheap affordable cars with those generators which all you have to do is take a garden hose and do a fill up.

If the gasoline companies want to fuckin' play hard ball and not let us in, I'll make it so they go broke.”

He smiled, “Your loyalties to the organization run deep.”

“I remember slights and I remember favors. I repay each accordingly. When it's a big slight, I really repay accordingly.”

Dave came over and said, “Little John is impressed. I've told him these are only going to our take down guards until we get things settled.”

Sam said, “Dave, you need to listen to Rhette, he's aware of a technology you have in development which he's revolutionized the world. He's told me about what he sees and why he's doing things and I think he's absolutely brilliant.

I'll tell you now I was thinking you were shooting blanks when you were talking about the man's mind, but he's got me completely floored with how he has me seeing it working.”

Dave smiled and said, “What things?”

I said, “Have your research guys check into that pulse technology for planes and see if you can get those generators in them as well as cars. I want to pull us off the OPEC obsession and get us to being financially independent of it.

Then, we'll start seeing our own planes get those motors before anyone else and we'll buy a car company which we can put those generator motors in.”

He smiled and said, “You're devious. Who told you about those things?”

“A birdy. He told me things but I didn't tell him things. Now I'm thinking about how we can used them to our advantage and get us truly away from being dependent upon anyone.”

He nodded and said, “I've got a home version of the generator in the works which has a built in storage pack. My reasoning for that is because people will become dependent upon it, but I'm thinking if it's producing all the power for their homes and possibly for sale, then when the thing goes bad, if they don't have a power storage system, they'll be without until it can get repaired.”

“How much does a home version one of those things cost?”

“To make or to sell?”

“Our cost to make?”

“Twenty dollars.”

“The whole unit or just the generator?”

“The whole unit. That generator mass produced is going to cost us about three dollars.”

“Oh man.”

“What are we going to sell it for?”

“With most industries, they sell things high and then, they bring them down in cost. What I want to do is tell the world, they can have them for $999 today, or thirty years from now. I won't be lowering the costs.”

“Have them made stateside and run full speed ahead. Now, how big of those things can I get to run cities.”

“Rhette, you're going to really wonder something here, but it's exponential. It's not the size of the thing, but how much water you put through it. You could put a six inch line to it and have it really shooting through it and it'd be producing the power however fast you could put the water through it.

We have it on a 3/8” line for home use since that is a little less than the 1/2” most everyone uses....it's the same size of line as your toilet...What we generate with it turned down is enough for the home.

If you want it for home use, the thing uses about a gallon an hour or an additional few dollars a month at most on your water bill.”

“Ok, so for a few dollars, you save seventy or eighty when you're not heating and air conditioning and more when it's winter or summer.”

He nodded his head.”

“Ok, so tell me this. IF you put it in a car, you could drive the motor.”

“Hon, let me tell you this. IF you put it into a car, you could take the engine out and have both the storage and the generator there in it's place. You could fill the tank and drive for about two weeks on that fill up.”

“Ok, so what do we do with it?”

“I'll get it done. You get me an entire car manufacturer bought. I'll suddenly be the whiz kid of the world.”

“Rhette, don't do that.”

“I'm not. Let me have the company above board and we'll get that technology in it. BUT, when I do, you better get that technology into those planes and everything else because we're going to take it public.”

Dave said, “Hon, let me get my whiz kid out so he can take credit for taking the world into the next century and making the best engine/generator ever.”

“OK, why is it you've kept him under wraps?”

“His family doesn't want him in the limelight.”

“Ok, so respect their wishes. Do it without the person, but be sure he gets all the royalties.”

Dave turned to me and said, “Hon, you're going to be so pissed at me when I do that.”

“Why?”

“It's your little brother.”

“Huh?”

“Yeah. He came to me and said he had this concept tor the laser pen light. He said he had tried to build one himself and came up with one that cut right through the wall he was shining it on. I saw it as an opportunity and we bought it.

Then, he said he was experimenting more and said he found some capacitors which boosted the power really high an was amazed at how long and how far the beam lasted off regular household current. He said he did it out in the garage of your mom and dad's house and cut down a tree clear up at the woods with it from the garage.”

“Man, that's got to be two hundred feet!”

“Yeah, so what he wanted to do was to test it with spread mirrors and see if he could take a prism and split the beam, but make it more powerful by focusing the prisms back into a single beam. He did that, but what he did was he put them through magnifying lenses and it made the beams come out super strong.

The experiments were even interesting to me. He was finding out he was talented in it and we really were upping the power each time we'd do another experiment. Then, we got to the experiment of experiments and he focused a lot of lasers around a room onto a single pinpoint of a diamond we used for the prism.”

“What happened?”

“It came out in all different ways and really fried up the room. What we did was we decided to make a room of geodesic dome with it being nothing but mirrors. We focused all of the points off of that mirror into one spot and it came out so bright and so powerful, it was amazing.

We learned by using a dimmer, we could make the the lengths of the laser longer and shorter. Then, we got brilliant and put the thing through a computer and fluctuated the power and got really accurate.”

“How did you make it so it would be that powerful and be able to go through water?”

“That's a powerful beam there. Water has a resistance and it's also got a prismic effect, but if you have a really strong thick beam, you find you have a better chance of it going to go through the water stronger.”

“Ok, it's confusing with me.”

“Well, what we did was we really tested and tested and any hair brained idea was something we did to make it better and stronger. What we ended up with was a lot of different effects because each color of laser did something different.”

“Ok, I'm confused.”

“You have Red, Blue, Green, and Yellow lasers. You also have some that are really cool because you get a different effect when you put multiple color lasers all focused to the same spot. IF you do it, you get a perfect white laser which is the most powerful.”

“Really? I thought if you threw all the colors into one, you got black?”

“Not with light. With light, you get white. With pigments, you get black.”

“Ok, it's all too confusing to me.'

“Well, consider your brother the Einstein of lasers because the kid really has this stuff put together. What's interesting is he is like you when he runs up against a problem. He'll tear it apart and really break it down to it's smallest detail and rebuild it to get what he's got going with it.”

“Is he the one that built that generator?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok, so is he patenting these ideas?”

“He's got full blueprints and diagrams. What he's doing now is he wants to build a super generator.”

“Why?”

“Ok, when you shoot a laser into the Earth's shield, you get a problem because you have problems with the angles you can do things. If you do it one way, you could have a super powerful rainbow like a Sun Dog, but if you do it a different way, you could have a super powerful beam which shoots out at a completely different angle than it's intended to be.”

“Did you get it accomplished?”

“Yeah, he finally just got pissed and turned the thing all the way up and shot it. What happened, is it worked and we had a four foot wide beam come down and it boiled the ocean in that one area.”

“Ok, so what does that do?”

“You're about as patient as him. He went out there and we drove a barge into the light. It vaporized the entire spot that was four foot wide....no plasma, no hot metal on the edges, just vaporized like you took a big knife to it and cut it.”

“Man!”

Sam's mouth was hanging open and he was hanging on every word Dave was saying.

I said, “Well, is that it? Because that's interesting, but how do you aim the thing. It's not going to be easy getting someone to go towards the light except for the cooked fish that come bubbling up”

“You can be so sarcastic.”

“Well, you can be so friggin' slow telling a story. And, which brother is it?”

“Ash.”

“Well, he's a friggin' doctor, what did you expect. He's got a brain.”

“We did a test and you were asked questions once on a telephone call orally and you passed more and made higher results than he did.”

“Ok, was that before or after college? I'll tell you in college, I didn't do a thing.”

He smiled. “It was recently last year. You remember a test you did for a love connection thing.”

“Oh man, that was you? I'll tell you all those questions were pissing me off. I figured I'd play along and then, when they started having me to things on scratch paper. I finally ended it and told them to get fucked.”

“Yes, but you made a 96% on that test.”

“Cool”

Beck came over and said, “You've got a call.”

“Why didn't it come through on mine?”

“Your mom said your's isn't answering.”

“Ok, let me have yours.”

“Hello?”

“Rhette!”

“Yeah, everything alright?”

“No, you need to get home to your house. Matt called and said they're going to serve a federal warrant on you to confiscate a server of yours. Microsoft is suing you.”

“Huh?”

“He said they're wanting your Sun server and want to sue you over your FD4 program.”

“That's the one that runs the billboards. I worked on that with Kevin, they don't have a thing to do with it.”

“Hon, I'm just telling you what they're doing. I'd say they see you making money with it and think they can confiscate your server and get the program to copy it.”

“Then why don't they just pay for the thing? Well, fuck it. I'll make their lives hell here.”

I got off the phone and turned to David. “Ready to take Microsoft into the ground?”

“What's going on?”

“They're going to serve a federal warrant on my house to get my server. They want my FD4 program which is the one that does the 4 jumbos at a time. They're trying to say they developed it.”

“Did you use Windows for it?”

“No, it's a Sun program.”

“They're trying to steal your program. I think you're right. Let's hit them in the balls and cost them more money than they'll ever make from your program.”

“How?”

“It's the middle of the night. We'll do a call and walk out. We'll lock them out and then, we'll start taking out their buildings on their campus.

About noon, after the sixth building goes down, we'll call them and ask the man if he's ready to let go of that suit. IF he says no, I'll tell him to look out his windows and watch the rest of his buildings go down. Then, we'll kindly tell him we're going to go down and take out his printing building in ten minutes if he doesn't agree to let go. IF he doesn't, I'm going to blow the printing building and then call him again and tell him he and his board are all my targets.”

Sam asked, “What's this program?”

“Rhette developed it in his private business. He's done really good with it and has made a fist full of dollars < Clint Eastwood whistles>.” Dave said smiling.

I smiled. “Sam, it's not the money. It's the usefulness for the system which can take a jumbotron and go from making six hundred thousand a year to making a million and a half per year working in series.”

He asked, “Ok, what does this operating system do?”

“Ok, when you're driving down the street, you see a billboard coming up. You see it change to a brand new Chevy truck. You think, “Nice, but too fucking expensive.” and then you get maybe a block down the street and you see the billboard change over to the Chevy truck and it asks, “Thought about it yet?” and you think, “Yeah, I thought about it...it's too fucking expensive.” Then, you drive a block down the street, you see the billboard change over to making it look like your behind the wheel. The picture says, “Nicely equipped for $24,000.” You think, “Hmmm, not as bad as I thought” and you drive down the street. The next sign pops up showing the truck side profile saying, “That's $400 a month.”. You think, “Hmmm, that's not as much as I'm paying for this one.” and you think, I wonder what their warranty is. You get to the next sign and it says, “Four year unlimited warranty limited time only.” You then think, “Hmm, interesting. I've got two payments on this one to go, I'll have to go look at one.” Then, you get to the last sign and it tells you where the location nearest is for the Chevy dealer.”

Sam smiled and said, “This sign reads your mind?”

“No, what we have is a set of six ads for six different Chevys. What it is, is a program which rolls that ad over and as you drive along, it's based to change as you do the speed limit. They're in sync so you have that same vehicle go through the whole set of four, six, or eight signs. We now have a company out in Nebraska which has a set of sixteen signs which are like the old signs leading you to their store.”

Sam nodded and said, “We used to have road signs like that which everyone looked forward to reading. It sounds like you've taken it to a new level.”

“Yeah, but the idea was mine and it took a lot of math and timing to get the programs so you could get the program and set in the distance between signs and the speed limit in that area.”

He nodded and said, “Rhette, Microsoft is a very powerful company.”

“Bullshit, it's just a bunch of men who do their jobs like us. The only difference is I've got Bill Gate's ass nude in some photos.”

Dave looked at me surprised. “How in the hell did you do that?”

“Hon, he's not the prim and proper dude everyone makes him out to being. And, he's not a bit camera shy when he's in the buff.”

Dave smiled and said, “You were thinking ahead.”

“Not for this, but curiosity.”

“How'd you get them?”

“My Aunt lives out there and so do my cousins. My cousin is a real busty beauty ex show girl, playmate. We had a pool party one night after a show and when we got there, the party had already gone nude. Over in the hot tub was a bunch of people and you know where I headed. When I got there, I saw this guy who wasn't bad looking and thought, “Hmmm, he looks familiar.” as he didn't have his glasses on. So, she came over and we made a deal we'd get him. If he was gay, he'd go with me and if he was straight, he'd go with her.

Well, she went over and sat next to him . She started to caress him and things went into movement. I took some photos and he really hammed it up for the camera.”

“You're amazing.”

“No, it's a part of my past life years ago. Maybe he figured I had the photos and he would get them by trying to confiscate my server.”

Dave said, “I think he's trying to get your program. Why don't you give him a call and let him know he's fucking with fire.”

“OK”

I heard a vehicle pull up and turned to see Fat Cat get out. He was all decked out like a pimp.

“Fat Cat! What the fuck are you doing looking like a pimp!”

“Who's that?”

I went over and hugged him. He looked at me and said, “You look like someone, but you don't.”

“I have a new face. How the hell you doing?”

He must have recognized and said, “Rhette?”

“Yeah.”

“OH man, how are you?”

“Doing well. I've got a gift for you. You want?”

“OH man, I'm not sure. I'm doing well.”

“How well?”

“I run some girls.”

“What the fuck are you doing? You didn't get enough and you want to go back?”

“I gotta make a living.”

“It's not the pimping I mind, it's the enforcements. You get to slapping around on guys and you get your self in shit.”

“Not that much I have to do.”

“Well, I'd give you your gift, but the second I saw you out there trying to pimp him, I'd have to kill you.”

He looked at me and I said, “Don't even think it, you're in my torture room and my underground. We've got a long history, but I can definitely make things short term.”

“What's going on with you? You sound like you went uptown.”

“I did. I got the city under me as well as this state and several more and soon, I'll have the whole country.”

“Why don't you share some love?”

“I thought about it until I saw you doing the small time hood thing and now I'm inclined to just let you walk on out of here without your present.”

“Let's see, I might be able to be persuaded to let them go.”

“I might be persuaded to give an order to go raid your house and get them to go for you.”

“Don't be touching them.”

“Then get the fuck out. I've got no presents for idiots. You've got three weeks to get rid of the girls or get the fuck out of the country with them. The second I find out you haven't, I'll be there to get them and get you down here for some education. You don't have any options here.”

He swung around and I pointed. “You see those guys over there? That one is cut in half by a laser. The other was shot clean through with a laser pulse. The man who has it is over there wondering if he can cut your arm off before you can land one punch.”

“Bullshit.”

“Dave, take his hair and give him a wedge. Let it slide off in front of his eyes so he can see for himself.”

Dave cut Fat Cat's hair.

I said, “Tilt your head forward.”

He did and the hair fell down in front of him. “You want to risk it? Or, do you want to act right. I think it's bullshit you're even thinking about laying a hand on an old friend.”

“You've turned into a racist.”

I turned to Marlon. “Marlon? How big of a racist am I?”

Marlon came over and said, “Man, you're in need of a new jaw.” He hit Fat Cat in front of all of us. Fat Cat went down and I said, “The reason you were called is because I remembered you fondly. Since you've been here, you've done nothing but slander my memories of you. Why don't you go over there and sit in the sauna while I get your present prepared to go with someone else.”

I went over to get the Police Commissioner and brought him over to stand in front of Fat Cat. “This is Fat Cat. What do you think of him?”

“Oh Baby, they told me you had what it took to make me happy. I need one that will fill me.”

“Sir, take the telephone out of your ass, he doesn't want you. He wants to be stupid.”

“He doesn't want me! How am I going to satisfy him?”

“We'll find you someone else.”

“I can only satisfy him.”

“He's not going to be worthy of you. He's trying to be something he ain't got no right being.”

Fat Cat turned and said, “Rhette, let me talk with him for a few moments.”

“No can do. I was going to offer you him, and a job down here getting answers and doing a little intimidation, but I guess that doesn't apply any more.”

“I can't be a member here!”

“Why the fuck not? Marlon just became a member tonight.”

Marlon said, “Man, I told you things were changed.”

I turned to Fat Cat and said, “How long have you known me?”

“Oh damn. When was it, '93 or '94?”

“I think '94...maybe December of '93. Since then, how racist you seen me?”

“I haven't. Kevin was until you two got together, but not you.”

“And now, I'm a racist because I tell you things which you need to hear? I think you're fucked up in the head. I've made it so minorities and gays could be in this organization. I've made it so you'd have a chance, but I won't do it so you get to run girls.

Beck over there is a leader of mine in Miami. How do you think she'd like it if you were trying to run girls in her city? She'd probably have you becoming a girl yourself on the fast track by seeing to it personally your shit was cut off.

So, do you want the job and the gift, or do you want to go sit in the sauna and piss me off some more?”

“Do I get to be a member?”

“The second you get rid of the girls and Cat, that's an order which means if you ever defy my order again and get any more, I'll have you killed. The other order is you're not going to pimp this guy out and run any boys either. You're to do your job here and be happy. You got it?”

He looked at me and I could see anger boiling.”

“Ok, go sit your ass in the sauna.” I turned to Beck and said, “Hon, go get the honey and slap it on his balls. We'll feed them to the ants.”

I started to walk off and Beck came up. Cat said, “Rhette, I'll do it.”

“That's the last time it takes you that long to make a decision. The next time, I don't play the games. I'll just blow your head off myself. I've got to lead these people and if it weren't for our friendship, I'd already had your brains splattered. Go get your gift and meet down here at the entrance you came in tomorrow night at ten pm. Park out there where you see the cars parked and we'll get your trainer to come and get you.”

“How much will I be making?”

“Let's say your bills will be met and you won't have to worry about a bill.”

“That's not answering my question.”

I turned around and said, “Cat, come here. He came over and I said, “Let's go in here and talk.”

“Why?”

“Because you're doubting me. It's pissing me off and I'll tell you it's going to be real hard holding my temper here.”

“I just asked a question.”

“Get in here and I'll answer it.”

He came into the sauna and I closed the door. “Cat, let me tell you something. Those people out there are mine. You're mine now. Do you remember me ever letting someone disrespect me in front of me and mine inside?”

“No”

“Then, cut the bullshit. This job doesn't have a paycheck attached to it. You know why?”

“Why?”

“Because I want you happy no matter what it takes. You're going to have nights where you're going to have to kill people and you're going to be thinking this job doesn't pay enough. Then, there are going to be a few weeks when you don't to a thing and you're going to think you've got gravy. It's that way.

