Never Say Never
Chapter 15
Friday, October 26, 2001
1800 Hours Local Time
Rabb Home
Potomac Heights
Mac was feeding Tricia when she recognized the sound of Harm's Corvette pulling into the driveway and park beside her Cherokee in front of the garage. She waited a bit before he walked into the house. She turned and offered her lips to his greeting. He gave Tricia a kiss on her downy head.
As he straightened up Harm said, "After I come back down from changing, we'll talk about Webb's visit."
"You read Jimmy's incident report. It's all in there."
"I know, but the report doesn't say what Webb's alleging about me and Stoechler. You know my office is in the loop on all intelligence matters; even when it's incidents like the one in Stoechler's office. By the way, decent job on prosecuting."
"Thanks. Go up and change. I'll put Tricia down in bed and we'll talk as we eat our dinner. I'll heat it up in the microwave."
After Harm changed, he came down to find his and Mac's covered plates at their places at dining room table. Mac came in with the baby monitor and put it on the table next to her plate. They began to talk as they ate.
"So, care to elaborate on Webb's accusations."
"He said that Stoechler told you about Pagano. You allegedly told Pagano who told the Chinese, yada, yada."
"Where would they get the idea that I'm a spy with Pagano?"
"I don't know. Someone is setting you up for something."
"But for what? Also, is it just Webb? He doesn't have the chops or the resources to act alone. The CIA won't sanction it. He has to have an ally outside the CIA."
"If that's true, who is it?"
"That's the big question isn't it."
Same Time
AJ Chegwidden's Residence
MacLean, VA
As Mac and Harm pondered on who might be out for them, AJ Chegwidden was pacing the floor of his living room. He stopped when he heard the phone ring. He picked it up answering, "Chegwidden!"
"AJ, it's Clay."
Chegwidden looked at the cordless set ID#. He didn't recognize it as he asked, "Webb, where are you calling from?"
"The DC Jail. I need a lawyer."
Chegwidden became circumspect , knowing that jail phones were notorious for being monitored, "What are they charging you with?"
"Attempted assault. They even impounded my car. Mackenzie pushed the panic button for her Secret Service protection. I didn't know she had one."
"Alright, don't say anything more. I'll be there within the hour." Webb gave him the police precinct address.
90 Minutes later
DC Metro Police Precinct
Webb and Chegwidden were discussing the incident at the Rabb's house. "So, you weren't able to plant the thumb drive?"
"I couldn't get into the house. She spoke to me through the screen door."
"We have to think of something else. I'm really sick that Rabb keeps getting away with leaving my niece as a target for an assassin. If he hadn't pawned his work off to her, he would have been the one to face Hemlock."
Chegwidden didn't have any care or empathy to the fact that Harm could have been the one Hemlock killed.
"And with Mackenzie's uncle getting away with disgracing my father in Vietnam."
"We'll have to think of something else. In the meantime, keep a low profile. Your CIA bosses won't be happy that you got arrested."
"Yes, that's one more thing I have to face tomorrow morning."
They got into Chegwidden's Escalade and drove away from the precinct house.
Saturday, November 3, 2001
Our Lady of Fatima RC. Church
Rabb Farm
Belleville, PA
It took a lot of wrangling to get Meghan and David's wedding set up. David and Meghan's assignments required that they had to live in the DC metropolitan area. They purchased a house in Clinton Md. It was centrally located to the White House and Joint Base Andrews as well as David's squadron at the Pax River NAS. Thus, they lived far from their original family bases. Also, their wedding date aligned with their vacation times from the Navy & Secret Service for their honeymoon.
David's family was large. His parents had eight siblings between them with their families of thirty cousins among them. Meghan's family was small with both her parents being only children and no cousins. Meghan and Loren's family were from central Ohio around Canton and David's family in New York's Mid-Hudson Valley in Mahopac, Putnam County, it made for some geographical inconvenience on both families to agree on a church and reception venue. As a compromise, Gram stepped in and offered her farm as the wedding venue for a modest fee. It was equal travel time from Canton and New York.
The wedding party was small, after the maid of honor and best man, Meghan naturally had Loren as her maid of honor with Sarah, David's sister Margaret and Meghan's best friend, fellow Secret Service Agent Carolyn Turner as bridesmaids.
David had his brother Michael as his best man with his other brother Robert, cousin Andrew and Harm as his groomsmen.
The nuptial mass was early at 1300 with the reception taking up the afternoon into the late evening. There were the usual wedding photos around the farm including photos of the wedding party, the parents of the bride and groom and the happy couple illuminated by the sunset on top of the mountain.
