Storiesonline.net
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                             The Donaldsons
                            by Lazlo Zalezac

Copyright© 2009 by Lazlo Zalezac


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Description: Melinda is a highly driven executive of a major aerospace company. Life was perfect until she tangled with the Donaldson family - a group of the most arrogant and difficult people she had ever met. After that, life gets a little strange.

Codes: MF slow
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Chapter 1


He closed his eyes and listened to the distant noises that managed to drift into nook that held his desk. From far off, he heard the unmistakable click-click of a woman's high heels striking the concrete floor. The sound of a rivet gun was muted by distance and dampened by poor acoustics. It attempted to drown out the noise of her heels, but she had already entered his territory where the acoustics worked in her favor.

Anyone who had ever seen his office considered it to be the worst in the entire company and, for an enterprise that employed nearly a million people, that was saying something.

Part of what made it so horrible was the location. It was on the edge of a major aircraft production area at the dead-end of an access way that provided maintenance with the ability to change the air filters for the wire harness assembly room. He had no idea why the room required air filters and, quite frankly, he wasn't curious enough to ask. All he knew was that once every other month, a maintenance man opened the cover and replaced two air filters.

Reaching his desk required him to walk through a hallway that ran along the side of the wire harness assembly room and then turn a corner to walk down an even longer hallway that ran the width of the room. His desk was located at the end of that walkway. The advantage of the location was that the right turn tended to kill the sounds from where the fuselages of large passenger jets were assembled although it didn't seem to affect the smell of metal that hung in the air.

The fact that his desk was in such an out of the way place didn't matter to him. He took a perverse pleasure in the fact that he had few visitors and those that stopped by never stayed long. Part of the reason was that visitors didn't enjoy the dark trip to his desk or the poorly lit work area. On the other hand, he found having a poorly lit work area to be an advantage and he wasn't bothered by the oppressive walk through the dark to reach his desk. Truth be told, he liked his office.

In fairness to the company it must be said that the darkness of the hallway was not imposed upon him. Every ten yards, an empty light fixture hung down from the high ceiling. Every visit by the maintenance man who changed the filters included putting in new light bulbs in the fixtures. As soon as the maintenance man left, he removed the newly installed light bulbs. After years of this little game, he had an entire drawer of his squatty little file cabinet filled with light bulbs.

His desk would never have anyone in the company lusting after it. The beat up old steel tanker desk had been manufactured in the 1950s. It was topped with a single goose- necked desk lamp that had to be thirty years old if it was a day, an old computer monitor left over from nearly a decade ago, a keyboard with several keys missing, a single button mouse, and an old-fashioned telephone with a rotary dial. As far as he knew, his telephone was the last of its kind in the entire company.

The click of high heels grew ever louder suggesting that his visitor was about to turn the corner. He didn't have to look to know that his visitor was Melinda Davis. She was the only woman in the entire facility who wore high heels when walking around the huge aircraft assembly area to reach his desk. Safety regulations prevented her from cutting three quarters of the trip by taking a shortcut across the assembly area. He assumed that she made the long walk in heels just to be in a particularly foul mood by the time she reached him. He wasn't going to complain since the heels made her legs look great.

Melinda Davis turned the corner and paused to stare at the man hunched over his desk.

Every time she came here she expected to find some gnomish misshapen man with pale white skin from a life time of living in the dark. The reality of Mike O'Connor was just the opposite. He was tall, muscular, and tanned with chiseled facial features. When he looked at her with his brown eyes only one name came to mind — Clint Eastwood.

She approached his desk knowing that he knew she was there, but he studiously ignored her. The fact that he ignored her only feed fuel to her irritation. Stopping six feet behind him, she turned off the flashlight that had been necessary to see her way to his office. His hand snaked out to reach for the goose-necked lamp. Glaring at the back of his head, she said, "If you turn that light to shine it on me, I will kill you and leave your body here to be found by the rats."

Without saying a word, Mike swiveled the hood of the goose-necked lamp so that it was aimed at her. He spun around in his chair and looked at her. With a disappointed expression on his face, he said, "I keep hoping that you'll show up here naked. With that red hair of yours, I know that you've got a field full of freckles under those clothes. I'd really like to play a game of connect the dots with your freckles."

"One of these days, I'm going to fire you for sexual harassment," Melinda said unable to keep the flash of anger out of her voice. She knew for a fact that he hadn't attended any of the required sexual harassment training courses since starting with the company. The last time she had mentioned that he was required to attend a course once a year, he had retorted that he didn't need any lessons on how to harass someone; he was quite proficient in that department without training. He had followed up on that by asking her to remove her blouse. She was not amused.

"I didn't know it was possible for a lowly employee like me to sexually harass such an important vice president of a company this size like you," Mike said. He yawned while negligently covering his mouth with his hand.

"One of these days you're going to screw up big-time and I'll be able to get rid of you,"

Melinda said.

Mike opened a drawer and removed a letter from inside it. For almost a minute, he made a huge production out of reading it. Looking up at her, he said, "This letter is from your boss. It appears that my last patent has been licensed for a hundred million dollars."

Melinda was well aware of that fact. The patent had turned what might have been a loss on her annual financial report into a year with a sixty million dollar profit. It wasn't the first time he had done that and it was highly likely that it wouldn't be the last time. She had read the report he had sent out three days ago and suspected that he was going to repeat that level of success with his most recent research results. She halfway expected his latest invention would bring in fifty percent more money than the last one. She asked,

"How do you do it?"

"I'm just naturally handsome and women throw themselves at my feet," Mike answered flashing a smile intended to impress.

"That's not what I'm talking about!" Melinda said giving him a look that should have killed him.

Amazed that such an attractive woman could get such an ugly expression on her face, Mike asked, "You weren't?"

"No. How is it that you come here two days a week, work in this dingy cave with an antiquated computer, and bring in millions of dollars every year?" Melinda asked.

Looking hurt, Mike said, "I resent that."

"Resent what?" Melinda asked unable to follow the logic of his reply.

"You calling my wonderful office a dingy cave," Mike answered with a grin.

Turning to look down the dark hall, Melinda asked, "What happened to the light bulbs that are supposed to be here?"

Mike opened a drawer of his filing cabinet and picked up a light bulb. Holding it up for her to see, he answered, "Here is one. I think there are a few more around here. You know, light bulbs don't walk off all by themselves. Someone must be stealing them for nefarious purposes."

Rather than rise to the bait, she bit her tongue. For a moment she entertained the idea of getting light fixtures that required a key to get access to the light bulb. She wasn't sure if such a fixture existed, but after two years of tramping through the dark to get to his office she was half tempted to find out.

She glanced down at the computer next to his desk. It was the size of a mini-refrigerator.

Unable to believe what her eyes were telling her, she pointed at it while asking, "What is that?"

"That is my computer," Mike answered.

"Is that an 8 inch floppy disk on your computer?"

"Yes, it is," Mike answered. He picked up the old floppy disk that had been on top of the computer and waved it around. Pointing a finger at her, he said, "You don't find many of these around anymore."

"Are you telling me that your computer has an eight inch floppy drive in it?"

Mike slid the floppy disk into a slot on the computer. He flipped the lever that moved the spindle onto the floppy. He answered, "Yes, it does."

"They haven't made those in decades," she said staring at the box. If his computer used eight inch floppy disks then it had to be at least twenty-five years old. They had employees who were younger than that computer.

"It does make it tough to get replacements. I did find a 30 megabyte Winchester hard drive the other day and was thinking of installing it in my computer."

"What computer do you actually use to do your work?" she asked.

"This one," Mike answered pointing to the machine.

She decided that his computer was going to have to get replaced along with the keyboard mouse, and monitor. She noticed another antique on his desk and said, "I thought that phone had been replaced."

"I found another one at a flea market just like the last one. They wanted a whole ten dollars for it, but I talked them down to five. I submitted an expense voucher to get reimbursed, but I think someone is holding up processing it," Mike replied. He ruffled through a desk drawer and held up the yellow copy of an expense voucher.

"What happened to the new phone that I ordered for your desk?" Melinda asked unable to believe that he would have done something like that.

"I installed it in the break room. You should have seen those guys. They were so appreciative that they didn't even care that I wasn't union. It appears that their requests to get a telephone in that room kept getting rejected," Mike answered with a grin.

"There was a reason their request was rejected," Melinda said.

"What reason?" Mike asked.

The company and the union needed some negotiating points that could be the subject of easy compromise. Placing telephones in break rooms was one of the points the company could graciously yield on without it costing much. Melinda answered, "That is none of your business. I'll have it removed."

"Well I wouldn't worry about it. It is a modern lightweight plastic phone and won't last three weeks. This one of mine is made of Bakelite with real copper and will last for years unless someone steals it," Mike said while pointing at her to let her know that he would blame her if his telephone went missing.

"Your phone has to go."

"Why?"

"It is a rotary dial phone. Half of our telecommunications equipment won't support rotary dial phones anymore. We're phasing out the old equipment," Melinda said.

"Pity that my little old telephone should require that we maintain more reliable equipment at the expense of being modern. You'll regret modernizing your equipment," Mike said dismissively.

Melinda bit her lip to keep from saying something that she would regret. The last time he had baited her with something like that he had been proven correct. It boggled her mind how someone who was able to advance the state of the art in the aerospace industry like he did fought modernization with such a passion.

In the absence of a retort, Mike asked, "So what brought you down here to see little old me?"

"We've got a problem," Melinda said. The CEO of the company had recommended that she give the problem to Mike O'Connor. She had protested, but her boss had given her a sound argument for bringing him in on the project. They both knew that Mike would solve her problem. Knowing that didn't make it any easier to give the job to him.

This trip to his office was an example of why she didn't want to work with him. She had asked Mike to come to her office, but he had refused on the grounds that he didn't like her office décor and that it would give him nightmares for a week. He had rambled on for fifteen minutes about a hostile workplace and how he would hate to be put in a position where it was necessary to sue the company for damages that would result from the emotional distress. That had been a week ago and she had finally caved into the inevitable.

"Of course you do," Mike replied with a smile. He was pretty sure that she had lots of problems and that he figured heavily in the majority of them.

Melinda ignored the gibe and said, "We're having engine failures on one of our experimental products."

"Which one?"

"That's classified," Melinda answered.

She was about to explain that he would have to work against the specs without knowing why they were required when he said, "You must be talking about the Bird-4 prototype."

Melinda stared at him. He wasn't supposed to know anything about the Bird-4 prototype.

It was one of the black projects funded out of the Department of Agriculture on behalf of the Department of Defense. That particular line of funding had been arranged so that the project wouldn't show up on the books for the military oversight committees to see. The work on that project wasn't being done anywhere near here. She said, "I am."

"Why doesn't it surprise me that you're having problems with that piece of junk?" Mike asked dryly.

"What do you mean?" Melinda asked wondering how he always managed to say the one thing that would bug her most.

"I'm pretty sure the tolerances are too tight on that engine the three stooges designed.

Who was it — Wagner, Jones, and Gantry? Yes, that's right," Mike said. "There's no way to manufacture the turbines that meet those performance characteristics; at least, not without having to pay ten times as much for them as you're willing to pay."

Stunned by the fact that he knew who had designed the engine for it, the words came out of her mouth unbidden, "How do you know that?"

"I think I remember the numbers that were in their design," Mike said ignoring her question. He swiveled his chair to the side and opened the drawer of his desk. He pulled out a slide rule and started manipulating it almost as fast as the eye could follow.

Unable to believe that anyone still owned a slide rule, much less actually used it, Melinda asked, "What are you doing?"

"Making a quick calculation," Mike answered giving her look that she should have known the obvious.

"Use a computer," Melinda said. No one used a slide rule any more. She looked at the computer and realized he was probably better off using the slide rule.

"It would take longer to start the computer than to finish this calculation." Mike said while whipping the slide back and forth. After a minute, he stopped his manipulations and said, "Just as I thought."

"What?"

"The tolerances on the turbines are way too tight. The blades are too thin for their length.

Considering the fact that there are always minor fluctuations in pressure inside a turbine engine, the blades are subjected to significant stresses. Even a small impurity in the metal will cause them to fail when the engine is run at full power. My quick estimate is that you'd be doing good to get it up to sixty percent power," Mike answered. He looked at her over the slide rule.

Melinda rubbed her forehead feeling the beginning of a major headache. She wasn't going to tell him that the engine ate itself whenever it approached sixty percent power.

They had spent months of computer time trying billions of possible design parameters in an attempt to get a reasonably fuel efficient design.

His forehead wrinkled while he thought about the problem. He absently scratched his chin with the slide rule. Staring off into the darkness, he said, "We'll have to redesign the whole engine."

"That could take years," Melinda said.

"Nah, just a couple of weeks," Mike said while turning to face his desk. He tossed a pad of paper on the desk and picked up a pencil. Within seconds he was scribbling notes over the topmost sheet. Calling over his shoulder, he said, "You're dismissed."

"You can't dismiss me," Melinda said. She stared at the back of his head for a minute and then muttered, "I guess he can."

"I'm going to get you moved out of here," Melinda said before she turned and stomped away. The neat little click-click of her high heels had an angry sound to them.

Mike listened to them recede away. In a voice loud enough to carry to the end of his hallway he said, "Just like a woman — she can't resist getting the last word in." He chuckled at the strangled shout his comment produced.

Confident that she was gone, he smiled and touched a switch on his monitor. An image of his computer desktop appeared on the wall in front of his desk. He slid the keyboard out of the way and touched the single button on his mouse. A red keyboard appeared on his desk. Dimming the light from the goose necked lamp, he said, "I would never get any work done if she moved me out of here."

Running his fingers over the keyboard projection, he muttered, "Where did I put the design for that engine? Ah, there it is. It will just take a few minutes to adjust the design for her requirements. I'll sit on it for a couple of weeks and then e-mail it to her with a note that she owes me a steak dinner. God she's a pretty woman."

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The corporate headquarters were twelve miles away from the manufacturing plant where Mike O'Connor worked. Melinda couldn't help but feel nervous when she entered the office of Jack Armstrong. The fact that it was the nicest office in the entire company emphasized that he was a very important man. Jack Armstrong didn't need an office to convince others that he was an important man. Despite the fact that he needed a cane to walk, the man projected power and confidence just walking into a room.

Getting called to the office of the CEO was not necessarily a good thing for a person's career. Jack tended to praise success in public and reprimand failure in private. She was ready to wait for him to acknowledge her, but he rose from his desk the moment she entered the room. He said, "I heard that you went out on the floor of the assembly area."

"Yes, sir," Melinda answered. She didn't have to ask how he knew that. The people out there tended to get nervous whenever an executive walked through the plant without an escort of a dozen middle managers working furiously to hide whatever problems might be present. He probably got a dozen calls from the Union representatives for her little journey to Mike's office.

"I take it you visited with Mike O'Connor," Jack said.

"Yes," she answered curtly.

"It is about time you got him involved with your turbine problem."

"It would have been earlier, but he wouldn't come to my office."

The tone of her voice conveyed volumes. He said, "You don't like him."

"I detest him," Melinda said. Every time she had to deal with him, she felt like he was the one who controlled the situation. It didn't matter that she was Vice-President of Research and Mike O'Connor was just an engineer. She had six directors working for her.

Under them were section managers who oversaw district managers who oversaw unit managers. Mike O'Connor was at the far end of the chain.

Jack studied her for a moment and then asked, "Do you know what I like about him?"

"I have no clue," Melinda answered.

Jack smiled at her. After enough of a pause to get her full attention, he said, "My vacation cabin in Colorado."

"A cabin?" Melinda asked confused by his answer.

Jack answered, "His little contribution to the company last year added to my annual bonus an amount of money that was sufficient to pay for it. I like that little cabin. I like it a lot. The view of the mountains from my back porch is just amazing. I like it there so much, that I just have to like the man who got me the money for it."

"I can understand that."

"You should like him, too."

"You mean my bonus," Melinda said knowing exactly what he meant. Her division had always been run as a cost center rather than a profit center. Research and development was just that kind of business. Mike's little inventions had changed that around significantly.

"He put six million dollars in your pocket," Jack said pointedly.

"I know."

"You should be nice to him."

"He's just so... , so... , ugh!"

Understanding her frustration, Jack asked, "Do you know what he calls me?"

"No, sir," Melinda answered afraid of what she was going to learn.

"He calls me the fucker at the top of the pyramid," Jack answered with a chuckle.

"You're kidding."

"He says it to my face even," Jack said. If asked he would admit that the first time Mike had said that to him had been a little shocking. There was nothing like stepping out first thing in the morning to appreciate the view of the mountains and having someone greet you like that.

"When did he do that?" Melinda asked.

Jack answered, "It just so happens that he has a little cabin in Colorado. We're neighbors."

"He's a lowly engineer. He shouldn't be able to afford that," Melinda said.

"He makes as much as a director," Jack replied.

Melinda said, "I never understood that."

"He put six million dollars in your paycheck. There's no reason he shouldn't see a little money for his contribution to the company as well," Jack said pointedly. He would never have promoted her if he had realized that she was so stingy with rewarding exceptional performance. Of course, he did have to admit that Mike was a special case. Lots of competent people hated the man with a passion.

Melinda said, "I'll try to be a little more patient with him."

"I'm going to insist that you do a little more than that," Jack said.

"What?"

"You're going to have to be nice to him," Jack said. He knew that Mike was likely to save her ass with that Bird-4 project.

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"Hello Mike."

Mike listened to the voice for a moment and then asked, "What is so important that the fucker at the top of the pyramid deems it worth his valuable time to call a poor little mover of stone blocks?"

"What did you and Miss Davis discuss when she visited you?" Jack asked.

"Oh, we talked about a little of this and a lot of that. You know how it goes — a lot of words are exchanged but a great deal of the meaning is lost in the translation," Mike answered.

Jack cleared his throat and asked, "In what way does the meaning that you'd like to see her naked get lost in the translation?"

"It was meant as a compliment and she took it as an insult," Mike answered.

"You don't talk to women that way," Jack said.

"You do if you want to get laid," Mike said.

"You aren't supposed to hit on your boss," Jack said.

"Why not?" Mike asked. "Why waste a perfectly fine opportunity to sleep with a woman who has that kind of body?"

"You just don't do those kinds of things," Jack answered.

Mike replied, "Don't tell me that the idea of throwing her across your conference table and fucking the hell out of her hasn't crossed your mind."

Jack sighed knowing that there was no way he was going to answer that question. He asked, "Has anyone ever told you that you can be a real asshole?"

"Not in the last couple of hours," Mike answered.



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Chapter 2


Giving visible evidence of the nervousness he felt, Chuck Norton shifted from leg to leg in a slow motion version of the pee-pee dance. He had been called to the office of the Vice President of Research and Development without warning or explanation. There was no way that was a good thing; the woman had a reputation for not suffering fools lightly. He could not think of any reason for him to be there and that made him worried.

He looked around at the office. The carpet was thicker than the carpet at his home. The solid wood furniture looked expensive. Two very large monitors occupied her desk; one on each side of it. He knew that they were connected to a single very powerful computer that was hidden inside the desk. He knew that only because he had been given the work order to install them. He wished he had a work order to justify this visit.

Melinda looked down at the report she was reading and then back up at Chuck. She frowned trying to make sense of what she had read. Finally, she asked, "Superglue?"

"What?" Chuck asked unaware of what she was talking about.

"You were supposed to replace a computer yesterday," Melinda answered. In light of what Jack had told her about being nice to Mike, she had attempted to upgrade his antiquated computer system. Everyone enjoyed getting a more powerful machine and she was sure that he would appreciate the gesture.

"Oh, that," Chuck said relaxing now that he understood what this meeting was about. He pulled on his ear lobe and then added, "Yeah. We couldn't remove the monitor, the lamp, or the mouse. All three of them were super glued to the desk."

"Why would he do that?" Melinda asked not expecting to get an answer.

"I don't know, ma'am. He glued the desk in place, too."

"His desk?" Melinda asked incredulous that anyone would super glue their desk in place.

"Yes, ma'am," Chuck answered unable to keep from chuckling based on the shocked expression on her face. He had told the story around the break room and everyone else thought it was pretty funny.

"What kind of madman super glues his desk to the floor?" Melinda asked.

Despite knowing that it was a rhetorical question, Chuck answered, "Someone who doesn't want their desk moved."

Melinda asked, "Did you replace his computer?"

"No ma'am," Chuck answered.

"Why not?"

Chuck had not told anyone what he had discovered when he opened the antique case. The inside of the case had been packed with sixty-four of the smallest CPU cards that he had ever seen. There was a lot of computing power packed into one place. He answered, "His computer was better than the one I would have replaced it with."

"That old crate?" Melinda asked wondering if Mike had somehow brainwashed Chuck into that strange mindset of his where he believed that old equipment was better than new equipment.

"All you saw was the outside. I looked inside the case. That old crate contained the most advanced computer hardware I've ever seen. I'm not sure that I even understand how it works," Chuck answered.

"Where did he get it from?" Melinda mused aloud.

"He might have gotten it from Steve Connor," Chuck answered.

"Steve O'Connor?" Melinda asked wanting to make sure that he hadn't dropped an 'O' from the front of the name.

"Steve Connor. He works in the robotics division over in manufacturing," Chuck answered.

"Okay." She jotted the name down on a notepad.

"Now that guy is a real squirrel," Chuck said shaking his head.