So, instead of a paycheck, you get a debit card. You go out shopping and you get whatever you want. You go get your cars and you go get your house paid off and your bills, and no matter what, you stay happy. Then, you'll realize it takes less to keep you happy.

You'll have your love. You'll have everything you want, and you'll have your debit card. You'll think you've got it made.

All the rest of your life, you do that and when you're ready to retire, we have a nice little party for you and you get benefits for the rest of your friggin' life.”

He looked at me and said, “Is that how it is for you?”

“Yeah, I don't take a paycheck. I take whatever it takes to make me happy. Tonight, I gave my kid fifteen hundred for pizza. Then, I didn't need it because the person pissed me off making it. So, I took a police officer and an ex con and make them boyfriends and gave them a job in the pizza parlor. They'll live happily ever after.”

“Huh?”

“Someone else Cat, you're not going to work in a pizza parlor. What you'll do is you'll work down here in this area and you'll get results with the other guy who does it.”

“Why do you want me down here?”

“The other guy has been here as long as I have. I imagine he's ready to retire.”

“How long you been in this?”

“Oh fuck, since, '88 maybe?”

“You had to be a baby then.”

“Yeah, but I met the guy and we became friends. Then, we fell in love. Now, this is mine.”

“What happened to Kevin?”

“We're still friends. He's with my brother in law. They're starting their relationship and they're happy.”

“What happened?”

“My face happened. Things happened and along the way, broken hearts happened. We've kept it upright, but we're not able to stay lovers.”

“He's an idiot.”

“I agree, but my new lover would beg to differ because he's now happy.”

Cat smiled and said, “Well, I'll take my gift home and clean out all the girls.”

“What you do is you bring them down here. If they want to do that, then we'll empower themselves to do it to themselves and act as their protector. The only difference is if they don't pay me a dime, I'm not going to step off in their ass. Maybe they can get me information.”

“I imagine they could.”

“Ok, go get your gift and show up tomorrow night. They'll give you all your things you'll need tomorrow.”

“Rhette, I'll need money for a car.”

“Here's five hundred dollars. Take a cab and go pick one out. Then, have the general manager there give Dave a call so Dave can cut a check.”

We walked out of the sauna and Dave looked at me suspiciously. “Dave, do we have any cars down here he can drive home?”

“Yeah, we keep cars and trucks. What does he want?”

Cat asked, “Do you have a 'Vette?”

Dave asked, “Convertible, or Hart Top.”

“Hard Top. Black on Black if you have one.”

Dave nodded and said, “Here, let me take you down there and we'll get you something picked out.”

They went over to the truck and Dave got in the driver's seat. Cat got in the passenger seat and they took off.

Beck came over and said, “Is that package real on him?”

“Yeah, it's about sixteen hard.”

“Man!”

“Yeah, that's why I wanted him here. He could make some people really hate their time down here.”

She smiled and said, “He's a bit egotistical.”

“Yeah, but he's good people. We were close in prison. He made some times with Kevin and I better and we returned the favor as often as we could. I really think we're way up on him with the favors, but that's neither here nor there.”

She smiled and said, “Do you think he'll work out here?”

“Yeah, why? You want him down there?”

She shook her head no and said, “He seems wrong for the job.”

“No, here's what you have. He's a tough person, but he's a teddy bear underneath. He can be as rough as me and he can be as tender. He's got the size I'd dream of having, but we've got a good history.”

I pulled out my phone and called central control. “Yeah”

“Get me Bill Gate's home phone number.”

“Ok, but I don't think he'll answer, I think he's located elsewhere in the world.”

“You have his personal cell phone?”

“Yeah.”

“Give me that. I'll call it and then we'll play tag.”

Beck said, “Rhette, don't be nice there. The man likes to be a geek, but he's got a goon squad bigger than yours.”

“No, I've got a goon squad watching him. He'll soon find out what all I have he needs.'

I let the phone ring and about when I was ready to hang up, a very tired “Hello” answered.

“Hi, Bill Gates please.”

“Who is this?”

“Rhette Michaels.”

“Who?”

“Rhette Michaels. You're filing federal charges on me and confiscating my server.”

“I'm afraid I don't understand and how did you get this number?”

“Well, it's not too hard when you have all your guards from me. It's really not too hard when most of your staffing for cleaning, cooking, grounds, and secretarial are all through my services.”

“I'm afraid you're mistaken.”

“No, I'm afraid you are. Here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to have my people pulled. I'm going to start costing you serious money. You want to fuck with me over a program I developed and then play ignorant games, I'll cost you more than you've even begun to think about obtaining.”

I heard the phone hang up.

I dialed main control. “Yeah”

“Call all of our people out there and pull them from Microsoft, his home compound, and his family. Let them all start having to drive themselves without security and then, see when they get to work, the place is ashes.”

“You want me to order strikes from here?”

“Can you do that?”

“Yeah, but I've never done it before.”

“Well, get prepared to do it more often. I think I just found a way I can delegate it so I don't have to call a lot of people.”

He chuckled and said, “Gee thanks”

“No problem. It makes my life easier, but your welcome for appreciating it.”

“That was sarcasm.”

“I know, but mine wasn't. You'll amaze yourself with what you can do.”

“What do you want done?”

“You call their security and and tell them to pull themselves out of the place. Before they go, you tell them to get all the people out of the buildings as we're about to bring them down.

Then, you start hauling in the bombs and lay out a building a minute for the next ten minutes. Then, you call him and patch him through to me.

I'll see if it wants to hang up on me again and if he does, you kindly call him back and tell him I'm going to leave nothing standing until his home. You tell him I'm one strike away from taking out the house and if he wants to play that card, you tell him to stay on the phone with you while you make the strike and then before you hang up with him, you tell him you're going to go international and start bombing all his printing plants. That should wake his ass up that he's gotten me pissed because that's where his money is made.”

“Ok, glad to do it.”

I hung up and went over to Beck. “When you have problems in the future, use your central control down there to do your strikes. It really cuts through all the phone calls.”

She smiled and said, “That's delegating it out.”

“Well, I'm learning.”

She said, “Hon, I have my security guy do that for me.”

“Oh, well, I never thought of him. Do you think I should call him?”

“No, next time call him first.”

Sam sat there looking and listening. “You're interesting to listen to. You two are learning and communicating out how to do things better. I never once thought I'd communicate out how it was best to order a strike, but you guys are even making that more efficient.”

I smiled and said, “Sam, the other night, when I was ordering things out, I had little John and Beck both calling like you wouldn't believe. It really cost us some time because if we'd have a team we turned that over to, it'd give us some other time to do important things.”

He nodded and said, “Your job is to stay focuses and intimidate the opponent. I agree if you get so wrapped up in the details, you'll soon find out you're not staying focused in what you should be doing.”

My cell phone rang and interrupted him. “Hello?”

“What are you doing to me?”

“I asked the same thing. Then, I called you and got hung up on. Now, I'm taking your buildings out one by one. When I get the campus down, I'll go for your house and see if you still want to fuck with me. IF you do, I'll take it out and then start going for your printing plants. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got other important things to do and you've not nearly lost enough money.”

“Hang on!”

“I'm sorry. I call the shots here. Maybe you think you've got money fuck face, but let me tell you I've got more at my disposal than that. My real goal is to have you really wondering who you thought you were fucking with in regards to trying to levee that federal warrant. Did you think you were going to steal my program?”

“I was told it was ours.”

“It's a Sun program you dumb ass!

I'm the one that wrote it and I'm the one that got the math done on it. You just blindly strike out at people without knowing if your people are lying to you? Well, you'll lose a building a minute and as you can see, you're not gaining a thing by talking to me. I'll stand here and talk to you until they're all down...then, I'll stand here and ask you if you'd like to reconsider before I blow your house to hell.”

“I have surface to air missiles.”

“My weaponry is coming from space you dumb fuck. Go to your window and take a look.”

“I'm not there.”

“Well, I'm guessing you're either lying to me or your people are making calls. If so, I'm probably tying up your line so you know I'm taking them down one by one. I'll let you go until you can have them decide if it's your operating system or not. Good Bye.”

I hung up and turned to Beck. “He's a dumb ass.”

Sam smiled and little John said, “Rhette, be careful. He's told you he's better armed than you anticipated.”

“Yes, but does he have space?”

“I don't know. You ought to ask Dave. He might have gotten something from him.”

“Well, we'll wait a minute or three. I'd like to have a few more of his buildings fall.”

My cell phone rang. “I've checked, You're correct. We're wrong.”

“Yes, and now, what was your intention?. To steal it, or to fuck me out of it?”

“I'm not sure. I never even knew we were involved in this.”

“Well, contact your people and let me know before that building goes down.”

I hung up and smiled. Little John said, “You're enjoying this entirely too much.”

“The man has done this too many times. What you don't know is right now, I'm sure there are those who are getting phone calls and being told to look out their windows because the fireworks is payback happening.”

My phone rang. “We were trying to steal it. I spoke to my guys and they said they wanted to try intimidating you into giving the server and copying it.”

“Well, thank you and thank them for your honesty. Now, let me think on it three minutes what I'm going to do while you lose another three buildings.”

My cell phone beeped. “One second, I have a call coming in.”

“Yeah” I answered.

“Ok, we're down to corporate head quarters. Do you want me to make the call with him, or you?”

“I've got him on the other line. I've been stalling him so he can lose buildings. Let's see what he wants to do.”

I clicked over and said, “I've got my strike command on the line. He says we're down to your headquarters and then, we'll go personal to your house and your family's homes. That should take another fifteen minutes and then, we'll go over to the printing plants.

So, what do you think you owe me for the headache, embarassement, and the attempted humiliation you've given me?”

“I'm not sure. You've really leveled the shit out of my campus.”

“Bill, I've thought of you as a decent fella. I've heard you pull this shit time and time again and thought, “Man, it must suck to be that person.” But, never once thinking my program would be that valuable.

Then, I created the thing and found out it's been selling like hot cakes and making me a lot of money. I can understand why you want it because I'm over a hundred million with the thing and going.”

“It's not exactly that. You've got a part of the program which really makes people wonder if that's what they were thinking. We can use that in a lot of our games.”

“Ok, here's the deal. I keep my program and you buy that for let's say, five billion. If you don't want to make the deal, let me know and I'll hang up. Just keep in mind your headquarters and your house are next as well as your family's homes. Then, we'll go over to the print plants.”

“I'll make the deal.”

“No, you don't have to if you don't want to. I mean, I'm not twisting your arm or anything.”

Beck covered her hand over her mouth she was laughing so hard. Little John smiled and had tears in his eyes.”

“Rhette. Dammit! I ....I....I'll do that.”

“Ok, you talked me into it. Now, should you forget, that's a five with a lot of zeros after it. I think that's about what my Miami segment made last week alone.”

“Must be a lot of money in what you do!”

“Yeah, there's a lot of money in what you do too. Now, let's have your legal department contact my court here and tell them to retract that warrant. When I get contacted about that, I'll pull you out of my sites.”

“How'd you do the thing with the lasers?”

“Let's just say our research and development are way ahead of the military.”

He chuckled and said, “You showing it off isn't going to keep it a secret.”

“No, but it should make them wonder what the fuck they're up against. I bet they'll want to kiss a little higher when it comes to my ass.”

He laughed and said, “Here's what you do. When you go speak with them, you let them know that's just a prototype and you're developing a lot more things.”

“They're already developed.”

“You know that and I know that, but they don't know that. Then, you have them buy your next generation above them instead of that one. You get them to sign agreements to buy that one and development agreements for the new generation which is the prototype before the one you blasted me away with. You got that?”

“You're in the ballpark with the prototypes. We're three generations ahead of them on most things.”

“What you don't know is they're going to be begging you to really not develop the things. They'll pay you not to develop them.”

“Too late, we've got everything with the lasers in it.”

“You know that and I know that now....but, they don't. What you do is you go in and you casually ask questions of the generals there like “Don't you wish you had a laser that would reach out and touch someone? Or, don't you wish you had a laser was on a helicopter?”

“I don't think we have one there, but I know we have them on a lot of other things.”

“Well, make them pay for development of all of them and what you do is you make them pay like half a trillion for the next generation of what they have and for each generation after that, you really make them pay like three or four trillion.”

“Ok, but it's too much money.”

“No, that's the way it goes. They know you have something which works and I'm telling you now, the Russians, Chinese, and everyone else know now too. You're going to have a real problem because you've got them all running scared and us probably getting calls of them wanting to take us to a treaty table so we don't blow them away.”

“Ok, I'll talk with Dave about this and see what he suggests. I'm sure he'll probably not appreciate me getting his balls in the ringer over this.”

“I don't know. From what I know, he's a nice guy.”

“You were a nice guy too until you started this shit with me. Heck, I thought when I met you, you were fun and had a great body.”

“Huh?”

“Oh, it's been a while but we met at a nude jacuzzi party.”

“When?”

“Back in the late 80's in Las Vegas.”

“Oh man! That was a long time ago.”

“Yeah, we're just a little older.”

“I remember that party. Some nice people there.”

“My cousin was the blonde with the huge cannons in your face. I was the geekzoid taking shots with my camera like a Chinese tourist.”

“You still have those pictures?”

“Yeah, I was just telling a friend of mine here about them. She doesn't think you're hot without your glasses.”

“Well, you and my wife agree on something.”

“Your wife's a nice lady. I've heard a lot of what she's done monetarily for the Mormon's up at Nauvoo.”

“She's great that way.”

“Well, let me know if they're going to back off and get that warrant pulled and I'll let you know where to get me that money deposited.”

“You might try Vegas since it's going to be taxes.”

“Shouldn't be, that's a settlement.”

He laughed and said, “It'd have to go through my lawyer for that to happen.”

“Well, I think we need a legal arrangement so you don't think you can fuck me and get by with it.”

“I'll get it drawn up.”

I hung up and said, “Folks, that's decent. I learned a bit about how to do things and got to get more money than I'll ever need to spend.”

Dave came back driving the truck. Fat Cat pulled up in a Vette and climbed out. “Rhette, that car is perfect. I don't need one now.”

“Ok, let us know when you want it replaced.”

“Dave let me know how to do it.”

“Ok, take your present home.”

Dave came over and said, “How are things going?”

“We've struck a truce. I'm afraid you need to talk to him about how to sell the government on prototypes and stuff.”

“Ok, I imagine we need to do that.”

“Yeah, in a major way.”

“What'd you do?”

“They blew the hell out of his stuff with the sky lasers.”

“Oh man, I'll contact them. Just know we're getting into a lot of money with that now.”

“Just see my brother is a very wealthy man.”

“He's getting sixty percent. I think he's splitting it with everyone in your family, but I'm not sure.”

“Ok, but Bill said something about half a trillion for the next generation of what they have and then trillions for everything else.”

“Did you tell him what we have?”

“No, I have his guessing all over the page.”

“You'd probably have him more closer to what we have than what you think we have.”

“I can add and I'm coming up with a lot. This is just a dye job you know!”

Beck and little John started laughing and Dave smiled. He came over and hugged me. Sam smiled and said, “If I didn't have to go back home, I'd play the fourth Stooge.”

“No, we've got fourth and fifth, we do need sixth though. JT is four and Kevin is five.”

Beck laughed and said, “I've not met either one, but Dave gave me a bit of a rundown on them.”

I nodded and said, “Dave's going to be everyone's step papa.”

He came over to me and said, “You're my step papa.”

“Only in Missouri could we be each other's step papa's and we're away from the Ozarks.” I said laughing.

He laughed and said, “Sounds interesting, doesn't it.”

I said, “Ok, now, the nights done here. We need to call the cleaners to come get the mess here and then, we'll take it on home.”

I flipped out my phone and called central control. “We need the cleaners to the torture room. We're done here.”

“Nice negotiating there.”

“Thanks. Probably paid for a year of running that damned airline.”

“Well, it'll buy you a lot of planes.”

“I'll make sure you guys have a nice bonus on your checks.”

“It's been fun.”

“Let's hope it stays that way.”

“I'm supposed to tell you the group from St. Louis is coming over in the morning.”

“Ok, would you give them a call and tell them I'm going to be heading that way in the morning to see the Cardinal and pick up someone, then, I'll be coming back this direction and then going home to South Carolina for a few hours.”

“Busy day.'

“Yeah, but then I'll be back here to start meeting those who are coming in.”

“Incredible.”

“Tell them I'll need my fast jet tomorrow.”

“You might speak with Dave.”

“Ok”

I got off the phone and said, “Dave, I was told I might speak to you about needing my fast jet tomorrow. You have a faster one?”

He smiled and said, “I have a faster one, but it's only big enough for six people. You and Steve could use it tomorrow.”

“Anything special to fly it?”

“Not much. You get in and when you get up there, you hit the buttons and hang on. You'll be amazed at how fast it goes.”

“How fast?”

“You'd be to South Carolina in about five minutes.”

“It goes Mach 5?”

“No, Mach 7. It's designed for Mach 30, but we've never gotten that long of a run with it.”

“Why not?”

“I'm going to say it and then, you're going to want to do it, but no one has been brave enough.”

“Ok, why not?”

“Rhette, you get to going that fast and you're probably going to have a problem with flying out of Earth's hemisphere. Then, you'll have to reenter and that's time consuming.”

“Ok, so this thing doesn't have auto pilot?”

“Yeah, but it has issues with gravitation pull. It seems to not want to stay near the Earth.”

“Maybe you've got something wrong. Maybe it's called inertia. It's too fast.”

“No, they have those scram jets on it and it's designed to stay in the hemisphere.”

“Who designed the thing?”

“The Japanese.”

“Did they do a simulator on it?”

“I don't know.”

“SO they built the thing and were too chicken to try it out?”

“They tried it, but only out into space and then returned.”

“Ok, so did it work?”

“Yeah, but they didn't go but Mach 11 and that was it.”

“Ok, let's see what I can do with it. I won't take Steve up in it because if anything happened with it, I'd want him to raise Robert.”

Dave said, “You're seriously thinking about this, aren't you!”

“Yeah, so what, it's speed. When it's your time to go, it's your time to go. Besides, I've already been through the surgery to rebuild me.”

“That's not funny.”

“Dave, listen, when it's your time, it's your time. Until then, you do what you can to have the best ride you can.”

