Resolutions – 10

Feeling Things Out

by MMB

"Now that we're all here," Senator Burns tapped on his water glass to get the attention of everyone around the table, "maybe we can start. Phil, since everything we do depends on adequate funding — unlike everything else in this town…" There was a general rumble of jaded chuckles.

"Everything on my end is still one hundred percent green light. All I need is a name to put on a check." The mousy little accountant from the National Security Agency stared at the Senator from Florida. "I keep waiting to hear that I can start cutting checks to the Centre again."

Burns shook his head. "We won't BE cutting checks to the Centre anymore, Phil — I already told you that. My meeting with the new Chairman didn't go well at all, and meetings between some of my associates and other members of the Centre administration have been equally unsatisfactory." He toyed with the spoon in his coffee, watching the swirl of creamer gradually color the entire container. "I understand General Curtis has been working on getting around the Centre power structure and dealing with the people involved directly." He looked over at the steely military man. "Any luck?"

"Not yet," the gravelly voice announced unhappily, and there was a rumble of dismay from around the table. "Our one success so far has been to liberate the documentation of all our efforts from the hands of the Pentagon and get it safely shipped to Norfolk."

"We can't afford to be sitting around with our thumbs up our butts, people," the Senator from Montana looked from face to face sharply. "We have a schedule set up that would mean our being able to take affirmative action in several key trouble spots around the world. We don't have the luxury of…"

"We don't have the Centre behind us anymore," Burns growled out his answer. "And face it, efforts to put everything that the Centre had been doing for us back into operation is NOT going to happen overnight. We have to proceed carefully, and not trip over any wires that activate an investigation. We're all in this up to our necks, you know."

"I'm going to suggest that we revisit the suggestion to open an investigation into Centre operations in general," Tom Jackson, Senator from Vermont, piped up from his end of the table. "The point was made at our last meeting that we know enough about them already to get the FBI nicely interested…"

"The problem with that," Canfield countered, "is that the Centre just went through a major reorganization. Many of the principles against whom charges could have been brought have either vanished or died — remember that there WAS an explosion at the Delaware headquarters just a couple of weeks ago."

"There has to be SOMEthing…" Burns insisted.

"I see no alternative but to investigate the current administration," Phillip Baldwin spoke softly but caught everyone's attention. "I don't know of anybody in a position of authority that doesn't have at least ONE skeleton in their closet…"

"That's what I was thinking when I spoke to George the other day," Burns nodded enthusiastic agreement. "The Centre's financial and research dealings with notorious underworld figures has been common knowledge in the law enforcement field for years. Hell, the Centre has been paying hush money to at least three in the FBI that I know of —and there's at least one agent there who'd give his life to bring the Centre to pay for things they've done. Bring that all out and throw the possibility of public exposure and hearings in the face of that bitch of a Chairman — and watch her climb back on board our little train of thought so fast…"

"I told you," Canfield warned, "that making such a blatant move could blow up in our faces. That bitch of a Chairman over there is nobody's fool — she was promoted from the ranks, which means she survived over there when several we know of simply vanished. I also want to bring to your attention that if we start hauling in other federal agencies to do the footwork for us, we run the risk of them tripping over one of our long-forgotten coattails. We don't need to shoot ourselves in the foot here."

"I agree that we need to not overplay our hand with the Centre." Jackson sipped at his coffee after hearing the arguments pro and con. "The lady in charge is smart — if she's been ditching our projects, nine chances out of ten she's been nuking her connections to the underworld too. If we start something without ample justification, we could call attention to ourselves — and we DON'T want to do that."

"You know," Phil Baldwin mused aloud, "if she's only been in charge a few weeks, there's a good chance that there are several less than savory policies of the previous Centre administration that she may not have dealt with yet. Between the bombing and, I understand, a kidnapping, she's been playing a game of emergency damage control."

"True," Burns was starting to smile. "I wonder if she's caught on to the way her brother used to go about hiring his clerical help?" He gazed around the table, and noted that each of the men seated there had a suitably disgusted look on their face. "Yeah, I know — the man was a slime and deserved the electric chair several times over, and he used to be our best friend at getting our projects pushed through committee there and into development. But if any of those girls are still alive, and are still working there… Couldn't we start things up over fair employment and immigration law?"

"A couple of words about Chinese Intelligence infiltration into high security research facilities and the potential National Security issues into the right ears in my office should do the trick," Baldwin offered.

"Isn't that exploiting those women all over again?" Canfield asked unhappily. "You know, we're trying to defend our country, not make this into a case of tit for tat on the backs of relative innocents."

"We're using the resources available to us, George," Jackson told his colleague firmly. "We need the Centre with us — and we really don't have a lot of choices about how we go about getting such a thing back."

"I'd like a chance to let my people get the scientists back to work WITHOUT having to go to that extreme," Curtis complained. "I'd like a little more time on that. We start investigations all over the place, and my people won't be able to get close to the Centre people anymore."

"All right," Burns tapped on his water glass again. "All those in favor of Phil's suggestion of starting investigations and seeing if that won't convince the Centre to stop being so damned obstinate…" He raised his own hand and counted Baldwin as joining him. "All those in favor of giving Doug another week to get his ducks in a row before trying something else…" Canfield's hand went up immediately, as did Curtis'. Burns swung his head over to look at his colleague from Vermont. "Tom?"

"How about both?" was the answer. The others around the table looked at each other. "I mean it," Jackson continued. "We can quietly check out to see if any of Lyle's cuties from the Orient are still on the Centre tax rolls while waiting for Doug's flunkies to do their stuff. That way, IF Doug's idea works, we won't have caused undue attention — but if his idea flops, we've already done some of the leg work that will jump-start the investigation."

"I like that," Baldwin nodded after thinking about it for a while. "It covers both bases rather nicely."

Burns looked around the table. "Are we agreed, then — we give Doug another week, and Phil sees whether we have anything to work with left over from Lyle's nasty little habit?" The heads around the table all nodded with various degrees of enthusiasm. "Then I'd say our meeting is finished."