"What do you mean?" Melinda asked.

"No one goes in his lab. Rumor has it that he has the entire place booby-trapped. Considering what he can do with a robot, everyone is convinced that entering his lab would be like walking into Terminator Land," Chuck said.

"Why would they think that?" Melinda asked. She knew how rumors like that could spread.

"When you walk up to the door, a robotic voice tells you to leave or face dire consequences up to and including death. The freaky thing is that it addresses you by name," Chuck answered.

"I wonder why they haven't fired him," Melinda said.

Chuck replied, "The guy is real good. Seventy percent of the robots we use in the automated manufacturing facilities run on software that he's written. I've heard that he has over two hundred patents."

"I wonder why I've never heard of him," Melinda said thoughtfully. If he was that good with robots, then he should be working in her autonomous vehicle area. The Bird-4 project was way behind on the guidance software side of things.

"I don't know," Chuck answered.

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After having spent three hours reading about Steve Connor, Melinda stopped by Dale Long's office. Sticking her head in the door, she said, "Dale, I just learned that you have a guy in your division that I might need for a year or so."

"Who?" Dale asked looking over at the attractive woman.

"Some guy by the name of Steve Connor," Melinda answered.

"You can't have him," Dale answered automatically.

"Why not?" Melinda asked despite knowing that Dale would be a fool to let him go. Steve was a real producer. She had also read the personnel file which wasn't quite so complimentary of him.

Dale answered, "He's a money making machine for my division. There is no way that I'll let him go."

"I really need him for a black project," Melinda replied. She knew that a project like that could often command considerable leverage in getting people permanently reassigned.

Dale sat back in his chair. He knew that he didn't want to get into a pissing contest with Melinda. Odds were good that he would lose; particularly if a black project was at stake. Those kinds of projects often translated into billions of dollars of revenue over decades. No one would let a petty turf war risk that kind of money.

After thinking about it for a moment, he realized that he didn't have to do anything. One conversation with Steve would convince her to leave him alone. He said, "Go talk to him and see if he'll work for you."

"Thanks," Melinda said leaving as soon as the word was out of her mouth.

Dale chuckled once she was gone. Turning back to his work, he said, "She won't be thanking me when she gets back."

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Melinda turned the corner of the brightly lit hallway and came to a stop. The hallway was so brightly lit that it almost hurt the eyes. The walls were a sterile bright white with a single door at the end of the hallway on the left side. The floor was white with a red line drawn across it and the message 'Do not enter' was written above the line. She stared at the line realizing that it was being projected on the floor by a laser. She looked around to spot the laser and noticed that there were a dozen cameras aimed at her. She took two steps to the side. The nearest cameras tracked her movement.

She stepped across the line. The message moved to five feet in front of her and changed to read, 'Turn back now.' She muttered, "Nice theatrics."

Although the hallway was only thirty yards in length, it seemed longer to her. The cameras swiveled to track her progress. Despite expecting it, chills ran down her spine while she walked down the hallway. The cameras made an ominous whir when they turned. She didn't realize just how intimidating it was to be watched by a dozen cameras like that. She almost stumbled when the message on the floor changed to read, 'Death awaits you.'

She reached the door at the end of the hallway and stared at the red lettering that had appeared over it. It read, 'No gurlz aloud.' She said, "You could have spelled it correctly."

The sign changed to read, 'Abandon all hope.' A metallic voice came from a speaker by the door, "You have been warned, Doctor Melinda Davis, Vice President of Research and Development. Leave now or face dire consequences."

Despite being half tempted to run, she reached out to open the door. It was at that moment when she realized the door didn't have a doorknob. She pushed the door, but it didn't open. Glaring at the speaker, she said, "Very funny. Let me in."

"Say the magic word."

Melinda stared at the speaker for a moment unable to believe what she had heard. There was no way that it was a program on the other end. She bit her lip to keep from saying something that she might regret. She forced the word from her mouth, "Please."

The door slid open making a sound straight out of a science fiction show. She mumbled, "Someone has watched too much Space Trek."

The speaker announced, "You are now entering a sexual harassment zone. You have been duly warned."

"Very funny." Rolling her eyes, she entered a small room about the size of a closet and heard the door slide to a close behind her. A sick feeling of being trapped rose when the lights in the room started to fade. She started feeling dizzy when they went out entirely. There was the sound of a door sliding open. She looked into the dimly lit room beyond the door. All of the light in the room came from images projected on every square inch of the walls.

"You are a pretty one now, aren't you? Too bad my cousin has already claimed you for a wife or I'd be asking you to shimmy out of those clothes and spread out on that table over there."

"What? Who?" Melinda asked stunned by the statement. She looked around for the source of the voice before spotting a man who looked a lot like Clint Eastwood seated in a chair.

"Cousin Mike told me that he is going to marry you," Steve answered.

"Mike who?" Melinda asked with a sinking feeling in her stomach. Only one other man in the company dared make those kinds of vulgar statements to her.

"Mike O'Connor," Steve answered.

"He's delusional. We aren't getting married," Melinda said clenching her hands into fists.

Steve grinned and then said, "In that case, why don't you get out of those clothes?"

"In your dreams," Melinda said angrily. All she needed was another jerk on that project.

"You're just like Mike described you," Steve said.

"How was that?" Melinda asked. She was pretty sure that she didn't really want to know the answer.

"He said that you are a fiery red head who has enough freckles under your dress to play a day long game of connect the dots," Steve answered.

Getting described like some kind of sex object was not Melinda's idea of a compliment. She said, "He's an asshole."

Steve laughed at the comment and then said, "That's how his mother used to describe his father. In fact, I think that is her pet name for him. If you keep talking like that you'll be a member of our family before too long."

"I didn't come here to talk about your family," Melinda said. The thought of getting married to Mike O'Connor made her nauseous.

"I know that. You came here to talk about the Bird-4 project. I bet Edwards is struggling with the software for it. He's good, but nowhere near my league," Steve said without a trace of hubris in his voice.

Melinda stared at him wondering if there were any secrets left in this company. Not only did he know about the Bird-4 project, but he knew who was heading the software development side of it. She said, "Yes."

"It has been a while since I've done any programming for autonomous vehicles. It must have been three weeks at the least," Steve said. He leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head.

"I didn't read anything about that in your file. What have you done?" Melinda asked.

"My lawnmower," Steve answered. He paused for a moment and then said, "Well, actually it is my fleet of lawnmowers. I've got thirty of them taking care of my yard. In case you're wondering, I have a large lawn."

"Lawnmowers?"

Steve smiled at the look of disbelief on her face. He said, "Let's see. I have a fleet of cooperating terrain following devices that are fully autonomous and use GPS for navigation purposes. In a fashion analogous to distinguishing between friend and foe, my little lawnmowers can distinguish between flowers and grass. Oh yeah, they can also refuel themselves while in operation. If I remember the system requirements document correctly, that sounds a lot like your Bird-4 project to me."

"It does," Melinda said. She was going to fire the head of security right after leaving here. Mike and Steve both knew too much about the Bird-4 project.

"I'll join your little project on one condition," Steve said.

"What condition?" Melinda asked not liking the smile he gave her. She was afraid that he was going to ask her to strip for him.

"You go out on a date with Mike," Steve said.

"Never," Melinda said.

Steve turned in his chair while saying, "You have my e-mail address in case you change your mind. You know the way out."

Melinda stared at the back of his head thinking that if looks could kill that Steve would be a dead man at the moment. She turned and headed towards the door. It slid open while she approached. She stepped through and listened to the door slide closed behind her. Once the door was closed, the lights slowly raised. When the lights had reached full intensity the door to the hallway slid open. She stormed out of the little room and into the hallway beyond.

-------

Dale stuck his head through the door of Melinda's office and asked, "How did it go with Steve?"

"That man is impossible," Melinda answered with a low growl. The more time that passed since her meeting with the man the angrier she had gotten. Of course, she wasn't sure who she was angrier with — Steve for his crude remarks or Mike for telling people he was going to marry her.

"What did he do?" Dale asked although he was pretty sure that his imagination could provide the details. There was a young woman in personnel who had ventured into Steve's lab a year ago to question him concerning his sexual harassment training records. After his masterful demonstration that he knew how to harass young women, she had returned to her office in tears. It made him wonder how Melinda had fared. After having dealt with the man he knew that her position in the company would not provide any protection.

"Let's just say that he needs some sexual harassment training," Melinda answered.

"Actually, I wouldn't put it that way," Dale said.

"You're right. He's already an expert in sexual harassment."

"Do you still want him to work for you?" Dale asked with a smile. The only reason he kept Steve on was because he was such a good producer. The fact that the guy was a jerk justified approving the unusual efforts taken to prevent visitors to the lab. He could just imagine all of the harassment lawsuits that would result from letting him interact with more people.

"I don't know," Melinda answered. She was hoping that Edwards would be able to pull a rabbit out of the hat and start making some real progress. Deep down inside, she knew that was unlikely. Steve's assessment of Edwards was right on target; the man was good but not in the league necessary to pull off this programming effort. She frowned and then added, "I might not have a choice."

Dale was about to reply when the telephone rang. Knowing that her secretary wouldn't have put the call through unless it was important enough to interrupt the conversation, Melinda answered it. Her face turned pale while she listened to the man on the other end of the line. After a minute she put down the phone and looked over at Dale.

"What's the matter?"

She answered, "One of my employees was just killed in a massive ambush last night."

"What?" Dale asked.

"A dozen or so gunmen shot up Edwards' car when he was driving home," Melinda said trying to wrap her mind around the news. Although the caller hadn't known all of the details, the evidence had suggested that Edwards had been specifically targeted. The ambush had occurred in the middle of a suburban street one block from his home.

"Why would they do that?" Dale asked. He had no idea who Edwards was, but he didn't like the thought that someone who worked for the company was murdered.

Melinda answered, "I have no idea."

Thinking that it sounded like some sort of gang retribution, Dale asked, "Could he have been involved in drugs?"

"I doubt it. Edwards had a top secret clearance," Melinda answered. It wasn't impossible for him to be involved in any kind of criminal activity; just highly unlikely.

"I hate to ask this, but who is Edwards?" Dale asked.

"He was the programming lead on my black project," Melinda answered. It dawned on her that she was going to have to ask Steve Connor to join the project. His condition on joining the project reverberated in her mind. There was no way that she was going to go on a date with Mike O'Connor.

Dale asked, "Is there any chance the attack was related to your black project?"

"No one kills engineers like that because they are working on a black project," Melinda answered with a frown. She hadn't even entertained that idea. Her computer beeped letting her know that an e-mail arrived. In light of the news she had just received, it seemed like a good idea to check it immediately. She said, "Let me see what this is."

"Sure," Dale answered.

Melinda opened the e-mail and read it carefully. A low growl emerged from deep in her throat while she read it. After reading the last line, she said, "I'm going to kill that asshole."

"What?" Dale asked. He wondered how such an attractive woman could get such an ugly expression on her face.

Reading aloud, Melinda answered, "Dear sweetness."

"Uh oh," Dale said.

"It gets worse." Leaning towards one of the monitors on her desk, she read, "You will find a design that fits your specifications attached to this e-mail. You owe me big time for this. I bet I had to work an extra three or four hours to save your nice well rounded ass on this project."

Terrified that Steve was the author of the e-mail, Dale said, "Please don't fire Steve. I'll talk to him."

Melinda ignored the interruption and read, "As a sign of your undying gratitude and inability to resist my magnificent good looks, I expect you will want take me to a very fancy restaurant for a steak dinner. I accept your kind invitation. May I also express my hope that you'll be dessert?"

"I can't believe it," Dale said. It was going to be nearly impossible to keep Steve from getting fired. "What kind of a madman writes something like that in an e-mail?"

"Your husband to be, Mike O'Connor," Melinda read.

"Confident fellow," Dale said relieved that it wasn't Steve.

"P.S. Clothing optional."

Even under extreme torture, Dale would never admit how difficult it had been to keep from laughing. It took some effort to keep control, but he finally asked, "This Mike O'Connor wouldn't happen to be related to Steve Connor, would he?"

"They are cousins," Melinda answered. Her voice dripped with disgust.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Dale said. It was getting even harder to keep from laughing.

Melinda said, "In light of Edwards' untimely demise, I'm going to have to get Steve on this project."

"You don't sound pleased," Dale said. He couldn't imagine being a woman and having two men like that working for him.

Melinda said, "I can't deal with one of them; I've got no idea how I'm going to deal with both of them."

"I feel sorry for you," Dale said.



-------

Chapter 3


Standing in the parking lot of a redneck gun range was not Melinda's idea of a good way to spend a Thursday evening, but the situation demanded that she take some steps to protect her people. Several of the lead engineers on the Bird-4 project had been killed over the past four weeks.

There wasn't a chance that the deaths were anything other than direct attacks by an enemy force. No one would buy the explanation that an ambush by a dozen attackers along a residential street in a bedroom community was a simple mugging. Three engineers died in that manner. After the project manager had been killed, his replacement had been given an armored car. The first failed attack was followed up with a direct assault on his house. No one in the family survived. Additional attacks had killed two other engineers.

No one knew for a fact what group was behind the deaths, but just about everyone had their own theory. Among the usual suspects were the Russians, Chinese, and Al Qaeda. There were even some who believed the North Koreans were making sure that nothing interfered with their weapons program. Melinda belonged in the camp that suspected the Chinese.

The upshot of the situation was that she had to scramble to find protectors for her people. The most logical source of protection would have been the federal government, but the project was not officially a military effort. Too much attention by the typical federal agencies would raise concerns about the project coming under the wrong kind of scrutiny. Getting the effort killed by Congress was just as effective as getting it killed by a hostile enemy.

Unable to protect her people in a suburban environment, Melinda had moved the project to an isolated area in Utah. The engineers and their families were housed in mobile homes in the middle of nowhere. When the attacks changed nature and were directed at the research facility, she turned to a mercenary company to provide protection. Hiring WhiteIce Global had brought a complete halt to the attacks.

There was only one small problem. One engineer would not live in Utah for more than three days a week and demanded a more personal level of protection. That is what brought her here. She knew nothing about the guy she was supposed to meet except that his name was A. A. Ables and he went by the nickname 'Tripp.' Mike O'Connor, her favorite pain in the ass, wouldn't accept anyone else.

The rear wheels of the monster truck spun when the driver floored it after making the turn into the graveled parking lot of the gun range. Melinda could hear the sounds of rocks hitting the highway sign that stood across from the entrance to parking lot. She had wondered why the sign had looked so ratty. Now she had her answer.

The truck slid to a stop ten yards from her. The bright head lights and row of lights across the top of the truck blinded her. She threw up a hand to protect her eyes from the blinding light. She muttered, "Fucking jerk."

She looked over to see what the security man who had come with her was doing. A sick feeling came over her when she didn't find him standing beside her. The lights on the truck went off. She turned to see the guy who she had come to meet.

In the dark, she couldn't see the occupant of the vehicle. She looked over to the side hearing the security man approach. He was not smiling. Looking over at Melinda, he said, "You didn't say that you were here to meet Tripp."

"You know him?"

"Her," he corrected.

A small woman climbed out of the monster truck. She said, "I'm a her."

"I thought we were waiting for a guy," Melinda said unable to believe that such a small woman would drive such a large truck.

"Hello, Tripp."

"Howdy, Jimbo." She ran a hand through her short hair.

"Where is Deuce?"

"He's in the tree line watching you," Tripp answered gesturing off to the side.

"He's still not pissed at me, is he?" Jim Boynton asked.

Melinda tried to follow the conversation recognizing that there was a bit of history here. It was about that time that she noticed something a little odd. She said, "There's a red spot on your chest, Jim."

Glancing down at his chest, Jim gave a single fingered salute in the direction of the woods. He shouted, "If you're going to shoot, at least aim for my ass. I can't afford to be laid up for long."

The reply echoed across the field. "Considering how far up your ass your head is, I'd hate to risk hitting your brain."

"Very funny," Jim said noticing that the red dot had disappeared.

"So have you reconsidered my proposal?" Tripp asked.

"I'm not marrying you," Jim answered feeling more than a little uneasy by the predatory way in which she was watching him.

"You'll marry me," Tripp said with confidence. "No one can resist a romantic proposal like the one I gave you."

"You ambushed me at the airport." The first time he had met her, she had bushwhacked him on his return from Afghanistan at the airport. He had just gotten off the plane with Andy 'Deuce' Ables when the small woman had jumped on him and announced that she was going to have his babies right after they got married. It was almost enough to drive him back on the plane in the desire to return to the safety of Afghanistan.

"I went to a lot of trouble to propose to you. I had to buy a ticket to get through airport security so that I could meet you at the gate."

"You don't know me."

"Deuce told me all about you and your adventures in his letters home. I spent hours looking at your pictures." She turned to Melinda and said, "Look at him. Have you ever seen a man so well built? I bet he's got a nine inch cock in those pants."

"Excuse me," Melinda said shocked by the comment. She had come there to hire Tripp for a protection job. The last thing she expected was to have a woman discussing the size of a man's package.

"Quit talking about me like I'm meat," Jim said.

"So you're the woman that my Cousin Mike is going to marry," Tripp said ignoring Jim's comment.

"Cousin Mike? Marry?" Melinda asked. "Are you talking about Mike O'Connor?"

"Yes."

"You're related to Mike O'Connor?" Melinda asked in shock.

"Mike says that you are a smart woman. I think he said that your IQ is in the upper one percentile. You got your doctorate from Carnegie-Mellon at the age of twenty-four. Mike really appreciates a woman with brains," Tripp answered.

"He's an asshole," Melinda said wondering how Mike O'Connor knew her IQ.

"That's what Mom calls Dad," Tripp said with a grin. She added, "She was a star in the roller derby until she met up with Dad. They fought like cats and dogs until he pinned her on the floor during a late night wrestling match. The rest was history."

"Your mother was a star in the roller derby?" Melinda asked. Images of hard looking women elbowing each other while skating around a track came to mind.

Tripp said, "She's a good looking woman, but tough. You don't want to get on her bad side. Dad said it was love at first sight."

"Does your mother agree?" Jim asked wryly.

Tripp laughed and said, "It took him some time to convince her that she loved him."

Melinda was startled when a man stepped out of the dark and stopped beside her. He looked her over and then asked, "Is this her?"

"Yes," Tripp answered with a curt nod of her head.

"Wow. You have to admit that Mike has good taste in women. I'm sure that he'll have hours of fun playing a game of connect the dots with her freckles. I know that I would," Deuce said examining Melinda appreciatively.

"I'm sure she'll enjoy it just as much as he will," Tripp said.

"I'm not playing connect the dots with your cousin. He's an asshole," Melinda said. She couldn't help noticing that Deuce bore a strong resemblance to Clint Eastwood.

"You sound just like Mom when you say that," Deuce said.

"Arg!"

"She'll make a good wife for him. I bet they have real smart kids," Tripp said.

Deuce looked over at Jim. Sounding like a big brother giving advice to his little brother, he said, "You could learn something from my cousin, Jimbo. He sees what he wants and goes after it. Tripp is an attractive woman and you could do worse than getting married to her."

"I'm not marrying your sister," Jim said shaking his head.

"You don't have to feel insecure just because she's a better shot than you are," Deuce said knowing that would get a reaction out of Jim.

"She's not a better shot than me," Jim said knowing that he had made a mistake the moment the words were out of his mouth.

"How about the last time you two were at the target range?"

"She grabbed me between the legs when I was firing," Jim said hotly.

"Let's face it -- you lost. Your shot was nowhere near the target," Deuce said. "I had bet twenty bucks on you. I'm still pissed about that."

Nudging Melinda with an elbow, Tripp said, "Don't you love a strong man? He'll put up a good fight knowing that he's going to lose anyway. I find that stimulating in a sexual way."

"You might as well give in and marry her, Jimbo," Deuce said. He wasn't looking forward to another evening listening to his sister talk about Jimbo.

"Is your entire family crazy?" Melinda asked.

Jim said, "I wish I was back in Afghanistan. It was safer there."

Deuce patted Jim on the back and said, "Aren't you happy that we're going to be working together again?"

"Not really," Jim answered watching Tripp out of the corner of his eye. The way she watched him was unnerving.

Tripp said, "Don't forget that I'll be there too."

Deuce laughed at the expression on Jim's face and said, "Don't look so worried, Jimbo. She's an Ables. We're all warriors in the Ables side of the family, even the women."

Melinda said, "Enough about who is getting married to whom. I just want to get down to business."

"So who am I supposed to protect?" Tripp asked.

"Mike O'Connor," Melinda answered.

Deuce shook his head and said, "Those O'Connors and Connors. They are always calling on us Ables to save their asses. You'd think that people with their brains would learn how to stay out of trouble."

"I know what you mean. Remember when Mike and Steve were in elementary school?" Tripp asked elbowing her brother in the side.

Deuce said, "How could I forget? Those two were bully magnets."

"It was just because they were the smartest kids in school," Tripp said.

"That's true."

Tripp said, "You've got to admit that we got in a few good fights as a result of that."

"I remember when you threw Charles through the school window. Mom was so proud of you," Deuce said.

"He was asking for it. He shouldn't have destroyed Mike's helicopter," Tripp said.

"I really liked that helicopter," Deuce said.

"I liked it too. All through fifth grade Mike gave me rides to school on it."

"How many fourth graders build a helicopter?"