He said, “Ok, I'm going to let you, but you've got to videotape it so you have proof for the world records.”

“Oh hell. I'm just wanting to go home tomorrow. I'm not going to set any records.”

“Ok, but just in case you do, I'll tell you it'd take less time to fly around the world than it would for you to fly to South Carolina.”

Beck said, “Hon, he's trying to soup you up into breaking it for him.”

“Let me see. Mach 30 is like twenty one thousand miles an hour, how many miles are around the world?”

I don't know, but at that fast, it'd take like less than ten minutes to get to South Carolina.”

I smiled. “Let me see what we can do. You swear the auto pilot works on the thing.”

“Yeah”

“Ok, what I'll do is I'll go up and I'll scram it. Then, I'll have it get us there and land the thing.”

“Ok, but be careful going over Paris Island.”

“When was I over Paris Island? I don't even known where it is?”

“You know that island that you see off to your left when you look out the back of your house?...the one that doesn't look like there's anyone living on it?”

“Yeah”

“That's Paris Island.”

“Oh man, I've probably flown over it every time I've went over my house.”

He smiled. “Yes, and we're catching hell. They know it's us, but they also have been told it's you. We told them we'd talk to you.”

“Ok, why did they get themselves in an uproar?”

“Let's just say the last time they called it was some General who was making threats.”

“I'll try to watch it.”

“Hon, listen to me. They've been courting us for that laser system for a long time. They're not going to do anything because they know I'll sell it to the highest bidder against them if they piss me off.”

“How long have you been doing this with my brother?”

“I can't remember. I know it was before he went into college. DO you remember when we had all those lasers out when they were pointing it at pilots?”

“Yeah?”

“Those were ours. We were selling those all over the place. The deal we had in place was the Japanese could produce them in return for the plans to that scram jet and a few other things.”

“And they went for it?”

“Yeah, they those things because they think they can take our technology. What they don't know is that laser there is at the end of it's life cycle. We've built it, we've perfected it, and we've nano-ed it. It's history.

They were willing to buy it to get a clue as to what we're going to do next. They never got a clue because your brother basicly scrapped the plans for the laser as we know it and went about it a different way.”

“I wouldn't have a clue how to build a laser, so I couldn't tell you. I know if you harnessed the power of those little light emitting diodes, you'd have something because those things get bright fast.”

He smiled and said, “You sure you haven't been around your brother?”

“No, he's my brother, but we've lost touch. Brent and I are getting close, but I've let him down lately.

“I'm just wondering what you three would do if you combined your brains.”

“Ick”

“What do you mean 'Ick'?”

“I'm thinking of us three combining our brain. We'd have a bi-sexual crazy son of a bitch who'd be redneckish like hell.”

“How do you figure?”

“Brent's all about that straight. Ash is Bi-sexual, but married. Me, I'm gay and you have them two who seem to think a woman's place is a woman's place.”

He smiled. “I think looking at you he'd be hot. I know your brothers are all attractive.”

I cocked an eyebrow at him. “You trying to tell me something Dave?”

He laughed and said, “I wished I looked like any one of you. You're all good looking.”

“Thanks”

The cleaners got there and we started walking towards the elevator. I pushed Sam and Dave pushed little John. Beck walked along side.

Beck asked, “You're going to have to go to St. Louis tomorrow, are you leaving directly from there? Or, are you flying back over here?”

“I hadn't thought of that. I do know I have to go there to get Jeff and visit with the Cardinal, but I believe Jeff's going to come over here.

Dom and everyone is coming over here, so they'll have to fly over.”

She smiled and said, “They need to bring things over. They could drive.”

I nodded and asked, “Why did you ask?”

“I want to go over and question someone. I need to get an answer.”

“You can ride over with us and ride back with them if you'd like. I think we'll take that scram over and that way, we can fly on from there.

Who is it you need to question?”

“One of the men who was in Miami with little Jimmy.”

“Why?”

She smiled and I said, “Rhette, I get the feeling more was going on there than we knew. Little Jimmy is now seeming withdrawn and asked if I would see how that guy was doing.”

I smiled. “Hon, one of the questions you need to ask is if the guy would like to go down there. We're standing in the way of hearts again and I don't want to be known for that.”

Sam reached up and patted my hand. “Rhette, you make good decisions.”

“It helps to think with my heart.

I have a question. Who was it over there holding up progress?”

“There are two primarily who are so against each other, they instantly go against the other. When one votes one way, the other will deliberately vote the other way.”

“Ok, let me know who those two are because neither will be on my board. They've got themselves to blame they lost the organization, and it will be obvious I've chosen to exclude them from any future activities.”

“They're powerful.”

“I don't care. I'm powerful. I imagine they have men in their organizations which use common sense and will see my options are limited. I can allow them to strangle me as they've done this organization, or I can exclude and let them know their behavior is what I won't tolerate in this group.”

He patted my hand and said, “I'll get you the names of some of their leaders. I think you'll get along well with them and they'll pull for you.”

“Good.”

Little John looked at me and said, “Rhette, you've got the headaches of the world now.”

“No, we do. You're equally as much of this as I and David. We're not going to do this without each other, and we'll need to be there covering as much as we can.”

“What's your first plan of action?” he asked.

“Get ordained and then, on Saturday, I have to scram to South Carolina.”

“Why?”

“I gave my word to a church lady there I would be there for their benefit luncheon. I'll do that because I think that's when we're going to announce JT's running for Governor.”

“Steve is really sure he doesn't want to run?”

“Yes. I'm not arguing it because I understand completely what he's doing.”

“What's he doing?”

“Ok, let me explain and then once I do, please understand and don't judge him.”

“I'll try.”

“When you were a little kid, you knew who your dad was. You were raised to fill those shoes some day and you did. I'm sure Sam did and Dave sure has. With me, I was trained by Gino and I stepped back in. BUT, haven't we all questioned ourselves and compared ourselves to what our mentors did?”

A chorus of 'yeses' came out.

“With him, he's a crooked Sheriff's son who became Sheriff. He's not did much with his life and attributes what he's done to what his daddy handed down. Now, he's got a Police Commissioner's job which pays more and is for a city which has more people in it than the whole county. He'll have more men working under him and he wants to see if he's good in the job.

It's not Governor which is going to give him that challenge. It's this role. We talked about it and we're going to support each other to be the highest standard we can be. He's going to support me and I'll support him.”

Little John said, “Rhette, I understand it, but I've never looked at what I've done as being comparable with what my dad did.”

Sam said, “John, your father was an absolute fool. You've not been. Forgive me for saying that about him, but you've not been in the limelight like he and you've certainly not been dancing near the flames. He did and he got burned.

You've chosen wisely and you've got a great team here. You guys work well in and out of each other's presence and you're just damned nice guys. I'm really anxious to see what can be done.”

Dave said, “I'm not sure what my role is going to be in this. Can you give me a clue Rhette?”

“Dave, you do best with businesses. Our planet has gone global in it's approach with manufacturing. What I want for you to do is to be a broker for all of them. You can get us profits that way, and you can get us profits from having factories wherever, but I want a good paying job segment to be brought stateside.”

“What is it you have planned for the rest of the world?”

“This is going to sound strange, but there are a lot of places which just plain don't have a pot to piss in so to speak. Yeah, I feel sorry for those starving kids, but their leaders are there soaking up all the relief money and still they starve. What I've got to do is I've got to be more wicked than the CIA and we've just got to go in there and create our own governments.

What I see is the jobs which absolutely have to be the cheapest done and can't have machines do them, we'll truck over there into plants ran by us. I imagine even a penny on some of those items will be too much, so we'll have to make it fractional what we make on the goods.

What we need to do, is we definitely need to feed those people. In a world economy, food shouldn't be an option. It is, but that's got to change.”

Beck asked, “How do you change it?”

I looked at her and said, “Hon, let's say this. The United States wants to bitch about deforestation of Brazil. I'm sorry, but we did it here and now, we've got tons of land which isn't forested.

To me, if you're a farmer on subsidies, then I want you to plant a fucking tree on that lands and keep from cheating me by farming that land and collecting subsidies.

Also. If the government owns a lot of that land out there and it's as far as the eye can see, then why aren't there trees on it already? I'll tell you. Because it's easier to bitch about a problem than it is to do something about it. It's easier for some fat politician to sit in and office and vote away millions and billions of dollars of relief to some faceless kid than it is to help his own at home.

It's time for that to change. It's time for us to say to those of the world, your leaders are crooked and your starving. I'd give you money, but it'd only make your leader richer. The answer has to be no. I'll keep it at home and keep myself in power before I prop up someone else.”

Sam said, “It's often been looked at by everyone the US is a terrorist state. You support more crooked things governmentally than any other on the planet. Yet, you want to point fingers at Russia, or China, or others.

When bad things happen to the US, you don't see huge outpourings of relief like we do elsewhere. That's because we're over there cheering something bad has happened to you.”

“That's probably true, but what you don't see are the people. I learned a long time ago it was people who made a country instead of leaders. Our leaders can tell us to hate and brainwash us to hate, but ultimately, it comes to us to do the hating or loving. I'd rather institute peace on Earth by living it rather than allowing others to do the thinking for me and me just following.”

Sam asked, “What would you do if your leader wanted you to prepare war on someone?”

“Have they done it to you?”

“In ways, yes.”

“Your leaders or ours?”

“Mine. Yours don't speak with us anymore.”

“Good. Then that should be easily handled.”

“Don't be so sure. The power of the press are still on their side.”said Beck.

“There's a problem with that thinking hon. I've got enough money, I can buy something. I doubt if it will be papers, because I think their time has about ended. BUT, I think I could do well to look at something which probably no one has thought about tackling.”

Little John asked, “What?”

“Time Warner. They've got so much and everyone thinks they're Everest, but to me, they're achievable.”

Little John said, “I'll look into my connections. They've got a lot of flaws.”

Dave said, “They're weak in a lot of ways, but they've got assets which just haven't panned.”

I said, “Dave, do us this favor. We just saw Yahoo turn down offers from Microsoft. We saw a lot of other companies shiver, but what I saw was Google turn their back on Yahoo because they were afraid of pissing off the whale.

Go start buying up Google and just plain go in and offer Yahoo that bloated thirty seven they want. You'll snap it up and we'll have it.”

“How do you know they want $37?”

I looked at him and said, “Ok, I don't watch much television at all. I get my news from the internet. One of the things I read made a point of saying someone had said that if Yahoo were offered $37, they'd snatch it up. So, go do it. Then, we'll add it in and cross it with AOL and Google.”

Dave smiled and said, “It'd make more sense.”

I nodded and said, “While you're out there, you start buying up shares of Sprint.”

“Why?”

I said, “Well, I'll tell you and then, you're going to just be amazed.

Sprint is here in Kansas City. Yeah, it's out in Johnson County, but it's here in the metro area. That's plus one.

Plus two is one thing I know and it's their customer service sucks. They've got some really hateful people and talking to them is like talking to AOL to get off their rosters.

So, what I think is we'll go public with the horror stories as a company and say, “Hey, we bought the company and to be honest, it sucks. We're going to do some really critical customer service training and we're going to guarantee satisfaction on the first phone call.”

Dave looked at me and said, “I think it will work, but what we've got to do is we've got to have someone to hang out to dry.”

I nodded and said, “Yeah, the head of it. To me, the CEO is the one who needs to be thrown out. He's aware of the situation and all which matters to him is his huge salary. I'll tell you it's pretty hard to justify his huge paycheck when it's coming from raining piss down on customers.”

Little John said, “Guys, I've got to be honest here and tell you I've got deals with Time.”

“What sort of deals?”

“They don't air things and I don't go charging windmills.”

“Well, that's about to change. They could flood the airwaves with propaganda all day long, but if I buy the company, I think ot would stop. Don't you?

Also, I'll tell you how big of balls I'll have with this. I'll step up to the plate and go prime time with it and give a speech telling the world we're the mafia, we're here, we've been here, and we'll be here....get used to it. We're also coming above the board and these are the companies we own. You don't like it, don't buy our products, ride in our planes, or eat our food. We could give a damn less.

I'll tell you now. People will look at us and they'll compare us to Wal-Mart and they'll love to hate us, BUT, they'll still ride in our planes, eat our food, and do business with all of our companies.”

Dave said, “You do that and our stocks are going to plummet.”

“Dave, I could give a shit about the value of our stocks. My goal here is to have everyone seeing us and saying, “Whoa! They stepped up to the plate and look at that, they're admitting they're there, and now, they're telling me what I thought all along. I think I'm going to like this.” The plus of this is our guys worldwide are going to walk out with their chests puffed up and look at the Russians, the Tongs, and all the little fucking gangs and say, “Hey, where's your leader? He's not up there on primetime. It must be because he's got little ones.”

Little John said, “I think if you do that, you'll be made Enemy #1 by our government.”

“I don't think so. I'll tell you why. Our President can stand up there and point a finger and say what he wants, but he's already suspect. I can stand across from him and say, “Hold up, I've got here, here, and here, when you were talking with this dude. Here's what you said, and here's what you did afterwards. You're wanting to tell the country I'm bad for them, but you're selling shit stacked so high you smell dude, get the fuck off the stage.”

Beck laughed and said, “I think that would work. The thing is we've got a reputation which is like the bad kid from across the tracks. Everyone wants something from us, but they don't want to admit they hang with us. It's time to call them on the carpet and tell the world they're a bunch of hypocrites. If we do it, then it gives us credibility whereas it pulls them down. We'll have more believability when we're asked about if we did something.”

Sam said, “What happens when you get called on the carpet for things we did? Are you going to rat them out?”

“Like Cuba? Like Russia? Like Nicaragua? Which one? Or all of them? I'll tell you now, those weren't on my term. They can't hang me for it any more than we can hold a sitting President for things his predecessors have done.”

Sam said, “Rhette, let's get you in and then, we'll have some strategy sessions on that. I think the thing with Kennedy is too soon.”

“Hey, if they ask, and you know they will, then we're going to have to say something. I'm not going to hem and haw and suddenly look like I don't want to answer a question.

Instead, I think what we should do is we should be prepared and then give our viewpoint on it and tell why it got done.”

Sam nodded and said, “The problem there is there are a lot of people involved who could still be taken down.”

“That's probably true. Is it for good, or for bad?”

He shrugged and said, “A lot of both.”

“Well, we'll have to say that. We can't be seen from skulking away from the issue as that would really look more sinister than just answering the friggin' question. Hell, it was before I was born.”

Beck said, “Yes. Just answer it that way. Say, “It's before I was born and if you want me to rewrite history, let's go all the way back and we'll do it. What you're going to find is you're not going to like a lot of it because we've been there in the good and the bad.”

Sam chuckled and said, “Ok, I'll support you on answering it that way Rhette, I can not support you on answering it totally honest yet.”

“Ok, we'll do that. BUT, we'll tell everyone we'll do it when the last one is dead.”

“No, what we'll do is we'll open the files when they open the files. Theirs will have black lines drawn through a lot and we won't. By then, they'll have a chance to attempt to point the finger at us and we'll turn it around and point the fingers back. The only problem they'll have is we've got sound recordings and movies, or stills of a lot of those meetings.”

I said, “Guys, why did we get bogged down with that? We go from talking about what good we can do in the world to the one thing which will hold us up from being accepted. That's not only negative, but not productive.”

Sam said, “Rhette, you need to know what we gained there. You need to know why we did things the way we did. We were told we would be getting to do things. It was told to us we'd have it as the Las Vegas of the East. It'd be our island. And then, rather than allowing us in to get things done, they chose to go in and use their people. They were told it'd be fucked up, but they chose to do it their way. Then, they want to point the finger and make us look bad. That's when Bobby started bringing people up to testify and we told them it wasn't going to happen. They thought because they had the military on their side, it could be, we still told them we could get him whenever wherever and we did.

What happened there was we were given more on the West coast and Las Vegas was just handed over. We were supposed to ignore the slights and they'd try to make it look like it was anyone and everyone that did it.”

“Well, I'll just answer the question I like my head and I'll get whacked if I answer it before it's time.”

Sam laughed and said, “You don't know that you can't get whacked now?”

“I believe anything when I see it. Until then, I expect it to happen.”

He asked, “What's the one thing in the world you want the most?”

“Kids. That's the answer it will be forever. I want eight kids.”

“Why eight kids?”

“To be honest, I don't know. Maybe it's because my lucky numbers are 7 and 9 and I'd rather have something in between.”

Dave said, “Rhette, let me do some calling and see if we can't get yours and his genes spliced so you can have your own kids rather than kids who aren't yours.”

“It doesn't matter how I get them. For all I care, I can adopt one off each continent and have one incontinent.”

Everyone laughed and Dave bumped me up against my shoulder. “Kid, I stepped into that one.”

We rode up in the elevator and I said, “Guys, the white and gold room is Robert's. Gino's is mine with Steve. There are others here.”

Dave said, “ The pink satin one is my sister's. No one sleeps there.”

I turned to him and said, “Dave, it's my house now. She's not coming back and I'm not protecting that relationship any longer. She might shit upon you and you allow it, but it's a given it's going to happen to me whether I keep her that room or not.”

He stopped and looked at me and said, “Man! You know, you've said it in words which just exploded in my chest. You're damned right.”

I turned to Beck and said, “Hon, you're more like a sister to us both. I'd be honored if you have the pink bedroom. If some bitch comes in, in the middle of the night, you just take her out and I'll dispose of the body before breakfast.”

Dave laughed and said, “Rhette, I'm not supposed to laugh about things which could be serious.”

“Dave, the second she can make it into this house without being sent a load of buckshot, then we've got bigger problems than her. She's definitely not going to be here because I'll start asking for things back she wasn't given specifically in the Will.”

He looked at me like he didn't understand. “What do you mean?”

“Your mama's china was to go down through the men of this family. Your sister pranced in here and took it. Unless the bitch sprouted a pecker, I want it back. It's yours and if you don't have an heir, then I want it to go over to Dom.”

He nodded and said, “Rhette, do you have a moment?”

“Yeah, I've got all the time you want.”

I turned to Beck and said, “Hon, take the bedroom. We're going downstairs because Dino needs a milkshake.”

Dave ran to me and hugged me. “You remembered!”

“Hon, I remember so much.”