"Good," Curtis growled with a smile. "I'm hungry. Whose turn is it to buy breakfast this week, again?"

"Yours." Jackson, Baldwin and Canfield replied in unison, then the whole table broke into boisterous laughter that banished the serious mood of the meeting just concluded.

Miss Parker opened the door and then paused without standing aside to let her Chief of Security into her home. Sam's brows raised as he looked down into his boss' face and found a sparkling and humorous grey gaze measuring him up expertly. "Is there something wrong, Miss Parker?" he asked deferentially.

"You tell me," she retorted, glad that none of the others had arrived yet so that she could grill him without embarrassing him in front of others. She had hardly recognized him when she'd opened the door — his face had a soft and contented look to it that was quite different from the pure business look she was used to associating with the ex-sweeper. It certainly was a far cry from the whipped puppy look that had characterized his countenance while searching for Davy and Deb. "You look like the cat that ate the canary."

He looked away with a slight smile and… Miss Parker gaped… even a hint of red flushing his face. "OK, that's it!" She gripped his arm firmly and pulled him into the house and closed the door behind him, "Spill it, Sam, and don't leave out anything." She planted herself directly in front of him and looked up at him expectantly, waiting.

Sam looked down at his boss — his friend. She'd been very clear in California that she considered him a part of her unconventional family. But still, she WAS his boss. "I…" He took a deep breath. "I'm getting married," he announced bluntly.

Miss Parker stared, and then the grin began to spread across her face. "Mei-Chiang," she stated with a sudden, sure knowledge, only to see him bob his head awkwardly in a nod, the red on his face just a little more visible. "It's a little sudden, isn't it?"

"No, ma'am." He looked into her eyes suddenly, and she was mesmerized by the look of absolute certainty in those blue depths. "It just might seem that way to everybody else."

"Well, congratulations," she said gently, patting his arm in a congratulatory gesture, and then stood back as if thoroughly dissatisfied. "Oh hell!" she burst out suddenly and threw her arms around his neck and gave him a quick and completely unexpected hug. "I'm so happy for you both."

Touched beyond belief, Sam hugged her back very briefly. "Thank you, ma'am," he breathed in relief and surprise.

"You WILL invite Davy and me to the wedding, won't you?" she demanded imperiously then, leading the way into the kitchen and the coffeepot. "When is this all going to take place?"

"As soon as possible," he told her, taking the mug she held out to him. "We'll be going for the license and blood tests Monday afternoon…"

"As I suspected," she nodded knowingly. "And then…"

"As soon as we can after that." He smiled shyly at her. "And I wouldn't dream of getting married without having you there as a witness, Miss Parker."

"That is GOOD news, Sam," Miss Parker beamed at him and watched him relax into that quiet contentedness she'd seen at the door, knowing that the only reason she was seeing it was that it was still just the two of them. That he would finally relax and share his happiness with her in such a personal way was the first overt sign that he was accepting the fact that he really did belong to the 'family' after all — and that, in and of itself, was enough to brighten her day. "That's actually some of the best I've heard in a long time." She lifted her head as the sound of another car crunched up her driveway. "Have a seat, looks like the others are here."

"Yes, ma'am," Sam carried his mug to the kitchen table and took a seat. He'd have to tell Mei that her biggest fear — Miss Parker's disapproval — was groundless. He smiled. He'd do that when he picked her up again at the apartment building later.

Soon he heard the chatter of Tyler and Harrison's voices with Miss Parker's. The three came into the kitchen and Miss Parker put down the trio of empty mugs on the table and filled them all at once. "OK, boys — what went on yesterday while Sam and I took a day off?"

Tyler quickly summarized the day's events. Miss Parker swore softly when she heard of the disappearance of the hard-copy documentation from the Pentagon archives. And then Harrison piped up to report that Doctor Mitchell had received another phone call from Stiller, it seemed — a most definitely threatening one. She had called the Security office late that night from the apartment upstairs afterwards, too afraid to be alone anymore.

"Call Colonel Fox and see what he can do to rein in the bastard," Sam grumbled.

"I fully intend to when I'm through here," Tyler replied. "But I'm fairly sure that Fox has his own tap on Stiller's line now. I'm betting he knows about this already — all WE have to do is sit tight and wait for him to move."

"What about this other project we know about — Black Hole?" Miss Parker demanded. "Do we know who was involved with it on our end, and have we spoken to that person?"

"Dr. Henry Zeigler was administering the project on our end," Tyler informed her. "Since Black Hole involved both pharmaceutical and psychological research, Psychogenics was put in charge."

Miss Parker looked down into her coffee in sudden consternation. Did Sydney know anything about this project as the head of Psychogenics? She'd have to call him after the meeting and find out. She looked up again. "So… Have you talked to Zeigler?"

Tyler shook his head. "He's at a conference in Berlin and won't be back until Tuesday."

"Meet him at the airport with a full security team," she ordered Sam in a quiet voice. "I don't want Stiller or anybody like him to even get a chance at him."

"Yes, ma'am." Sam scribbled in the notebook he carried with him at all times. "I'll call our satellite office in Berlin and get some extra security for him while he's there too."

"Good thinking." She looked over at Tyler. "How's Mitchell this morning?"

Tyler shook his head and deferred response to Harrison. "Well?" Miss Parker asked again.

"I had an extra security team assigned to monitor the apartment already — and I ordered one of those men to take up position inside the apartment with her, to give her a greater feeling of security." He shrugged. "I haven't heard back from him yet this morning, but I didn't hear from him again last night — and nothing from the outside surveillance reported anything amiss."

"Stiller probably doesn't even know yet that she isn't at home anymore," Tyler offered. "Her phone calls are all being forwarded automatically to the apartment."

"Any sign of activity in the unused labs at the Centre itself yet?"

Harrison and Sam looked at each other and then both shook their heads. "Nope," Sam replied. "And we had the cameras back up and the monitors installed and running right away. If there's anything going on, it isn't happening in that part of the Centre."