"Not many."

"Of course, all of the O'Connors are good with mechanical things."

"That's true. The Connors aren't bad when it comes to math and science."

"Do you remember Steve's second grade science fair project?"

"Wasn't that the year he had Mike build him a ten foot tall Van De Graff generator?"

"That's right," Deuce said.

"He was disqualified because they couldn't get it in the door of the school," Tripp said.

"I remember that. He was robbed," Deuce said disgusted.

"I even offered to widen the door with some C-4," Tripp said.

Melinda stared at Tripp and Deuce while they strolled down memory lane. She couldn't believe half of what was coming out of their mouths. Elementary school kids did not build helicopters or Van De Graff generators. Leaning over to Jim, she said, "They are driving me crazy."

Jim whispered, "They might drive you crazy now, but you can't find anyone better to have beside you when the shit hits the fan."

Tripp grabbed Melinda by the arm and announced, "Let's head over to Cousin Mike's house. You can ride with me in the truck. It'll give me a chance to fill you in on a little of the family history."

"I don't want to know your family history," Melinda said backing away.

"You better. You're going to be a member of the family soon."

"I'd rather die than marry Mike," Melinda said.

Tripp said, "It sounds like love to me."

Deuce said, "I'll ride with you, Jimbo. We'll discuss your upcoming marriage with my sister."

"I'm not marrying your sister."

"You say that now, but I remember what you said just after we got off the plane from Afghanistan."

"What did I say?"

"You said that she was a nice looking piece of ass," Deuce said.

"I didn't know she was your sister at the time," Jim protested.

"He said that about me," Tripp asked looking over at her brother.

"Yes, he did," Deuce answered.

"I didn't know that you were his sister at the time," Jim protested.

"I would have fucked you on the spot if I had known that," Tripp said licking her lips. "I like a man who appreciates me as a woman."

Melinda blurted, "What?"

"I hate all this political correctness crap. Men look at a woman and immediately decide if she would be any good in bed. Will they admit it? No. They have to act like all women are some kind of virgin ice bitches or something. Me, I like a man who looks at me and honestly admits that he'd like to fuck me. No games," Tripp said.

"Men shouldn't treat women like sex objects," Melinda said.

"Bullshit. Men and women are sex objects. You can't tell me that you don't want to try a little sport fucking with Jimbo. I mean, look at him -- he's got muscles on top of muscles. God, just looking at him makes me hot. Knowing that he can kick ass in a firefight makes me even hotter," Tripp said.

"It is not polite to say things like that," Melinda said.

"It is fine with me if you want to lie to yourself and others; just don't hide behind politeness to justify it to me," Tripp said. Smiling, she said, "Why don't you get in the truck and I'll take you over to Mike's house? The sooner you two get together the sooner you'll feel better."

Earning a look of relief from Jim, Melinda said, "I'll ride home with Jim once we've finished our business here."

"I'll take the job. It'll be nice to spend a little time with Cousin Mike."

-------

Melinda stared out the front windshield of the car still trying to come to grips with her encounter with Tripp. She said, "That is one scary family."

"Yeah."

"That Tripp is a real trip," Melissa said.

"You know that she's right," Jim said in a depressed tone of voice.

"About what?"

"I am going to end up marrying her," Jim said.

Melinda looked over at Jim and said, "You must be joking."

"You've never seen her in a gym. She's an amazing woman," Jim said.

"You like her?"

"I'm just not ready to get married yet," Jim said with a sigh.

"Okay."

Jim looked over at her and said, "You aren't going to be able to resist Mike for long."

"He's an asshole," Melinda said automatically.

"Deuce told me a bit about his family when we were over in Afghanistan together. He was always telling me about his cousin Mike. He's some sort of engineering super genius in a family of engineering geniuses," Jim said.

"That doesn't impress me," Melinda said.

"Right," Jim said skeptically. "I think that the more you are around Mike, the more you're going to like him."

"I'll never like him."

"You protest too much."

"I protest just as much as is required," Melinda replied feeling a little warm under the collar.

Jim chuckled and said, "Right."

After a minute of silence, Jim said, "I probably shouldn't tell you this story, but I will."

"You don't have to entertain me."

Ignoring her lack of enthusiasm, Jim said, "I went to work for WhiteIce Global last year and was teamed up with Deuce. We got sent over to Afghanistan.

"Things were pretty nasty over there. Deuce and I were stuck in a hellhole part of the country watching the Taliban kick ass on our guys there. It was not like they were really winning any fights. It was just that there were so many of them and every one of them was willing to die to take out one of us. It always started with an ambush. They would fire at us while we scrambled around for cover. They would withdraw once we were responding in an organized manner.

"Needless to say, we were getting pretty damned tired of it. One day, Deuce gets pissed. Next thing I know, he's on the satellite phone calling one of his cousins back here in the States. Four days later there's a package waiting for us when we come back from patrol. Inside of the package is the stupidest looking gun you've ever seen in your life along with a little box. You know what one of those toy periscopes looks like? Well, the gun looked just like one of those.

"The next day we are on patrol and get ambushed. Deuce pulls out that gun and takes one shot. He puts it away and picks up his regular rifle. I'm still waiting for something to happen, but there's nothing. The fight lasts for another fifteen minutes and then the enemy leaves. Two hours later, Deuce gets out the little box that came with the gun and plays with it for a minute. He then makes a call on the satellite telephone."

"What happened?"

"Ten minutes later one of our jets flies overhead and drops a single bomb on the mountainside about twenty klicks from our position. There's a huge explosion. I'm talking about a real big bang. We get over there and find at least fifty of those bastards are dead."

Not quite sure what to say, Melinda said, "That's nice."

"The same thing happens the next day. Deuce shoots one guy with the funny looking gun and packs it away. A little while later, he makes a call and all hell breaks loose twenty- five klicks from where we were attacked. We go over there and there is nothing there but dead terrorists."

"I don't get it. What has the funny looking gun got to do with the call," Melinda asked.

"That gun was shooting a transmitter rather than a bullet. When they carried off their dead and wounded, Deuce was tracking where they went using the little box that had come with the gun. Once they stopped moving, he would call in an airstrike and that would be the end of the bad guys," Jim said.

"That sounds good for our guys. I wish I owned the patent on that," Melinda said.

"It wasn't long before we stopped getting attacked. It appears that in the war of attrition, our side won," Jim said with a short laugh.

"That's good, but why are you telling me that story?"

Jim said, "After Deuce explained to me what was going on, he told me that his cousins whipped it up over night and shipped it out to him the next day. I think Mike built that gun."

"So what if he can build a funny looking gun? I'm not that impressed," Melinda said. She had to admit that it was a rather remarkable solution to the problem. It wasn't the kind of thing that she would have ever thought of doing.

"Right," Jim said skeptically.

Melinda turned to watch the scenery through the passenger side window. Although it was night and they were driving along an unlit road, the monster truck that was following behind them lit up the entire area with its lights. The reminder of the truck drove her thoughts to the petite woman driving it. She had never dealt with a woman who talked that bluntly about men. The idea that a woman would actually welcome sexual comments from men struck her as unreal.

A stray thought came to Melinda. She said, "I'm curious about one thing."

"What?"

"That gun in the shape of a toy periscope - how did Deuce fire it? The torque should have made it impossible to hold onto it when it was fired," Melinda said.

Jim said, "I have no clue. You'll have to ask the person who designed it that question."

"Never," Melinda said. She knew that she wasn't going to get any sleep until she figured out an answer. She was quiet for a moment and then said, "Elementary school kids do not build helicopters or Van De Graff generators."

"You're might be right, but I wouldn't bet any money on it," Jim said.

Melinda sighed. The Bird-4 project was in serious trouble and she needed people like that working on it. She said, "I'm going to have to bring Steve Connor into the project."

"So hire him," Jim said.

"He won't work for me unless I take Mike out on a date," Melinda said.

"It sucks to be you," Jim said. He glanced in the mirror at the truck behind him. He sighed and said, "I'm not ready to get married."



-------

Chapter 4


The dreaded date had finally arrived and Melinda was not happy about it. It was the evening that she was taking Mike O'Connor out for a steak dinner. She decided that if she was going to have to do something so abhorrent that it was worth doing it with a bit of class. She checked out her appearance in the mirror and was pleased with the image reflected back at her. She was wearing a conservative black dress that flattered her figure without looking too sexy. At least, that was her opinion.

Armed with a small black purse and reservations at the best steak house in the area, she headed towards the limousine parked in front of her house. Looking like someone had shot his favorite dog, Jim stood by the rear door holding it open for her. When she approached, he looked over her outfit. Surprised by her choice, he asked, "Are you sure that you want to wear that dress?"

"Why shouldn't I wear it?" Melinda asked.

"He might get the wrong idea," Jim said. He felt that any woman who showed up on a date with him dressed like that was advertising that she interested in him. Although he had never met Mike he was pretty sure the man would come to the same conclusion.

"Don't worry about that. I'll put him in his place if he gets the wrong idea," Melinda said with a smile. She had spent half the night coming up with little witty retorts that would make him look like a fool if he made too much of her appearance.

"Yes, ma'am," Jim said. Gracefully, Melinda got into the car. Jim closed the door and went to get in the driver's seat. He muttered, "This is going to be a disaster."

Settling into the back seat, Melinda said, "Jim, let's pick up Mike and get this evening over with as quickly as possible."

"Yes, ma'am," Jim said.

"He wasn't all that thrilled about us picking him up at his house," Melinda said.

"I wonder why," Jim said worried about what they would find when they got to Mike's house. He wasn't sure why, but he felt like he was forgetting something very important.

"He probably lives in a dump," Melinda said satisfied that Mike was finally on the defensive. She added, "It is about time that asshole got a little taste of his own medicine."

"This evening is going to be a disaster," Jim said while starting the limousine. Jim checked the mirror just in time to see Melinda double-checking her make-up. For someone who was not interested in the man with whom she was going to a restaurant she seemed to take inordinate interest in her appearance. "This is going to be a disaster."

"What was that?"

Jim asked, "Why did you ask me to handle your security this evening?"

"I don't know," Melinda answered evasively. She wasn't about to admit that his name was the only one she could remember when asked who she wanted on security that evening.

"You know that Tripp is going along with us," Jim said.

That little announcement surprised Melinda. She hadn't even considered that Mike would have his protector with him. The idea of having to deal with the two cousins together terrified her. She said, "I didn't think about that."

"I wish I was in Afghanistan," Jim said maneuvering the car down the street.

Neither one spoke for the rest of the trip to the gated community where Mike lived. The only voice came from the GPS navigator when it announced that Jim was to make a turn. Jim stopped the car at the gate and waited for the young man stationed there to take notice of them. The kid looked to be fifteen years old. The young man walked over to the driver's side of the car and waited for Jim to roll down the window. The young man asked, "May I have the name of the person you are visiting, please?"

"I'm here to pick up Mike O'Connor," Jim answered.

The young man stuck his head through the window and looked in the back of the car. Grinning broadly, he said, "Nice to meet you, Melinda Davis. Cousin Mike said you were pretty and he wasn't lying. If he hadn't already laid claim to you for a wife, I'd be asking you to go to my senior prom with me. Since he's claimed you, let me be one of the first to welcome you to the family."

"I'm not marrying him," Melinda said shocked that someone so young would even suggest taking her out on a date. Every clever remark she had dreamed up the previous evening deserted her.

Jim's eyes darted the name badge worn by the young man. He groaned when he read the last name. He said, "He's an Ables."

Feeling panicked, Melinda said, "Get me out of here, Jim."

The young looked at Jim for a second and then asked, "Are you Jimbo?"

"Yes," Jim answered wishing he was anywhere but there.

The young man stuck out a hand and said, "Welcome to the family, Jimbo. I'm Wally Ables. I heard that you are going to marry my cousin Tripp. She's told me all about you."

"I'm not marrying her," Jim said.

"That's what you think. She's got her sights set on you. Us Ables never miss once we take aim at something. You're as good as caught," Wally said proudly.

Jim said, "I'm not that easy to catch. If you don't believe me, just ask the Taliban."

"Cousin Deuce says that they're not so tough; there are just a lot of them," Wally said.

Knowing how Deuce felt about the Taliban, Jim knew better than to argue. He said, "I'd feel a whole lot safer in Afghanistan facing the Taliban than being here facing Tripp."

"Damn! Tripp is going to orgasm when I tell her that," Wally said slapping his thigh and busting out in laughter.

"It wasn't that funny."

Between bouts of laughter, Wally said, "You really do know how to sweet talk an Ables woman. I'll let you through the gate and then give her a call to let her know you're coming."

Jim leaned forward and rested his forehead on the top of the steering wheel. He could hear Wally chuckling while walking back to the guardhouse. Wally's voice carried well enough for Jim to hear, "She's going to be all over him like gunfire at an Ables family picnic."

Jim moaned. "This is a disaster."

With the date spinning out of control even before it began, Melinda said, "We pick them up and drive straight to the restaurant. You are not to stop on the way there; not even for red lights. We won't order any appetizers or drinks before dinner. I'll order our steaks to be served raw so that we can eat and get the hell out of the restaurant without having to wait for them to be cooked. I'll ask for the check when they serve the food. We'll be out of there in fifteen minutes, max."

"That sounds like a plan to me," Jim said.

Melinda sank into her seat and asked, "How many cousins can they have?"

"They've got a lot," Jim answered. He pulled through the gate and headed towards Mike's house.

Melinda looked out the window and said, "It looks like a nice neighborhood. I wonder why he didn't want us to pick him up here."

Jim noticed a woman watching them from her living room window. He turned his head to get a better looking thinking that his eyes were playing tricks on him. The light reflected off the windows and he couldn't see her anymore. Not quite sure of what he had seen, he replied, "I'm not sure."

The road was wide with houses set back from the street and hidden from view by hedges or trees. Jim kept getting occasional glimpses of people through the trees, but they were just flashes that were too short to make out any details. There was something strange about it, but he couldn't put his finger on it. Some idea was tickling the back of his brain, but it didn't have a sense of danger to it that would have grabbed his full attention.

The GPS navigator announced that they had reached the address Mike had given them. There was a wall of very well trimmed hedges surrounding the property. Jim turned the car into the driveway thinking that Mike must spend all of his spare time gardening. The landscaping around the house was spectacular. There wasn't a leaf out of place. Jim muttered, "I wonder why he didn't want us to see this."

Amazed by the profusion of flowers that surrounded the house, Melinda said, "Wow. Look at that yard."

"It is nice," Jim said.

"I don't think the neighbors would appreciate it if we honked the horn to let them know we are here," Melinda said.

"You're probably right."

Melinda said, "You better go up there and let them know we're here."

"I'd rather not," Jim said even while unbuckling his seatbelt. He nearly hit his head on the ceiling when Melinda screamed. His pistol was in his hand before he knew it.

"There's a naked man coming here," Melinda shouted.

Jim stared at the naked man for a full five seconds. The topless woman at the window and the flashes of people through the trees suddenly made sense. He groaned and said, "This is a clothing optional community."

"What?" Melinda asked on the verge of hysteria.

"I kept thinking there was something I was forgetting. I can't believe that I forgot that Lockwood Estates is clothing optional," Jim said. The full implications of what he had just said came crashing in on him. He looked up at the house in horror thinking that he wouldn't survive if a naked Tripp stepped out of the front door.

"We're in Lockwood Estates?" Melinda asked in a shrill voice that reached a volume that was close to a scream.

"Yes," Jim said putting away his pistol. He used the button to lower the window on the front passenger side door. Leaning over, he called out, "Hey, could you let Mike O'Connor know we are here?"

"I want to meet the pretty lady who is going to marry Mister Mike," the man said moving to the front car door. His voice was that of an adult, but the inflection sounded like an eight year old kid.

Jim stared at the man realizing that he was mentally challenged. Having a naked mentally challenged person around his charge was not the best plan from the prospective of being a protector for an attractive woman. He wasn't quite sure how to handle the situation never having encountered one like it before. He muttered, "Oh Shit!"

Melinda said, "I'm not marrying Mike O'Connor."

"That is not what Mister Mike said," the man replied sticking his head through the window.

"He is wrong," Melinda said doing her best not to look in the direction of the naked man.

"Mister Mike is never wrong. He is the smartest man in the world," the man said looking at her like she had better accept what he said as the gospel truth.

"He's an asshole," Melinda said automatically.

The man frowned. "Don't say bad things about Mister Mike. He is the bestest guy in the world. He made a chair that can climb stairs for my mommy. She can't walk."

Jim tried to head off further discussion before it exploded into something nasty. He asked, "Could you let him know that we are here?"

"Pretty lady has to apologize for what she said about Mister Mike," the man said.

Pretty sure how Melinda would react, Jim said, "Remember the plan — we drive straight there, eat raw meat, and leave. Apologize to him."

"I'm sorry," Melinda said wishing the evening was over. In a mumble she added, "that I ever agreed to this in the first place."

Fortunately, the naked man didn't hear the added qualifier. Pulling his head from the window, he said, "Okay, pretty lady. I will get Mr. Mike."

Their visitor didn't have a chance to move more than three feet when the front door opened. Jim stared at Tripp thinking he had never seen her in a dress before. He could just see his days as a bachelor disappearing. Before he had a chance to comment on it, Melinda said, "That bitch. She's wearing my dress."

"Damn, she's hot," Jim said.

"She's going to have to change that dress," Melinda said while crossing her arms. There was no way that she was going to show up at O'Toole's wearing the same dress as another woman.

Mike walked over to the car. Reaching the mentally challenged young man, he said, "Hello Sammy."

"Hello, Mr. Mike," Sammy said standing up a little straighter.

"The yard looks really good," Mike said making a production out of examining the lawn.

"I mowed it just like you asked," Sammy said with a proud smile.

"Yes, you did. You did a good job," Mike said.

"I'm going to work on the flowerbeds tomorrow," Sammy said.

"I'm sure that you'll make that flowerbed look great. You've got a green thumb," Mike said patting Sammy on the back.

Sammy bent down and stuck his head through the car window. He said, "Don't mind what Mr. Mike is saying about me. He always says that I have a green thumb, but I don't. It is pink just like all my other fingers."

"I'm sure it is," Jim said watching Sammy wave his fingers around so that he could inspect them. Melinda looked like she was about to make a comment when Jim said, "Remember the plan."

Sammy stood up and said, "I've got to go home now. Mommy told me to be home early for dinner."

"That's a good boy, Sammy. You wouldn't want to make your mother wait," Mike said with a smile.

"I just wanted to meet the pretty lady you are going to marry. She's pretty, but she says mean things about you. Mommy would wash her mouth out with soap if she was here," Sammy said.

"I'm sure she would," Mike said with a laugh. He looked in the car at Melinda. She was glaring at him. He smiled at her.

Tripp climbed into the front seat and looked back at Melinda. She checked out the dress and said, "You're wearing a fuck me dress too. It looks like Mike is going to get just as lucky tonight as Jimbo."

"I'm not getting lucky," Jim said while trying to cover his eyes.

Tripp ran a hand up his thigh and said, "Yes you are."

Melinda said, "Go in and change your dress."

"No," Tripp replied turning her attention to the man in the driver's seat. She patted Jim's crotch and then acted surprised by what she felt. She said, "Oh, what is this? It seems to me that the trouser snake is getting bigger. We're going to have to see what we can do about letting it out of its confinement."

"You're killing me," Jim said glancing over at her. She was leaning forward and he got an eyeful down the front of her dress. She wasn't wearing a bra.

"That naughty trouser snake; it just got bigger," Tripp said.

"Get a room!" Melinda held out her hands like she was fending off something ugly.

Tripp said, "Later."

"Never," Jim countered.

"We'll see about that," Tripp said.

Melinda was about to comment when she noticed that Mike was seated next to her. He winked at her and then said, "Look at all of those freckles."

Crossing her arms across her chest, Melinda said, "Let's get this evening over with."

Jim said, "Yes, ma'am."

"I like the way you do that," Mike said.

"Do what?" Melinda asked.

Mike smiled at her before answering. "When you cross your arms like that, it lifts your breasts up. It is kind of like you are putting them out there on a shelf for everyone to see and admire."

From the front seat, Tripp said, "Don't you love it when a man openly admires your body?"

"No," Melinda said uncrossing her arms. Now that he had called attention to it, she didn't know what to do with her arms.

"Don't do that. I'm trying to drive," Jim said while moving Tripp's hand off his lap. He reached over to turn up the air conditioner hoping to cool her off.

"I'm in hell," Melinda said.

Turning around in her seat so that she faced the back of the car, Tripp said, "Mike, did you notice the dress she's wearing?"

"Yes, I did," Mike answered.

"She must really like you to wear a dress like that. It screams out that she wants you to take her right here," Tripp said.

Mike glanced at Melinda. The expression on her face suggested that having him take her right there was the last thing on her mind. He said, "I don't think so."

"The smart man finally got something right," Melinda said.

"She's just acting," Tripp said.

Mike said, "She's wearing that dress to lure me closer. When I get close enough, she's going to beat me until I surrender."

Tripp laughed at that and then said, "She's not an Ables woman. Only an Ables woman considers a good fight to be an act of seduction."

"Don't fight. Remember, don't fight," Jim mumbled.

"So where are we going?" Mike asked.

"O'Toole's," Melinda answered.