We went downstairs and I got out the Ice cream. He smiled and said, “You're already doing it wrong.”

“Nope. Watch. I learned how to do this the fast way. Your daddy ain't got a thing on me with this stuff. You man the blender and get a cup of milk in there.”

He looked at me and said, “Milk goes last.”

“You question me! You put the milk in there and you'll have a perfect shake in about half that time.”

I went over to the microwave and put the carton of ice cream in. I put it on forty seconds and then let it do it's magic. When it came out, I peeled the cardboard back from the carton and cut the ice cream into eight equal portions. I started putting the ice cream (cherry cordial) and he watched as it began to become a shake.”

I put it in his glass and said, “There, half the time and all the greatness!”

I made mine and then, Beck came down. I went over and made her one. She tasted it and said, “Oh man!”

Dave said, “Hon, this is what my dad was known for. We'd have these talks where it was just he and I, or Rhette, he, and I and we'd solve a lot of problems.

When he was dying, a lot of times, he couldn't hold anything down. He'd come down here and we'd make up a shake. He'd take a few bites of it and we'd end up sharing it.”

His voice broke and he turned his head with tears. “It was the times like that which brought us closest together. He'd listen and we'd talk about what we wanted and what were our disappointments in our lives. That's why I'm here, because I want something and all I can do is ask Rhette if he'll help me with it.”

I came around the counter and hugged him. “What is it?”

“I want an heir.”

“Ok, so you decided after all this time that you'd come over to the dark side and have your way with me!”

He laughed and said, “No!”

“What I'd like to do is I'd like to see if Rose will let us harvest her eggs and we do the test tube thing. Then, rather than raising the kid, I would like for you two to do it and us be the grandparents.”

I smiled and said, “You need to speak to Rose about that. I imagine she's going to be happy you want a child, but she's going to be spittin' mad you're thinking she's too old to raise a kid.”

“No! It's not that! I want us to have a nice life. A kid's going to drag us down. I want us to share the child with you and I think it'd be the way we could do them all.”

I said, “I'll talk with Steve. You talk with Rose. Then, what we'll do is we'll get together and we'll talk. If there's a technological way, I'll do it.”

He nodded and said, “Rhette, I know it can be done. I'm not going to say anything, but I know two gay guys can have a kid.”

“Ok, that's wonderful. We'll go that route and we'll get it done. What we need to do is we're going to have to have surrogates which will carry them, and that's going to be a problem because they're not going to want to let us have them.”

Beck said, “I'll carry one. I'll give you guys the kid and then, you let John and I see it come up.”

“No, because you're supposed to have gotten your own and I forgot. That's totally wrong of me.”

Dave said, “Beck, what if I told you I could get you kids as many as you want, all you have to do is just go and fill out the paperwork.”

“How long does that take?” She asked,

“About a morning from what I'm told. What we can do is we can have someone be there to fill the papers out while we're on our way, and then, when we get there, we can get the kid or kids you want picked out.”

She said, “Where?”

“There's a place over in Serbia Yugoslavia which has been receiving some generous contributions from me. I know they'll allow you the child you want.”

I said, “What about Steve and I?”

“You want your own blood. Since you wanted that, I never mentioned it.”

“Oh, well, let me speak to Steve. If we can have our own, then that's fine, but I'm not minding either way.”

He smiled and said, “Ok, now what you guys aren't thinking about is you're going to need to hire nannies, get furniture picked out, and get a lot of things bought.”

He turned to me and said, “You need one of those papoose things because you're going to be carrying one around with you wherever you go.”

“Oh, well, ok, but let's plan that for early this upcoming week.”

Beck smiled and said, “You're going to schedule getting a kid?”

“No, to go shopping. I'm not going to be caught like I was with that funeral. Heck, who knows how much Neiman Marcus wants for kid's clothes!”

She laughed and said, “Hon, I'm not going to let you raise my God child on ebay either.”

“No, but that's a thought. I bet there's a lot of good items on there for them locally. We'll have to look.”

Dave chuckled and said, “Rhette, I'll go up now. You speak to Steve and I'll speak to Rose.”

“Ok, what do you want on your omelet in the morning?”

“I don't know. Why?”

“I'm having omelets, hash browns, biscuits and jelly, country fried steak and white gravy.”

“Oh, it sounds good.” He said, “I'll take mine western style.”

“My western style or western western style.”

He smiled, “I don't want that fire hot stuff you call western, I want something which is going to be setting with me.”

“Ok, so you want the works without the green chilis.”

Beck started laughed and asked, “Why are you asking about that now?”

“Because I've got a tribe of people to cook for and I've got to get all the veggies chopped up, but first of all, I've got to go get the veggies from the Rolls down there.”

Dave said, “Why'd you take the Rolls down there?”

“It was hitting the fan. I had to get in as fast as I could. I went in at the Midas place and went right there.”

“Ok, you were over at the Ox.”

“Yeah.”

“Lana give you much guff?”

“No, she was trying to get a rise from Robert.”

He laughed and said, “The poor kid.”

I nodded and said, “You don't realize he's named after Bob, do you?”

“No, I'd never thought of it. I wonder how he's going to take it when he see's him?”

“I don't know, but I've got to get down there and see everything. He and I are agreeing on some things which need to be done in the tunnels. Be prepared to spend some money.”

“Ok, just tell him not to go overboard.”

“We're not, but we're going to be doing a lot of security changes. I don't like the thought of no checkpoints.”

“What do you mean?”

“Ok, there are no stops down there. Right now, you get in, you got free range to ride the tunnels. That's crap.

He's in agreement we need the stops, but what I want down there are safety measures implemented which are two-fold.”

“Like what?”

“Ok, let's say you're a level 1 recruit down there for the first time. You make it in the gate, now do you get as much clearance as you or I do?”

“No”

“It happens down there. To me, that's crap. What we need are radio transmitters in our beings which broadcast our whereabouts down there.

When you drive along, or I do, we're granted passage and privilege to everywhere. If we want certain people in an area and no one else, then they can go there, but no one else. It means not only do those gates not open, but those hydraulic street stops don't go down beyond that point. The days of joyriding down there are over.”

“What if they're on 4 wheelers like tonight?”

“We're going to have laser barricades. They're welcome to proceed, but they're also welcome to drive through and get cubed. It will stop someone and it'll leave them trapped if they don't have authorization in that zone. That means no one comes down in through an air shaft and gets to run all over the place too.”

He nodded and said, “Ok, I'll get on it. It's all making sense.”

“Ok, but one last thing and I'll get off your ass about tonight.”

“Ok”

“Central Control gets put behind eight inches of steel. Those which enter have to be triple locked through and not even us can enter there if we're under threat.”

He nodded and Beck asked, “What happens then?”

I said, “Beck, first of all, there are alternative locations for us to assume control which aren't in there. Tonight, those dumb fucks had us by the balls and let us slip between their fingers. That man saved our asses and took a bullet to stop them. He's lucky he's not dead.”

She said, “You mean to tell me if those people had known what they were doing, they could have won?”

“Yeah. Fortunately, my control panel overrides theirs. We saw the gun flashes when we drove by, but we got to the arsenal. Had they jammed the arsenal from there, we'd had problems. Instead, we made it through and I got up and out of there to a location where I could assume control from them.”

She shook her head. “Guys, you were lucky.”

“Yeah, but what we need to do now is do some other things which will get this changed. We're learning from the mistakes and then, it won't happen again this way.”

Dave said, “Name another thing?”

“Put a roll down door over the entrance to that tunnel. Several thousand people drive by it every day and with it sitting at an angle, everyone's got to wonder why it's different than the others. Plus, having a locomotive block the entrance was damned dumb.”

Dave looked surprised and said, “What!”

“They drove a train down there and parked it. Then they disabled it so that no trucks could drive up the tunnel. That's our security.”

Dave shook his head. “Rhette, I'll get that changed. One thing I want to do is I want us to get this place buttoned up and then, I want to have our guys like Bob, you, and I get our heads together and see if we can crack this place open.”

“Ok, but there are weak points. One of them is up there in front of that Midas. I was able to get in with the Rolls garage door opener and then go down. Once I was down here, there wasn't a thing stopping me. Had I stolen that car, it would have been over just because of the garage door opener.”

“I like the chips in us telling the central computer who we are. That way, we can see where people are. Where their last known location was, and let that do the talking for us.”

“Yeah, but those chips have to be placed in them when they're asleep. I don't want everyone knowing where they are so they can just go to that point and dig it out of a dead person.”

He nodded and said, “Where do you suppose we locate it?”

“It's got to be placed someplace where we know it is. Where the person's not going to feel too much pain, and where we know the person will be dead in order to give it up.”

He said, “Ok, either their brain or their heart.”

I said, “I think their brain. Now, how do we get it there without a helluva lot of surgery.”

Beck said, “Guys, I'm going to suggest something, but that's entirely up to you.”

“Ok.”

“I'd suggest you put it in their groin. You can put it there and do so with a quick shot of lidocaine and plant it. You're getting too complex with this. You need to think we're going to need to do a million guys across this country at least.”

I looked at Dave and said, “She's thinking a lot bigger than what we were. She's right.”

I patted her hand and said, “Thanks hon.”

She said, “Why don't we go get those veggies so we can be cutting something while we're talking?”

Dave smiled and said, “Just call someone and tell them to bring them up. You might as well park the car down at the bottom of the elevator too.”

“I need to go out to the Overland Park house sometime and get my helicopter. It'd do me better to have it down here instead of out there.”

“Steve like it?”

“Steve's in love with the place. He's in love with the city, and he loves things here. He told me he wants this city to feel like his city when he drives down the street.”

Beck smiled and said, “You know, I already feel that way when I drive around Miami. It's liberating because I drove down to the docks and they flagged me right on in. It seems like suddenly, I can go places and be seen as someone now instead of no one.'

I nodded and said, “Be sure to let someone know if they treat you like no one in the future. Also, if they give you shit, you get on the horn and you call their supervisor and the person you know who runs that place. If they're the person who is over the place, you dress them down and you get them to straighten it up.”

“I've already been doing it. One of the guys who I had issues with was over the docks. He had balls enough to say they'd never put a woman in as the head. I politely told him I expected his resignation on my desk in the morning.

He wanted to get mouthy and I said, “No thank you. I'll have someone come get that resignation.” He told me to bring an army. So, I went down and I called security. We went down to the man's office and I walked in. I stood in front of him and said, “I'll take that resignation now. My army is standing outside and your ass is history here. Don't ever bother thinking you can apply for work in this profession again because it won't be allowed.”

I nodded and smiled. “Hon, what we're going to do is we're going to get a database of everyone's names and stats. Then, we'll have all that stuff so we can get people blackballed.

Now, what I need to ask you is what you've done about pulling all those people in who never showed and swore allegiance.”

“We're getting it done. It's time consuming because the lists they had aren't really good, up to date, accurate, and just plain truthful. I think the man pulled dead people's names in so his books looked better than they were.

I do know I've had several guys come back and say the address never existed.”

“Ok, what we'll do is we'll start from scratch. I'm sorry. I guess I'm not used to deception like that. I'm glad the man's dead.”

She smiled and said, “Hon, I'm already using a program I got from the web free which is interesting. I can pull up the person by their name, address, eye color, or whatever and get them.”

“Let Dave have that address and we'll get it for here. We'll need to get in and do some modification as I'm sure it doesn't have what hand they are and whether they shoot left or right handed.”

She looked perplexed and said, “What's that got to do with anything?”

“Well, let me show you something. You see this? I can't wink my right eye. I can my left, but not my right. Why? I dunno, but when I'm aiming a gun, I have to shoot left hand. I'm right handed, but have to shoot left.”

“Interesting, I never knew that!”said Dave.

“Just be thankful they didn't fuck up my aiming eye or I'd be in a world of do-do. Instead, they made it so I'm still proficient enough to kill someone.”

He said, “I'll get that program and have them do some changes on it which will get me all of that information I can get on it.”

I said, “Dave, I want a sort of “My Space” site where I can pull up all the people, and their occupations in an area. I want to have all that information because I know it will come in handy.

There have been a lot of times when I have thought I've seen someone before, but with my life, I don't know if I've seen someone at a gay bar I've tended, in prison, or if they're a customer from the sign shop. It's hard to pin a person down and they're sure not giving me any information when they just look familiar.”

He nodded and said, “Rest assured, the older you get, the more you have that happen. Maybe it's good we're doing this and that way, we can have a database we can log through and help us.”

“Yeah, take for instance if we got a description in this organization of six foot tall, 185, Italian, black hair, and brown eyes. How many of them would that have us pull up?”

He laughed and said, “Oh man!”

“Yeah, but some things change. If I put on there the guy had a nice ass, then he might be a police officer or a pro baseball player. Those guys all start off having hot asses and then after five years, they're like huge asses.”

Beck laughed and said, “Hon, your man doesn't have a huge ass and he's been in that seat for 20 years.”

“Yeah, I wonder what went wrong. Maybe he's had an ass replacement!”

She smiled and said, “He's one of the few cops I've ever met that's taken care of himself.”

I said, “I don't understand it. He eats at Mabels for breakfast every morning and says he eats at a lot of different places for supper because the old women give him free meals. Maybe he doesn't eat lunch.”

Dave said, “I'm going to call down there and get those veggies. If we're going to stay up, I've got to eat something.”

Beck laughed and said, “Guys, I've got to go to bed. If I don't, I'll not be any good to my guys tomorrow. What do you want us to do tomorrow?”

“Here's what is on the itinerary for you. Your guys are going over to the Americana and are going to take that place over. I want every aisle, seat, and possible place which can be used to be searched for bombs, and anything which might be dangerous.

Then, I want your guys to build a podium up in the middle down there and have seats set on the ground floor. On the podium level, you might give me about three hudred seats behind the podium.”

Dave asked, “What are you going for?”

“I want all those families of the dead up there behind me. I want all the other people down in those seats and in the bleachers.”

Dave said, “Ok, what we' need is an end of the place blocked off Beck. It's an old Basketball stadium, so use the bleachers behind him as their seats.

Then, use the floor area and make it so right up front is enough space for seating next to wheelchairs. Have that center aisle about ten feet wide so when those wheel chairs are seated there there's still walking area of about six feet.”

She nodded and said, “Ok, so it's like a huge conference.”

“Yeah” Dave said.

She asked, “Ok, how many seats for guests of honor?”

I said, “Ok, here's what I want. I want enough room so you and John can sit up there. The Bates can sit up there with all their families. Dave and Little John can sit up there with their families, and then, Steve and I can have my parents and family that chooses to show there.”

She said, “Ok, how many seats is that?”

I turned to Dave. He said, “Put about forty up there to the sides. In the middle have tables with red and black satin alternating and white lilies. At the table, have twelve seats and then, we'll just have everyone else sit where they can out in the crowd.”

I looked at Dave and said, “Lilies?”

“That was dad's favorite flower.”

“No it wasn't? He hated lilies. He said they reminded him of a friggin' funeral. He loved Peonies and Roses. We spent a fortune on thornless roses here and they all died. The peonies outside are taking over the place, but that's why they're there.”

He wrinkled his brow and said, “Who liked lilies?”

“Certainly not Meemaw or your dad. Meemaw loves Snapdragons which also reminded your dad of a funeral.”

Dave smiled and said, “You're going to laugh, but at dad's funeral, I had a lot of lilies because I thought they were his favorite.”

I chuckled and said, “I'm surprised he didn't come up out of that casket and tell you it reminded him of a funeral.”

He laughed and said, “I would have told him, 'Yeah, dad, yours, now lay down and let us get this over with.”

I laughed and said, “I'm surprised he didn't have that detailed out to the perfect split second.”

“He said he had thought about it but kept putting it off because he thought you would've took care of it.”

“Oh man.” I said feeling bad. “Dave, you really should have gotten someone to get me there.”

He said, “Hon, it's all water under the bridge now. It's sad to say, but that's all I can say.”

I nodded and said, “Well, we're going to do what we can to make things better in the future.”

Dave turned to me and said, “Ok, let's make a pact here. At my funeral, I want a black casket. The lining I want white. I want my black suit and that's it. I don't want any flowers on the casket, and I don't want any around the room. I just want a photo of Rose put over my heart and you to have my viewing without a funeral service.”

I looked at him and said, “No funeral service?”

“No, let people eulogize me to everyone else out on the streets. Either they're going to talk good or bad, so I'd rather they do it out there and tell the truth than be fake in talking good about me.”

I said, “Ok, I'll do that.”

I turned to Beck and asked, “Any special requests?”

“I've got mine all written out. The only thing I'll want different now is to have some sand from the beach put in my casket under my feet. I'll tell God when I get there he can pave the streets with gold, but Miami's sand is as close to Heaven as I want things to be.”

I said, “Well, for me, I could care less. I imagine I've got to be buried, but it's something I don't care too bits about. If I had my rathers, I'd rather I be cremated and mixed with some concrete and made into little dildos to be shoved up all my enemies asses. That way they knew I did give a fuck, and they took it one last time.”

Dave laughed and said, “Oh man! You know that would be hard to get that many people down there into the tunnels.”

I said, “Not really, I'm mellowing out. There's not as many on my enemy list as there once were.”

Dave asked, “Top ten list of your worst enemies, and Beck, write this down.”

“Number 1. Robert Hayes. A Leutinent at Farmington Correctional Center. He once handcuffed a man with his hands behind his back and then tackled him from behind to ride that man's face into concrete the day before he was to be released. The man went home needing major reconstructive surgery.”

Number 2. Ed Francis He's a guard at Farmington. The man harassed with his religion so he could judge others. We finally had him removed from our housing unit because of the religious issue. We sued on grounds his job was correctional officer, not prison chaplain.”

Number 3. Rachel, Chad's mom. Any mother who would knowingly kick her child out because he has problems needs a swift kick in her ass. Yeah I liked him, but having him thrown away at me because she didn't want him was stupid.

Number 4. I don't know. That's all I can think I really hate. If you notice, I don't choose to hate people other than those. I hate situation now instead.”

“What do you mean?” asked Beck.

“Losing your job due to a place relocating to Mexico tops that list. Hate crime is a second. Third is drunk drivers who beat the system.”

Dave said, “You'd put that up there at the top of your list?”

“Dave, right before I got out, there was a cute little guy who was brought to me because someone I knew out on the streets wanted me to help him.