"I want a complete sweep of all active labs during business hours tomorrow," Miss Parker aimed at Sam again. "I want documentation checked and the security teams given a list of banned project names. If there's even the slightest mention…"

"Done." Sam scribbled again.

"What do we do now?" Harrison asked. "It doesn't seem like we're doing much of anything," he shot a cautious look at his boss and direct superior, "with all due respect, ma'am…"

"We sit tight, gentlemen, and we wait." Miss Parker picked up her coffee and took a long sip. "And if Fox doesn't haul Stiller in pretty soon, we take our evidence of his complicity in Mitchell's attack to the Dover DA."

"That's it?"

"That's it," she replied dourly. "We're legit now — we obey the law. We don't engage in our own arm-twisting anymore of anybody but our own, as much as we'd want to. We sit, and we wait for the proper authorities to finally get off their asses and earn our hard-earned tax dollars." She looked around the table. "Welcome to the new day at the Centre, boys."

"Yippee," was Tyler's sarcastic retort. "I wasn't even a part of the 'old' Centre and I miss it already."

"That makes two of us," Sam grumbled, carefully avoiding looking at his boss.

"Three of us." Harrison put his coffee mug down with a thump.

"Four." All three men turned and stared at Miss Parker, at which point she shrugged. "After everything that's gone on lately, do you blame me?"

They all shook their heads and busied themselves with their coffee.

Deb put the newly refilled cup of coffee on the table next to her grandfather. "Here you are, Grandpa," she said softly.

Sydney studied her face carefully. "You're looking a little more rested today, ma petite."

"So do you," she replied and then sat down into the narrow place next to him on his daybed. "You needed your sleep yesterday." She studied her hands. "I'm sorry I was such a mess…"

"Hush," he patted her hands gently. "There's nothing to apologize for."

"Yeah, there is." Deb took a deep breath and then looked at him in the eye. "I lied to you."

"Oh?" Sydney let his hand rest on hers and merely raised his eyebrows questioningly.

"When you asked me to go in there and look at myself," she confessed, nodding at the open bathroom door with her nose. "You told me the only thing I'd see was where he bit me."

"You saw more than that?" Sydney was curious now — what had brought this about?

"I thought I did," Deb said defensively, and looked down. "But I came out and told you that you were right."

"You THOUGHT you did?" The psychiatrist's ears picked up on the nuances in her words. "Have you had a chance to rethink things, then?"

She nodded. "I talked to Kevin yesterday…"

"I know," Sydney smiled at her. "I had to wake you both up for supper last night, remember?"

"Oh yeah." A smile slipped past the guilt. She hadn't meant to fall asleep in Kevin's arms, but she had — and evidently he had fallen asleep waiting patiently for her to wake up again. "Anyway, I asked him if HE could see…"

He nodded, understanding at last. "And he told you he couldn't see anything."

She nodded, then looked up, her blue eyes swimming. "I'm sorry I lied, Grandpa."

He gazed at her with gentle sympathy. "I'm sorry you did too, ma petite. You see, the person you've most injured with this was YOU, not me."

"I still see everything, though," she whimpered. "Why can I see it, and you guys can't?"

"Why don't you tell me why YOU think that's so?"

Deb's gaze slipped away from his again and back down to her hands, warm beneath his. "Because I can't let go?"

"Verrrry good," he soothed softly. "And why do you think you can't let go?"

"Because I'm afraid?"

"Afraid of what, Debbie?"

"Afraid it's my fault," she whimpered.

"We've talked about this before, haven't we?" Sydney asked gently, and she nodded glumly. "Tell me again why it's your fault?"

"I don't know…" she whimpered again, this time the tears beginning to fall. "I just feel like it's my fault."

"What do you feel is your fault?" Sydney decided to tackle the problem from another angle.

"That he… that he…"

"You mean to tell me that you did something that made that man want to touch you like that?" Sydney carefully kept the shock and dismay from his voice. He had to be a therapist now, not a grandfather. She nodded her head again, not able to look at him. "What did you do that made him want to touch you?"

"I tried to scream — I made him angry," she told him in a shaky voice. "I tried to fight."

"So you're saying you didn't have the right to scream or try to fight?"

"It was stupid," she charged herself brutally. "I was tied up — thrown over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes…"

"And you think that your trying to scream or fight made him want to touch you the way he did?"

"I don't know why else he would have done it," she said in defeated confusion.

"Have you considered that he would have done this to you regardless of whether you had screamed or fought?"

The blue eyes came up to meet his in surprise. "Why?"

Sydney felt sick to his stomach to have to explain the mind of a potential rapist to her, but she needed to face the honest truth about the situation with no punches pulled. "Because some men get a great deal of sexual stimulation out of the sense of power that comes with the act of assaulting a woman or a child. Assault and rape are all about power and control, things that can be very sexually stimulating to some very psychologically disturbed men — and the more power and control they have over their victim, the more turned-on they get. So think about it. You were tied up, your mouth covered with duct tape — and even if you tried to scream or squirm, there would be no way that you could effectively say 'no' to him." He could see the horror his words were brewing. "You could have lain very still and not made a sound, OR you could have fought with all your might and screamed your head off as best you could, and he STILL would have touched you, molested you — maybe even raped you had the other man not stopped him. And he would have, simply because he could and because he wanted to."

"Really?" Her voice was very small.

"Parker told me that this man was arrested in Los Angeles later for having raped and killed another woman, Deb. A prostitute — a woman who made her business letting men have sex with her for money."

Deb swallowed hard. "I know, she told me this too." And the very thought was enough to make her want to throw herself into her grandfather's arms again and hide.

"Do you really think a man capable of doing such a thing — and evidently not for the first time — would have any problems with the idea of molesting or raping a beautiful girl like you while you're all tied up and unable to fight him off?"

"No…"

"So, now tell me again. Is it your fault?"

He could see in her eyes that she was finally processing the information properly. "He wanted to touch me that way simply because he could and I couldn't say no? Nothing I would have done would have changed his mind?"