With a little scream of delight, Tripp said, "I love O'Toole's. I'm sure they'll have fresh oysters for Jimbo to eat. You know what they say about oysters, Jimbo."

"Yes, I know," Jim said trying to concentrate on the road.

Melinda stared at Tripp wondering when a woman like her would ever have a chance to go to a place like O'Toole's. It was extremely expensive and so popular among the wealthy that it was nearly impossible to get reservations regardless of how much money one had. She had been very fortunate that someone had canceled when she had called to get a table.

Jim made good time on the drive to O'Toole's. He managed to do so without running any red lights. He pulled into the parking lot and stopped the car at the valet station. Tripp looked over at the station and said, "Hey, it's Cousin Billy!"

Looking at the fifteen year old kid who was approaching the car, Mike said, "Cousin Wally told me that his brother was working here."

"Another cousin?" Melinda asked incredulously. It seemed to her that she couldn't turn around without running into a member of Mike's family.

"Oh God!" Jim said.

Tripp got out of the car and greeted the young man, "Cousin Billy! How are you doing?"

"Cousin Tripp! I heard that you finally found a man," Billy said.

"That's him driving the car," Tripp said pointing to the driver's seat.

"I heard that he was fairly good in a fight," Billy said.

Tripp said, "Deuce says he's one of the best."

"I'm glad to hear that. Everyone in the Ables clan says that you have excellent taste in men," Billy said.

Jim's forehead hit the steering wheel. He groaned and then said, "I'm doomed."

"He's a real sweet talker," Tripp said.

"Really?" Billy asked.

Smiling, Tripp said, "He compared me to the Taliban. He said he was more afraid of me than them."

"I bet that charmed the panties right off of you," Billy said.

"Sure did. I left them on the floor of the living room," Tripp said. She glanced over her shoulder and saw that Jim was staring at her. She flipped the back of her dress up and then let it drop.

"Oh my God. She's not wearing any panties," Jim said.

Melinda said, "She's a slut."

"No. She knows what she wants and is going after it. Jimbo doesn't stand a chance. No one can resist the charms of an Ables woman," Mike said with more than a little pride in his voice.

"I'm not marrying her," Jim said. Mike's laugh didn't reassure him.

Billy asked, "What are you doing here? I heard that you were out protecting Cousin Mike."

"I am," Tripp answered. She pointed to the backseat. "He's in the back with his bride to be."

Billy opened the door and stepped back to let the passenger out of the car. While Melinda exited the car, he said, "Welcome to the family. I heard that Mike had laid claim to a pretty woman, but calling you pretty just isn't close to accurate. You're drop dead gorgeous. If he hadn't laid claim to you, I'd be inviting you out on a date at the target range."

Melinda nearly tripped on hearing a fifteen year old kid trying to ask her out. She growled, "I'm not marrying Mike."

Billy asked, "Why not?"

"He's an asshole," Melinda said.

Billy shook his head in wonder. Turning to Tripp, he said, "She even talks like an O'Connor woman. I bet she's an engineer, too."

Mike eased out of the car and said, "That's right."

"I hope that you'll invite me to the wedding. I'd love to work security detail," Billy said.

"I'll keep that in mind," Mike said. "It is going to be a big wedding. I'm planning on inviting all six clans of the Donaldson family."

Tripp winked at Jim and said, "It will be a double wedding."

Melinda turned to Jim and whispered, "We eat raw meat and then we leave. Fifteen minutes, max."

"If we eat fast, we can get out in ten."

"Deal."



-------

Chapter 5


"Cousin Lily!"

"Cousin Mike!"

"Cousin Lily!"

"Cousin Tripp!"

"Cousin Lily?" Melinda said feeling faint. She had a feeling that she knew what the next subject of conversation was going to be.

"Did I mention that it is a very large family," Jim said feeling sick to his stomach.

Smiling at Mike, Lily said, "When your girlfriend was trying to make a reservation here, I had to cancel a reservation to fit you in."

"Who did you cancel?" Mike asked out of general curiosity.

"The Governor," Lily answered.

"The Governor?" Melinda asked thinking that she hadn't heard correctly.

"Yes."

"You didn't have to cancel his reservations for me," Melinda said earning a smile from Tripp, Mike, and Lily.

"It isn't everyday that Mike's girlfriend takes him out on their first date," Lily said.

"I'm not Mike's girlfriend," Melinda said wanting to set the record straight.

"Why not?" Lily asked.

"He's an asshole," Melinda answered.

Lily looked over at Mike and said, "She talks just like an O'Connor woman. I bet she's an engineer, too."

"Argh!"

"She is."

Desperate to change the subject, Melinda asked, "Was the Governor upset that you canceled his reservations?"

"He was a little irritated, but I reminded him that the O'Toole clan donated a bunch of money to his campaign," Lily said.

"Cousin George is alright. He won't hold a grudge for long," Tripp said.

"Governor Anders is your cousin?" Melinda asked wondering how many cousins Mike had.

"The Anders clan is full lawyers and politicians," Mike said.

"Cousin George is a real piece of work. He said that he might stop by to meet you," Lily said.

Tripp grabbed Jim's arm and asked, "Would you like Cousin George to perform our wedding ceremony?"

"I don't think Governors can perform marriage ceremonies," Jim said. As far as he could remember it was a Justice of the Peace who did that.

"You might be right," Tripp said. She winked at Melinda and said, "Did you notice that he didn't object? I'm wearing him down."

"This is Jimbo?" Lily asked looking at Jim in surprise.

"That's right. I'm going to marry this sweet talking fighting man," Tripp said hugging Jim's arm.

"I'm not getting married to you," Jim said. He sniffed the air. The odor reminded him of something, but he couldn't place it. It took him a minute to realize that it was Tripp's perfume. He still couldn't place the smell, but he liked it.

Ignoring the denial, Lily took a moment to examine Jim. Finally, she said, "Looks like he's packing a monster in those pants."

"I plan on finding out tonight," Tripp said.

Melinda said, "I'm in hell."

"No," Jim said trying to back away. He was pretty sure that if Tripp got her way that his days as a bachelor would be numbered.

"I'm sure you'll have fun, Cousin Tripp," Lily said.

"I will," Tripp said.

Lily turned to Melinda and said, "You've got such lovely freckles. I'm sure that Mike is going to enjoy playing connect the dots with them."

"Over my dead body," Melinda said.

Lily sighed and said, "She sounds so much like your mother, Mike."

Nodding his head in agreement, Mike said, "Dad was lucky when he found Mom."

Giving a hint at her age, Lily said, "I remember their first date. Your Dad tried a hostile takeover of your mother's company. He figured that his company and Lee Engineering would be an unbeatable combination. Cousin Liz had a very different idea. They met here to strike a deal. The negotiations have lasted for forty years."

"It would be an unbeatable combination," Mike said.

Melinda felt like the world was spinning around her. Lee Engineering was run by Elizabeth Lee; a woman judged by many to be the finest female engineer in the country. Melinda had gone into engineering after hearing a talk by her. Hoping that she was wrong, she asked, "Your mother is Elizabeth Lee?"

"That's mom," Mike answered with a grin. "Of course, that's her professional name. She's actually Elizabeth O'Connor."

"Why are you working for us rather than her?" Melinda asked. She had been crushed when her application to work at Lee Engineering had been turned down. She had taken a position at the aerospace company when the job offer appeared out of nowhere.

"Dad," Mike answered.

"Your father?" Melinda asked.

"I couldn't go work for one or the other without hurting someone's feelings," Mike answered.

Melinda thought about it for a second as the pieces came together. She asked, "Your father runs O'Connor Engineering?"

"That's dad," Mike answered proudly. It was one of the largest engineering firms in the country.

"O'Connor Engineering is a major subcontractor on a dozen of our projects," Melinda said realizing that Mike was probably richer than any of the executives at her company.

Lily said, "I wouldn't be surprised. All of the O'Connors are mechanically minded. Of course, Cousin Mike is the best of the lot of them."

"I wouldn't say that," Mike said modestly.

Lily asked, "Who built a fully functional flying saucer in their backyard when they were in sixth grade?"

"I did, but it was just to replace my helicopter," Mike answered.

Tripp said, "I loved that helicopter."

"You built a fully functional flying saucer?" Melinda asked. She remembered the conversation about the helicopter and hadn't believed that story the first time around.

"Well, it is more like a hover craft. Unlike most hover craft, it can achieve altitudes of five thousand feet," Mike said.

"You're kidding me," Melinda said.

"I was just a kid at the time. I would do it differently now," Mike said.

Lily asked, "Whatever happened to that flying saucer?"

Mike grinned and said, "I take it out to New Mexico sometimes and fly it around Roswell."

"You don't?" Lily asked wide-eyed.

"I just love to read the newspapers afterwards," Mike said with a very large grin.

"You are a very naughty boy," Lily said. She gave him a love tap on the arm.

Melinda said, "I don't believe you."

"Maybe we can fly down there later tonight," Mike said.

"You don't have a flying saucer."

"Do you want to bet? If it flies then you go to New Mexico with me," Mike said.

"If it doesn't, you drop this insane idea that you and I are getting married," Melinda said.

"Deal."

"You're on," Melinda said wanting to prove him wrong.

"Is that a promise?" Mike asked.

"If it is a flying saucer and it flies, then I'll go with you."

"I'm looking forward to it. I'll bring a blanket so that we can land in the desert and watch the stars," Mike said.

"Like that is going to happen," Melinda said dismissively. "Once you've shown me what you are calling a flying saucer, I'll be too busy laughing to go anywhere with you."

"I've always wanted to make love under a star filled sky," Mike said.

Tripp said, "Cousin Mike is going to get lucky tonight."

"No he is not!"

"I think he's not the only one who is going to get lucky tonight," Lily said looking over at Jim.

"I'm going to take Jimbo to the gun range with a couple of the old black powder rifles. I've never met a fighting man who could resist the smell of gunpowder," Tripp said.

Jim sniffed the air catching that familiar scent again. Unable to keep his curiosity in check any longer, he asked, "What is that perfume you are wearing?"

"Do you like it?" Tripp asked with a grin.

"I'm not saying," Jim answered.

Tripp said, "It is Hoppe's No. 9."

"I love the smell of that stuff," Jim said thinking that she was using unfair tactics against him. It was cheating; no man could resist that smell.

Lily said, "You and every other Ables male."

-------

Melinda had heard stories about this room, but had never expected to see the inside of it. It was the private Donaldson room and was used only by invitation. Presidents, royalty, and other distinguished people had been allowed or denied entrance according to criteria that made no sense. She had been dining there once when the Governor and the President of the United States had gone through the polished wood doors.

The entire room was filled with photographs. She went over to the wall and started to look at some of the pictures. Those near the top were almost a century old. Mike stepped up behind her and pointed to the oldest picture on the wall. He said, "That is the only known picture of great-grandfather Donaldson. He had six daughters and no sons."

Pointing to a picture with a young woman and a man in a suit, he said, "The oldest daughter, Anna, married an O'Toole. Peter was a young man just starting out in the restaurant business. This is the original room of O'Toole's. It has been kept in the family for three generations and the fourth generation will be running it before too much longer.

"The second oldest daughter, Donna, married an Ables. Charlie was a lowly captain in the U.S. Calvary at the time, but retired a Colonel. All of the Ables serve in the military before entering law enforcement or becoming adventurers of some kind."

"She was a little lady," Melinda commented. She couldn't keep from observing that Tripp bore a strong resemblance to Donna Ables.

"The third oldest daughter, Susan, married a Connor. Chuck Connor was a chemist back in the day when dye research was big money. They quickly moved over to the plastics industry and made a killing in the early days of plastics. The Connor clan has always kept to the sciences. Steve is one of the first to move into the computer sciences, but he's a wizard at it.

"The fourth oldest daughter, Alice, married my grandfather, Michael O'Connor. I'm named after him. He repaired tractors for a living at the time they married, but he was an inventor in his spare time. He soon had a couple of inventions that allowed him to work fulltime in his basement machine shop. There are still a dozen devices around every household that are based on patents he filed."

"Like what?" Melinda asked.

"That little latch with a spring in it," Mike said. It wasn't a significant invention in the grand scheme of things, but it was the invention that made his grandfather independently wealthy.

"Oh," Melinda said. She was going to have to look it up one of these days.

"The second youngest daughter, Claire, married Walter Anders. He was the mayor of the town at that time. He later went on to hold office in the state legislature," Mike said.

"What about the youngest daughter?" Melinda asked.

"Ah, that was Cybil. She married Doc Sanders," Mike answered.

"Sanders? As in the Sanders' Hospital?" Melinda asked.

"That's the Sanders clan. Doc Sanders opened it and his oldest son grew it to its current size. His other sons and daughters spread across the country. Half of them work in teaching hospitals," Mike answered.

Staring at the pictures on the wall, Melinda quickly figured out that each daughter had five or more children. Their children appeared to have had five or more children each. Based on the number of photographs, there had to be five hundred descendants of Donaldson running around. She asked, "Every one of these is a relative of yours?"

"Every one of them," Mike said.

"Is this a picture of you?" Melinda asked pointing to a picture under that of Alice O'Connor. It was a picture of a young kid standing in front of a flying saucer.

"Yes."

"That is your flying saucer?"

"Yes."

"It actually flies?" Melinda asked.

"Yes it does," Mike answered.

"That's impossible," Melinda said.

"You'll say otherwise when we are watching the stars in New Mexico later tonight," Mike said.

"We'll see," Melinda said although she was beginning to have her doubts.

"Let's get to the table. Our private chef should be here to take our order," Mike said while leading her over to the table.

"Our private chef?"

Mike said, "Only the kids of the O'Toole clan cook for this room."

"I noticed that all of your young cousins that I've met have jobs," Melinda said making reference to Wally and Billy.

"Great-grandfather believed that kids should hold jobs at the earliest age possible. He felt that it was the only way to instill in the young a sense of responsibility and a respect for money," Mike said.

Tripp said, "I started by parking cars here when I was fourteen. I became a guard at the local mall when I was sixteen. I spent four years in the Army and left to start my own protection service."

Nodding his head, Mike said, "I started working in a machine shop when I was fourteen. At seventeen, I started working as a draftsman. Mom and Dad insisted that I pay my own way through college."

"They are filthy rich," Melinda said.

"They earned it," Mike said. He looked over at the door to the kitchen and announced, "We're in luck. Our chef tonight is Jenny."

"She's better than Cousin Dan," Tripp said looking excited.

A woman who looked like a very young version of Lily stepped over to the table. She smiled at Mike and said, "I'm your Chef tonight."

"Excellent," Mike said earning a big smile from Jenny.

Looking at Melinda, Jenny said, "The last time you were here, you ordered the swordfish. I have a nice swordfish steak with your name on it. I would like to suggest the Parchment Baked Swordfish. This recipe is out of this world."

"That does sound good," Melinda said unable to believe that they had remembered what she had ordered the last time she had been here.

"Remember the plan," Jim said squirming in his seat.

"I'll have the Parchment Baked Swordfish," Melinda said.

"She forgot the plan," Jim said slumping down in his chair. He moved Tripp's hand off his crotch and said, "Don't do that. There are children present."

"Where?" Tripp asked.

"Your cousin can't be more than sixteen years old."

"She's an O'Toole," Tripp said dismissively.

Jenny turned to Tripp and said, "Cousin Tripp, you'll take your usual?"

"Of course," Tripp said.

"One Cajun Bayoubaisse coming up," Jenny said.

Mike said, "That sounds good."

Still looking at Tripp, Jenny said, "I assume that you'll want your date to have something stimulating."

"You bet," Tripp said. She flashed a grin at Jim.

Giving Melinda a sharp look, Jim said, "We'll all have raw steaks. Bring the bill when you bring the food."

Jenny laughed. Looking at Tripp, she said, "You haven't got him under control yet, Tripp."

"He's putting up a good fight, but he can't win," Tripp said.

Jenny asked, "Are you wearing some Hoppe's No. 9?"

"Yes."

"He'll be yours in no time," Jenny said ignoring the groan from Jim.

"I know," Tripp said.

Jenny looked at Jim and asked, "How about a simple chowder, steak dinner, and a souffle for desert?"

"That sounds good," Jim said. He figured that if he was going to be stuck here that he might as well enjoy the meal.

Jenny said, "I bet you like your steak medium rare."

"Good guess," Jim said.

"Great, I'll put together the seduction special," Jenny said.

Sitting up a little straighter, Tripp asked, "What's that?"

"I'll start him off with a serving of oyster chowder made from Olympia oysters. They are small, but very flavorful. They are the perfect size for use in a chowder. We all know what they say about oysters."

"I was going to suggest oysters," Tripp said.

"I was thinking of something more along the lines of corn chowder," Jim said wondering if he was going to regret his order.

"I've got a very intriguing topping for steaks that includes figs and truffles. Both of them have long been considered aphrodisiacs."

"That does sound effective," Tripp said.

"That doesn't sound so good," Jim said getting worried about the direction this meal was headed.

"Asparagus is a very sexy food, so I'll serve that as a side to his steak. Back in the nineteenth century, asparagus was served to bridegrooms in order to increase their interest," Jenny said.

"I didn't know that," Tripp said. "I always heard that it made a man's semen taste bad."

"A little pineapple juice will fix that problem," Jenny said.

Jim said, "Aren't you a little young to be talking about aphrodisiacs and semen?"

"Food and sex go together like motherhood and apple pie," Jenny said dismissively.

"Right," Tripp said in agreement.

"We'll finish his meal with a Chocolate Souffle. Did you know that Chocolate is considered an aphrodisiac? It contains a sedative that lowers inhibitions and a stimulant that increases the desire for physical contact. It was such a strong one that hot cocoa was banned from monasteries centuries ago," Jenny said.

Frowning, Jim answered, "I didn't know that."

"Sounds like a perfect dessert," Tripp said.

"This isn't going well," Jim muttered.

Jenny turned to Mike and said, "Cousin Mike, I've got some great venison. Are you up for it?"

"You know it," Mike said with a grin.

Jenny said, "My little sister, Cathy, will bring out some bread for you to enjoy while I prepare your meal."

"When did she start working here?" Mike asked.

"She's been here for three weeks. She started right after her fourteenth birthday," Jenny said.

Mike asked, "Is she working in the kitchen?"

"Yes," Jenny answered with a smile.

"Does she like it?" Mike asked.

"She's a natural," Jenny answered.

"I'm glad to hear that," Tripp said.

Jenny smiled at Mike and said, "She doesn't know you're here. I'll send her out in a minute."

When Jenny went into the kitchen, Mike leaned over to Melinda and said, "When Cathy comes out, don't mention the scars. She's a little sensitive about them."

"What scars?" Melinda asked.

"She burned herself when she was a little girl," Tripp answered.

Mike said, "When she was seven, she tried to surprise her parents by making dinner for them. She had an accident with some grease and ended up with a third degree burn on her arm. It was a nice thought that didn't turn out too well."

"Oh," Melinda said.

"She is Mike's favorite cousin," Tripp said.

"I don't have favorites."

"Yes you do."

"No I don't."

"You're always dragging home wounded strays."

"No I don't."

"What about Sammy?" Tripp asked.

"I like Sammy. He's got a heart of gold," Mike said.

Tripp looked over at Melinda and said, "When he went to college he rented a room near the campus. After graduating, he comes back with his landlord and her son in the back of his car. She's paralyzed below the waist and her son is mentally challenged. They live in the mother-in-law house behind his house that he built for them. Sammy does a little gardening around the yard, but Mike spends more money taking care of them than Sammy could possibly earn as a gardener."

Mike said, "I don't spend that much. Besides, I couldn't leave her there; she was losing her house."

A young woman entered the room and placed a basket of hot bread on the table. She stood by the table waiting for Mike to notice her. It was obvious that she was excited. Mike looked over at her and warmly said, "Cousin Cathy."

"Cousin Mike!"

"Come here and give me a hug," Mike said holding out his arms. The young woman ran to him and flew into his arms.

"I wanted to thank you for the wonderful knife set that you gave me for my birthday," Cathy said.

"How's my favorite cousin?" Mike asked. The pair rubbed noses.

"I'm working in the kitchen!" Cathy said excitedly.

Tripp leaned over to Melinda and said, "If you can't tell, she's his favorite cousin."



-------

Chapter 6


Melinda stared at the craft thinking that it did look like a flying saucer. The flat body was twenty-five feet across with a dome in the center. The body was painted a solid flat black that didn't reflect any light. The black dome reminded Melinda of a dark pair of sunglasses. Grudgingly, she said, "I will admit that it looks like a flying saucer."

Mike went over and fiddled with something on the side. The next thing she knew, the domed top was swinging open to the back. Mike said, "There are a few design flaws, but you have to remember that I was in sixth grade when I built it."

"What kind of design flaws?" Melinda asked wondering if the design flaws meant that the craft wasn't safe to fly.

"Well, the footholds that I put in are too small for adult feet," Mike said pointing to some indentations along the side.

"I guess that is understandable," Melinda said lamely. She had been expecting something a little more substantial that she could use to claim that it didn't fly.

"Let's get in," Mike said leading her over to one side of the craft.

"Are you sure it is safe?" Melinda asked feeling suddenly nervous.

"Yes," Mike answered with confidence. He had been flying the little craft for years with very few problems. He added, "I just gave it a full maintenance check three weeks ago."

"Okay," Melinda said. She struggled up the side of the craft to reach the passenger seat. When her foot slipped out of the foothold, she said, "You're right. The footholds are a little small."