He came over and I'm thinking I wish I had more time to do because the guy is that hot. Then, I asked him what he was in for. He said Vehicular Manslaughter and I told him there's no such thing in Missouri, but either it was third degree or first degree murder based upon whether they could prove deliberate intention.”

Beck asked, “What's that mean?”

“Ok, here's deliberate intention. You and a group of girls all make a date to go to see the Chippendales perform. ON the way down in the elevator, one of the girls says, “Girl, I'm going to get so fucking drunk tonight I'll have any man that will have me.” Then, you go out and she get a little tipsy and drives herself to a jail cell because she has a wreck and kills three people.”

Beck said, “Deliberate intention?”

“Hon, she made the statement she was getting drunk in that elevator. She may of not intended to kill someone, but she sure said she was going to get drunk on purpose. That took that crime maximum punishable by ten years and made it a 50 year minimum prison term.”

Beck looked shocked. “My girlfriends say that all the time!”

“Yeah, I hear it all the time too. You don't know how many time I want to tell people to shut their pie holes because they're fucking themselves into longer prison terms.”

Both of them looked shocked. I said, “Dave, I'll tell you now, Don't ever bring me someone who's went out and killed a family with a car and say it's no big thing. That kid stood there in front of me and was bitching because he only got ten fucking years for killing a family while he was driving drunk.

What I'll tell you is that family is just as dead as if he pulled a pistol and blew them away. The only difference between the two is he could have called a taxi, or rode a bus home and left the car parked. Someone who charges into a bar and kills someone with a pistol is stupid, but that person who for either lack of a dollar, or pure ego killed someone. I refuse to entertain the thought of allowing them into this organization.”

Beck said, “Man, you know I never thought about it much, but you saying how you felt and how people do things really let me know how the law can change over some words.”

I said, “Oh hon, let me tell you the most used words which will fuck a man more than saying 'I do' and that's, “I'm going to kill you bitch.” He'll say it and he'll probably not intend on killing her, but he'll scream it and the neighbors next door will testify they heard it.

What it will do is it will take that Murder 1 into a Murder 2 by showing premedetation. One will give you a chance of parole and the other won't.”

She said, “I've heard people say that too. They say they're going to go home and kill their husband, or kill their kids and not mean it. BUT, they could and those words would be used against them.”

I said, “Just remember when you say something it can come back to haunt you later. I'll tell you I'll never testify against you and I know Dave doesn't recall anything when he's on a stand, but remember to be careful what you say where too.

In an elevator, they have video and most have sound. No, it's not legal for them to do that, but who's to say the guard gets his kicks listening to and viewing people have sex on it. So, just be careful.”

She laughed and said, “I understand. If I had that job, I'd probably do it too.”

“Yeah, but what happens is you end up testifying to things you see and then you get fired....if you work for me.”

The man bringing the veggies up entered the room. He handed the bag to me and I went over to the chopping block. As we talked, I chopped veggies.

Beck asked, “What would you like for me to do?”

“In the walk in, over to the right side is a box of bagged eggs. Take two of the bags and bring those in. I'll show you how to work with them,”

She brought them in and said, “Hmm, I've never seen these before.”

“They're eggs you don't have to break. What you do is you take the kitchen scissors from that block over there and and you open them into that big stainless bowl over there. Then, you take half a cup of warm water and you add it into it. Then, you leave that measuring cup out and we'll use it for the cooking.”

She watched me chopping veggies and said, “You know your way around a kitchen!”

“Yeah, I love cooking, but for just two it's a hassle. I'd cook for six and then, we'd have left overs frozen. It made it nice because Kevin's good at boiling water.”

She said, “I thought you said he worked in the bakery with you?”

“Yeah, but that's something that's big and industrial. He can operate those mixers and it's not a biggie. Ask him to make a box of macaroni and he'll look at you like you're nuts.”

Dave laughed and said, “I sure understand.”

I laughed and said to Beck. “Ask both of those guys to Bar B Q and they'll both hop right to it. I think it's a thing of the cave man mentality.”

She laughed and I said, “Ok, in the walk in there is some bags on the left one shelf up about mid way to the center of the walk in of minced ham in five pound bags. You'll see it and it'll look like the kind you see on salad bars. Would you get one of those and then I'll get the grill heating.”

She laughed and said, “You cook on industrial proportions.”

“Hon, those kids upstairs are going to amaze you when they all come down hungry.”

I went over and turned on the grill. I took a brush and painted it with cooking oil. While it heated, I went to the freezer and got the hash browns. I got four bags and came in to pop two of them in the microwave. They filled it and I put it on five minutes.”

Back came in and I said, “Ok hon, here's what we're doing. In that huge skillet, pour those ham bits and try to drain the juice in the sink. Then, stir fry those until we get those really heated through.”

I went over and took a half gallon of salsa and put it in a sauce pan. It got put on the back burner to simmer.

I turned the oven on and then ran to the freezer to get the frozen biscuits. I counted out forty eight and then, grabbed twenty four country steaks.

Back in the kitchen, I took two sheet pans and put the wax paper to them. I laid the biscuits out and then the country steaks. They got put into the oven and then, I took a stock pot and put two gallons of water in it. It got put on to heat.”

Beck was watching me hustle around. “Ok, when that water gets heated, take that bag of pepper gravy and mix it in. When that ham gets heated through, take about a third of it and put it into that gravy mix. I'll do the hash browns now.”

I took the bags of hash browns and threw them onto the grill. They began cooking and I took some of her ham bits and put it into the egg mix. I stirred it through and said, “Ok, this is the egg mix. Once those potatoes get cooked, we'll put those onto a sheet pan and get those into a hotter oven. What we'll do is we'll take those meat fritters and put those into a warming dutch oven and we'll have a drainer under so any juices won't be sat in. The biscuits can stay in foil in that oven and those potatoes will be divided up so we have those in foil for each kid.”

“Huh?”

“Ok, what makes it fun is you'll see a kid look at you like you're dumb. You hand them a long folded foil packet and it'll have the potatoes and the omelet in it. They'll be steamy and warm and they'll wonder how you ever got so smart.”

Her eyes lit up and said, “Amazing!”

“Yeah, you cook it up and keep it warming. You can put the meat in there too with the gravy, but I like to add it in last. Some kids would rather have ketchup or salsa all over everything. Just the same, we can have ours fresh and they'll have theirs heated and just as good as fresh.”

Dave said, “Hon, I'll tell you now. Rhette learned to cook from someone in that food buggy and they perfected the art of cooking for a crowd. He'll teach you things about clean up and thinking ahead which will amaze you. You'll think he's got it down to the point he'll have you beat cleaning everything up.”

I said, “Hon, half of the things you'll see me do are things which will cause our clean up to be a lot less. I'll cook cakes with wax paper under them. When we go to wash that sheet pan, you'll see it's nothing. The same goes with all of those pans I've done so far. The hardest part about cleaning anything here is that grill. I'll tell you now it's the part I hate the most, but what you'll see me do is I'll do something which will amaze you afterwards.

I'll tell you now, Dave's been cooking in this kitchen because there'd already be foil on that grill if anyone else had been here.”

Dave said, “I can't figure out why you do that.”

I held up a paper towel. “Dave, that's how much dust and grease I wiped off it. There's dust in this house and there's still going to be grease on that grill no matter how often you clean it. What I do is I wipe it down and then, I grease it and then wipe it again. It cleans it and then, we are clean enough for me to start cooking on it. Had you put that foil on there when you were done, that dust wouldn't have settled on that grill. Yeah, it looks tacky, but I'd rather have it look tacky than be all dusty.”

He grimaced. “Ok, I didn't realize it got so dirty from just sitting.”

“Most people don't...not even professionals in restaurants. They'll walk out and let their stuff sit over night without a thing covered. What gets me is they'll come in the next morning and turn things on never minding the fact there's probably been mice or whatever all over that stuff.”

Beck looked ill. I turned to her and said, “Hon, don't worry about here. This place has more treatments for pests, critters, and rodents than you could imagine.”

I turned to Dave and asked, “That bat colony still out there?”

“I imagine, I've not done anything with it.”

“Your gardener probably has. He hated the thing but I told him to leave it be.”

He nodded and said, “I couldn't tell you.”

“Well, if they're not out there, we'll put up another few barns for them. I want my bats.”

Beck asked, “What for?”

“Hon, I'm going to tell you a funny story and then, you'll laugh and suddenly want bats.

When I moved to Moberly from KC, the house there had bats....lots of bats. We moved in and had the attic doors open. I saw one come flying down and thought the world was ending. You'd have thought it was Lucy with a mouse. I ended up with a tennis racket and a metal trash can lid. I'd hit them with the racket and then put the lid over them.

They stayed like that under the lids until the next day when I called a woman nicknamed the “Bat Lady” down in Columbia. She told me she'd come get them, but then told me they were great if I'd just leave them alone. She told me they'd eat their weight in bugs each night and took care of bugs which were annoyances like mosquitos and the like.

Well, I decided to let them alone and they didn't bother much. We had a in ground swimming pool and a tennis court there, so the advantage of having them was we could go out at night and never be bothered with any bugs.”

Beck said, “Interesting. I never thought about that.”

“It's a natural way of taking care of bugs. I'd rather have bats here than have to spray all sorts of chemicals and have my kids play in them.”

She nodded and said, “You think ahead.”

“Hon, a good colony of bats will keep this whole area bug free. If I put two of them up, then we'll be assured we really don't have a problem.”

When the everything got done to the point the eggs hit the grill, I know my stomach was thinking my throat had been slit I was so hungry. The veggies being so liberally given to us by the Bates, we had plenty to put on them. I dished them hot and gave Dave and Beck theirs. I cooked up the kids and the Bates guys and put those in the aluminum foil. By the time I'd sat down to eat mine, I saw the sun coming up on the horizon.

Steve came downstairs and came in. He gave me a kiss and said, “Man! It sure smells good in here.”

I got up and got him a foil pouch out. I put it on a platter and then got him his meat and gravy poured over. He took his biscuits and really put the jelly to them.

He sat down with us and said, “Man hon, this is good!”

Beck said, “You know, I really like this and it's not an unhealthy meal. He's found a way to take a lot of the fat out of it and really fill us up.”

We'd eaten and had gotten Dave his flavored coffee when we heard a thunder of kids coming down the steps. Dave smiled at me and said, “You were perfect with the timing. That's uncanny.”

“Yeah, thank goodness they'll think I did it all for them.” I said giggling.

I dished everyone's out and then got the Bates guards theirs. One of them said, “Sorry we went to sleep.”

“No problem. I understand. You had a long day yesterday and thankfully, we got things lined out so we're safer. Besides, we have a truck out there patrolling.”

They ate and then, I went up to get little John taken his in bed. He woke and said, “Oh man, this is nice! Thanks.”

“No problem. We've got everyone fed, so we're going to get ready to go over to St. Louis. Then, we'll be going on out to South Carolina. Beck will be going with us to St. Louis and will ride back with everyone from there. Would you please see Jeff gets taken to the tunnels and locked down so he can detox from whatever he's on?”

“You want him in the torture area?”

“Yeah. He won't go anywhere, but it's going to be better we have someone keeping an eye on him.”

“What happens if he sneaks off?”

“Then we put an APB out on him and we bring him back. I'll have guardianship of him, so it's not like he's going to be without an eye or three on him.”

“Ok, I just wanted to know.”

I said, “Little John, this is a personal favor to his dad and him. He may not appreciate it, but I knew both him and his brother in prison. I think he's the better of the two, but both of them are decent.”

“What about the one that......” He made a gesture of throwing someone over a railing.

“Even he's a decent guy. I think I know what happened there. I think he caught wind the woman had a stash of money in the house and he wanted to rob her to get it for drugs. Both of them gambled and both lost a chance at a decent life from here on out.”

Little John said, “He really should have thought things through.”

“It's the panic of a situation where one makes it from bad to worse. I can't understand the raping of her though.”

“Power trip. Pure power trip.”

“Well, he's fortunate he kept his ass out of death row. If it weren't for his daddy's money and the Cardinal's urging during the sentencing hearing, I think he'd saw that death chamber.”

Little John said, “Well, do him a favor and get him over here and off the stuff.”

I left the room and saw Sam rolling himself to the elevator. “Sam, I'll help you.”

“I kind of expected a servant or two around here.”

“I blew them all away last night. They wanted to take the place over. I'll get more today.”

He chuckled and said, “You having breakfast?”

“It's hot and waiting. I think you'll appreciate what we're having.”

I rolled him into the dining room and saw the kids were over cleaning things up. I went over and got Sam's breakfast and put everything out onto a platter. When I took it over for him, he looked surprised. “Steaming hot! I know you didn't just cook it that fast?”

“No, it's a trick I've learned. It's as good as brand new, but a few hours old.”

“You need to teach my cook that trick. These biscuits are like fresh out of the oven.”

“They are. They were just put in a dutch oven to assure freshness. The meat was too.”

He ate and had some of David's flavored coffee. He asked, “What's your plans today?” to me.

“I'm going to St. Louis with Robert, Steve, and Beck. Then, Beck's going to bring back some people as well as one of my new charges. Then, Steve, Robert, and I will probably go on out to South Carolina so we can make an appearance for the CNN cameras.

Then, tonight, we'll be back here. Why?”

“I was wondering. Who's in charge of security here?”

“Which part? The tunnels? Or for the Americana over there?”

“I'd like to see the tunnel security and then go over to the Americana to check on things.”

“Ok, what I'll do is I'll call Bob up and then, he can give you the grand tour down there.”

Dave said, “I can give him a tour.”

“Would you mind?”

“No problem. I've got a few business items I need to handle, but it can wait.”

“Ok”

I asked Dave, “Where do I get the scram?”

“I'll have it out for you. It's not like a normal jet. We can launch it here.”

“Where do I land it?”

“You can land it on the runway out there. I'd not land it out at the plantation until we have that road paved.”

“Ok.”

Robert asked, “When do I start my classes?”

“I've got to get someone hired. You can go with us today, but we'll get you lined out.”

He looked hurt and asked, “Can Aaron go?”

I looked at Aaron and then Dave. “Dave, can we get five into that scram jet?”

“Yeah, they're small, but you can get six people in there including yourself. It's a tri deuce set up as far as seating goes.”

“Ok, I wasn't certain.”

He said, “Why don't you guys come with me and we'll go get it. I'll need to show you something which is a special feature you're not going to be familiar with.”

“Ok'”

He called and then turned to Sam. “I'll be right back. I'll need to go get them situated. Enjoy your coffee.”

I went over and hugged Sam good bye. Beck went over and gave him a hug too.

Steve said, “You seem chummy with him.”

“Hon, that man's giving me the world. I'll kiss his ass.”

Beck chuckled and said, “I would too.”

We went down in the elevator and Dave spoke to Steve. “What I need to forewarn you about is the speed of this jet is going to be alarming. My advice is not to look down and try to see anything moving....it'll just bug you. If you keep your eyes focused upon the horizon, you'll be fine.”

Steve said, “What's different about it?”

Dave smiled and said, “Let's just say, it takes someone skilled and with lightning fast reflexes to fly this thing. One false move and you could go barreling out into space at twenty thousand miles an hour.”

Steve paled and looked at me. “Hon, think of it this way. The space shuttle goes fast, but this thing goes a little faster. It's the future in intercontinental flight. We can do that trip to South Carolina in very little time at all.”

Dave said, “About ten minutes. What we're doing is we're going to be running it at normal fast speed rather than trying to pick off any records. The record for speed for flight right now is about that fast. We're going to wait to have Rhette try some speed runs when he's alone.”

When we got to the tunnels, we were met by a guy driving a stretch Gator. He took us out and then towards downtown. I tried to keep my bearings of where we were heading but lost my way when we went into a new tunnel I'd never been in. We took a left and the nearest I could figure was we were out towards Independence.

When we parked, we were taken to what looked like a room. Dave said to everyone. “Guys. Would you mind waiting a moment? I need to get Rhette acquainted with flying this. We'll take a short flight and then, I'll have him right back here.”

Steve said, “I'll keep everyone entertained. Have fun.”

Dave walked me over and said, “Hon, this thing is going to look weird to you. There's hardly any wing and there's more cockpit than anything. What we'll do is we'll get you a launchpad out at South Carolina and then, you'll be fine.”

“Launchpad?”

“Well, that's the best way I can associate it. It's not a runway because it's more vertical.”

“Ok”

He took me into a room and I saw the scram. I said, “Ok, I'm nicknaming it 'the flea'. That's what I think it looks like.”

“It's like a flea because it's powerful. It can make itself seem huge.”

We got in and he said, “Ok, here's the deal with this thing. Things are the same, but that button there is your power. You press that thing and it's like providing nitrous to a car engine. That center lever there in between your throttles is the Hyper pulse boost. The other two are your pulse motors.”

“Ok, now tell me about a pulse motor.”

“Not much to tell you. It's like a jet, but it's way more powerful.”

“What am I going to hear when I fire this thing up?”

“Nothing.”

“Huh?”

“You're not going to hear anything the whole flight. It's not like a jet where you push the throttles wide open and it gets louder. It's just nothing like it.”

“Ok, how do I take off and how do I land it?”

“That's the fun part of this thing. I didn't want to tell you in front of everyone but you can land this thing in about three hudred feet. It's stabile all the way down to about thirty miles and hour when the lack of wing just doesn't let it stay airborne.”

“Ok, so let it be on the ground or darned near it when we're down to that stall.”

“Yeah, but now, here's the biggy with this thing. When you hit the ground, you do NOT throw it into reverse thrust. If you do, you'll go backwards and it'll take you either into the next life or airborne backwards. Neither are fun, so don't do it.

The brakes on this thing because you're going so slow are in the wheels. You can steer it and taxi with the pulse all the way down to a mile an hour. It's amazing technology.”

“Ok, now what happens if we have a problem?”

“You stay with it. What will happen is you'll stay with it. If anything goes wrong with it, it's just going to stop running. It's not going to explode and it's not going to do anything but just stop running.”

“Ok, so I'm up there in the wild blue yonder at twenty grand and it just stops running. I see the ceiling coming and I just blissfully go out into space and you'll come get me.”