"What do you think?" Slowly, very slowly, she shook her head after thinking hard for a long time. "Are you sure?" he insisted. "You aren't just telling me this because you think that's what I want to hear…"

"No," she said in a shaky, breathless voice. "I'm just having trouble believing that some…" Her blue eyes came up to his again. "He could have been thinking about it all the time we were on the plane, in the car…"

"That's right," he nodded and then waited to see what other implications would start coming clear.

"Nothing…" Her mind was a-whirl and she looked around the den, not seeing it at all for the moment. Her mind replayed those horrible moments in that hot and filthy house in California, and it was like seeing the entire episode from a completely different perspective. She had been the first one lifted from the trunk of the car — and her attacker had been quite insistent at being the one to carry HER inside. His hands had started their unwelcome travelling almost the moment he'd laid hands on her — before she'd even tried to fight back. "It wasn't my fault." For the first time, she said it and almost believed it.

"Is that the truth then?" Sydney asked quietly. He could tell she was so close to the break-through…

She looked back at him again, and the blue was clear, and the tears were gone. "It wasn't my fault," she said again, a little more convinced. "Nothing I did…"

"So do you have anything to be afraid of?" he asked next, pursuing her own line of reasoning backwards to the beginning of their discussion.

Deb shook her head slowly. "It wasn't my fault," she repeated. It was true. It WASN'T her fault.

Sydney finally allowed himself to lift a hand to her cheek. "I think you owe it to yourself to go back into that bathroom and look again, now," he said quietly. "Don't you?"

She looked over her shoulder at the bathroom and then back at her grandfather's warm chestnut gaze. "Maybe I won't see it this time?" she asked hopefully in a small voice.

"Why don't you go check it out, and then come back out and tell me the truth this time, OK?" He smiled at her. "If you still see everything you thought you saw before, then we'll talk some more, because then we'll both know that something else is making you hang on and not let go. But don't be afraid to look and see that there's nothing there — only that one small bandage."

Deb stood and walked over to the bathroom door with much more determination this time. Sydney listened to the door click shut and then the rattle of the knob that told of the door being locked from the inside, and reached for his coffee cup with a sigh. He took a long sip of the cooling liquid and then put the cup down to wipe the tears from his cheek that had been forced to wait until he was alone to be shed.

Dear God, he had to get through to her somehow, sometime!

Jarod put the bowl of cereal down in front of Ginger and then went to the front door. "I was thinking that you'd be here sooner or later," he commented as his half-brother walked past him. "Mom did have to make my MY place the staging area this year…"

"Mom's got the hotdogs, and Em was fixing salads all day yesterday. Did you do your shopping?" Ethan asked, raising his own load of grocery bags straining with the plastic bottles of soda and water.

"I have chips and cookies of all sorts," Jarod crowed, leading the way toward the kitchen. "And I have a surprise for you."

"Not before I get a cup of coffee, I hope," Ethan grinned, and then grinned wider when he saw Ginger at the kitchen table shoveling in her breakfast, still in her pajamas. "Ah! A wood-sprite in her nightie is sitting at your table, Jarod,"

Jarod grinned and merely asked. "Who is this, Sprite?"

Ginger smiled at the newcomer and swallowed the half-chewed wad in her mouth. "Ee-fan," she said carefully. "Righ, Daddy?"

Ethan's steps died in his tracks and his mouth dropped wide open. "Did she?" He stared first at the little girl, who had gone back to eating after getting her confirming nod from her foster father, and then at his smirking brother. "She's talking?"

"Like a magpie," Jarod crowed again, this time with a warm tone of fondness and pride. "She's still a little rough on the pronunciation, but that's getting better almost by the moment — and she has an astounding vocabulary. I think she's been soaking up everything she's ever heard anybody say to her all this time, and now she's ready to let it come out." He ducked through the garage door briefly to haul in the ice chest.

"Wha dat, Ee-fan?" she chirped, as if to prove Jarod's point.

"Sodas," he answered in surprise. "All kinds of sodas and drinks. What kind do you like?"

The dark eyes sparkled. "Semmup," she answered immediately.

"Eat up, Sprite," Jarod urged gently. "The picnic's not going to be until after one — so you don't want to start the day hungry."

"This is amazing!" Ethan gaped as he shook his head and then began to unpack his bags into the ice chest. "I just saw her… how long ago?"

"The day Parker left," Jarod told him, fetching the bags of crushed ice from the freezer. "This just started a little over a day ago…"

"Has Mom heard her?"

Jarod smirked. "It was Mom that got her started. Something as simple as buying her a pair of butterflies for her hair."

"Gamma," Ginger nodded in agreement. "Buffa-fies."

"I'll be damned," Ethan said, shaking his head again.

"Bee dam…" Ginger repeated.

Jarod shot his brother a warning glare. "We don't have to repeat EVERYTHING we hear, Sprite," he told his daughter seriously. "OK?"

"'Kay," she agreed readily and picked up her bowl to drink the milk that was left at the bottom. "Go pi-nik now?"

"Not yet," he shook his head. "YOU need to go get dressed first."

"Sim-soo?"

"A tee shirt and the pants that your Grandma fixed the other day," he told her firmly. "We'll get out the swim suit later if it's hot, though. I promise."

"'Kay," she agreed again and trotted off to her bedroom to put on some clothes — specifically the jeans her Grandma had lengthened and then decorated with a ring of embroidered flowers at the hem and a tee shirt.

"I talked to Charles yesterday after you left the office," Ethan mentioned the new psychiatrist who would be starting orientation next week as Jarod's replacement as he watching Jarod carefully pour the crushed ice between the bottles in the chest. "His family is flying in today to join him after all, and he'll be ready to begin sitting in with you bright and early on Monday."

"I'm glad that worked out," Jarod breathed a sigh of relief. "At least when I leave this time, you won't end up snowed under." There was another knock at the door. "How much you want bet that's Jay?"

"No takers," Ethan chuckled. Their younger brother also tended to be the most fun loving of the three — and for the last two years, this picnic was his annual back-to-school celebration. He left Jarod still pouring ice and answered the door. "We figured it was you."