Mike said, "It would help if you weren't wearing high heels."

"I always wear high heels," Melinda said defensively. There was no way that she could have predicted that the evening would include climbing into a flying saucer.

"I've noticed. They give you a well shaped calf," Mike commented.

"High heels are expected of women in my position," Melinda said. She was very careful to present a professional image at all times. Even around the house she tended to wear professional dress.

Not believing that for a minute, Mike said, "Right."

"It is true," Melinda said.

Mike said, "You're the only woman in the company who enters the production area wearing high heels."

"The only time I wear flats is when I'm in the gym," Melinda said. Reaching down to give her a hand up, Mike took the opportunity to caress her calf. Melinda snapped, "Stop that."

"Mom always said that it was safe to touch bare skin on a date," Mike said grasping her foot and giving her a steady platform for climbing onto the craft.

"Your mom is wrong," Melinda said indignantly. It was difficult looking graceful while climbing into the craft. She made it to the top and climbed into the seat. The seat was a tad tight.

"Mom is never wrong," Mike said while coming around the side of the craft. "A woman sets the tone of the date by the clothes she wears. She knows exactly what she is offering with every square inch of skin that she's showing."

"I never heard it put like that," Melinda said.

"Our family is rather honest about things like that," Mike said.

Thinking about how every male in that family had talked to her, she said, "The men in your family are crude around women."

"No, the men in my family are honest around women," Mike said. "If we find a woman attractive, then we tell her so. The women are equally honest."

"Your cousin Tripp is the most vulgar woman I've ever seen," Melinda said. She had never seen anyone acting so overtly sexual in her life. Not even in those hard R movies did women act so aggressively.

"No she's not. She's using every weapon in her arsenal to win the mating competition. Jimbo doesn't stand a chance," Mike said.

"It isn't a competition," Melinda said.

"It is the most competitive activity in which humans engage," Mike said correcting her. He climbed into the craft and settled into the seat. It was a little snug, but he was used to it.

"I don't like to think of it that way," Melinda said. Mike looked at her and laughed. "What's so funny?"

Mike said, "A women will wear all kinds of clothes, hairstyles, and make up to present herself in a more attractive manner to men than other women. The amount of money spent on beauty products exceeds seven billion dollars a year. That's pretty significant when you consider that the majority of that is being spent by around forty million women."

"It sounds kind of crass when you put it that way," Melinda said. She couldn't deny the numbers.

Mike said, "You might want to fasten your seatbelt."

It took Melinda a moment to figure out the complex seatbelt. It was the same type of seatbelt used by race car drivers. She finally got it together. Mike reached over and pulled the straps tight. He said, "That's better."

"This is a substantial seatbelt," Melinda remarked feeling the belt press her into the seat.

"All the better to protect your luscious body," Mike said.

Deciding not to react to his comment, Melinda asked, "When are we leaving or are we just going to sit here and pretend to fly?"

Picking up a plastic coated checklist, Mike said, "As soon as we get through the checklist. Do you want to read it out to me?"

Taking the list, Melinda scanned the items on it. It seemed pretty substantial and complete. She read out the first item and watched Mike transform into a very serious minded individual. The process of working through the checklist took fifteen minutes. Once they were done with it, Mike said, "Hold on."

Moving slowly, the craft left the garage and headed into the air. Melinda looked down into Mike's backyard. Tripp and Jim were watching them leave. Tripp was smiling and waving at them. Jim looked like a cat at a dog kennel. In a way, she felt sorry for him.

The first thing that Melinda noticed about the flight was that it was remarkably smooth. Remembering early films of experimental craft like this bobbing and weaving all over the place, Melinda said, "I expected it to wobble a little."

"Getting rid of that wobble was the most difficult part of getting it to work," Mike said.

"How did you manage it?" Melinda asked. The ground moved past quickly under the craft. They were really moving along at a good speed.

"Believe me, it wasn't easy," Mike answered. He then launched into a technical description of how he managed to eliminate the wobble.

The next hour was spent having an extremely detailed technical discussion. The exchange was fast and furious. Despite her desire to keep from liking this irritating man, Melinda found the conversation extremely interesting. It had been ages since she had been able to engage in a discussion of this nature.

Mike navigated the craft towards New Mexico. Leaving the bright lights of the city behind, the stars overhead appeared to burst forth brighter. Melinda looked up at the sky through the dome and said, "Look at all of those stars."

"It is amazing isn't it?" Mike said. He turned the craft a little so that it was heading towards the west.

Noticing the slight change in direction, Melinda asked, "Why are we changing course?"

Although an aircraft could take a straight-line approach to a destination, the realities of flight often required taking a less direct approach. He said, "We want to avoid Amarillo."

"Why?"

"Too many eyes," Mike said looking down at his GPS system. He sighed and said, "It seems like everyone has a video camera. I'm sure that there are hours of footage of me flying around."

"I now know that there are such things as flying saucers," Melinda said with a small laugh. She wondered how many times she had argued against the existence of flying saucers while in college. It was kind of strange to think that she was now flying over empty countryside in one.

"How does it feel to be a little green man from outer space?"

Melinda laughed at the question. She imagined that if they were to stop and get out that someone would describe them like space aliens. She asked, "So how many times have you been reported as a space alien?"

"Once or twice," Mike said with a grin. He said, "I was rather offended by their description of me."

"Scrawny with long limbs and a big head," Melinda asked making reference to the description of the so-called grays.

"Right," Mike said.

Melinda teased, "It sounds accurate to me."

"I'll have you know that I'm not scrawny," Mike replied.

"I noticed that you didn't deny that you have a large head," Melinda said.

"My head is properly proportioned for my body," Mike said. He glanced over at her and said, "Some women have compared me to Clint Eastwood."

"In your dreams," Melinda said despite the fact that the thought that he looked like Clint crossed her mind every time she saw him.

"I'm sure that I've starred in a few of your dreams," Mike said.

"They are called nightmares," Melinda said unable to suppress the blush that came unbidden.

"Right," Mike said having noted the red blush that had spread across her face.

"Can we change the subject?" Melinda asked.

"Sure," Mike said. He glanced at the clock and said, "I imagine that Jimbo is proposing to Tripp about now."

"I doubt it," Melinda said.

Mike said, "You forget that I live in a clothing optional community. I'm pretty sure that Tripp was naked before we were ten miles away."

"I forgot about that," Melinda said. She caught herself imagining what he looked like naked.

"I'm pretty sure that he didn't struggle too much," Mike said with a laugh. He could imagine the look on Jimbo's face when he turned around and discovered Tripp standing there naked. The poor guy probably didn't know whether he should run or drop to his knees.

"Men don't struggle at all when faced with a naked woman," Melinda said.

"Of course they don't. Nature demands that men spread their seed as far and wide as possible," Mike said.

Melinda had heard this discussion many times in the past. As if reciting some boring text, she said, "And nature demands that women attract mates who will take care of them."

"That's right," Mike said.

"We are more than our biology," Melinda said.

"I won't disagree with that. However, I have found that when I've presented the appropriate signals that women are much more responsive," Mike said with a grin. He would like to see her argue that.

"What kind of signals?"

"Doing things that demonstrate that I'm an alpha male," Mike answered.

"Like what?" Melinda asked.

"Demonstrating my success by flaunting my money," Mike said.

Melinda said, "That works only with gold-diggers."

"Gold-diggers who are following a biological drive," Mike countered. He glanced over at her and asked, "Do you know what works better than money?"

"What?" Melinda asked.

"Being honest about what I find attractive about a woman. It demonstrates a confidence that most men don't project. Women find it irresistible," Mike answered.

Having had a lot of that honesty directed at her, Melinda didn't think it worked well at all. It didn't dawn on her that every time one of his cousins made a comment about her appearance that she was totally lost for words. She said, "It angers me."

"I'm sure that your heart skips a beat every time I compliment your appearance," Mike replied.

"That's only because I'm trying to control my temper," Melinda said.

Mike laughed at the comment. He said, "I haven't even brought out the big guns yet. Ten minutes after turning on the O'Connor charm, you'll be begging me to be the father of your children."

"You're delusional," Melinda said.

"Not at all," Mike said with a confident grin. His confidence only made Melinda more resolved to resist his charms. Of course, he counted on that knowing that when he really started the process of seducing her that she'd fall that much easier.

"You're impossible," Melinda said crossing her arms.

"I love it when you cross your arms like that."

"Argh!"

-------

While Mike maneuvered the craft towards an isolated building, he said, "We're there."

"Whose barn is that?" Melinda asked finding it strange to find a barn in the middle of nowhere.

Mike pushed a button on the dashboard of his craft. The door on the barn started to slide open. He answered, "Mine. I own this place."

"There's nothing here," Melinda said. There was absolutely nothing within sight of their location except for that barn. She couldn't even see a road.

"I know. That's what is so good about it," Mike answered. Seeing that she was about to ask why that was so good, he said, "No prying eyes to see the flying saucer."

"Oh. I didn't think about that," Melinda said.

"And the stars are much nicer here," Mike said directing the craft through the open doors. After a few seconds, the craft settled down on the floor of the building. Once it had landed, he shut down the engine and opened the covering dome. Smiling at her, he said, "There's some stairs at the back of the building that go down to my apartment. You might want to freshen up while I get the craft ready for the flight home."

Melinda released the seatbelt and stood to get out of the craft. Looking down at the footholds, she realized that she was never going to make it down without removing her heels. She slipped off her shoes and made her way down the side of the craft. It wasn't nearly as difficult getting out as it had been getting into it.

Once on solid ground, she took a moment to look around. The building was a lot larger than it had appeared on approach. There was a complete machine shop off to one side. She leaned against the side of the craft and replaced her shoes. Heading towards the back of the building, she spotted the stairwell. Not sure of what she would find, she went down the stairs. Lights came on illuminating her way.

Reaching the bottom of the stairs brought what had to be the biggest shock of her evening. She was looking at a huge apartment that was larger than her home. Clearly the need for privacy wasn't important since there wasn't a single wall separating any of the functional areas. The furniture looked like it cost a fortune.

She walked around taking in the décor. There was a desk in an area that clearly functioned as an office. She noticed a pad of paper and a slide rule on the desk. Staring at the slide rule, she said, "Nobody uses one of those anymore."

"He said that I was to freshen up. Where's the bathroom?" she asked once she got over her shock of seeing the antique on his desk. Glancing around, she noticed the showerhead inside a glassed in area. She found the toilet tucked away behind the shower wall. There wasn't a door, but the arrangement was sufficient to give a little privacy.

After taking care of her physical needs, she left the enclosure and spent a few minutes in front of the mirror fixing her makeup. She turned to find him leaning against the wall of the stairwell watching her with a grin on his face. He said, "It is nice to see that you're making yourself pretty for me."

"I'm not making myself pretty for you."

"Sure looks like it to me."

"Don't you have anything better to do than watch me?"

"Nope," Mike answered.

"Well find something," Melinda said.

"You're never going to be able to walk outside in those heels," Mike said.

"I guess we'll just have to head home without stargazing," she said.

"There's a box over there on the table. You might want to check it out," Mike said.

Melinda had not noticed the box on her initial pass through the room. Not sure what to expect, she went over to the table. Looking at the shoebox, she asked, "What is it?"

"Open it," Mike said.

Melinda lifted the lid off the shoebox. Inside was a pair of sneakers. She lifted one out and examined it. Not only was it the correct size; it was the brand that she normally wore at the gym. Looking over at him, she asked, "How did you know my size?"

"I cheated," Mike answered with a grin.

"How did you know my size?" Melinda asked wondering if he had broken into her house. She knew that he wouldn't do it; he would have an Ables do it.

"I called your mother," Mike answered.

Shocked, Melinda asked, "You called my mother?"

"She was so excited that she was going to become a grandmother that it was almost impossible to get off the phone. You wouldn't believe the things she told me about you," Mike said.

"You called my mother?" Melinda asked unable to believe that he would actually do that.

"Yes. She's a very nice lady and very helpful. She gave me the sizes for every piece of clothing that you wear. She even told me what brands you like," Mike said.

"You called my mother!" Melinda said.

"Of course I called your mother. Establishing a good relationship with your future mother-in-law is very important," Mike said.

"I'm not going to marry you," Melinda said.

"I also talked to your father. He was quite gracious in giving me permission to propose to you," Mike said.

Melinda pulled out a chair from the table and sat down before she collapsed. This was a disaster. She was not looking forward to explaining to her parents that she wasn't going to get married. She asked, "You asked my father if you could marry me?"

"Yes," Mike answered. He walked over to her and touched her lip. In a very soft voice, he said, "Your days as a single woman are about to come to an end."

"I have to admit that you're a confident asshole," Melinda said recovering a little from the surprise. She needed to get a little distance from him to regroup.

"You sound just like Mom talking to Dad," Mike said eliciting a low growl from his date. Ignoring it, he said, "Why don't you put on your shoes and we'll go check out the stars?"

Mute, Melinda put on the sneakers. Mike asked, "What do you think of my place?"

"Impressive," Melinda answered.

"My cousin Edgar designed it. He's one of the best structural engineers in the world," Mike said.

"Who decorated it?" Melinda asked.

"Sammy's mother. She was an interior decorator before the car accident took away her ability to walk. From what I understand, she was one of the best in the country. Her ability didn't help her much after the accident. There isn't much use for an interior decorator that can't get into the places she's supposed to decorate. I have had her decorate all of my places and I've never been disappointed," Mike answered.

"I never thought about it like that, but I can see where having a disability like that would make it tough to be an interior decorator," Melinda said thinking that all she needed was ten minutes alone to regroup and she would be able to handle him. It just seemed to her that every time he started talking that he was taking her by surprise by the topic. "Was Sammy injured in the accident?"

"His mother was pregnant with him at the time of the accident. He's lucky to be alive," Mike answered.

"That must have been rough on her," Melinda said. She couldn't imagine trying to recover from an automobile accident while pregnant. It must have been heartbreaking to discover that her baby had been born mentally challenged.

"She's a strong woman and a good mother. You'll like her," Mike said. Seeing that she had finished tying her laces, he said, "Let's go."

Stepping outside the building required that they pause for their eyes to get used to the dark. Mike said, "There's a nice spot a hundred yards from here. I've got a small stack of firewood there."

Wondering how it was that Mike had so many things prepared, Melinda realized that he had planned on having her out here this evening. Hoping to put a minor dent in his plans, she said, "No need to light a fire."

"It is no problem at all," Mike said.

Walking across the desert in the sneakers was a lot easier than it would have been in the high heels. She hardly noticed. She was still trying to recover from the shock of learning that Mike had called her parents. She wondered when he had done it. Her parents hadn't mentioned talking to him the last time she had called home. That reminded her that she probably should call home more frequently.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Mike said, "We're here."

Melinda watched Mike spread out a blanket. Gesturing to it, he said, "Have a seat."

"Thank you," Melinda said looking down at the blanket. Her dress wasn't exactly the proper clothes for lounging around on a blanket. Taking care in not exposing an inch of skin more than necessary, she sat down on the blanket.

Mike went over to the small mound of fire wood. While fussing with his lighter, he said, "Do you know what I like the most about you?"

"My freckles," Melinda answered. It seemed to her that her freckles were a popular topic of conversation among Mike and his relatives.

"No, although I do find your freckles fascinating," Mike replied. The tinder finally caught and he eased back to watch the fire.

"My legs?" Melinda said. She fully expected him to give a crass answer that it was her ass or breasts.

"Nope, although I must admit that you do have excellent legs," Mike said. "Were you ever a dancer?"

"I wasn't ever a dancer," Melinda answered. She knew that she wasn't going to avoid it much longer. She said, "I guess you like my breasts or ass the most."

"Nope," Mike said knowing that he had her hooked now. It was time to reel her in.

Surprised, Melinda asked, "What do you like the most about me?"

"Your mind. You're one of the best engineers I've ever met," Mike answered.

"Oh my," Melinda said feeling flustered. He had snuck that one by her.

"Your solution to the heating problem on the drone project eight years ago was inspired," Mike said. "I remember reading..."



-------

Chapter 7


Melinda opened her eyes and looked around. The sun was rising in the east. Seeing it, she sat up. A small breeze caused her to look down at her nude body. The events of the previous night came rushing back to her. She groaned, "Oh my God. It wasn't a dream."

"Good morning," Mike said. He was lying on his side watching her sleep.

Frantic to get in the protective cover of clothes, Melinda asked, "Where's my dress?"

"I think you are sitting on it," Mike answered watching her try to cover her body with her hands. She wasn't being very successful. It made him wonder if she was really trying all that hard.

Melinda shifted and grabbed her dress. She nearly tore it in her chaotic rush to put it on. With the dress still covering her head, she said, "You cheated."

"I did?" Mike asked amazed at the difficulty that she was having in getting dressed. He would have offered to help her, but he had a feeling that would only make her angry.

"Yes, you did."

"How?"

"You talked about my mind rather than my body," Melinda said. It even sounded lame to her.

"I didn't know that was cheating," Mike said with a grin. He wondered how long it would take her to realize that she was trying to put the dress on upside down.

"It is," Melinda declared. She gave a small scream of frustration when she realized that the dress was upside down.

"I must admit that you have a wonderful body," Mike said.

"Don't talk to me about my body," Melinda said. She finally got the dress mostly covering her.

"You're right. I'd rather talk about your mind," Mike said.

"Don't say a word about my mind. That's cheating," Melinda shouted. She finally got the dress so that it covered all of the parts it was meant to cover.

"You're right. I'd rather talk about how much fun it would be to work on a submarine with you," Mike said.

"Do what?" Melinda asked looking around for her underwear.

"I bet that working together, we could build a submarine that would put all of the others to shame," Mike said.

"A submarine?" Melinda asked forgetting about her underwear for a minute.

"Yes. I keep imagining a submarine with a transparent front that would let us watch the sea life while we're cruising through the Galapagos Islands," Mike said.

"There's a reason why submarines are built like tin cans," Melinda said.

"I must admit that it would be a challenge. I was thinking of something about a hundred feet long, seventy-five feet wide, and about ten feet tall," Mike said.

"Not a cylinder," Melinda asked finding that she was interested in the idea.

"I was looking at making something a little more unusual than that. I was thinking of something along the lines of a manta ray in shape although not quite as wide," Mike said.

"You wouldn't be able to take something like that too deep. It would be kind of too large for shallow areas," Melinda said.

"It just needs to get deep enough to avoid the turbulence of storms and we could add a small run-about for shallow areas," Mike said.

"That's true," Melinda said.

Knowing that he had her well and truly hooked, he said, "I'd love to take it through the region around the Galapagos Islands. Can you imagine watching the diversity of aquatic life in their natural habitat?"

"That would be wonderful," Melinda said. She always visited aquariums whenever she had the chance.

"It would make a nice trip for our fifth anniversary," Mike said.

Melinda snapped out of her daydream and shouted, "Stop doing that!"

"Doing what?"

"Cheating," Melinda said. It seemed to her that he was always keeping her off balance. Last night, he had talked about her accomplishments as an engineer. It had been so easy to talk about it that she completely dropped her guard. The next thing she knew, she was taking off her dress. Things got real fuzzy about that time.

"I wasn't cheating. I was talking about you and me designing a fully functional touring submarine," Mike said pleasantly.

"Where is my underwear?" Melinda asked. She had to get herself together before she lost it completely.

"Hanging off the cactus over there," Mike said pointing to a plant a dozen feet away.

"Oh, God."

"I never saw anyone so eager to get out of her panties," Mike said.

"I don't want to hear about it."

"You do let your passions get the better of you at times," Mike observed.

"Shut up."

"You are quite vocal too," Mike said. He was enjoying the moment.

"Don't say another word."

"That was the best night of my life," Mike said.

Melinda practically whimpered on hearing that. She hung her head and said, "That's it. Torture me some more."

"I'm serious. I've never been with a woman like you," Mike said while getting up to walk over to the cactus on which her panties hung limply.

"Rub it in."

"I can't wait to work with you," Mike said. He got the panties off the cactus and held them up for her to see. Making a production of it, he lifted the panties to his nose and sniffed. Smiling up at her, he said, "Someone was excited last night."

"That's disturbing," Melinda said staring at him.

"I can't wait to see if you are half as passionate when working as you are in bed," Mike said tossing the panties to her.

"Kill me now," Melinda said. She couldn't even say why she had done what she had done the previous night. It was very rare when she let loose like that. The idea that she would do that with Mike O'Connor was so foreign to her that it felt like it was happening to a stranger.

Mike crouched down by the blanket and picked up his clothes. He said, "Let's get to the barn and eat."

"Aren't you going to get dressed?" Melinda asked. She kept finding her eyes drawn to his pride and joy.

"You've seen it all. In fact, if I remember correctly you've handled the interesting bits quite extensively," Mike said. He grinned at the sequence of expressions that crossed her face.

"I was drunk at the time," Melinda said.

"You had one glass of wine with dinner and nothing else alcoholic for the next four hours," Mike said pointing out the weakness in her excuse.

"Can't you let a girl retain her dignity?"

"I'm just keeping you honest," Mike said.

Melinda led the way to the building. She had thought it preferable to lead than to follow the naked man back to the building until Mike said, "The view from back here is wonderful."

"Ugh! I want to kill you."

"No need to wait up for me. I'll just follow along behind you," Mike said when she stopped to glare at him.