“Wrong. What will happen is this thing will slow. Because you're decelerating so fast, you'll have some issues, but it's not going to get unstable or anything like you see on the Six Million Dollar Man. What you'll see is it will just slow down and you'll be pulled by gravitational forces.”

“Ok, so I just sail right on into the nearest mountain.”

“No, What you do is you pull it down and then, you throw out your parachutes. This thing will be caught by them and you'll be took down to the earth safely.”

“Then what? Because I'll tell you now folks are going to want this thing.”

“By then, we'll have a catch party after you. We've got another one of these things which will come rescue you. We can hover around at that stall speed and we can also fight off anything that wants to do harm.”

“Ok, that's my next question. What do I have on this thing which I can use to protect myself?”

“You've got the pulse to outrun anything and you've got your laser shield.”

“Ok, tell me about the laser shield.”

“Laser shield. It's that screen right there. Someone comes up...let's say a Mig 35. It thinks it's hot shit and it gets into that screen. When you see it come onto that screen, it's within your range. You hit that screen and the computer will automatically shoot it out of the sky.”

“Hold up. What if I'm in amongst friendlies?”

“Good news. You're flying among friendlies. You're doing great and suddenly your ass sees a Mig 35 coming. When it comes onto that screen, the computer is going to differentiate what was there and what wasn't and shoot the unfriendly out of the sky.”

“What's the distance I have with it?”

“Unlimited. You can take it up to wherever and fight it, or, you can be in close proximity and fight. It's not going to matter. What you need is a straight line of site to shoot it down.”

“Ok, let's get this thing in the air.”

We fastened in and he said, “These seats Rhette are your neck support, helmet, and your shock suit. They're also your passengers. The difference with this plane and others is this. That HUD up there is there for everyone to see. You can fly this baby sitting in the back there as well as the front.”

“Ok, next item before we go because I'm not seeing a fuel level indicator.”

“It's not got one. You're able to fuel it by flying it.”

“Huh?”

“The pulses refuel themselves and put their excess energy into the reserve so you can take off with it. You're not going to ever have a problem with this running out of fuel.”

“Ok, that's bringing another problem. Let's say I'm ninety friggin years old and I fly this thing. Then, I have the big one because after twenty years Steve finally took a Viagra. You going to tell me we're going to fly around for eternity?”

“No, your seat will let out an alarm and get you landed at whatever nearest hospital there is which the computer deems is the problem.”

“Ok, but I'd prefer a good hospital and not something which is really lacking.”

“We've got good hospitals all over the world we can go to and this thing can land there automatically.”

“Ok, let's get up in the air.”

“I've been waiting on you. Hit the yellow button and get us airborne.”

I hit the yellow button and a computerized woman's voice counted down from five to one. Then, it was a ride like the Mr Freeze ride at Six Flags feeling like Mag Lev.”

We sailed up in the air and out into the blue sky. We climbed and then, I eased the wheel forward to get us level.

Dave's voice came through my seat speakers. “Ok, take a look where we are. This thing flies comfortably up above fifty. You'll have no storms and turbulence. If you do, that's no problem, but what will happen is the computer is going to figure out where you're going and get you down and in as fast as possible. It's going to protect this plane at all costs.”

“Ok, now, I see I'm flying at about 590 now. Where do you want us to wring this thing out?”

“Take it wide open so I can get you clocked for the record and then, we'll get back.”

“Really?”

“Rhette, you're out over Kansas. Nothing is here except you, me, and a few ears of corn. Let 'er hang open.”

“Ok.”

I pushed the pulse all the way forward and nothing really was noticable in my sight.

Dave said, “Ok, you might give us a turn around because you're looking to me to be out over Nevada now. If you keep going, you'll be out over the Pacific and we'll have a bit of an issue.”

“Ok, how much of a sweeping bank do you want?”

“The computer will do it. You just let it know you want us to go back home.”

“How?”

“Tell it to go home.”

“Ok” I looked at my indicators and said, “Go home.”

“Yes Rhette.” I heard it say.

I looked at our airspeed indicator and saw we cruised through the turn at Mach 15 and then sped back up to get us back to Kansas City.

“Ok, now what's this thing going to do to land?”

“You're going to be amazed, but don't freak.”

“Ok”

“The computer is going to get you there. Just trust it or you'll crash us.”

“Ok”

We flew on in and I saw us come in from the North. We flew and as we got closer to the city, I saw us begin to slow. We crept on in and by the time we were over St Joe, I saw us really begin to slow.

We kept flying straight and then, it lowered us to being in line with a sky scraper. We lowered and then, about the time I was really thinking we were going to hit, we slowed and the side of the building opened up. We hit our stall about the time we hit the building and we went on in. The brakes automatically engaged and we pulled around to an elevator. It loaded us and then lowered us down to the sub-level where it took us right to the lift.

We got out and I saw the launch mechanism lift is so it was ready to take off again.

“Dave, I've got one request.”

“What's that?”

“I want that thing to stay level until we're loaded on and then lift us into position. Climbing in at that angle is a bit of a problem.”

“Ok, we'll get that programmed in. Any other questions?”

“It's pretty neat. I like it.”

“I knew you would. Now, here's the deal. This one here and mine are the two we have now. When you're in yours, I wear this signal. When I'm in mine, you wear yours. That is also your key to this thing.”

“Ok, now can I take everyone and show them what it's like to fly that fast?”

“Yeah, the military knows we have them. They'll bitch about us but there's not much they'll do. We've told them we'll give them the technology when we're through testing it. Our deal is we'll have it for two years and then, they'll get an elite squadron which will be ten planes and that's it.”

“Ok, I'm not liking that.”

“Why?”

“That sounds too cushy, what's the deal we have for selling them to them.”

“Ok, this thing is technically what they're going to shove through Congress as the S-3 fighter.”

“Ok, S-3 meaning what?”

“Stealth three”

“Fighter?”

“Well, technically it's not a fighter. Technically, the it's a reconnaissance plane, but it will engage, divert, and destroy.”

“Ok, what about theirs is going to be different than ours.”

“Very crafty. You're seeing where I'm going with this.”

“I had hoped.”

“They're going to pay us a billion seven for these things.”

“Ok, now what I want you to do is I want you to deliver them on time without cost over runs.”

He nodded. “Anything else?”

“Yeah, get it put through that the factory is in South Carolina.”

“No can do.”

“Why not?”

“They see these flying out of Kansas City. This thing is an enigma to a lot of the military because of some key features.”

“And those are?”

“Look at it, do you see a flat area?”

“No.”

“It's radar signature is none. The heat signature on this thing is none. Go over and put your hand on the end of that plane. You'll feel it and there won't be a hot place on it. That means heat seaking isn't going to get it.”

“Ok, then up the price ten billion per plane. Sell it to them that this is the safe version of the deadly one to come out. You've still not told me what makes theirs different from ours.”

“Rhette, in the programming, theirs is only going to go Mach 15 and that's it. Theirs will have some limits on those lasers. The protectionistic feature we've got of the laser control pod is that it's there and if anyone ever attempts to dislocate it from the cluster, it will make the entire plane self destruct and not be usable.”

“Ok, the military is going to really cry foul. You know that.”

“Yes and no. They're being shown the wave of the future. We're not giving them the wave of the future, they're going to have to BUY that technology.”

“Ok, now what I want you to assure me is my family's name is on that extra ten billion per plane. That's a hundred billion and I want them to have it.”

“What for?”

“For investing along side Steve's family. We're not made of money and apparently, his side is now. It's not going to bode well that I look like the pauper who landed the billionaire.”

He smiled and said, “Ok, we'll get you that. You know whatever you want for them you're going to get anyway, so don't worry about that.”

“I do because I love them. To me, it's not about appearances, but when we're setting with one of the brains of this century in my family, then I think he should get more than what he's getting.”

“He's donating it so you look good. Now, if you want him to have it, I'll get him money, but I'll tell you now we can't afford that brain he's got.”

“Well, just do it so we have something. We're going to be cleaning up on a lot of weaponry and things, so I think the least we can do is see we're in the ball park as Steve's family.”

Dave said, “Rhette, there's a lot more where that comes from.”

“I know and what we need to do is we need to sit down and you need to tell me what we've got. If we've got it, that's great, but it's time we start selling some of this stuff so we can make something off it too.”

“Ok, we'll do that. Let's get you guys going and then, I'll see you when you get home.”

“Dave, thanks for putting up with me.”

He smiled and said, “Hon, I'm going to tell you what I call this buggy instead of the flea. I call mine the Rhettexplorer.”

“Why?”

“It's predictable and safe. It's killer and it's what I think is the future. When I saw that thing, so many things went through my mind and the main one was that you'd love it. All the rest of the things, I just knew you'd go 'ho-hum', but this one, I knew you'd love.”

“Well, you got that right. It's perfect.”

“Rhette, I'll tell you now, this plane isn't ever going to be for the common millionaire, or billionaire for that matter. At the price per copy we're charging, no one is going to really give up that much change for one.”

“Ok, now what's going to keep it from being stolen.”

“All those chips you have in your body are checked by this thing to assure it you are you.”

“Does that mean I can't fly yours?”

“You can fly any of them...including the military's.”

“Will the military's suddenly go fast for me?”

“No. It's not even in that chip to where it can be accessed. We're not selling them something they can even hot wire to get a new set of controls.”

“Ok, that's good. For that amount of money, let them have the next generation be another one which just has a new computer chip in it. That way, we're getting a pretty pricey update from them.”

He smiled and said, “Your fangs really come out when it's to suck the blood from the government.”

“No, I think us getting a share of that money is good for me. Now, how much are we making on these puppies?”

“You don't want to know. You might demonstrate you have a heart in regards to them and feel guilty.”

“Nope. Just let me know I'm making a lot more than they'll think is possible.”

“Ok, the main pod of it is built out there by our boys in Seattle. They think we're making these for Chance amusements to have you a special ride like a kiddy ride. They charged us twenty one thousand for the pods. The glass canopy cost us a bit over fifty grand each. The electronics cost us about seventy thousand. The pulse motors are not very expensive at all. All in all, we've got about four hundred thousand in each one.”

“Oh man!”

“Yeah. I knew you'd be happy.”

“No, here's what I want to make me happy. When we speak to our Congressmen about this thing, I want assurances the profits from this thing are all untaxed. That means they don't get to chase down anyone and get a dollar from them on this.”

Dave smiled and said, “Rhette, do you want that deal with all of our military contracts?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok, I'll get it. I think their fear is we'll take these things over to someone who can afford it and then they'll see that opportunity slip by.”

“Tell them the price of these planes aren't negotiable. Also, tell them this if for the whole package of ten....not a buy one now and then cancel it all. Tell them if they don't take the deal, we'll take it to other countries and then auction it to the highest bidder.

Then, tell them once that happens, the United States will be out of contention for everything and you'll put it into the programming it won't ever work when flown by an American.”

“Oh man, you're really cutting to the heart.”

“Yeah, I know they're going to try to get it and they're going to try to do a lot of dirty tricks to get it. I want them to know if they go bad on any deal, I'll take the rest of our technology and run overseas to the highest bidder. They can suck one after that because they'll see our might go to blight damned fast.”

“Ok, when we go to those meetings, we'll have them by their balls.”

“You're not going to have a most wanted out on my brother are you?”

“No, to be honest, the person getting the credit for all those is a made up person.”

“Ok, what are we going to do if Congress subpoenas this person?”

“We'll go in and tell them the person just flew out of the country and told Congress to fuck themselves with hopes of ever getting any further inventions from him.”

“Ok, sounds like a plan. Let me get in here and get these guys so they'll not feel like they're lacking for fun.”

He laughed and I went in. “Come on!”

“You're back already?”

I looked at Dave and said, “Guys, I've already went out and broken some speed records and gotten back. Now, let's get everyone loaded and we'll go out and do the same with you guys.”

Robert and Aaron all but ran to the flea. Beck looked at it and said, “It sure doesn't look like it's capable of much.”

I said, “It's amazing. I'll show you things you'll really find interesting.”

Steve said, “Hon, you'll take it easy if I'm uncomfortable, won't you?”

“Yeah, but you'll be fine. I'll tell you now, the hardest part of this thing is this take off. From then on, it's a nice experience except for the landing here.”

“What's wrong with it here?”

“It's a bit scary. I'll tell you to close your eyes and that way we'll be fine.”

Dave laughed and said, “I'll see you off and then, I'll see you when you get back.”

We loaded and I said, “Ok everyone strap in and then, when I pres the yellow button hang on because this thing isn't joking when it does the count down.”

They strapped in and I checked everyone. I pressed the yellow button and it did the countdown and then took off. We sailed up and out and once we leveled out, Steve said, “Man!”

“Our ceiling is higher than others. You don't realize it, but we're up above where most planes fly. This thing is pressurized and you don't feel like you need to be. Now, watch this because we're going to go all out with the speed.”

Steve said, “Hon, be careful.”

I pushed the pulse throttle forward and Steve said, “Man, it's quiet, but I know we're hauling.”

“Hon, see that green indicator there in the middle of your HUD?”

“Yeah.”

“That's Machs we're traveling.”

“So we're traveling at what?”

“We're going about thirty five machs. That's a little over twenty three thousand miles and hour. Now, watch this because we're going to do a turn. This turn is cool.”

I did the turn and said, “You see that there? That's us going up into Montana. Now we're heading back across South Dakota and heading on in to St. Louis.”

We flew into St. Louis and got clearance to land. We landed and took it on into the hangar there. I opened the canopy and everyone got out.

“Guys, come here. I want you to feel something.”

They came to the back and I said, “Feel all over this. There's no heat signature. That means no surface to air missile is going to get us.”

Steve said, “Hon, what's it fly on?”

“It's pulse. There's a storage capsule in there which it uses when it starts. After it starts, then it's generating it's own fuel. Technically, this won't ever run out of fuel.”

He said, “Ok, what's the radioactivity of it?”

“It's not that sort of power. This thing is pulse not Atomic. Pulse is sort of using sound to break apart the oxygen and firing the hydrogens at the oxygen to get it to excite and exit the end of the plane. You do that fast enough and enough period, you get a movement of the air which is sort of what you call a SCRam which is like a jet.”

“Interesting.”

“Yeah, now, I'll tell you something. It's really fool proof this thing can be flown. The speed and landing is really neat.”

We went over to the limo and I said, “Take Robert, Aaron, and Beck to Robert's mother's house. Steve and I will need to go to the Cardinal's residence. When we're there, I'm going to need at least 4 good sized men to help us get Jeff out to the car and into the jet.”

“Do you want him sedated?”

“I'm not sure what sedating him will do with him being on the drugs. We could end up doing him some worse harm than what we're trying to do.”

Beck said, “Hon, what I think you could do is you could sedate him with Thorazine. It's been used a lot and can do him no harm.”

“Ok, we'll have to get some. How do we get that?”

She said, “Let me make a call. I'm sure there's a pharmacy which we can get a shot.”

“OK”

She made a call and then said, “We're cleared to pick it up at any Wal-Green's up here. All we have to do is give this prescription number and we'll be able to get it.”

“Ok, you give it.”

We went and dropped off Beck, Robert, and Aaron. Then, we went over South to the Cardinal's residence. What was interesting in pulling up to his place was the security they had built into the building. It was sort of like a huge D shaped building. You entered into the center and did a nice turn around and exited out the same way you came in.”

When we got out of the car, I saw the Cardinal walking towards us. He wasn't wearing any vestments or cloaks. He had on black pants and a nice medium blue polo.

“Hello!”

“Hi, I'm glad to see you again.”

He smiled and said, “I'm sort of a black sheep in my family.”

“You still have family?”

He laughed and said, “Well, you know.”

“Well, a lot of your family have been killed. They broke their word and we had another war over in Kansas City last evening.”

“Oh dear.”

“Yeah, this time, only one person lost their life on our side and a lot more lost their life on the other side.”

“It's such a shame.”

“Yes, it is, but it's the way we have to do things. I really wish we didn't have to go there, but it's that way.”

We went into an inner hallway and he made a motion towards a sitting room. “Let's go in here. They're in there. It's not been easy, but Jeff is aware something is happening. He's very skittish.”

“Ok, let me go in and speak with him alone. He knows me, but he doesn't know my position. His dad does, but he doesn't.”

“Ok, maybe that will be best.”

I turned to Steve and said, “You watch this exit. IF he comes through it, he'll be running and he'll be as powerful as a freight train. My advice is not to attempt to stop him.”

I turned to the guards and said, “You guys go and you man those doors. You guys are the shield.”

I went into the room without waiting on the Cardinal. “Jeff! Hi! How are you doing?!”

His eyes looked wild. He was really tweaking.

“How long have you been up?”

“Not long.”

“Bullshit someone else Jeff. It looks like it's been at least four or five days.”

He looked at me like he couldn't believe I cussed in the Cardinal's house. He didn't say anything and I said, “Jeff, look at me.”

He looked at me and I said, “Ok, now, your dad and I have talked. You know this isn't a road you want to go down.”

“It's none of your business.”

“Well, that's where you're wrong. What we're going to do is we're here to do an intervention to save your life. Consider this the first day of the rest of your life and you'll have it about right.”

“I don't want to go anywhere.”

“That's not an option. I can tell and so can anyone else in this room you're under the influence. My question is what it is and not whether it is.”

“It's not much.”

“Ok, if it's not much, then we'll have no real big issue getting you off it.”

He looked at me and turned to his dad. “Why'd you do this?”

“I love you Jeff.”

Jeff just crumpled. I thought he'd fight, but it seemed like he just wilted inwardly and all the fight went out of him.

I went over and hugged him and nodded to the Cardinal. “Jeff, let's get you home.”

“Where are you taking me?”

“I'm taking you home with me. We'll clean you up, get you sober, and then we're going to get you a job where you'll have some hope for your future.”

“Huh?”

“You heard me. The days of your dad's money are over. He's signed the guardianship papers over to me and now, it's my dime which takes control of your life. I'll tell you now it's not going to be me out there working to support you and hand you money to create a habit.”

“I don't want to go.”

I turned to the Cardinal. “Would you get Steve in here?”

“Sure”

Steve walked in and I said, “Jeff, I'd like to introduce you to my partner, Sheriff Steve Jackson.”

The mention of Steve's occupation caused Jeff to tense.