As the wedding party got to the bottom of the mountain, Meghan came up to Harm and gave him a heartfelt hug.
"Thank you so much for letting us use the farm for our reception. It was incredibly special for David and I."
"I'm incredibly happy for you as well. I'm glad yours and Tuna's folks were able to come to a deal. I know President and Dr, Bartlett enjoyed it."
"Yes, they did. Even President & Mrs. Clinton were having a fun time."
"So where are you going on your honeymoon?"
"Aruba. It's very relaxing. We can poolside at our hotel or go out scuba diving or any other outing on our own."
"Good to hear. Now let's get back to the party."
Friday, December 21, 2001
1400 Local Time
Rabb Farm, Belleville, PA
When Harm and Mac pulled up to Gram's farmhouse, while Harm got out to go open the driver's rear door to extract Tricia from her car seat, Mac got out, turned, and opened the rear passenger door. A tall young woman in a Navy overcoat with Lieutenant bars on the shoulders and officer's cap got out. Gram, Trish, and Frank came out to greet their children. After they got their greetings, everyone started walking into the house. Surprising everyone, Tricia started leaning out of Harm's arms toward Frank. Frank gladly took his granddaughter and carried her into the house.
When they entered, they saw Loren and Sergei stand to greet them. Loren reached for Tricia. Frank relinquished his granddaughter to her godmother. Tricia squealed and giggled with delight as Loren rained beaucoup kisses on her.
As this was going on, Harm brought his, Tricia's and Mac's bags up to their bedroom. While he was up there, Mac introduced the young woman as, "Lt-Dr. Jennifer Coates, this is Harm's Grandmother Sarah Rabb and his parents Trish & Frank Burnett, Harm's brother Sergei and our cousin Loren. I asked Jennifer to join us for the holiday. We've been friends since our Time together at Duke. While I went to Law school she went to medical school."
During this Harm came down to find everyone settled in the living room. Tricia was in Loren's arms sucking on a bottle. Gram was sitting in her armchair. Jennifer, Trish, and Mac were sitting on the couch in an animated conversation. Harm went over to sit beside his wife and put his arm across her shoulder.
"Have you told mom yet? " Harm asked Mac.
"Told me what?" Trish asked.
"We're having another baby. I'm about a month along. We started trying after Meghan and Tuna's wedding."
"What are you hoping for this time?" Gram asked.
"Healthy and happy. I wouldn't mind another girl. I'm not anxious to name my son Harm the III," Harm replied.
"Why is that Harm?" Gram asked.
"I'm the last Harmon Rabb. I grew up with a lot of ridicule of the name. Hell, the damned former SECNAV named me "Harmful" Rabb because he had a negative opinion on how I do my job. The reason President Bartlett asked me to be his National Security Coordinator was because he saw the good things I did. The present SECNAV certainly doesn't call me Harmful."
"I can understand that. I remember the days you came home from school with a few black eyes after fights about your name," Trish added.
"Well either way now we know that your next baby will not be named Harm III. We'll be happy with whatever other name you two come up with when she or he is born," Gram replied as a way to change the subject.
"What is your schedule lake this weekend Sarah," Frank asked.
"Well because it's Christmas Eve Monday, the JAG Office is closed. It doesn't make sense to open the office for one day and close it the next. We'll go home Wednesday afternoon after an early dinner," Mac replied.
"Very nice," Frank replied.
The family settled down to enjoy the holiday weekend. Jennifer pitched in to help prepare the meals. Gram took her out on the farm early every morning to help with the chores. During Saturday's time out, Gram asked, "Tell me child, what is your family like and why aren't you with them?"
"Well first as Mac said, we're friends from Duke University. We were dorm roommates. Mac and Harm know my story. I don't have any extended family except for my father. Because of him, I almost didn't get to go to college.
"Really what did he do?"
"I was inspired to become a doctor when I was fifteen. That's when my mom died from injuries she sustained when a drunk driver t-boned the driver's side of her car while she was sitting there waiting for me. I saw it happen as I was coming across the field from soccer practice."
"Oh my God that's awful," Gram said.
"That's not the worst part. We lived in western Maryland and the only thing that our local hospital could do was try to stabilize her with transfusions before they could transport her to a level one trauma center thirty miles away. I went there with her in the ambulance. When they took her into the center the nurses made me wait outside. They tried to do all they could, but she didn't make it. I'll never forget when the nurse came out to tell me all she said was, 'We tried everything, but she's gone. The doctors told me that the collision had totally exploded her aorta. There was nothing anyone could have done."