Turning, she stomped towards the building. His laughter added fuel to her anger. She muttered, "I just need ten minutes alone to collect myself."

Mike followed along appreciating the way that her dress showed off her body. He nearly burst into laughter when she shouted, "I can't believe that I slept with him."

He called back, "On the first date no less!"

"Argh!"

Mike laughed at her reaction. He knew that she was going to marry him despite her constant denial. He followed her into the building. Without waiting for him, she made her way to the stairwell. She wanted to get a shower. It wasn't until she reached the bottom of the stairs that she realized he would be able to watch her wash. She wanted to cry.

Mike passed by her before calling over his shoulder, "Let me wash up first and I'll start breakfast while you take your shower."

"Okay," Melinda answered.

Five minutes later, Melinda caught herself watching Mike lather his body in the shower. She mumbled, "God he's a good looking man."

Mike paused in his shower and looked over at her. Seeing that she was staring at him, he sent her an exaggerated wink. Realizing that she had been caught watching him, she spun around to face the other direction. Mike said, "Damn, she's a fine woman."

After rinsing off, Mike stepped out of the shower. He called over to her, "The shower is all yours."

"Thanks," Melinda replied wondering how she would get the nerve to strip in front of him.

"How do you like your eggs?" Mike asked.

"Didn't my mother tell you?"

"I didn't ask."

"Over easy."

Mike was about to make a joke, but held off. He said, "Just so that you know, I like mine over hard."

"Oh," Melinda said. She wasn't quite sure what that meant. She was going to say something else, but he had walked over to the kitchen area. It dawned on her that he was letting her know that he expected that she would be preparing breakfast for him sometime in the future.

"Breakfast will be ready in ten minutes," Mike said.

In a supreme act of courage, Melinda undressed and stepped into the shower. She kept glancing over at Mike to see if he was leering at her, but he was busy in the kitchen. Keeping an eye upon him, she washed her body. She nearly died when he glanced in her direction. She got angry when he laughed and went back to work while shaking his head.

After rinsing off, she stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel. After she had dried her body, she wrapped the towel around her body. It was just big enough to cover all of the important bits. After picking up her little black dress, she looked it over. It was covered with sand and stains that bore visual evidence of what they had done the previous evening. It was ruined.

Mike said, "Mycroft."

"Yes, sir."

The disembodied voice coming from nowhere startled Melinda. She looked around trying to see who else was in the room.

"Display the plans for Manta One on the wall, Mycroft," Mike said. A projector displayed the plans for a submarine on the wall across the room. Even as the display slowly came to full brightness, the voice said, "Yes, sir."

"Thank you, Mycroft."

"What was that?" Melinda asked.

"Why don't you check it out?" Mike called over to Melinda. He cracked an egg into the frying pan without looking up to see what she was doing.

Feeling like she had entered a science fiction film, Melinda walked across the room staring at the plans projected on the wall. The plans were not very well developed. There were major regions in which boxes were drawn labeled with the function that was to be installed. She could see the shape of the hull and major support structures, but there were a lot of features missing.

Her mind started filling in the details. There were areas where greater support was needed to counter the pressures that any depth of significance would put upon the hull. Mentally she changed a little of the design wishing that she had a computer to help perform the stress calculations.

Mike appeared by her side and said, "Breakfast is ready."

"Already?"

"Yes," Mike said. He handed her a cup of coffee. Once she had taken it from him, he slipped a finger in the top of the towel. With a gentle tug, the towel dropped to the floor. He said, "You don't need that here."

Wide-eyed, Melinda couldn't believe that he had done that. She would have hit him, but he had stepped back. He said, "Don't worry, I won't attack you."

She followed him to the dining table. Much to her surprise, he pulled the chair out for her. She sat down and stared at the breakfast plate. There were two eggs, bacon, hash browned potatoes, and whole wheat toast. Next to the plate was a glass of orange juice. Her stomach growled in a very unladylike manner. She said, "It looks good."

"Thanks. Dig in before it gets cold," Mike said.

They didn't talk while eating. About midway through the meal a chime sounded. Mike looked up and said, "Yes, Mycroft."

"A call for you."

"Put it through, Mycroft."

"Yes, sir."

A woman's voice filled the air. "Mike?"

"Hello, Mom."

"Can you clear the runway? I'll be there in an hour," his mother said.

Melinda's eyes nearly bulged out upon hearing that. Here she was sitting naked with the son of Elizabeth Lee and the queen of engineering was on her way there. Even if she put on her clothes, her little black dress was completely ruined. The woman would see the stains and know exactly what had happened.

"No problem, Mom."

"Is she there?"

"Yes, Mom. She's here."

"That's good. I can't wait to see her again."

Melinda was waving her hands and mouthing, "She can't come here and see me like this."

"She says hello," Mike said.

"Can't she speak for herself?"

"Her mouth is full at the moment."

"Ah, having a little morning fun. I'm sorry to interrupt."

Melinda squeaked.

"We're just having breakfast," Mike said.

"It isn't too late for a little morning fun."

Melinda squawked.

"I'll keep that in mind, Mom."

"Is there a bird there?"

"No, Mom."

"I keep hearing squeaks and squawks."

"That's Melinda, Mom."

Melinda squawked again.

"Odd. I thought she was a more articulate woman than that."

"I think she's a little scared of meeting her future mother-in-law."

Melinda squawked.

"No need to be scared. I haven't bitten anyone in ages."

"What about Dad?"

"Okay, I bite him all of the time. He's an asshole."

Melinda squeaked.

"Now you've scared her, Mom."

"Sorry, Mike."

"I'll see you in an hour."

"Bye."

"Bye."

Now that the conversation was over, Melinda recovered enough to say, "You asshole."

"Uh," Mike said raising a finger.

"I'm naked and your mother is coming here."

"There's..." Mike said.

"My only dress is stained with you know what!"

"I'm still here, dear," Mike's mother said.

"Oh my God," Melinda said. She wanted to crawl in a hole and die.

"She just turned so red that all of her freckles disappeared."

"I'm sure if you search for them, you'll find where they went."

"Good idea, Mom."

"I'll let you go then."

"Bye."

"Happy hunting."

"Thanks, Mom." Mike paused for a moment and then said, "Hang up, Mycroft."

"Yes, sir."

"Send out the drones to clean up the runway, Mycroft."

"Yes, sir."

"Thank you, Mycroft." Mike looked across the table at Melinda. She looked mortified. He said, "You're in luck. Mom likes you."

"I have never been so embarrassed in my whole life," Melinda said. She would have run off to hide, but there was no place to hide in his house.

"That was nothing. Stick with me and there'll be plenty of other occasions to be embarrassed," Mike said.

"You're not comforting me."

Mike said, "Mom did have a good suggestion, though."

"What?"

"I really should search for your errant freckles. We'd had better find them before they have a chance to disappear for good."

"I just made a complete ass out of myself and you're talking about freckles?" Melinda asked.

"Of course," Mike replied seeing that he was getting a rise out of her. "I haven't had a chance to play connect the dots yet."

Melinda screamed, "You asshole!"

Mike leaned forward and made a production of studying her chest. Looking up, he said, "They're back. I guess you aren't embarrassed anymore."

"I'm angry."

"I noticed."

"You did that on purpose."

"Maybe I did and maybe I didn't."

"Which is it?"

"Do you know where I live," Mike asked changing the subject.

"You live in Lockwood Estates."

"Yes, I do," Mike said. "What do you know about Lockwood Estates?"

"It is a nudist colony," Melinda answered. She found the idea of people setting up a clothing optional community disgusting. "There should be laws against it."

"Would you like to know who my neighbor is?" Mike asked.

"Who is your neighbor?"

"Mom," Mike answered.

"Oh God."

Mike said, "Sitting around the house with naked people is not atypical behavior around my neighborhood."

"I'm a normal person. Really, I am."



-------

Chapter 8


"Dim the lights, Mycroft."

"Yes, sir."

The lights dimmed to a quarter of their normal brightness. Mike said, "Keyboard, Mycroft."

"Yes, sir."

An image of a keyboard appeared on the surface of the desk. Mike reached down and started typing. There was a soft click each time a finger stabbed down to the surface of the desk. Melinda watched and asked, "What is that?"

"Ah, that's a little invention by Cousin Steve and Dana. You know Steve. Dana is my little sister. She's an electrical engineer," Mike answered as if that was sufficient to satisfy her curiosity. It wasn't. He said, "Read the words on the wall."

"Why?"

"We have to calibrate Myra to your voice," Mike answered.

"What does that mean?" Melinda asked getting frustrated by the lack of detail in his answers to her questions. She would have stormed out of there by now except Mike was using computing capabilities that boggled her mind and she had to learn more.

"Myra won't understand you unless we get enough data about your voice for her to recognize you," Mike answered. Anticipating her question, "Myra is just a little system that Steve threw together when working on his doctorate."

"Okay," Melinda said thinking that she was going to have to track down Steve to get some answers to her questions. She looked up at the wall. Her eyes scanned the text for half a second. Turning to look at him, she said, "I can't read that."

"Are the words too big?"

"No, you asshole."

"Well, read it," Mike said smiling at her.

"He looked at her with steel grey eyes that sent shivers down her spine. She thrust her bosom forward in anticipation of the caress that his strong hands..." Melinda read aloud. Unable to continue further, she said, "I can't read that romance novel garbage."

"Okay. How about this?"

Melinda looked at the wall and read, "Kneeling at his feet, she reached up and grasped his hot throbbing ... I'm not going to read that pornography either."

"How about this?"

Melinda looked at the display. Shaking her head, she said, "That's a sex manual."

"Yes, it is."

"You are sick. You are a very sick man," Melinda said.

"That's odd. I don't feel like I have a fever," Mike said.

"You're sick in the head. You need a psychiatrist," Melinda said.

"Ah, that would explain the absence of a fever," Mike said. He typed for a moment and then said, "We're not making much progress. If you ever want access to your computer, you have to finish calibrating the system for your voice. Try this one."

Melinda looked at the display and read, "Is there a man alive who can resist a killer blowjob? Even if you believe that you're already an expert fellatist, you may find something new in this article..."

"Hello, kids."

Mike turned around and said, "Hello, Mom."

Afraid to look, Melinda asked, "How long have you been here?"

"I arrived about the time you started reading that rather interesting text on the wall," Liz answered.

Melinda looked over at Mike and said, "Asshole."

"I see that you use my favorite term of endearment for my husband on Mike. You already sound like an O'Connor woman. It must be love," Liz said with a smile.

"I keep hearing that," Melinda said slowly turning to look at the woman who she had respected for most of her life.

Liz said, "You have to keep a tight rein on O'Connor men. They have a tendency to get out of control."

"I'm well aware of that," Melinda said. She just hadn't figured out how to put that knowledge to work.

"We're not that bad," Mike said.

"Yes, you are," his mother replied. "By the way, I parked the jet at the end of the runway. I hope you aren't expecting any company."

"Where's Dad?" Mike asked.

"He's at home working on a proposal for the Army," Liz answered. She shrugged her shoulders and said, "He's never figured out how to delegate work."

"How big is it?"

"If the asshole hasn't lied to me, he's putting in a bid for two hundred million. I've got a team putting together a bid for a hundred and ninety nine million," his mother answered.

"He's going to be pissed if you win the contract," Mike answered.

"He undercut me on that last job," Liz said.

"That's true," Mike said.

Melinda asked, "You bid against each other?"

"We each own a business with people who need jobs," Liz said.

Mike said, "It makes for very interesting discussions over the dinner table. Those two keep maneuvering to find out what the other one is doing."

"You could work together," Melinda said.

"We tried that and it didn't work," Liz said. She shook her head and said, "If that man wasn't the best fuck in the world, I would divorce him and drive him out of business."

"What?" Melinda asked. She was shocked by the coarse language.

"Dad says the same about you," Mike said.

"I know. He's right. I'm damned good in bed," Liz said. She looked over at Melinda and said, "If you want to keep Mike around, you should probably finish reading that article. It sounded interesting."

"Sure," Melinda said unable to come up with something more original to say.

"It is so good to see the two of you together. I've been waiting years for this day," Liz said.

"Huh?" Melinda asked.

Liz walked over to the sofa and took a seat. Looking up at the ceiling, she said, "I remember it just like it was yesterday. I was at your high school talking about careers for women in engineering. You were seated there in a nice little school uniform hanging on every word that I said. You asked some very pointed questions that belied your age."

"You remember me?"

"It isn't everyday that you run into a fifteen year old senior in high school. I knew after taking one look at you that you were the girl for my dear little Mickey."

"Don't call me Mickey."

Ignoring her son's protest, Liz said, "I've followed your career quite closely. You got a nice little research project while an undergraduate from O'Connor Engineering. I really had to twist the asshole's arm to get him to put up that money for you, but you did a killer job on it."

"What?"

"When you graduated first in your class, I knew that it was destiny for the two of you to meet. When I heard that you were going after your doctorate, it just confirmed that I was right. It was really a sad day for me when I couldn't hire you after you applied for a job at Lee Engineering."

"Why didn't you hire me?" Melinda asked.

"You would never have had a chance at a relationship with Mike if you were working for me. If I had introduced you to him in a social context, little Mickey would have run away. I had to get you a job where he was working, so I made a deal with Jack Armstrong to hire you so that the two of you could meet without a mother's interference."

"You got Jack Armstrong to hire me?" Melinda asked. Her entire career was suddenly completely different than she could have ever imagined. She knew that she had a hidden benefactor, but had never guessed that it was Elizabeth Lee.

"That old bastard wouldn't put the two of you on the same project no matter how much I twisted his arm. He knew that if you two met that you'd leave and set up your own business," Liz said.

"What?"

"I despaired of ever having the two of you meet."

"There was no need to despair. I saw her on her first day there," Mike said.

"No you didn't," Melinda said.

"Yes I did. I was in the lunchroom when you came in looking lost and nervous. Your idiot mentor, Charles Goodwin, led you over to a table and left you there while he played cards with his friends. He kind of dumped you there and forgot about you. You had to chase him down when he marched off after lunch without you," Mike said.

"I can't believe it," Melinda said remembering every detail of that horrible first day on the job. She hadn't heard of Mike O'Connor until after she had reached a director level.

"Dr. Goodwin. His name should have been Dr. Badloss," Liz said in total disgust.

"You know him?" Melinda asked.

"He was the project lead on one of our contracts with your company. He is a poster child for mediocrity. What a jerk," Liz said.

Mike said, "I told everyone that you were going to be mine."

"You didn't?" Melinda asked. It had been kind of strange how every single man in the company had avoided her during her first few years there.

"Well, I let Rich Ables do the telling," Mike said.

"Rich Ables? An Ables was the head of security at the time?" Melinda asked trying to remember him. She remembered that one of the security people often stopped by her desk to make sure that no one was bothering her. It wasn't until he was gone that she learned he was the head of security.

"Yes, he was," Mike answered. "He left the company to start WhiteIce Global with Tripp's father."

"Tripp's father runs WhiteIce Global?" Melinda asked. That was the same firm handling security on the Bird-4 project.

"Yes he does."

"Jim works for WhiteIce Global."

"I know. Tripp's father figured that hiring potential suitors would be the best way to find a young man good enough for his daughter. A year ago, Jimbo was one of twenty candidates. Since he's the only one alive and still fighting; he won her hand in marriage," Mike said.

Well aware of how Jim felt about getting married to Tripp, Melinda asked, "Does Jim know that?"

"Of course not. The Ables are smarter than that," Liz said.

Mike asked, "So how did their date go last night?"

"When I stopped by your house, half of the furniture in the front room had been smashed. It was nice of you to offer your house to Tripp," Liz said.

A minor episode that featured destruction of property was a normal phase of the Ables mating ritual. He said, "It must have started off well. How did it end?"

"They were arguing over honeymoon destinations. She was for going to Afghanistan. He was arguing for Hawaii," Liz said.

"I think they'll go to Pakistan. WhiteIce has just gotten a contract for Pakistan and it looks like it will be a very dangerous assignment. Tripp will love it," Mike said.

Liz said, "I don't know about that. They might end up going to Venezuela."

"What's going on there?" Mike asked. Venezuela had been making noise, but that didn't really matter much. It was when they started keeping their insane promises that companies like WhiteIce got called in to make things right.

Although visiting a warzone was not her idea of a honeymoon, Melinda could see that it would appeal to Tripp. She said, "If you ever read the papers, then you would know the president of that country wants to create a single South American nation that will unite the Spanish speaking countries to attack the US."

"That's still nothing," Mike said.

Liz interjected, "The Castro brothers were mysteriously taken ill last night and guess who is suggesting that he step in to help run Cuba?"

"Not the dickhead from Venezuela," Mike said with a groan.

"That's right."

"What can they do about that?" Melinda asked.

Mike answered, "WhiteIce will send in a couple of their iceberg units to take care of the problem. Two or three thousand dead people later, there won't be a problem."

"That's horrible," Melinda said.

Shrugging his shoulders, Mike said, "It could be worse. Our government could wait a couple of years until things really got bad. Then it would require two or three hundred thousand people to die. Our government could wait a little longer and then it would require two or three million people to die."

"How do you know that?"

Liz said, "You attend enough Ables family picnics and you pick up an odd fact here and there."

"Oh, that reminds me. We better get her a gun before she goes to an Ables family picnic," Mike said.

"I didn't think about that."

"Why?" Melinda asked.

Mike answered, "You don't want to get drawn into a little family game they play."

"What is it?"

"Walk the talk," Liz answered.

"What kind of game is that?"

Liz answered, "That's a tough question to answer without going into a bit of history."

"It all started when some crazy gun control group decided to picket one of their family picnics. They managed to ignore the protesters until one of them grabbed Millie because they thought it was wrong for a ten year old to be carrying a gun. The next thing you know, the protesters are lined up at the end of the target range," Mike said.

"The wrong end of the target range," Liz injected.

"Oh no," Melinda said having an idea where this story was headed.

Mike said, "The idea was to see who could shoot closest to the person without actually hitting them. The oldest Ables started first and they worked their way down in age."

"I'm sure that the person getting shot at didn't appreciate it," Melinda said in what she believed had to be an understatement of the actual situation.

"They didn't have to stay there to get shot at. They could leave anytime they wanted," Mike said.

"There was just one little constraint."

"What?"

Mike answered, "They had to put together a convincing argument that the Ables didn't really want to be shooting at them."

"Or they just had to admit that they really wanted a gun and were ready to use it," Liz said.

Knowing Tripp, Melinda was sure that there was nothing that could be said to convince an Ables not to shoot. She said, "I bet it didn't take them long to admit that they wanted a gun."

"You might be surprised. It was when the Ables had worked their way down to the ten year olds that last of the holdouts broke. If they had actually gotten their hands on a gun, I'm pretty sure there would have been wounded Ables walking around," Mike said with a laugh.

"I'm sure," Melinda said thinking that the entire family needed some intensive family counseling. "So I have to bring a gun with me to an Ables family picnic."

"You have to bring it and shoot it," Liz said.

"I guess I could ask Jimbo to teach me how to pull the trigger," Melinda said.

"There's more to it than pulling a trigger. You should probably ask Tripp to teach you how to really shoot a gun," Mike said.

Liz said, "It will give you and her a chance to talk. She'll want to find out all about your date and his proposal."

Mike said, "I haven't proposed yet."

"You haven't?" Liz asked surprised to hear that.

"He hasn't because he knows that I'll never accept," Melinda said. The words didn't ring true coming out of her mouth.

Curious about what was taking him so long, Liz asked, "Why haven't you proposed, yet?"

"I'm still in the process of making her my love slave," Mike answered.

"Like that is going to happen," Melinda said folding her arms across her chest. Noticing the look of approval he gave her she uncrossed her arms.

Liz asked, "How do you plan on doing that?"

Mike answered, "I'm giving Myra to her so that she can work on Manta One with me."

"That will definitely work," Liz said looking over at Melinda.

"It won't work," Melinda said somewhat unnerved by Liz's acceptance of her fate.

Mike said, "She just has to read that passage up there and we'll have Myra calibrated to her voice."

Liz gestured to the wall and said, "Get reading, Melinda. Myra is going to change your life."

"While she's reading, could I get you some coffee, Mom?"

"Sure, that would be nice," Liz said.

"One coffee coming up," Mike said rising from his seat.

Melinda looked at the display and growled. She read, "Is there a man alive who..."

-------

There are software systems and then there are Software Systems. After a lifetime of using software systems, Melinda had just discovered that she knew nothing about Software Systems. Myra was the most amazing piece of hardware and software that she had ever encountered. There was nothing like it on the market. Not only was it voice controlled, but it employed input devices that were straight out of science fiction movies. She had thought that the projection keyboard was something until she started working with the projection graphics tablet. Then she had discovered the projection browser.

Inputs were one thing, but the outputs were something else. Myra talked to her in a nice feminine voice with a slight trace of a British accent to it. There were none of the odd pronunciations of words. Not only was it capable of providing flat displays projected on the wall, but it also provided 3-D projections that appeared just above the surface of the table. Some of the images looked so real that she thought she could reach out and touch them.

The functionality that Myra provided was mind blowing. Never would she think of a computer as office equipment again. Why spend twenty minutes writing a letter when she could request the computer to compose it for her and just modify it? Search engines? They were so blasé compared to the concept maps Myra provided. The CAD/CAM programs she had used in the past were toys compared to what was loaded on Myra. With tools like that, she could do engineering as fast as her mind was able to conceive ideas.