“Jeff, this is the way it goes. You can either come with me and we'll get you clean and sober, or I'll turn you over to Steve. He'll take you and charge you and then, given the three strikes law, you'll have to be clean and sober because you'll never get out of jail. Now, what do you want?”

“You've lied to me.”

“No, I've not lied. I'm giving you options, but the option of you going on as you've chosen aren't possible any longer. Do you want to go out of here in cuffs? Or, do you want to go out willingly and walk on your own accord?”

“I'll go.”

“Ok, now, what I'll tell you is on the other side of that door are four big huge ex football player guards of mine. You'll think I've started to go for butch men with how much masculinity you'll see, but they're employees of mine.”

He chuckled.

“If you think you're playing me, I'll tell you now those guys can carry your ass out of here and your ride will be in the trunk of that limo instead of the back. You got me?”

“Why?”

“Because a headliner for that big old bitch cost fifteen grand. The hides for the seats cost more than the car does used. So, rather than have you think you're good enough to fuck it up, I'll have you puke your guts out in the trunk where a Rug Doctor can clean it up.”

“I'll be ok.”

“You promise? Because I'll tell you what. It doesn't matter if I'm out there in the middle of Germania or on I-55, I'll chase your ass down and I'll beat it. You got me?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok. Now, let me speak with your dad and the Cardinal for a moment.”

He sat down and I said, “Guys, Jeff's given me his word he's going to go. We'll do this his way, but I'll tell you now he's not going to be selling out on me.”

Jeff's dad came over and hugged me. “Rhette, I really hope things work.”

“Sir, what you need to know is he's going to be going to work for me. I've got a job lined up in which he'll really wonder how in the hell I got it for him.”

The Cardinal chuckled and said, “Jeff, Rhette is someone I know you like. We've spoken about him and you said you only have fond memories of him.”

Jeff smiled. “Yeah, we've been through some times together.”

I laughed and said, “Jeff knows I'm not likely to fall for his charms and get lied to without him having repercussions. One of the biggest fights I ever was in was against Jeff and his celly. He and his celly and Kevin and I all went into battle and he saw I'm not afraid of whipping his ass.”

Jeff laughed and said, “I'll tell you what. Rhette throws a punch and that's one thing, but when he puts a can of Tuna in a sock, watch out!”

I laughed and said, “The story there is I shared a cell with Jeff for three weeks. Each week, Jeff would make up excuses as to why he couldn't clean the cell. The second week, he said he'd do it next week, so I let it slide. Then, the next week came and I rolled everything out of the cell.

He didn't get up out of the bunk, so I decided to let the tuna hit the sock. I swung it up under the top bunk and it hit that thing with a whunk. He sat up in that bed and I brought that can down. What happened was the can hit the edge of the bunk and cracked open. I'm slinging this thing and it's slinging Tuna juice all over the place. He started laughing and said, “All you had to do was ask!”

Everyone laughed and I said, “After that, we had no problems with him cleaning the cell. Then, he got moved and I did and then, a year later, I was with Kevin and we had that fight. I think it was then that Jeff got respect for me because he thought I wouldn't hit him.”

Jeff said, “Hit me! He let loose with a cannon! One second, I was standing there telling him to go ahead and let loose with this best shot and the next, I'd done been rocked!”

The Cardinal really laughed and said, “Guys, just be good to each other is all I ask.”

“I will. Jeff's entered my family and I'll treat him as good as anyone else.”

I went over and hugged Jeff's dad. “I'll have him doing well.”

“I think you will. Keep in touch.”

“For the first month, I'll keep in touch, but you're not going to hear from him. Then, after that, you'll hear from him once a week and we'll get it down to daily.”

He nodded and I said, “Don't worry.”

Jeff stood up and I walked arm in arm with him. When we went through the doorway, I felt him tense up. “Jeff, you break and I'll trip your ass about three steps out. You got me?”

“Yeah.”

Steve said, “I'm about half a step back. We'll do it without cuffs or with.”

Jeff turned to me and said, “How'd you get hooked up with a Sheriff?”

“You take a look at him? He's easy on the eye and it was either get arrested by him or invite him in for tea. He chose the tea and since then, we've had it good.”

Jeff laughed and said, “What happened to Kevin?”

“We're still friends, but we split up. He's now with Steve's little brother.”

“Oh, that's interesting.”

“Yeah, both of them are great.”

“You know anyone you can hook me up with?”

“Possibly one, but you have to get your shit in order first. I'll not waste his time on a junky.”

“Whoa. You really know how to hurt someone there.”

“I call it as I see it. What the fuck are you doing on the shit?”

“It's a lot harder to get off than it is to start.”

“Bullshit.”

We got into the limo and I said, “Jeff, you go up there and sit on the jump seat. Steve will be back here by the door. I'll sit up here so if you attempt to make a run for that door, I'll knock your ass out before you get to Steve.”

Jeff looked at me and said, “You said my dad gave you guardianship papers. Why?”

“Because I'm taking you across state lines...not once, but several times. The first time, you're going to Kansas City. You'll go through your first 28 days there and then, we'll take you to South Carolina and get you some Sun and Fun. By then, you'll have the Summer coming and we'll have you back to Kansas City for you to meet your fella...if that's in the cards.”

“What's he like?”

“I can't tell you. I know the guy's voice is sexier than hell. I know the rest of his family are all fine, so I imagine he's a babe too.”

“You're a lot of help. How old is he?”

“Couldn't tell you. He works for me in a very classified position.”

“What do you do?”

Steve said, “Rhette, don't answer that. If he doesn't know, don't jeopardize yourself until he's got six weeks in. Then, he'll be clean and won't try to blackmail you with it.”

Jeff looked at him and his eyes showed anger.

I said, “Jeff, deal with it. Steve will protect me better than Kevin ever did. He's got the ability to get to me better than Kevin did and I'll tell you now, he has parts of my heart which Kevin couldn't reach after all this time.”

Jeff shook his head and said, “Man! That has to be powerful because I know how you and Kevin were.”

“I know how you and Carla were. You can thank me now that I didn't mention Carla's name in there.”

Jeff smiled and said, “You don't get it do you?”

“What?”

“My dad's never going to accept me being gay.”

“Bullshit. I think if faced with either having a junky son or a gay son, I think he'd tell you to toke up a dick and get over it.”

“Do you think so?”

“Yeah. I do. In fact, I'll serve that up to him so he'll have it dealt with before you have to bring it up to him.”

“He won't deal with it.”

“Bullshit. I'll tell you now there are a few things I know about your dad. One, he has several gay guys on his staff. Two, he is more open minded than you give him credit. Three, he is waiting for you to make that revelation so you can just live peacefully within yourself.”

“Do you think so?”

Steve interrupted. “Jeff, I don't know you and you don't know me. I'll tell you for a long time, I chose not to be with anyone rather than offend my dad. I did what was expected of me and I lived the perfect little world. Then, I met Rhette.”

I nodded and said, “Jeff, how many of his words did you feel? You're doing the same thing. BUT, your dad isn't there. Steve's dad gave him a name and so did yours. Yours expects you to live life where he's not embarrassed and Steve's did too.”

Jeff turned to Steve and said, “How did you do it?”

“It wasn't easy. I chose to go through life and not let anyone know. Then, my dad got sick and it didn't matter anymore. I met Rhette and when I brought him home, my dad was dying and he accepted Rhette. It was interesting.”

Jeff smiled and said, “You know, I've known Rhette for a long time. What I've seen with him is he's really changed. He used to be someone that had a reputation where he was as easy as a cheap whore. The guys he went through were amazing.

When I came upon the scene, I went there to see him and hoped he'd let me have some. He looked at me and told me he couldn't with me because he'd want it to be more and right now he wasn't looking for more. By the time he was looking for more, I was already involved with Carla.”

Steve asked, “Who's Carla?”

Jeff blushed and I said, “Steve, let's just say Carla was someone in prison that a lot of guys all went apeshit for. Me, when I first saw Carla, I actually thought Carla was a woman caseworker. She had boobs and had curves guys just don't have.”

Steve said, “Ok, was she a pre-op transexual?”

I said, “It's more complex than that. Carla had both sets of equipment.”

“Huh?”

“Yeah, you heard me. Because she had a dick, they put her in a man's prison. Then, the administration there took her down and made her everyone's freak show by taking photo after photo of her. It was ridiculous.”

Jeff said, “You know, Carla didn't complain about it. She used it as ways to get things in that she normally couldn't get in.”

“Yeah, but I heard things and I'll tell you now, what they did there was way beyond what was cool.”

Jeff said, “Yeah, but you need to know she was playing everyone and was getting off on it just as much as they were.”

“Well, if it had been me, I'd played the game and then, I'd have turned the tides around until they were so screwed with sexual harrassment lawsuits they'd all lost their jobs.”

Jeff said, “You know she didn't mind it.”

“No, because I also know she had that shit.”

“That's just a rumor.”

“Bullshit. You play that game and tell yourself that, but I'll tell you something and you take it to the bank.

Right before I got out, I went over and spoke to the shrink. Not one time in the time I was there, did I ever go over there. When I got there, the guy had my files out there and he was looking at all the guys I had been with and stood there amazed at the jigsaw puzzle.

I went over to the table and he had a huge diaghram and you could see who had banged who and he couldn't believe I'd not been with anyone she'd been with.”

Jeff said, “I know I've been tested and I don't have it.”

“Jeff, she protected you. You don't get it. You were the money man. Why is it she brought back rubbers? It was because she wanted your ass non-contracting so you would get the money and you would get her what she had coming.”

He looked at me and said, “It wasn't like that.”

“Bullshit. You're so fucking blind you can't see it.”

I turned to Steve and said, “Steve, sometimes you can take the horse and throw him in the water. He'll swim in it and then he'll give rides like he's a fucking Merry Go Round and then, when you tell him he lucked out and didn't get sent to the glue factory, he'll tell you it wasn't like that.”

Jeff said, “Ok, if you're so fucking smart, then you tell me what it was about.”

“Ok, dumb fuck I'll do that!

You, dumb fuck, were the money man. She latched on to you because you had daddy's money. She rode that gravy train all the way out of prison. She had you get her an apartment and she had you set that fucking thing up. Now, you tell me if it wasn't all about that, then why the fuck didn't she have it all on her own!?”

“It wasn't about that.”

“No it wasn't. How long did you get used outside of prison?”

“She was married!”

“Oh, well did you see a wedding license? Or, was that the thing she said to shack up in the apartment you paid for with someone else?”

“I gladly paid for it. She saved my life!”

“I know. I said that with Kevin too and you know what? We made it through and we lived to see the end of it. BUT, we did it ourselves. We could tell others we needed that person, but in actuality, we only needed ourselves.”

He looked at me and Steve said, “Hon, do you realize what you said?”

Jeff smiled.

“Yeah I did. I know I'm stronger than I let on, but Steve, just like Jeff, I needed to be needed. You need to be needed. We all yearn to be desired and loved.”

Jeff said, “Guys, I'm going to have to have a fix here. If I don't, it's not good.”

I said, “Not happening. Give Steve the shit.”

He looked at me like I'd gone insane.

“Jeff, look at me. Steve's not going to arrest you. First of all, he's about four states out of his jurisdiction. Second of all, he's wanting to see you get clean as much as I. SO, hand the shit over.”

“Rhette, I can't. If I do, then it gets bad.”

I turned to Steve and said, “Ok, it's time to cuff him up.”

The guys sitting in the jump seats up towards the front all moved. They pulled Jeff down and I rolled him over onto the floor face down.

Steve said, “Babe, I don't have handcuffs.”

“That's ok, they've got them.”

The guys brought Jeff up and had him strapped.

“Jeff, those straps are so you don't hurt yourself. When we get to the jet, you'll have your own room and the guys will take care to sit with you during the flight to Kansas City.”

“What are you going to do with me in Kansas City?”

“You really want to know? I'll tell you. You remember Fat Cat Wilson?”

“Oh man.”

“Yeah, he works for me. You know what he's capable of doing to people and I'll tell you now I've given him a whole room of torture devices so he can really perfect the art of what he does best.

One of the things he'll be responsible for is you. He's not going to torture you, but he's not going to let you have the drugs. He'll see you're well cared for and you're not allowed to hurt yourself.”

“How do you know that? I don't even know what I want myself.”

“The key to that is having dried out with alcohol, I know sometimes the thing we need most of all is to realize we're not doing things the best for us. When others step in, then we have a chance to get better.

I've done it and now, you're going to do it for that final time.”

“What if I can't get better like you?”

I looked at him and then turned to Steve and said, “Steve, do you want to tell him, or shall I?”

“You tell him hon.”

“You'll die. I'll kill your ass and then, I'll go back to your dad and tell him the agony is over and that he finally knows you're at peace.”

Jeff looked stunned.

“Yeah, this time it's the end of the line. I'm mafia and your dad just handed you over to me to save your sorry ass. He knows the clinics haven't worked. He knows Charter hospital didn't work. He knows money isn't working, so he's doing the one thing which did work. He' throwing your ass away, but this time it's either the life option or the death penalty. So, you make that choice and we'll go on like you wanted to live until you fuck me with your “can't do” mentality.”

“It's hard.”

“Yeah, and it's easy when you've got people standing there helping you. Now, how many times did you relapse in prison?”

“Twice.”

“See, what happened?”

“I ran out of money and I came down.”

“Well, this time you're coming down and I'm going to clean you up. Your ass is going to stay clean because the second I find you dirty or stoned again, I'll call you in and the last thing you'll see is the gun being aimed at you and me blowing your brains out.”

“You'd do that?”

“In a heartbeat. You're doing it to yourself. So why shouldn't I go ahead and do it to you. It's time for your dad to know he's either going to live seeing you happy, or he's going to see you in that casket and won't have to worry any more. It's time Jeff....for you to stop being selfish.”

He looked stunned.

I went back and sat next to Steve. We rolled up to the airport and Jeff saw we were there. He started getting anxious again.

“Jeff, the way things are going to go is the limo is going to go into the hangar. You'll see our little jet there and you'll see a 737 business jet there. You'll be taken onto the 737 and you'll be given the back bedroom. You'll be sedated and then the rest of the passengers going to Kansas City will be allowed on.”

He looked at me and said, “And then what?”

“You'll go with them. Steve, I, our son, and his friend are going to South Carolina. We've got to go home to take care of some business and then, we'll be back in Kansas City tonight.”

“Will you come and see me?”

“I'll be there, but I don't know if you'll see me, or not. I'm sure you're going to be going into the dt's, so we'll see if you see me or not.”

“Would you make sure I don't itch?”

“Yeah, I'll make sure you don't claw your skin off, but I'm not going to be able to help you with the feeling like you're itching. You know that and I know that.”

Steve looked at me and asked, “Itching?”

“Hon, it's nerve receptors. In an addict's brain, the seratonin is messed up. Some drugs like heroin and morphine will mess with it. They'll feel like they've got to itch when they're coming down and I've seen one person actually take a cake slicer pick and serate his skin scratching himself with it.”

Jeff said, “I get to itching and it just doesn't stop.”

I said, “Jeff, I'll be honest with you. The hardest part you'll go through, we'll probably have you sedated so you're not really having a lot of those withdrawals. We'll let your body get toxin free and then, we'll pull you back up so you don't hurt yourself. I'd rather go that direction instead of having you hurt yourself.”

He smiled. “Ok, I think that will be better. Just make sure I don't puke and aspirate it.”

“I make sure we keep someone with you at all times. “

I flipped open my cell phone and said, “We're at the hangar.”

“We're on our way. You have to remember we've got a highway down over here.”

I laughed and said, “Well, hurry along each little bit.”

Alex said, “Rhette, I've missed seeing you today.”

“Well, we were only coming in to get Jeff and that's it. Now we've got him, so we're getting him home and taken care of.”

“Who's Jeff?”

“He's a babe who is on drugs. I've known him for a while and he's been nice the whole time except for the times we've fought.”

Alex laughed and said, “That makes it sound intriguing.”

“Well, we've only had two days which were bad in the last fifteen years.”

“That's not bad odds.”

“No, considering..”

“Ok, we're now on 270 and coming your direction.”

“270 is fucking forever long! Which part?”

“We just got off Manchester and we're heading this direction.”

“Ok, given traffic is probably normal, I'd say you're going to be here in twenty minutes. How about we go ahead and take him there and get back here.”

“Huh?”

“Tell Beck we'll be back and to watch the kids for us.”

“Ok”

I said, “Jeff, You're going to sit in the back. If you fuck with the movement of this plane and jeopardize a thing, I'll land it and your day just went from bad to worse. Do you understand me?”

“Yeah.”

“No, I'll tell you now if you threaten me or the man I love with bullshit, I'll drop this thing and I'll kill you. So you deal with things back there and you be amazed I've got a car better than the Jetson's, ok?”

“Yeah.”

We went over and I said to Steve. “Cut those things off him.”

“I don't have a pocket knife.”

“Ok, I'll be back.”

I went over to the guards and said, “One of you has to cut those straps off him and I want two of you to ride with us.”

“Ok”

They came over and I said, “Jeff, we're cutting the straps.”

I turned to Steve and said, “You got your pistol?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok, do not hesitate to use it. If he moves and attempts anything, he's to be only worried about how much his brains will splatter all over this canopy.”

We walked over and I opened the canopy. “Jeff, you sit all the way back there. You'll have a guard in front of you and one beside you. Steve will sit up there so you can see him, but he'll also have a good clear shot.”

I got up front and said, “Ok, guys strap him in and then get yourselves strapped. This will be a fast flight and then, we'll be back here.”

We taxied out and I got a radio order to make way for a bigger jet. “This is Rhette Michaels. I will not make way. I repeat, I will not make way. You tell that one to wait his turn.”

“You do not have an authorized number on your plane. You will not be allowed to take off.”

“Control tower, you contact your Terminal Manager and ask yourself how fast you're about to be shut down.”

I flipped open my phone and called Alex. “Alex, get up there and tell them you're going to lock the airport down for the next half an hour. Ask them to please remember Rhette Michaels gets priority and tell them to keep it locked down until I get back.”

“OK”

I turned and hit the yellow button. We took off up the taxiway and I brought it airborne. When I got up, I hit the pulse forward and said, “Take it to Kansas City.”

The speed rose and I saw it climb steadily and felt the corrections of the aircraft to get us into position to land.