"It's no fun when I can't even surprise people anymore," Jay grumbled with a smirk and held up his set of bags. "Two loaves of garlic bread, ready for the grill."

Ginger trotted back out of her bedroom, hairbrush and butterfly barrettes in hand, and skidded to a halt at the sight of the man who just looked too much like her Daddy. She threw Jay a confused look and then turned and trotted for the kitchen. "Daddy!"

"Wait a minute," Jay looked at his smiling brother in surprise. "This is our quiet little Mouse?" Em's alternate nickname for her new niece had seemed very apropos at the time.

"Jarod says she's more magpie than mouse nowadays," Ethan chuckled at the look on Jay's face. "But I see you still confuse her."

Jarod appeared from the kitchen carrying his little girl. "OK, we're going to get this straight," he was telling her gently as he carried her close to the other men. "Who is this?" he asked her, pointing at Ethan.

"Ee-fan," she answered immediately.

"And this?" He pointed at Jay.

"What's my name, Mouse?" Jay asked her too.

Ginger frowned. This was what she didn't understand. The voice was the same. The hands were the same. Even some of the expressions on the face were the same. She looked back and forth between the two. Daddy had hair on his face, some of it grey, and he wore glasses — but those were the only difference between the two. "Doh-no," she said finally. "Sorry Daddy."

"That's your Uncle Jay. Say Jay, Sprite."

"Chay?"

"That's right," Jay said gently, smiling at his niece. "Jay."

There was yet another knock on the door, and Margaret let Sammy trot into the house ahead of her. "Gamma!" Ginger twisted in her father's arms. "Buffa-fies, pees?"

"What? Your Daddy doesn't have your butterflies in your hair yet? My goodness!" Margaret scolded her oldest son with a wide smile that told the little girl she was joking. "You bring your hairbrush to me, then. I'll take care of it…"

"Where we going this year, Unka Jarod?" Sammy was tugging on his uncle's arm.

"I thought we'd hit the beach this year," Jarod said with a nod toward his picture window. "Plenty of room down below for a bonfire and barbecue." He put his daughter back down on the floor and watched her run to her grandmother to get her hair brushed.

"Yeah!" Sammy cheered.

Jarod moved to the front door and helped Nathan carry in the load of sacks from the car and then gave his sister a kiss on the cheek. "Welcome to this year's Russell Family Fall Picnic."

"Hello, Senator Ashland," Fox said, opening his front door to the esteemed Senator from California. "I take it you had no trouble finding the place?"

"None at all, Colonel. Your directions were superb." Becca Ashland was still a fine looking woman despite her age. Her silver hair was impeccably arranged in her habitual French Twist, and her powder blue jogging suit gave evidence to the slim shape she'd managed to retain over the years. Her face was one that was well known on television, and Fox was not surprised that she was an even more gracious and beautiful woman in person.

"Can I get you some coffee?" Fox offered as the Senator made herself comfortable on his couch.

"None for me, thanks — caffeine gives me the jitters," she smiled up at him with her photogenic face and startling blue eyes. "You can tell me a little about what I'm doing here, however. You were pretty vague on the telephone last night."

"I am sorry about that," Fox said, dropping into a leather-covered chair not far from his guest. "I guess I'm starting to get paranoid and suspect all sorts of things."

Ashland waited for a moment. The Air Force officer did seem a little less than relaxed in his own home environment. "What IS this about, Colonel?"

Fox crossed his legs and draped his hands over the arms of his chair. "What do you know about a research and development firm by the name of the Centre?"

"You mean that place that blew up a couple of weeks ago — the one in Delaware?" she asked with a blink. When he nodded, she shrugged. "Very little, I'm afraid. Should I know about them?"

"Frankly, I'm just as glad that you don't," Fox admitted. "They recently underwent a major upheaval in administration, and evidently the new Chairman over there has decided to take the place legit. She's cancelled all kinds of research contracts where the work being done was in the least bit questionable."

"Sounds admirable," Ashland settled back against the comfortable cushions behind her. "I hear a 'but' coming, however…"

Fox nodded. "Some of those contracts were made by apparently legitimate-sounding military officials representing themselves as associated with the Pentagon. When the Centre shipped all the documentation back to the Pentagon, along with all unspent funding, these so-called military officials started calling and meeting with Centre personnel, trying to get their projects restarted."

Ashland scratched behind her collar. "This is all very interesting, Colonel, but I still fail to see what this has to do with me."

"I'm coming to it," Fox assured her. "I'm just laying out the situation in full as I know it at this moment, so that you'll see my dilemma."

"I'm sorry," she said, folding her hands in her lap. "Please continue."

"Then one of these so-called military officials called the chemist in charge of a particular project — code-named Veracity — and made her an offer to surreptitiously restart the project even though her boss had eighty-sixed it. The chemist promptly reported this to her boss, and her boss got in touch with me. We had a tap put on the line, and I was there when this Colonel Stiller contacted the chemist again. She turned him down flat — and he didn't sound happy at all."

"I'm not surprised…"

"Yesterday, this chemist was attacked in broad daylight at her home — received a superficial cut around the circumference of her throat." Fox pulled his forefinger across to illustrate his point.

"I'd say you have a rogue officer and simply need to call in the MP's on him," Ashland suggested with a shudder.

"I would do that and figure that was the end of it, but some of the things that this man said to the chemist during the call we overheard made me suspicious. He spoke about being a part of the group of people. So I had a tap placed on HIS phone — and lo and behold, he soon got a telephone call from a superior officer who was also involved in this whatever-it-is conspiracy."

"And just who was this superior officer?" Ashland asked, now fascinated.

"An attaché to one of the Joint Chiefs — a General Curtis." He could see that he now had the Senator's full attention. "So I started running down the names of the people who had gotten in contact with the Centre administration directly. Seems that same General Curtis had made a personal visit to the Chairman — accompanied by a Senator Harold Burns."

"A Senator!" Ashland was shocked and dismayed. "What the hell have you uncovered, Colonel?"