Why should she be chained to a desk or lug around a laptop when her computer was accessible by telephone? Mike had dropped modified cell phone in front of her that allowed Myra to go with her. Built into the cell phone were projectors for the keyboard, graphics table, and heads up display. Who cared if it had to be used in a dark room? She didn't.

Upon finishing another tutorial on how to use Myra she looked up and found Liz seated across the table from her. Liz asked, "Having fun?"

"Yes," Melinda said.

"There is a lot of engineering talent in the O'Connor clan. There is a lot of scientific talent in the Connor clan. It is kind of amazing what happens when the two clans collaborate on a project, isn't it?" Liz said.

"I guess although the word that comes to mind is scary," Melinda answered. She looked around and didn't see Mike. She asked, "Where's Mike?"

"He's upstairs in the machine shop. I told him that he really needed to fix the steps into his flying saucer," Liz said.

Remembering how difficult it had been to enter the flying saucer the previous evening, Melinda said, "That would be nice."

"It was just an excuse to let me have a few minutes alone with you," Liz said.

"Okay," Melinda said thinking it was time for the mother-in-law claws to come out.

"What do you think of Mike?"

"He is the most frustrating man I've ever encountered," Melinda answered.

Liz said, "That's just because he doesn't do what he's told. All O'Connors are like that, but the men have it the worst."

"Why is that?" Melinda asked.

Liz didn't answer right away. She asked, "Do you respect the majority of engineers who work under you?"

"Not really," Melinda answered. She knew that she was a better engineer than most of them. The majority of people working under her viewed it as a job, a few viewed it as a profession, and none viewed it as a passion.

"Why?"

"I'm a better engineer than they are," Melinda answered. It might sound like a boast, but she was convinced that it was fact.

"Mike is a better engineer than you. He is truly gifted. His designs have as much art in them as science," Liz said.

"I know," Melinda said admitting it aloud for the first time. If the jet engine that he had designed wasn't enough to convince her of that, the flying saucer was a further example of just how good he was.

"You don't like being second best," Liz said.

"No, I don't," Melinda said.

Liz said, "Mike's father and I have never established which one of us was the better engineer. We compete on everything and it does tend to harm our relationship."

"Interesting," Melinda said.

"You won't have that problem with Mike. He'll challenge you every day of your life, particularly if you work on the Manta One project with him," Liz said.

"True," Melinda said.

"I wish I was good enough to work on the Manta One, but I'm not," Liz said. She looked at the younger woman and said, "Mike and I think very highly of your skills as an engineer."

"Oh my," Melinda said.



-------

Chapter 9


"It has been a week since I've seen you."

"I'll never forget that horrible night."

"You don't look happy."

"You forgot all about the plan."

"Sorry about that."

"That whole family is evil."

"What makes you say that?"

"I'm engaged to be married."

"Me too."

"You don't look happy."

"Neither do you."

"Aren't we a pair?"

"Yes."

"Have you got your gun?"

"Yes, I do," Melinda answered holding up the pistol case. She fully expected him to ask her to use it on him.

"I guess that we had better head over to the Ables family picnic," Jim said.

Pointing to the rear wheel, Melinda asked, "Is that tire flat?"

"No," Jim said after looking at the tire.

"Can't you make it flat?" Melinda asked. She was not looking forward to the picnic.

"No," Jim said.

"Why not?"

Jim answered, "Tripp said that she would kill me if I showed up too late to take part in the obstacle course race."

"What kind of obstacles?" Melinda asked unsure of what an obstacle course race was.

"I'm not sure. She said that her father set it up and it took him almost a month to make it," Jim said with a worried expression on his face.

"You look worried," Melinda said.

"Deuce told me a little about their obstacle course races. They aren't like the ones the military has us run. They're worse," Jim said.

"How bad can they be?" Melinda asked.

"I don't know and that worries me," Jim said.

Melinda said, "I guess we better go."

"Maybe that tire is a little flat," Jim said.

"Tripp will kill you if you're late."

Jim said, "Alright. Get in the car."

-------

Wondering why there was a roadblock in the middle of nowhere, Jim handed his driver's license to the state trooper. The man looked at the license and then shouted, "Hey, Pat.

Come over here and meet Jimbo!"

"Oh God."

"Is that the guy Cousin Tripp is marrying?" Pat called back.

"Yep," the trooper shouted.

"He's supposed to be protecting Cousin Mike's girl."

The trooper looked in the limousine for a second and then shouted, "Cousin Mike's girl is here too. She's a pretty one."

Pat Ables walked over to the car and stuck his head in the window. He gave Melinda a thorough visual examination and then said, "Cousin Mike said you were pretty, but calling you pretty just doesn't do you justice. If he hadn't laid claim to you, I'd be pulling you over ten times a day until you said enough and agreed to marry me."

"Thank you," Melinda said thinking there was not a proper response to that kind of statement.

Pat stood up and said, "Chuck, we better let them through. Tripp will kill us if we make Jimbo late for the great race."

"I know what you mean. She's been bragging on him all week," Chuck said.

Pat said, "I wish I was entered in the race rather than stuck out here on guard duty."

"I heard Uncle Rich got fifty snakes from the rattlesnake roundup for it this time," Chuck said.

"Oh God," Jim said with a sick feeling in his stomach.

Leaning down, Chuck pointed down the road. He said, "Drive on down this street until you reach the canon. Turn right at the canon and park anywhere. Just don't block the tank. Dad drove right over the car that blocked him in the last time."

"Got it. Park anywhere, but don't block the tank," Jim said. He wondered how many family picnics included warnings like that.

Chuck patted the top of the car and said, "Have fun at the picnic."

"Thanks."

"Good luck in the race."

"Thanks."

Jim drove down the road until he reached a civil war canon that was guarding the entrance to a large field filled with cars. Looking at the gun, he said, "This must be the place."

"The parking here is rather haphazard," Melinda commented. There were trucks and cars parked randomly around the huge field. She did notice that all of them were facing the road.

"There's the tank," Jim said pointing to a Sherman tank parked near the center of the lot.

There was a lot of empty space around the tank.

"Park over there," Melinda said pointing to the far end of the field.

"Momma didn't raise a fool."

"You're marrying Tripp."

"You're right. Maybe I should park in front of the tank and take a nap in the trunk," Jim said.

"And miss the rattlesnakes?" Melinda asked.

"I hope they were joking about the rattlesnakes," Jim said.

"Probably not," Melinda said shaking her head.

Seeing a familiar face headed in their direction, Jim said, "There's Tripp."

"I wonder why she's not guarding Mike," Melinda said.

"Are you trying to be funny? They've got a damned tank here," Jim said looking at her like she was insane. No one in their right mind would dare attempt to attack Mike here.

Melinda said, "Sorry. I forgot where we were."

"Where are we?" Jim asked.

"An alternate universe," Melinda said. For the past week she had been using one of the most complex computer systems in existence helping to design a submarine that could have passed for a space ship. Last night she had been dropped off at home in a flying saucer. Today she was driven to Testosterone City in a limousine. No normal person would believe her story. She had a feeling that everyone here considered a week like that normal.

Jim parked the car facing the road out of habit. He got out and looked around at the people walking towards the tank. It was like a scene out of western movie. Although he had expected everyone to be wearing camouflage, the typical garb was blue jeans, work shirts, and boots. Without exception, all of the men and women were wearing holsters.

Tripp ran up and threw herself at him with the result that she nearly knocked him to the ground. She hung on him with her legs wrapped around his waist and her arms around his neck. Kissing his face, she said, "I'm so glad you made it in time for the great race."

"I wouldn't have missed it," Jim said wondering if it was possible to get out of participating in it.

"Did you bring your camouflage?" Tripp asked.

"Yes."

Tripp said, "God, it makes me wet to think about you wearing camouflage."

"Uh oh," Jim said.

Tripp wriggled her bottom around a little and said, "Oh Goody! The trouser snake awakes."

"Not here," Jim said turning red.

Looking over at Melinda, Tripp said, "He's so bashful."

"I can see that," Melinda said looking around for Mike. She wondered why he wasn't there.

"I don't know why. There's a good nine inches stuffed in those pants of his," Tripp said.

"He might not want to advertise that," Melinda said turning her attention back to the couple.

Puzzled, Tripp asked, "Why not?"

"I have no idea," Melinda said shaking her head.

"You look good in those blue jeans," Tripp said.

"Thanks," Melinda said although she found them uncomfortable. She hadn't worn blue jeans since she was in college.

"Have you got your gun?" Tripp asked.

"Yes," Melinda answered holding up the case containing her pistol.

"You better put it on," Tripp said. She climbed off of Jim much to his relief.

"I'm not sure how to wear it," Melinda said.

After Tripp talked her through the process of getting the holster on the belt, she said, "I heard that you ruined your little black dress. Way to go."

"Where did you hear that from?" Melinda asked getting angry. If Mike was telling stories about her then she was going to skin him alive. She was pretty sure that someone had a knife that she would be able to borrow.

"Cousin Liz told me all about your little embarrassing conversation on the telephone,"

Tripp said.

"I forgot about that," Melinda said turning bright red on being reminded of the embarrassing conversation. She wondered how many people heard about that little conversation.

She said, "I see that Mike found your freckles."

"Yes," Melinda said.

Tripp winked and said, "Don't worry about your little black dress. Mine didn't make it through the night. Jimbo was an animal."

"I hope you didn't corner him," Melinda said. She noticed that Jim was beet red.

"I did. He put up a magnificent fight," Tripp said.

Melinda looked around for a second and then asked, "Where's Mike?"

"He got hung up on something technical," Tripp answered.

"Oh," Melinda said wondering what could be technical around here. She wondered if he had been put in charge of the ice cream makers or something.

"I'm supposed to take you over to him," Tripp said.

Melinda said, "Let's go."

Tripp turned to Jim and said, "Grab your camouflage. The obstacle course race is going to start in about thirty minutes."

"We've got plenty of time," Jim said moving over to the trunk of the limousine. He felt that he could walk through the course and have a bit of a chance to warm up before it started.

While he was opening it, Tripp said, "You've got to study the map of the course before the race starts."

"Map?" Jim asked wondering why he needed to study a map. Distracted, he grabbed his clothes and slammed the trunk shut.

"It's a long course this time," Tripp said. "Daddy wanted it to be challenging."

"Long?" Jim asked. He wondered if it would take more than twenty minutes to walk through the course.

"It will probably take about two hours to get through it," Tripp said.

"Two hours?" Jim asked getting worried. He had never heard of anyone taking two hours to get through an obstacle course.

Tripp said, "I wouldn't worry. Hardly anyone gets killed. Thanks to the Anders clan, we've got a lot of medics standing by."

-------

Melinda couldn't believe her eyes when she finally located Mike. He was wearing blue jeans, a work shirt, and a cap with the logo for a tractor company on it. Like everyone else, he had a gun strapped to his hip. He could have been the twin of Clint Eastwood.

She said, "I finally made it."

"Melinda! I was hoping you'd get here. We've got to finish building this before five o'clock," Mike said looking up from the piece of paper he was holding.

"What is it?" Melinda asked staring at the stack of wood, rope, and metal.

"A bowling ball throwing device," Mike answered.

"What?"

"Cousin Ed challenged me to a contest. It is him and his wife against you and me. We have the same materials as them and have to build something to throw a ten pound bowling ball as far as possible. We've got a case of green bottle beer riding on this," Mike answered.

"A case of green bottle beer?" Melinda asked wondering what kind of beer that was.

"I wouldn't worry about it. We're going to win," Mike said confidently.

Melinda went over to the stack of wood and looked it over. Turning back to Mike, she said, "There's not enough wood for a catapult."

"I know," Mike said.

"Are there any conditions on this?" Melinda asked.

"We can make anything out of that stack of material to throw a bowling ball as far as we can and we have to operate the device," Mike answered.

Melinda said, "All of that rope makes me think someone was thinking about building a ballista."

"I agree," Mike said.

"That's not the best way to throw a bowling ball," Melinda said. A better device would be a catapult, but there just wasn't sufficient wood to build a solid base.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

Considering the material for a second, Melinda knew that her idea wouldn't last more than two or three throws. She looked over at Mike and said, "Trebuchet."

"There's not really enough material for a proper trebuchet here."

"I know that. Who said anything about a proper trebuchet?" Melinda asked.

Mike grinned and said, "I like how you think."

"What about the counterweight?" Melinda asked getting to the heart of the problem with that solution.

"We have to operate it," Mike said.

"Are you up for a rough ride?" Melinda asked knowing exactly what he was suggesting.

"You read my mind," Mike said with a laugh.

Although she knew she could design the beast, Melinda wasn't sure that she was up to actually building it. She said, "You're going to have to help me. I've never worked with wood."

"Did I mention that we don't have to do all of the carpentry ourselves?" Mike asked.

"No you didn't," Melinda said.

"The Ables consider little projects like this training for the kids," Mike said. He turned around and shouted, "Wally! Billy! Danny! Lily! It is time to get to work!"

Wally and Billy must have been standing at attention two feet away. They beat Danny and Lily by five seconds. This Cousin Lily was a different girl from the one at O'Tooles.

She had short cropped hair like all of the other Ables women. Mike went over to them and said, "Wally and Billy! You are charged with finding every flaw in the wood that is part of the stack of materials over there. Is the wood soft? Are there worm holes? Is there a split? Does it suffer from wood rot? Arrange the wood by sizes and quality."

"Yes, sir."

"Danny! You are to inspect the metal. I'm sure there's something here we will want to use that will break while we're using it. Arrange the metal by kind and by sizes."

"Yes, sir."

"Lilly! I need you to check every inch of rope. Are there any rough sites? Are there any frayed areas? Sort the good stuff by size. Put the broken stuff in a separate pile. We will be using everything."

"Yes, sir."

"I can tell you without looking that we don't have a piece of wood that is long enough to serve as an arm," Melinda said.

"You know that that means," Mike said.

"We're going to have to splice some of them together to make the length," Melinda said.

There were a number of ways in which they could do that.

"We have plenty of rope," Mike said.

"Not as much as you might think," Melinda said trying to estimate the lengths of the coils.

Mike looked over the metal that was spread out over the ground. Shaking his head, he said, "No nails."

"That's going to make it a little tougher to build," Melinda said.

The next few hours flew by while the couple put together a bastardized version of an ancient weapon. Melinda couldn't believe how much fun it was working on the trebuchet and couldn't wait to see it operate.

-------

Melinda spotted Tripp and Jim walking over towards them. Jim was wearing a mud covered camouflage outfit and walking with a limp. She called out, "What happened to you?"

"He won!" Tripp shouted.

Impressed, Mike said, "Congratulations."

"If you can call it that," Jim muttered. He had taken a facial in the mud while ducking a swinging log that had appeared out of nowhere.

Tripp asked, "What would you call it?"

"I survived," Jim answered. He had never experienced anything like that obstacle course.

"It couldn't have been that bad," Melinda said thinking that this was a family picnic.

"There were snakes," Jim said.

Melinda said, "I wondered if they were kidding about the snakes."

"There were pitfalls," Jim said.

"You didn't fall into any of them," Tripp said.

"There was even a swamp. This is Kansas for Christ's sake," Jim said.

"Daddy was quite proud of that," Tripp said.

"I had heard the course was a tough one," Mike said.

"It was a war zone," Jim said. "They were even shooting at us."

"Paint balls," Tripp said dismissing the dangers.

Thinking about the one bright spot in the whole thing, Jim said, "I did get to shoot Deuce."

"Boy was he pissed about that," Tripp said. "It has been years since he was eliminated from the race."

"Great," Jim said.

Tripp glanced down at her watch and said, "It is almost time for the knife throwing contest."

"That sounds like fun," Jim mumbled.

"I'm the defending champion," Tripp said brightly.



-------

Chapter 10


"Cousin Steve!"

"Cousin Mike!"

"Melinda!"

"Hello Steve."

"You must be Shelly. He said you were pretty and he wasn't lying. He's always had a thing for women with long hair," Mike said.

Steve ran a hand through her hair. When she slapped his hand away, Steve said, "Silky."

Mike said, "I bet that would feel real nice wrapped around..."

"Don't say it," Shelly growled while holding a finger up in the air. "I swear I'll cut it off if one more man says that!"

"Welcome to the family," Mike said. He gave her a friendly grin.

"I'm not marrying Steve," the young woman growled.

"Where have I heard that before?" Melinda asked rhetorically. The poor woman looked positively miserable.

"Help me," the woman said looking over at Melinda.

"Is this your first date?" Melinda asked.

"Yes."

"What do you do for a living?" Melinda asked.

"I write software."

Thinking about how she would react when introduced to Myra, Melinda shook her head and said, "You're doomed."

Steve asked, "Can I borrow your flying saucer?"

"Are you going to take her to your place in Colorado?" Mike asked.

"Yes."

Rolling her eyes, Shelly said, "There he goes again. I don't believe in flying saucers."

"Believe," Melinda said knowing that she sounded crazy.

Mike said, "You'll have to wait until dark to fly it."

"No problem. We aren't going to leave here until after we get a little barbecue," Steve said.

Curious, Melinda leaned over to Shelly and asked, "Why did you agree to go on a date with Steve?"

"I lost a bet."

"Talking to him long enough to make a bet was your first mistake," Melinda said.

Steve grinned and said, "She never had a chance of winning."

"Never bet against a Connor," Mike said while giving Steve a friendly pat on the shoulder.

Melinda asked, "What did you bet on?"

"He said that he could compute pi times e to a million digits in less than fifteen seconds," Shelly said.

"How long did it take?" Melinda asked.

"Five seconds."

"How long did it take you to verify the answer?"

"All day," Shelly said shaking her head. She had wept when the final digit matched.

"You poor thing," Melinda said patting the young woman on the arm. She was going to say more except Tripp and Jim arrived.

"Cousin Steve!"

"Cousin Tripp!"

"You must be Jimbo."

"Yes," Jim said.

Steve said, "Welcome to the family. Cousin Tripp has told me all about you. She said that you pack a weapon in your pants worthy of an Able."

"Oh God," Jim said when Tripp ran a hand over his crotch.

Tripp said, "Definitely worthy."

"I heard you won the obstacle course race," Steve said.

"Yes."

"Congratulations. That just goes to show that are you definitely Ables material," Steve said hitting Jim on the back in a vigorous manner. He turned to Tripp and asked, "How did you do?"

"I'm still the reigning champion in knife throwing," Tripp said. She took the opportunity to pose with her hands clasped above her head.

"Excellent," Steve said.

Shelly asked, "Is this entire family crazy?"

"Yes," Melinda answered in a very serious voice. She sighed and added, "Don't worry. You'll lose your sanity soon and fit right in."

"Why do you say that?"

Melinda said, "A week ago I was a normal person who did normal things. I was a vice president of a major aerospace company running research and development. This week I'm engaged to him, I'm at a picnic surrounded by people who get sexually excited by shooting guns, and I'm building a trebuchet."

Looking hurt, Tripp said, "Hey, we don't get sexually excited by shooting guns."

"Really?"

"Okay, just a little," Tripp admitted causing Steve and Mike to laugh.

Melinda asked, "Do you want to know the worst of it?"

"What?"

"I'm having a good time."

"That won't happen to me," Shelly said without much confidence in her voice. She jumped nervously when a voice called out behind her.

"Cousin Steve!"

"Hello Cousin Wally, Cousin Billy, Cousin Danny, and Cousin Lily," Steve said waving to the young kids.

Wally said, "This must be Shelly."

"Yes, she is," Steve said.

"You said that she was pretty and you weren't lying. I know that you like long hair, but damn man — that is like incredible," Wally said.

Billy said, "I bet it would feel real good..."

"Don't say it," Shelly said glaring at Billy.

"She's a little touchy concerning comments involving tallywackers and hair," Steve said. He shrugged his shoulders and said, "Go figure."

"I'd love to have hair like that. I can just imagine a guy hanging onto it while doing me doggy style," Lily said.

"They're all a bunch of perverts," Shelly said rolling her eyes. She vowed to get her hair cut at the earliest possible minute.

"You get used to it," Melinda said with a sigh.

Steve asked, "Has Mike played a game of connect the dots with your freckles yet?"

"That's none of your business," Melinda snapped.

"Yes," Mike answered.

Tripp said, "All Jimbo and I have done is play a couple hundred games of anaconda hides in the hole. Let me tell you, that anaconda loves that hole."

"Anaconda, huh?" Lily said checking out his pants.

"It sure as hell isn't a garter snake," Tripp said patting him in the crotch.

"Oh God," Jim said.

Melinda glanced down at her watch and said, "Shouldn't you kids get back to work? We have to get it finished by five."

"Yes, ma'am," Wally said. As a group they headed back to where the trebuchet was getting constructed.

Tripp studied Shelly for a second, frowned, and then asked, "Where's her gun?"

"I was hoping to borrow one from you for her," Steve said.

"I've only got two on me," Tripp said with a frown.

"Lend one to her. I'd hate to have her play a game of Walk the Talk," Steve said.

Tripp said, "She's not one of those anti-gun nuts is she?"

"She knows how to fire a gun. I didn't think about it until we got here," Steve answered.

Tripp knelt down and rolled up her pants leg. She removed an ankle holster and held up it up for Steve. It was a little two shot derringer. She said, "Be careful. It's loaded."