I told Steve. “You might want to close your eyes. When we go to land, it's going to be scary.”

Before he knew it, we were pulling towards the building. I heard Steve's intake of breath and I saw him brace himself for the crash. We went into the building and then over to the elevator.

Steve sat up and said, “Did we just go into that building!?”

“Yeah hon. That's our landing strip. It's crazy, isn't it.”

“I thought we were dead.”

“I wasn't thrilled about it myself, but now I'm used to it.”

We rode down in the elevator and when we got to the floor, I opened the canopy.

A man was there and held out his hand. “You'll not recognize me.”

“Oh, I recognize the voice. How are you doing Bob?”

“Well, I'm glad we can meet.”

“Me too. I want you to meet Jeff. He's here to detox and get off drugs. What we're doing is we're taking him to the torture room and we're going to sedate him. Then, we'll keep him under so the effects of the detoxing aren't bad.”

Bob gave Jeff the once over and his eyes stayed there looking at Jeff. What's interesting is Jeff's gaze looked at Bob and I said, “Jeff, I told you about Bob. He'll be there when you wake up and I'm sure he'll look in on you as will I.”

I turned to Bob and said, “You'll get him to the room safely, won't you?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

“Good. I've got them holding the airport open in St. Louis. Them people didn't pick a good day to piss me off.”

He smiled and said, “Thanks.”

I motioned for the guards to get in and Steve to as well. They strapped in and I got us back there in no time at all.

When I landed, we rolled over to the hangar. The chatter on the radio was pure hatred by the bigger jets.

I opened up my radio and said, “All of you bigger jets which were just bought out by Rhette Michaels. Please identify yourselves.”

No one answered and I said, “Gentlemen, I believe the Frontier Airlines belong to me. American, you belong to me. If you want to make chatter and further slander yourselves, then do so knowing I'm taking flight numbers and getting your badges so I can summarily dismiss you. Now either shut it, or let it ride because I'll tell you now, I'm not going to pull my bet you'll be fired.”

The chatter got quiet really fast.

I said, “Control tower, let the ladies go. I'm back.”

“Yes sir Mr Michaels.”

Steve let out a breath of air. “Oh man!”

“Hon, I'm not going to blow. They know who is boss now and I'm sure they're really gritting their teeth.”

We rolled over to the hangar and were told the limo still hadn't arrived. I called Alex and he said, “We're working on getting there. They have someone who broke down. You know how it is. One car breaking down can shut down six lanes of traffic.”

“I know. I've been there. I've also been there when one car's hood flew open and the driver drove at seventy miles an hour. It just depends on who it is.”

He said, “I see the I-70 lines. We're almost there!”

“Don't celebrate yet, those could be the longest three miles of your life.”

He laughed and said, “It's like I-435 South in the old days.”

“Yeah, remember when they had the pot holes so big you thought you were losing your car in them?”

“Oh man, yeah! I had one once which not only gave me a blow out, but it bent the wheel and a tie rod. I contacted the state and they said it was a federal highway.'

“You should have asked them where you would have done the time had you taken that spare tire and threw it out into traffic?”

He laughed and said, “Oh man!”

“It gets your point across real fast. Now you can definitely contact them and get your money back. It feels kind of cool turning a major airport into your own private airport.”

“I can't believe you're back already.'

“It's a fast jet. What can I say!”

He laughed and said, “I'd ask for one, but I imagine it's something top secret.”

“Yeah and there's only a dozen of them. Ten of them are destined to be sold to our government and you'd be amazed at how expensive those are going to be. The other is Daves and this one is mine.

I'll let you ride in it sometime and then you can feel what it's like to go over 20,000 miles an hour.”

“What!”

“Yeah, on the way over here we got it up to over twenty three thousand. What's interesting is you pop off the sonic boom and you just don't hear the rest of them. It's like its really quiet.”

Alex said, “Rhette, we're bogged down. It's stop and go.”

“See, I told you! And the bad thing there is there's no way out. You can see where you want to go and not one bit of relief because you've got to go to that exit up there.”

He laughed and said, “You're not helping.”

“Well, let me tell you something that's interesting. You'll go down the grade there and you'll see a yellow diamond sign on that concrete barrier in the middle. One day, I was coming through there in a blizzard and saw a woman wipe out. Her care did like a friggin' ballet move and when it got done, the ass end was up there on that yellow sign!”

“No way!”

“Yeah, I'm driving along in like granny mode and I'm just not believing what I'm seeing. And you know what? This bitch opens the door and tried to get out!”

“Oh man! What was she driving?”

“IT was either a Lexus or a big Mercedes. You know the year when they had them looking the same. It was brown is all I remember.”

“What were you doing down here in a blizzard?”

“Oh hell, I had to work. When I got off work, I heard the car show was happening down at Cervantes center. So, I went and got snow tires put on my car and drove down there. When I got down there, I had this great big huge place almost to myself. It was like only a hundred people showed up!”

“Oh man!”

“Yeah, you should have seen the looks on the Lamborghini girl's faces. They're over there trying to put 'em in my face and I'm trying to look at the hot guy's ass that's trying to sit in the other side of the car. He was trying to get in and I could just tell he had on a thong that was riding up really tight and pulling his nuts down.”

“Too much information Rhette!”

“Oh bullshit. You're just pissed because you weren't there.”

He laughed. “You know, what's funny is now we're able to afford those things and look what we don't run out and get.”

“And I won't either! I have a Uncle out in Vegas who has a son that owned one. He said he was lucky if he could get the car to make it a week without needing a part or something. He said, the only time he ever knew the car to drive any distance whatsoever was the trip it took to drive it from LA to Las Vegas.”

“It sounds like a lemon.”

“He said, it was like owning a whole lemon orchard with how much that car cost. What he did was he went out and talked Wayne Newton into making an even trade for the car with one of his.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, so I imagine it's in Wayne's collection.”

“How long ago was that?”

“Oh man, back in the 80's.”

“Had to be a Countache.”

“Yeah, the kind with the big bumpers. It didn't have the air wing on it.”

“Oh, nice.”

“Hey, we're up there by that sign you were talking about!”

“If you got a few more blocks, you can take and look right and see the Holiday Inn in that video Snoop Dog and Nelly did.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I was there when they were putting the bubbles down the hallway.”

“What were you doing there?”

“Testing for Union Pacific railway. I wanted to be a conductor.”

“Now you own your own railway.”

“Yeah. I need to get on one of those and drive one some time just to say I did it.”

He laughed and said, “Rhette, I need to talk with you sometime.”

“Ok, so talk now.”

“Ummm....I've got a car full of people.”

“SO, they don't know what you're talking about. I'm sure they're not all listening to our conversation.”

“No, I think it's ok, I just want to know what you're going to do with that guy?”

“Which guy?”

“The one you just took to Kansas City?”

“Jeff?”

“The drug addict.”

“Yeah, that's Jeff. Why, do you like him?”

“He's nice looking.”

“He's a sweetheart. He's gay, but I'm not sure if I can commit him to St. Louis. His dad is an enabler and Jeff needs to figure out his dad's money is his dad's and not his to go out and get stoned with.”

“You going to help him?”

“Yeah, but it's not going to be easy. I think he's mixing either Heroin or Morphine with Crack.”

“Someone said Methadone here.”

“Who knows. What I know is they're going to do a blood sample there and we're going to have to run it along with a hair sample to see what we've got him on and what he'll have to have done to get off it.”

“You going to work him into the organization?”

“Yeah, someplace. I'm not sure. I want him far enough away from St. Louis his dad's money isn't easily gotten.”

“Rhette, all it takes is a debit card or a wire transfer at any Wal-Mart. If they want it, it can be gotten.”

“I know that, but.....hey, in all your time in Kansas City, why didn't you ever go over to the security section?”

“You mean over there with a man who I look at just gives me wood?”

“Bob?”

“Yeah, but no thank you. I'd get eyeball hard ons looking at the man.”

“Well, you probably ought to lose that inhibition and see if he'd go out with you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh bullshit, do I have to get more blunt than that?”

“He's too straight to be gay.”

“Like hell. The man is gay. He just needs someone who will be gentle with him.”

“Do you think?”

“Alex, do yourself a favor and look him up tomorrow when you're over here. Take the time to see if he'd like to go out to eat dinner with you and then, just carry on a conversation.”

“Would you ok that?”

“Why not? We're one big happy family now. My suggestion is for you to just make that move.”

“I'll call him.”

“Ok, he might be busy putting Jeff down, but he'll be available some time today.”

“What's his itinerary?”

“Sometime, he's going over security with Dave. Job two is to put Jeff down for us. Job three is to give Sam a tour of things and then, sometime he's got to be on the phone with you.”

“What do I say to him?”

“Call him and ask if he'd like to go out to eat dinner tomorrow night. Hell, how much harder can it get than that?”

“Where does he like to go?”

“I don't know. Let me call and ask.”

“Rhette, see if he's willing first.”

“Ok”

I rung off and Steve stood there smiling. “You're a matchmaking fool.”

“Well, I try.”

I dialed Bob. “Yeah”

“Hi, Rhette here.'

“Oh, hi, how's it going?”

“Well here. How'd it go with Jeff?”

“I think he'll be fine. We've got a medic checking him over now.”

“Get a blood sample and a hair sample and get it over to be tested to see what all is in his system.”

“Ok”

“Now, the real reason I'm calling is I need to find out if you have dinner plans for tomorrow evening.”

“No, why?”

“Can I set you up on a blind date?”

“With who?”

“Well, you probably know the person, but he's gay and he's thinking you're super fine.”

“Really!”

“Yeah, he said you give his eyeballs hard ons and which's why he never tried to get into your department.”

“Oh man....that's got me thinking. I know there are several I'd like for it to be, but none of them would give me the time of day.”

“Well, he'll be in tomorrow for the memorial service and if it'll be fine, I'll get you reservations with us when we go to Bates.”

“OK, tell him we'll go there and then, we can go to my apartment and have a night cap.”

“Ok, I'll do that.”

“Rhette, you going to give me a clue who it is?”

“Let's see.....would it matter who it was?”

“IF he's shy, does that mean he's shy, or is he afraid I'll think he's a dog?”

“He's shy. He's a babe. I'll tell you that now.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, and I'll tell you he's been around forever and I'll trust my life in the man's hands.”

“Hmmm, that should tell me something since he's been around for a long time.”

“Yeah.”

“Can I take a guess as to who it is?”

“If you'd like, but I'll probably learn more about your tastes than you'd care by you guessing.”

“That's ok. If you're going to be looking for me, then I'd rather you know.

Now, if I had someone who recently got promoted and he were gay, I'd tell you Alex would burn a house down he's so hot.”

“Ok, let's see what I can do there. You just know you have dinner with him tomorrow night.”

I rung off and Steve said, “Oh man!”

I rung back Alex. “Where you at now?”

“I'm up looking at that Holiday Inn.”

“Ok, well, why don't you call his cell phone. He's going to have dinner with you tomorrow night and you're going to have a night cap at his place.

Now, do you want to know that he thinks you're steamy hot and he thought you to be straight?”

“Really!”

“Yeah, so just think if you'd not been shy and he's not been led to believe you were butch, you could have been doing the snuggly together.”

“Oh man....I'll call him.”

“Ok, here's his cell phone number. Now, what I'd suggest is you not call him right now.”

“Why not?”

“Hon, You're in a car with the man's father and sister and her kids. He knows his sis is moving back, but he has no idea his dad is going to be heading up Kansas City.”

“Ooh.....man......You're really set to blow his world up.”

“No, because if they can't deal with it, then they'll be made to deal with it. If they don't, then I'll not change a thing until they deal.”

“Hey, guess what!”

“What?”

“We've got open highway.”

“Good.”

I rung off and said, “Less than five minutes, they've got open highway now.”

“Traffic there is a bitch, huh?”

“Yeah, it's one thing Missouri is noted for is terrible highway planning. They shove all sorts of highways into a bottle neck and then just can't seem to understand why traffic backs up.

Either that, or they have a major amusement park exit down at the bottom of a downgrade. They'll have vans, church busses, and everyone flipping lanes to get over and all sorts of semis trying to shut it down and get over just fo find they've driven over a car full of kids that weren't doing anything wrong except dying to go to a park.”

“Sounds bad.”

“Hon, if you told me to name one spot of highway where I could tell you a bunch of people would die every year, I could do so on three fingers. One is down there by Six Flags over Mid America. The other is out there on the Salt Lake when the fog rolls in and the other is down there in Mississippi where they have that steam off those paper mills. All three kill people and all three are due to poor design.”

What would you do to make things better?”

“Down there at Six Flags, I'd put up solid white lines and solid retaining walls which state either you are over and will make that exit, or you'll go on and you'll have to turn around.

Down in Mississippi, I'd spend some money and I'd make a tunnel at tax payer's expense in which that moisture isn't allowed to mess up the interstate.

Out at the Utah/Nevada line, I'd do some creative light management like they do on the Golden Gate bridge. When traffic got to be too much of bumper to bumper, I'd have the lights stop traffic and get them split up.”

“Do you think it'd work?”

“Hon, all it has to do is save one person's life and it's worked, but what you don't see is them trying anything. It'd make you think they're getting a direct kick back from tow truck companies or something.”

He laughed and said, “We're going to have a problem with that soon out home. I've been telling people that off ramp going out past your place and Hilton Head is just too small to handle the amount of traffic. They tell me it's sufficient and I tell them it's sufficient for traffic twenty years ago, but not for now. It's not going to matter one of these days when someone wealthy gets creamed and then, it's all over but the lawsuits.”

He turned to the little plane and said, “Hon, that plane is amazing. I never thought I'd see the day I'm going as fast as I am in it.”

“Yeah, now, I've got a question and it's entirely up to you.”

“What's that?”

“You could propose to me tonight and then, we could go to Italy for dinner, or we could go to Bates in Kansas City to eat.”

He laughed and said, “How about this. We go take the kids to the crab shack and then, we go home to Kansas City and go to Bates.”

“Oh man, I know what the kids will say. They'll say ok, but my stomach is going to really hate me doing it.”

“Look at it this way. We won't have lunch and we'll have that.”

“Ok, but you'll have to break it to the kids we're not having lunch.”

“Ooh, that's not going to be easy.”

“See, I told you.”

He laughed and we hugged. Just then, the limo pulled up.

Everyone rolled out and I went over to Ter. “Hi hon, how are you?”

She smiled and said, “I'm doing great. Robert's done nothing but talk about how it is over there. He's got me wanting to eat that bar b q already.”

“Well, we're going to have it again tonight. If you'd like, I can make reservations.”

“No, Bear is wanting us to go to a place down there called the Golden Ox.”

“Ok, we went there last night. You'll like it.”

She smiled and said, “Robert said the same thing. He mention a woman who had a set of twins?”

I laughed and she smiled. I said, “Hon, let's just say the boy looked like one of those people with a life preserver on.”

She smiled and said, “I'm just so sorry it's not been as great for you guys as it has been for us.

“It'll be better. You getting on good?”

“Wonderful. He's so great with us.”

“Good.”

She said, “Father is really looking forward to getting back home.”

“Good. I've not been over there to see what those houses look like, but the way I've got it is you'll have a house there, and Dom, and Bob. Now you can have a house in between Me-maw's or whatever, but there are five there. One of them is ours and then, the next in line is Dave's. I've told Bob he could have the one on the end, but it's entirely up to you guys.”

“Is he fine with everything?”

“He thinks it's great you're coming home. He knows your dad is coming home, but he doesn't know about him leading the city.”

She smiled and said, “Won't he be surprised.”

“Let's hope. Now, where's Dom?”

“He's over there.”

“I need to speak with him.”

I went over and hugged him. “Dom, what I need to ask is you not go to the tunnels until I'm there. I hope you are ok with this.”

“Sure”

“Ok, let's get you set up in your house tonight, and then, we'll get you down into the tunnels a bit later when I'm there.”

He nodded and said, “Rhette, it doesn't even have to be today if you don't want.”

“Well, what I'm doing is I'm trying to keep the shock to a minimum with Bob.”

“Why, do you think he'll be upset?”

“No, it's not that. What I've told him is you're coming back, but I've not told him in what capacity. I'd like to be there to tell him in person, but my time schedule is tight.”

He nodded and said, “How about if I call him and we have a sit down tonight.?”

“OK, but what I need to tell you is he's over our security whether you like it or not.”

“I'm fine with that.”

“Ok, but that's how he's got to deal with you being over the city.”

He nodded.

I brought Steve over and said, “Dom, I'd like for you to meet my partner Steve. Steve, this is Dom.”

Steve nodded and they shook hands. Dom asked, “Is he in the organization?”

“No, but he's completely welcome wherever I am. When he's in the tunnels, treat him as you would me and we'll be fine.”

“It's been forever since I've been in the tunnels.”

“You'll be amazed. They're expanding them all the time and now, it looks like a major military base underground down there.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, it's not only twelve feet tall from the floor to ceiling any longer. It's probably at least twenty to twenty four feet up there.”

His eyes grew wide “Really!”

“Yeah, also the tunnels now run out to Higginsville and over to Oletha, so you can see it's quite a huge place down there now.”

“Oh man, when I was little it was like to 30^th street and just a few blocks wide.”

“Amazing, isn't it! I can remember when it wasn't much bigger myself.

Well, you guys need to get a move on and we do too. When you get over there, David will give you guys a tour of the place and then, we'll all go out for dinner this evening.”

He nodded and said, “I've been told we're going to the Golden Ox.”

“Ok, well, we'll probably see each other. I've got to do some uninterrupted rounds tonight and then, we're going to get some sleep. Tomorrow is a big day.”

With This Ring

ab

Notes From Retta:

“From My Keyboard To Your Heart”,

Retta

RettaMichaels@Gmail.com

Copyright Notice – Copyright 2008 by RettaMichaels

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“From My Keyboard To Your Heart”, “ 'Retta”, “RettaMichaels”, “Retta”, “Rhett”, “Rhette”, “Vonn Michaels”, “VonnMichaels”, and “Vonn Michael's Stud Service Night Club” are all trademarks of the RettaVonnMichaels L.L.C.. None of these trademarks may be used, or authorized without consent.

Disclaimer: All individuals depicted in this story are fictional. Any resemblance to real persons, characters, locations, or incidents is purely coincidental.