"I wish to God I knew, Senator. My aide and I went down to the secured archive to take a look at some of the documentation for this Veracity — and it was gone. I asked for the sign-in logs and was told they had been classified…"

"Since when are logs classified information?" Ashland demanded.

"That's a good question." Fox's eyes flashed. "That's when I got in contact with Carl, and that's when he got in contact with you." Fox leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. "I'm essentially running an investigation without authorization at this point because I don't know who to trust to hand my evidence to — obviously this goes up to some of the highest levels of authority. I can't pull in Stiller without tipping my hand to the rest that there's an investigation going on. I can't go to just anybody at the Pentagon, because Curtis' influence could be widespread, and again I'd be tipping my hand to a co-conspirator. As for the Senator…"

"I think I finally begin to see where I come in," Ashland nodded somberly. "I'm a sitting member of the Senate Ethics Committee, and I have an established record of successfully going after Pentagon problem children and unscrupulous defense contractors." She crossed her arms over her chest and tucked her chin and thought for a moment, then looked up. "All right, Colonel. Precisely what is it you want from me?"

"I need someone on the Joint Chiefs who is beyond reproach to quietly authorize me to set up phone taps and surveillance on those military men implicated in this — and I need civilian assistance setting up much the same on your end."

"Done," she said quickly. "Admiral Greg Samson owes me one — I'll explain the situation to him and get you your authorization. You might have to get clearance from your own direct superiors to work for the Navy…"

Fox sighed. "I think I can swing that." Somehow.

"And I know a man in the FBI. He's not at the top of the heap, but he's sharp. I'll have him give you call in the next couple of days to coordinate your efforts on that end. AND I'll try to keep an ear to the ground on the Hill and see what this Burns fellow is into — what committees he sits and what his record is."

"Don't do anything overt," Fox warned her. "We want these guys caught — we don't want a single one of them to slip through our net."

Ashland stood and pulled a business card from her jacket pocket. "Here are my phone numbers — office, home and private. I have yours already…" She pulled out her other hand and showed him the card he'd given to Javitz. "Carl said to tell you he'd made a copy."

Fox rose immediately. "I can't tell you how much I appreciate your help, Senator," he breathed a sigh of relief. "Now, perhaps, you can understand my paranoia…"

"Indeed I can, Colonel," she said with a nod. "And unfortunately, I have a hunch that before this is over, that sense of paranoia of yours may become quite contagious."

Deb walked out the arcadia door into her grandfather's back yard and strolled aimlessly around the edges of the lawn. Several of the rose bushes still had fragrant blooms on them, and she paused and bent to stick her nose in one and pull in a lungful of the sweet perfume. The day was again warm and sticky, and the feeling in the air was of an approaching storm. The clouds were gathering in the south, which was always a sign of turbulent weather ahead.

Inside the house, she knew all was quiet once more. Grandpa Sydney had returned to his therapy machine on the daybed and settled down to a nap, something that she suspected was becoming a set routine for the older man now. Kevin had retreated to his reading in the living room again, and considering how much she had interrupted his work the afternoon before, she didn't dare join him today. Miss Parker had called and promised to be by later in the afternoon to prepare supper for all of them, as had been the pattern in days long gone by. She had considered climbing into her car and driving in to Dover to see her father, to let him know that she was actually feeling better, but the possibility of bad weather had convinced her to put that off until the next day.

She eyed Davy's tree house for a while and then carefully mounted the awkward rungs of the ladder until she was standing slightly bent in front of the tiny aerie. Davy and her father had built this three years previous while Grandpa and Miss Parker had provided advice and moral support from the ground. The little building in the arms of an old maple tree was really very complete, with a roof and three walls that protected any inhabitants from view from any other yard but Grandpa's. A canvas tarp had been mounted such that it could be brought down as a fourth wall to give a young boy complete privacy. A railing protected tree house inhabitants from falling off the edge of that open fourth side and gave something to hang onto as one climbed the last few rungs.

Following the example of her young cousin so many times in the intervening years, Deb sat down on the edge of the platform, hanging onto the railing and dangling her feet over the edge. It was time for her to think through the results of her talk with her grandfather that morning, as well as her discovery in the bathroom that Kevin and Sydney were right — she wasn't covered in handprints. She had come out of the bathroom like a shot, her tee shirt barely pulled back into place, and run to her grandfather's side and nestled into his arms, excited and upset. Grandpa had just held her without saying a single word and let her slowly stop her trembling as she rested against him.

She leaned her forehead against the railing and closed her eyes. What she still wanted to know was why, if none of this was any of her fault, did it take her just closing her eyes to begin to feel those groping, painful hands and fingers creeping all over her body again? She breathed a shaky sigh — disappointed that apparently letting go of the sense of guilt for causing her own misfortune had not banished the nightmares that still beset her. What was it going to take to let go of the memories now?

There was a rumble of thunder, and she raised her head to look off to the south again. Clouds that had been just beginning to gather when she'd climbed the tree were now gathered and turning dark. She heard the arcadia door open and looked down to see Kevin coming out into the yard, obviously looking for her. "I'm up here," she called and waved at him from her perch.

"It's going to rain," he called back, coming over to stand just under her. "Come on in the house now."

"I think I'll sit it out up here, thanks," she told him with feet still swinging back and forth over the edge of the platform. "I like it up here."

"You'll get wet."

She shook her head at him. "No, I won't — unless I decide I want to. I can just scoot back and pull the tarp and stay dry and warm as a bug in a rug." She looked down at him, her blonde hair waving in the growing breeze. "Why don't you come up and join me and see?"

Kevin looked back over his shoulder at the house where his mentor was still fast asleep on his daybed while the therapy machine slowly worked his knee. He thought about going back to his reading, and then smirked and put out a hand to begin scaling the nailed on rungs of the ladder up into the tree house. He pulled himself up through the hole in the platform to find Deb sitting very close to him. He looked around.

There was a box nailed to the interior wall of the tree house that evidently served as Davy's personal bookcase. Kevin bent and got close enough to read the cover of the top magazine. "Superman?" he read aloud and then turned questioning eyes to Deb.