"Where was your father?" Gram asked.
"Well, when I called him from the soccer field, he said he was in his church rehearsing his sermon for Sunday and he said he would meet me at the hospital," Jen said derisively.
"Was he a preacher?" Gram asked.
"Yeah, a Baptist, but the only three things he cared about were the father, son and the Holy Ghost."
"A real fire and brimstone one huh," Gram commented.
Jen nodded and continued, "Well it was hours after Mom died that daddy finally came to the trauma center. All he did was positively identify her, signed the papers, collected her personal things, and dragged me home. The congregation chipped in for a nice funeral which daddy presided over. The only thing was that in his eulogy he was totally nasty."
"How so?" Gram asked.
"Well instead of celebrating her life, she accused her of the sin of pride, coveting riches of the flesh, not of the spirit etc. He came just short of saying that she deserved to die," Jen said now crying a bit.
"You can stop dear," Gram offered.
"No, I want to get this off my chest," Jen insisted. Taking a deep breath and dabbing at her eyes she continued.
"Shortly after the funeral he bought new clothes, a new car, new vestments and so forth."
"Where did he get the money?" Gram asked.
"From my mother's insurance policy, it paid $150,000 and from her savings which was in the neighborhood of another $250,000," Jen answered.
"Wow how much of that did you see?" Gram asked.
"Not a damn penny," Jen answered.
"What did he do with it? Why didn't he tell you about it?" Gram asked horrified.
"To explain I have to go back to when Mom died. Among her things was the key to a safety deposit box. That's where she kept her will and the passbook to her savings account. He ripped up the will and started digging into her accounts. You see he never liked to make ends meet; my mother had a job as a real estate broker. She sold a lot of houses and made a lot of money in commissions. She helped daddy pay the bills, made sure we had a nice house, I had pleasant things, went to a nice private school, paid for my sports participation and other things I needed. Whatever she didn't spend on the family, she socked away. She never let my father have control of it. She knew that daddy wouldn't spend it like he should have."
"Your Mom was a smart woman," Gram said.
"Yes, she was. So, after daddy went through Mom's money he started dipping into the collection plate money. You see his congregation was small and the church was just an abandoned VFW Hall. He promised them a real church if they contributed regularly. Unfortunately for him he didn't deliver. So, some of the elders of the congregation got angry and started to wonder why after a few years of collections and fund raisers, they were still in the VFW and not in the real church he had promised to build. All they saw was that he was driving the new car and wearing the nice clothes. So, they called an auditor from the National Baptist Council to examine his books.
"What did they find?"
"They found that he was a degenerate gambler. That's what he was doing when I called to tell him of the accident. He lied when he said he was at the church. He was at a poker game. He only left after he was tapped out and the other players wouldn't give him any credit. After he used up the insurance and Mom's savings he started using the church funds for gambling."
"My goodness!"
"Yeah, my goodness is right. His excuse for the gambling was that he was trying to double what the congregation was giving him, but he hit a bad streak. The thing is it was a 'years' long' bad streak. The council called the FBI and now he's in prison for fraud and embezzlement."
"What about your mother's will?" Gram asked.
"That's the other thing. My father cheated me out of what was rightfully mine. Before she died, he never knew how much money Mom put in the bank. I only found out about the will when Mom's lawyer came to me during daddy's trial. He asked me about what happened to the money my mom left me. I told him that I never knew Mom's will even existed. He showed me a copy which stated that I was to get 80% of the money in her account and use it to pay for college. When I confronted daddy with that, he told me that I was an ungrateful daughter and that whatever money his wife made was his by right anyway."
"What did you do?" Gram asked.
"I slapped him and walked out of the interview room. After that he went to prison. So, since I was only sixteen at the time, the state put me in a foster home. They were nice people, but they also had ten other foster kids to care for. I got out of there as soon as I turned eighteen and graduated high school and enlisted in the Navy with an MOS of medical technician."
"How long after that did you decide to become an officer?" Gram asked.
"A year, that's when my monitor told me of the college programs that the Navy offered. Since I graduated high school with high marks, I enrolled at the University of Maryland. I majored in pre-med, graduated Summa Cum Laude and after Navy OCS I went onto medical school. After I interned and did my residency at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, the Navy assigned me to Bethesda. I swore that no one was going to die on my watch like my mother did," Jen said finishing her tail.
"Well dear we're glad that your path brought you to us," Gram said.
The Rabbs and their friends and family enjoyed the Christmas-New Year Holiday week without any controversy. After the holiday was over, things with Chegwidden and Webb began to get interesting.