"Super hero," she answered. "He's faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, can leap tall buildings in a single bound…"

"And this is true?" Kevin's chin had dropped to the floor, and he came over to sit next to his friend in confusion.

She was shaking her head and chuckling. "No, silly. They're just comic books, and Superman is make-believe — the product of somebody's overactive imagination. But he makes for a pretty good story sometimes. Davy likes them a lot." She put out her hand as she felt the first huge drop hit her forehead. "Do you feel like getting wet?"

"I don't think so," he shook his head.

"Then follow me," Deb ordered and pulled her legs up over the edge of the platform and scooted back until her back was against the back wall of the tree house. Kevin followed close behind her, driven by the three drops that had hit his nose and back of his neck. She bent forward and gave a tug on the tarp that had been thrown up over onto the tree house roof, and it came flopping down and closed off most of the increasingly chilly breeze. "See?" she said, finding a place close by him, "all warm and dry."

"And dark," he replied.

Deb looked around her. It WAS dark with the tarp pulled down — the canvas was thick enough to block out most of the late afternoon light. The sound of raindrops slowly increased from an occasional tap on the plywood roof until it was a continual patter. There was a rumble of thunder from far closer than she had expected, and Deb flinched back against the wall of the tree house — and into Kevin's shoulder.

"Are you OK?" he asked curiously. "Are you afraid of thunder?"

"Not usually," she answered truthfully, cringing again as another sharp crack rang through the air and the edges of the canvas were illuminated in the flash of lightening followed by another sharp snap.

"Here," Kevin lifted his arm, much as he had the afternoon before, only this time was the one to move closer and wrap the arm around her gently. Deb sighed and leaned into him, and he once more surrounded her with his other arm to hold her close. "You gotta admit that this was much more comfortable on the couch in the living room," he commented after a few minutes.

"What's the matter?" she asked. As far as she was concerned, she was thoroughly contented to let his arms hold her and protect her from the memories and nightmares that could and often did come at her in the darkness. Her time with him yesterday had kept all the nightmares away too — a fact that presented a number of different thoughts to her all of a sudden.

"Cushions are more comfortable than plywood to sit on," he announced as if after hours of scientific research.

"Thunderstorms don't last that long," she told him with a chuckle but then flinched again as a crack of thunder sounded as if overhead. She felt his arm tighten comfortingly around her and snaked her arm around his front to hold him back too. It struck her that she didn't have to remind herself that he wouldn't hurt her like she had the day before either. "Besides, this is kind of nice."

"You're feeling better." It wasn't a question.

She nodded against his chest. "You helped a lot yesterday."

"I did?" He was genuinely surprised. "I didn't do anything…"

"Yeah, you did." She leaned in a little closer. "You gave me the truth when I couldn't take it from my own eyes."

"You mean about seeing where that man touched you?"

She nodded again. "And then you showed me that I didn't have to be afraid of you doing the same thing."

That startled him. "You thought I would…" It was enough to make him loosen his hold.

"I wasn't thinking clearly," she said, hanging onto him tightly to make up for the loss of his embrace. "For a while, the only men I trusted were Uncle Jarod and Grandpa."

"And now?"

"I trust you." She said it in a tone of complete conviction. "I know you'd never hurt me." She felt the arms slowly fall back into place around her, and sighed in relief. "I'm sorry I doubted you."

"I don't understand any of this," Kevin said with a shake of the head. "I don't understand how anyone would do such a thing, and I don't understand your reactions…"

"I don't understand my reactions either," Deb admitted in a small voice. "That's most of the trouble."

The air in the little tree house turned chilly, and suddenly the sound of the rain hitting the plywood roof changed to a much harder, more driving sound. "It's hailing," Deb said softly, listening. She snuggled closer. "It's cold."

He tightened his hold on her once more and rested his cheek against the top of her head. "Better?"

"Mmm-hmmm," she nodded against him and relaxed. They were quiet for a long moment, just listening to the pounding of the hailstones against the roof above their heads. "Do you remember the last time you were out in a rainstorm?" she asked finally.

"I'll never forget it," he answered immediately. "It was the first time I was out in a rainstorm too – up at the inn, Ben Miller's inn — where Jarod brought me after he got me away." He chuckled in remembrance. "You thought I was crazy, standing out there in the rain. You brought me your dad's jacket."

"I think that was the last time I was really happy," Deb said eventually. "It wasn't but a day or so later when the bomb went off."

"I remember walking the beach with you there," Kevin reminisced. He also remembered holding her close and kissing her, but held that memory back in case it would upset her. It had been the best thing that he'd ever experienced — nothing since had even approached it.

"I remember other things too," she said knowingly, and he knew she was remembering too without mentioning it directly either. "Do you think we'll ever be able to go back to being like that again?"

"I don't know," he replied vaguely, nuzzling her hair and getting a whiff of the soft scent of her shampoo. He had forgotten until the day before just how good she smelled — like a bouquet of flowers. "Maybe — someday." He dreamed of it nightly, but for the time being, it seemed that reclaiming the closeness they had shared was an impossible dream, a hopeless one.

Deb rested against his chest and considered her options. This was Kevin — he'd never hurt her. He had held her before, and she had enjoyed his touch. And he had kissed her before, and she had enjoyed that VERY much. And right now, she was curious — would she ever be able to replace the horrible memories of degradation with gentler ones of him instead? The only way to find out would be…

She lifted her face from his chest and, when he looked down in the dim light to see what it was she wanted, stretched up the close the little distance between them. Their lips brushed, and like had happened weeks before, the contact was electric. Kevin held very still in complete shock, afraid to twitch or move in any way that would destroy the fragile moment. "What are you doing?" he whispered anxiously.

"Shhhh…" she hushed at him and stretched up again. This time he responded when contact was made, pressing back ever so gently. His pulse was starting to race — this was Deb in his arms again, just the way he remembered and so often dreamed and then despaired of her ever being again. He brought one hand up and cradled the side of her head tenderly. She shifted, turning more fully into him and reaching up to wrap her arm around his neck, pressing into the kiss more firmly.

Neither knew how or why it happened, but the kiss deepened. It was as if both had decided they wanted more and opened to the other at the same time. Deb felt a small moment of panic that quickly died when she discovered that he was in no hurry to rush in and overwhelm her. Her heart began to beat faster – with excitement, not fear. This was Kevin, and he cared for her. Feeling brave, she abandoned herself to the feelings that he was arousing in her that made her feel as if she were flying.

When at last the kiss ended, Kevin buried his face in her fragrant hair beneath her ear. "What are we doing?" he asked softly, then kissed her neck in such a gentle move that it raised the gooseflesh on her arm.

"It's called 'necking,'" she replied breathlessly, running the fingers of one hand through his hair and then tracing the outline of an ear with a forefinger in a caress that made him draw in his breath sharply.

"It's very enjoyable," he commented in a slightly deeper, more intense tone and then bent his head down to capture her lips again. This time he deliberately deepening the kiss and then thrilled to the sensation of her being as eager in seeking him as he was in seeking her. His hand at her back stroked down her back strongly and pulled her even closer into his arms while his hand caressed the line of her jaw and then traced a path down the column of her throat.

By the time their kiss ended this time, they finally became aware that the heavy pounding of both the hail and the rainstorm against the thin roof over their heads had ceased. "It's not raining anymore," Kevin breathed into her ear and then felt her lips trace a heated path up his throat as he gently kissed the ear and then the neck behind it.

"That's good," she replied and stretched up for another long, heated kiss that resulted in their both being quite flushed and breathless.

"I should go in and finish at least one project this afternoon," Kevin informed her, his tone and the fact that he continued dropping tiny kisses onto her cheeks and eyelids telling her clearly exactly what he'd much rather be doing.

"I suppose." Deb agreed reluctantly. She straightened, pushing herself away from him and rising up onto her knees. Kevin followed the same motion, seeing the logic in the way she was moving beneath the low-slung roof. He threw the tarp back and exposed a back yard that was glistening with moisture. "After you," she said, and waited for him to carefully climb down the wet and slippery rungs of the tree house first before following him.

They walked across the grass hand in hand, both bemused by what had just happened between them. Sydney looked up from his paper as the arcadia door slid open and let first Deb and then Kevin – both looking more than a little preoccupied – into the den. "You two were caught out in that mess?" he asked in surprise.

Kevin was shaking his head. "We were in the tree house," he explained with a glance at Deb, who merely blushed.

Sydney didn't miss the fact that Deb's hair was mussed and her lips looked a little swollen. A glance at Kevin told a similar story – and neither of them really wanted to look at him directly right now. Grey eyebrows climbed his forehead, but he kept his council to himself.

"I think I'm going to go upstairs for a while," Deb announced and slipped quietly away from her companion — and her grandfather's all-too-sharp eye.

Kevin watched her exit and then made a vague gesture in the same direction. "I… need to get back to work." He beat a hasty retreat, and Sydney heard him hit the couch in the living room with a big sigh that made the older man smile. It was all too obvious what had just gone on in the tree house.

Evidently Deb was trying to push her way out of the cocoon of fear that she had woven about herself and her heart. In that case, Kevin would be about as safe a man to test herself against as any she knew. He knew Kevin cared for his granddaughter deeply and would never deliberately do anything to hurt her in the least. He also knew that Kevin was well aware of the involuntary nature of the attack she was recovering from — and that the chances were that any advances that had triggered this little escapade had probably been made by Deb herself.

But considering discretion being the better part of valor, he decided that perhaps a private protégé-mentor discussion about the benefits and dangers in pursuing a relationship with a beautiful girl who was as attracted to him as he was to her might be in order. And it needed to happen SOON – before something considerably more intense than just necking in a tree house happened and jeopardized his entire therapy plan, not to mention threw a naïve and vulnerable young Pretender completely for a loop.

Perhaps Miss Parker could be prevailed upon to provide a similar mother-daughter talk with Deb when she arrived a little later on. It was clear what was going on: Deb was looking to move beyond her nightmarish memories — supplanting them with new ones that were far easier to deal with. It was a bold tactic, and an emotionally dangerous one.

"Thank you, sir." Fox saluted and then stood stiffly at attention waiting until General Potter had moved past him in the hallway. His direct superior, Potter had listened with interest to the reasons Fox was requesting permission to work temporarily with the Navy and then given his permission. Fox had timed his request carefully, catching the man on his way out of the Pentagon on a late afternoon for one of his famous fishing trips. This meant the man would be more eager to just make snap decisions and get on with things – and his reasoning had proven accurate.

He pulled the business card with Senator Ashland's phone numbers from his pocket along with his cell phone and dialed her cell number. After three rings, the call connected. "Hello?"

"Hello, Senator. This is Colonel Ted Fox."

"Colonel Fox! I've been expecting your call," the woman's brisk voice came over the line.

"I just received my permission to work with your Admiral Samson from my direct superior, ma'am."

Ashland raised her eyebrows at the rotund and aging black military man across the restaurant table from her. "I was just telling him about your situation, Colonel…." She paused as Samson held up a hand to catch her attention. "What, Greg?"

"Tell your Air Force Colonel to report to my office at oh-nine-hundred tomorrow morning with everything he has to date."

Ashland relayed the message. "I'll be in touch with you later, Colonel."

"Thank you, ma'am, and sorry to interrupt," Fox said contritely.

"You know how this town works, Colonel," Ashland replied, her blue eyes sparkling with mischief and intent. "I do you a favor – now you owe me one."

Fox nodded. "Yes, ma'am. And it will be an honor to repay that favor, ma'am."

"I'll talk to you later, Colonel," Ashland chuckled and disconnected the call.

"And now?" Samson asked his long-time friend with a salute of the whiskey glass.

"And now we go skunk-hunting," she answered, tapping her wineglass against his old fashioned glass. "Here's to success."

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