Shelly took the gun and looked it over with an expression of disgust on her face. Surprising Melinda, Shelly said, "All this little thing would do is piss off someone."

"You use it on the testicles when you're up close and personal," Tripp said apologetically.

"That would work," Shelly said while kneeling down to strap the holster to her ankle. She looked up at Steve and, for the first time since arriving at the picnic, smiled. She said, "Touch my hair one more time..."

"A little fire there," Steve said wiggling his eyebrows.

"I like her," Tripp said.

"You would," Melinda said shaking her head.

Steve said, "Thanks, Tripp. We're going to mingle a bit. Maybe I'll enter her in the pistol shooting contest."

"Have fun," Mike said. "Bring back the saucer in a week. I'm planning on taking Melinda to my place in Colorado."

"The one next to Armstrong's place?" Melinda asked.

"Yes," Mike answered surprised that she knew about it.

-------

The bowling ball flew seventy-five feet and then rolled for another twenty-five feet. Ed stepped back and said, "Beat that, Cousin Mike."

"Happily, Cousin Ed," Mike replied. He looked over at Melinda who just gestured at the trebuchet. It took him a minute to climb up the pole to the seat at the top.

"Hey! Wait a minute," Ed said staring at the device. It had just dawned on him what they had built.

"What?" Mike asked innocently.

"You can't do that," Ed said.

"Why not?" Mike asked.

"You can only use materials that were in the pile," Ed said.

"And I have to operate it. That requires me to sit up here," Mike said.

"Why?" Ed asked.

Unable to resist temptation, Melinda answered, "Design flaw."

"Uh," Ed said unable to figure out how to answer that.

"There's nothing in the rules that say I can't sit on it when operating it." The crowd that had gathered made noises suggesting they agreed with Mike. Mike looked over his shoulder and asked, "What do you think, Cousin Buck?"

"There's nothing in the rules that say you can't sit on it," Buck said.

"Damn," Ed said knowing he had lost the protest.

Buck said, "Fire away."

Mike took the rope and pulled it. The lock that had kept the arm cocked was released. Mike's weight forced the long arm to whip around carrying with it the bowling ball in the sling. It looked like it was moving in slow motion, but appearances were misleading. The ball left the sling and floated through the air. It looked like it went forever, but the distance was closer to a hundred yards.

Mike's journey was a little less spectacular, but much more dangerous. When the seat reached the bottom of the swing, he fell out of the chair. The sudden loss of his body weight to offset the weight of the arm caused the whole mechanism to swing back the other direction. Fortunately for Mike, he did not sit up and the seat missed his head by inches.

Melinda didn't notice the near disaster since her concentration was on the flight of the bowling ball. She jumped up and down excitedly shouting, "Yes!"

Taking care not to get hit, Mike rolled out from under the trebuchet. Sitting up, he said, "You owe us a case of green bottled beer, Cousin Ed."

Ed had watched the seat of the trebuchet swing inches from Mike's head. He said, "You were nearly killed."

"Nah. We had the return swing taken into account in our calculations," Mike said with a grin.

"That was spectacular. Can we do it again?" Melinda asked. Her eyes were glowing.

Buck asked, "Is that Mike's bride to be?"

"Yes, Daddy," Tripp answered.

"I like her spirit. Mike is a lucky man," Buck said.

Tripp said, "I think so, too."

"Has he played a game of connect the dots with those freckles?" Buck asked.

"Yes," Tripp answered.

Buck said, "That must have been fun."

"Do you like Jimbo?" Tripp asked.

"He did a hell of a job in that obstacle course. He even shot Deuce. Let me say that impressed the hell out of me," Buck said.

"I was so proud of him," Tripp said.

"It pissed Deuce off something bad," Buck said with a laugh.

"Deuce will get over it," Tripp said.

Getting a little more serious, Buck asked, "Does he satisfy you?"

"He leaves me limp," Tripp said.

"That's the way it is supposed to be," Buck said. He looked at the trebuchet and said, "Mike still has the magic touch. Ed spent a month putting together this challenge figuring that Mike wouldn't have a chance of coming up with an optimal design on the spur of the moment."

"She had a bit to do with it. She's real smart," Tripp said.

"She would have to be to get his attention," Buck said.

"I think she's smarter than Mike's mom. His mom agrees with me," Tripp said.

"Damn, I like freckles," Buck said. He winked at Tripp and said, "Don't tell your mother."

"Mom's got freckles," Tripp said with a grin.

"Like I said, don't tell her."

-------

The Ables family gathered around the picnic area waiting for the start of the barbecue dinner. There were close to four hundred people present. The half of a cow had been turning on the spit for the entire day. Huge pots of pinto beans had been simmering since the morning. Cast iron frying pans filled with corn bread lay steaming on the tables.

Buck walked out to the front and climbed the podium. In a loud voice that would be the envy of a drill sergeant, he said, "Listen up folks. We've got the results of today's competitions."

Cheers broke out in the crowd. Buck waved them down and said, "First place in the obstacle course race goes to Jimbo!"

Tripp stood up and, waving her arms over her head, shouted, "Way to go Jimbo."

Buck laughed and said, "First prize is a trip to the Kitty Cat Ranch in Nevada!"

"I'll drive you there, Jimbo!" Tripp shouted.

Looking worried, Jim leaned over to Mike and said, "He's just joking, right?"

"He's serious," Mike answered.

Tripp sat down next to Jim and said, "You're going to have to visit Candy. All the boys say she's the best."

"Uh," Jim said unsure how to respond.

Tripp said, "I'm sure that you can ruin her for all the boys. Go there and make me proud."

Shelly asked, "Is she serious?"

"She's serious," Mike said.

"This is a seriously sick family," Shelly said crossing her arms.

"Oh God. She shouldn't have done that," Melinda said seeing how Steve was looking at his date.

Steve leaned over and said, "I love it when you cross your arms like that."

"Why?" Shelly asked.

Steve's reply was nearly drowned out when Buck shouted, "First place in the rapid fire rifle goes to Rich Ables for the tenth time in a row!"

"Way to go Rich!" shouted a woman. "We're going to the Kitty Cat Ranch!"

Mike leaned over to Melinda and said, "That's his wife."

"Ah."

Shelly said, "She says that just like one of those sports stars talking about going to Ratland in California."

"The Kitty Cat Ranch is a hell of a lot better than Ratland," Mike said.

"It is, is it?" Melinda asked wondering how Mike knew that.

Without missing a beat, Mike looked at her and answered, "Yes."

Buck shouted, "First place in sniper fire goes to Mac."

"Way to go Mac!" shouted a woman who appeared to be in her early thirties.

Tripp said, "That's his mother."

"How old is Mac?" Melinda asked staring at the young looking mother.

"Fifteen. He's good. We've been waiting for him to get old enough to compete," Mike said.

"First prize is a visit to the Kitty Cat Ranch."

A young man stood up and danced in place. He shouted, "Alright. I'm going to get me some Candy."

"That's Mac," Mike said as if it wasn't obvious.

"He's only fifteen," Shelly protested.

Tripp said, "His mom won't take him down there until he turns sixteen next month. That's a great age to learn how to leave a woman with a smile on her face."

"That is wrong on so many levels," Shelly said horrified.

"He is an Ables. At his age, an Ables can shoot the dick off a fly at a hundred yards, live a month in the wilderness with nothing more than a knife, and can kill a person with his or her bare hands. The concepts of responsibility, honor, and duty are drilled into an Ables from the crib. Believe me, he is old enough to have sex," Tripp said.

"You really believe that," Shelly said.

In a voice that didn't allow argument, Tripp replied, "I'm an Ables. I know it."

They sat through the announcements of other prizes until Buck said, "And in the ancient weapons of war contest, the first place goes to Mike O'Connor and his bride to be Melinda Davis."

Tripp shouted, "Way to go, Mike."

"Thanks," Mike said.

"The prize is a trip for two to the Kitty Cat Ranch," Buck announced.

Mike shouted, "Alright!"

When Melinda frowned, Tripp asked, "Aren't you excited?"

Afraid that she had leapt to unfounded assumption, Melinda said, "I must have the wrong idea of what happens at the Kitty Cat Ranch."

"Why?" Tripp asked. She thought everyone knew what happens at the Kitty Cat Ranch. It was even on cable television.

"I thought the Kitty Cat Ranch was something else."

"What did you think it is?" Mike asked.

"A whorehouse," Melinda answered.

"You got it right," Tripp said.

Earning a glare from Shelly, Steve said, "It is the best little whorehouse in Nevada."

Flabbergasted, Melinda asked, "Why would I want to go to a whorehouse?"

"Yeah, why would she want to go to a whorehouse?" Shelly asked.

Tripp looked at the two women like they were incredibly stupid. She answered, "If you want to learn how to fuck a man into total submission, there's no better place to go then the Kitty Cat Ranch. They know tricks with toys that can reduce a man to a quivering idiot. One night spent talking to one of those women is worth a lifetime of experience."

"Oh my God," Jim said.

Shelly said, "You look pale. What's the matter Jim?"

Buck shouted, "First prize in knife throwing goes to Tripp."

Tripp stood up and shouted, "I'm going to the Kitty Cat Ranch."

"That," Jim said just before his head hit the table.



-------

Chapter 11


Melinda decided to stop by the company cafeteria to get a cup of coffee before heading off to her meeting. After paying for her purchase at the cashier station she noticed a familiar face seated alone at one of the tables. She headed over to the table. On reaching it, she said, "Hello, Shelly."

Shelly looked up and said, "Hello, Melinda."

"How's it going?" Melinda asked.

"I'm engaged," Shelly said. She wiggled a finger to show off the engagement ring.

"My condolences."

"Thanks."

Melinda took a sip of her coffee. She asked, "What got you?"

"That's a long story."

Melinda glanced at her watch and decided that she could miss her meeting. "I've got time."

Shelly sighed and said, "We're out in Colorado appreciating the view of the mountains. Let me tell you something, it is really pretty there."

"I know. I was there last week."

"I forgot about that," Shelly said. So much had happened over the past few weeks that it was hard to keep track of thing. "Anyway, I'm doing my best to keep Steve as far away from me as possible and he starts talking about my dissertation. After five sentences, I knew that he had read it and understood it. He was making connections that no one else has ever made. Five minutes into the discussion, we're arguing esoteric points that I've worked on in my spare time."

Melinda said, "Ah."

"The next thing I know I'm on my back announcing my orgasm to the stars," Shelly said. She had no idea how that had happened. It had followed a declaration of her brilliance.

"Mike did the same thing to me," Melinda said.

"I was about to object when I recovered, but he started all over again," Shelly said.

"They cheat," Melinda said.

"He must have been raised at the Kitty Cat Ranch because he did things to my body that defy words," Shelly said. She sighed.

"It sure makes it hard to stay at work," Melinda said knowing exactly what Shelly was feeling. "What convinced you to marry him?"

Shelly said, "Steve gave me a new computer. Her name is Emma."

"Mine is Myra," Melinda said.

"We spent a week improving the inferential algorithms it uses. My God, I've never learned so much in my life. It was intoxicating," Shelly said.

"I know the feeling," Melinda said.

"I guess you do." Shelly was silent for a moment. In a change of subject, she asked, "Have you ever met Steve's sister, Cynthia?"

"No," Melinda said.

"She's a physicist and very brilliant," Shelly said.

"She's a Connor," Melinda said.

Shelly said, "I had a long talk with her the other night when Steve was installing a secure network for the Ables. She told me about Samuel Donaldson. He was a really remarkable man for the times."

"What do you mean?" Melinda asked. Mike had given her an overview of the family, but she hadn't walked away so impressed with Samuel Donaldson.

"Samuel Donaldson had six daughters at a time when women were expected to be nice little subservient wives. He had a different idea. He encouraged them to pursue their interests far beyond what was socially acceptable. One of his daughters got a doctorate in chemistry. Another of his daughters got a degree in engineering. One of his daughters was the first woman in the state to become a judge. One of his daughters was the first woman doctor in the state. One of his daughters went to Paris and studied the culinary arts. He had a daughter who could outshoot and outfight any man this side of the Mississippi."

"Ah," Melinda said understanding how it was that they had chosen the men they had married.

"Samuel Donaldson instilled in his daughters the idea that they never had to settle for second best. He raised them to be independent, intelligent, and driven. Above all, he taught them to pursue excellence."

"That explains a lot," Melinda said.

Shelly was silent for a moment and then said, "It is so easy to assume that the clans are ruled by testosterone driven men, particularly the Ables clan. Five minutes of listening to them talk about women like sexual objects and you want to cut their balls off. The truth is very different. Cynthia explained to me that the women run the families and they run it with an iron fist."

"She said it that way?" Melinda asked.

"Well, she actually said that they ruled with an iron cunt," Shelly said rolling her eyes.

"That sounds a little better. They are flavorful when it comes to describing relationships between men and women," Melinda said.

"The important thing to understand is that every child is taught to pursue excellence from the cradle. Everything a child does while growing up is a lesson. Not one member of the family has failed to graduate high school by the time they reach sixteen. Not one in three generations."

"My God. That's incredible," Melinda said.

"They grow up to be confident because they know they can excel at whatever they attempt," Shelly said. "They are tested constantly. Each time they pass a test their confidence grows."

Melinda said, "Interesting observation."

"You've seen it. Those kids working for you when you built the trebuchet were being trained to take a pile of rubbish and turn it into a weapon. Those four kids had competed to see who would get to help Mike. You got the best four of all of the kids who wanted to help," Shelly said.

"I didn't realize that," Melinda said. She had never seen kids that age work so hard on something. It had been hard backbreaking work.

"Excellence," Shelly said looking thoughtful.

"Excellence," Melinda said thinking about the implications of an entire family dedicated to that concept.

Shelly said, "They are so arrogant."

"That's true," Melinda said. She was beginning to realize that they had earned that arrogance.

"I graduated high school at fifteen," Shelly said.

"Me too," Melinda said.

Shelly said, "So did Jimbo."

"You're kidding?" Melinda said.

"His father was a sergeant in the Army and won the Congressional Medal of Valor. He raised Jimbo with an iron fist. He pushed him to succeed in scholastic endeavors as well as martial arts. Apparently, he felt that a dumb man with a gun was a dead man with a gun. It wasn't a matter of luck that Jimbo won the obstacle course race," Shelly said.

"He said it was tough, but he didn't make a big deal out of it," Melinda said.

"Half the people who started didn't finish. That's saying a lot; particularly since we're talking Ables here," Shelly said. "The medics there were young members of the Sanders clan."

"I haven't had a chance to meet any members of the medical branch of the Donaldson family," Melinda said.

"They're the same as the others -- Arrogant, confident, and driven to excel," Shelly said.

"I'm not surprised," Melinda said.

Shelly rose from the table and said, "I guess I can't put it off any more."

"What?" Melinda asked.

"I'm clearing out my office. I'm resigning tomorrow. Steve and I are going to work on a signal processing system for an advanced sonar system," Shelly said.

-------

Melinda had been in office for only five minutes when Buck Ables walked in. He sat down in a chair before she had a chance to offer him a seat. He smiled at her and said, "You're problems are over."

"That's nice," Melinda replied taken aback by his informal invasion of her office space. She asked, "Which problems?"

"The ones concerning a certain black project," Buck answered.

"Oh those problems," Melinda said wide-eyed. She hadn't known that WhiteIce Global was trying to solve her problems. She had hired them to provide protection for her people.

"We tracked your problems back to the source. Interestingly enough, a certain government had already paid a rather unique organization to take care of the source of your problems. This morning, the source had a fatal encounter with its citizenry," Buck said with a wink.

"You mean that mess in South America?" Melinda asked.

"I didn't say that," Buck said with a wink.

"I got it," Melinda said.

Buck looked around the office and said, "I guess you're going to miss this place."

"I didn't know I was leaving," Melinda said.

"You will," Buck said.

"You might be right," Melinda said.

"We've got a bunch of young Ables who have graduated high school and are too young to enter the Army. They are all looking for jobs. When you and Mike head down to Florida to build your submarine, you might consider taking a handful of them along with you to work security."

"We'll do that," Melinda said. Buck Ables ran WhiteIce Global. She didn't think it would be a good idea to get on his bad side.

"Thanks," Buck said. He rose from the chair and headed towards the door. Just after reaching it, he turned to face her and said, "Welcome to the family."

"Thanks," Melinda said.

"I love freckles," Buck mumbled while leaving the office.

"I'm telling your wife you said that."

Buck laughed. He called back, "Don't you dare."

-------

Melinda stepped into Jack Armstrong's office without knocking on the door. He looked up from his desk and frowned at her. Irritated at being disturbed, he said, "What?"

"Buck Ables just informed me that the security problem on the Bird-4 project has been solved," Melinda said.

"Buck Ables? Do you mean Buckley Ables?" Jack asked with a frown.

"Yes," Melinda answered.

Jack sighed. He said, "I guess if Buckley says he solved the problem then it is solved. WhiteIce Global has a reputation to maintain. He's not going to blow it on a job like this."

"The project is ahead of schedule," Melinda said. The engine problems had been solved by Mike. A test engine had been built and it had performed within specifications. Others could make the necessary design tweaks to take it to a production level. Steve had solved the guidance and control problems. A dozen programmers were working on pulling it all together.

"How did that happen?" Jack asked.

"Mike O'Connor solved the engine problems. Steve Connor solved the guidance problems," Melinda answered.

"I wasn't aware that Steve Connor was involved in this project," Jack said. His frown grew.

"I borrowed him from Dale," Melinda said.

Hoping that he would get some good news, he asked, "How did your date with Mike O'Connor go?"

"We're engaged."

"Shit!"

"What's the matter?" Melinda asked surprised by his reaction.

"I thought that a date with him would drive you apart," Jack answered.

"Why?"

He spun in his chair and stared out the window for a minute. Finally, he said, "You're arrogant, but rightfully so. I knew one minute after talking to you during your interview for a job here that you would accomplish great things. I was right. Your rise through the company was unprecedented."

"Arrogant?" Melinda said thinking about how Shelly had used that same word to describe the members of the Donaldson clan.

"I did everything I could to keep you two apart. I didn't want you contaminated by the Donaldsons," Jack said.

"What? Why?"

"I hate my sister-in-law," Jack said.

"Who is your sister-in-law?" Melinda asked confused by the direction of the conversation.

"Elizabeth O'Connor. She's my wife's sister," Jack answered. He leaned forward and pointed at her. He said, "Mike is my nephew by marriage, but you'll never hear him call me Uncle."

"Oh," Melinda said. "Why?"

"I'm not a Donaldson," Jack answered.

"I understand," Melinda said and it was true that she did understand. Jack Armstrong might be a successful person, but he wasn't a Donaldson. He was driven by ambition; not by excellence. He was good, but he wasn't outstanding.

Jack said, "They are the biggest bunch of arrogant assholes you'll ever meet. There are so many of them that you can't swing a cat without hitting one of them."

Melinda stood up straighter. She said, "I am a Donaldson."

"They've contaminated you," Jack said.

Putting a sheet of paper on his desk, Melinda said, "I also wanted to tender my resignation."

"Of course," Jack said. He glanced down at the letter of resignation. He shook his head. "Get out of here."

-------

Melinda packed her personal possessions under the watchful eyes of three members of the corporate security force. Two of them watched every move that she made. The third leaned against the wall reading a book on military weapons. Whenever one of the two watchdogs got a little too aggressive, the third would yank his leash.

The first things to get packed were the awards. There were wood plagues on the wall; each one a token of some honor that she had received. Aligned on a shelf were six crystal corporate awards praising her for her pursuit of excellence. She wrapped each one in newspaper before carefully packing it in a box.

Clearing out her desk was a pretty simple matter. There were only a few items, but she took her time with them. Each item represented a significant memory and she allowed herself to relive them.

She picked up a simple gold Cross pen. It had been given to her by her parents upon graduating high school. They had been so proud that she had graduated at such a young age. The fact that she had been valedictorian had been icing on the cake.

The crystal candy bowl had been a gift by one of her bosses back when she was a fledgling engineer. She had saved his career on a project that had been near total failure. She had worked night and day to fix the problem; going so far as to sleep in her cubicle. Those had been heady days.

Her ever present companion at meetings had been an exquisite writing portfolio made of tanned English Bridle leather. That had been a gift from her parents. They had given it to her when she had defended her dissertation. A small brass plate adorned the leather. It was etched with 'Dr. Melinda Davis.' She had cried upon seeing it. The significance of her accomplishment had become real upon reading her name.

When she had started to put it in her box, one of the guards stepped forward and said, "You have to remove the papers."

Melinda opened the leather cover and removed the pad of paper. She dropped the blank pad on the desk and asked, "Satisfied?"

"Yes," the guard said.

She put the leather writing portfolio in her box. She moved the box off the desk. The guard who had been reading said, "Double check your desk. Take everything out of the drawers and put it on the desk. That way you will know that you didn't miss something."

"Good idea," Melinda said. She went through each drawer one at a time. All that remained were typical office supplies.

She didn't take nearly as much time packing her books. When she had started, one of the guards said, "We need to check those to make sure that you aren't walking off with company property."

"Drop it, Irving," the guard reading the book said. He didn't even bother to look up from his book.

"We've got our orders."

"Drop it, Irving."

"Ivan!"

Ivan lowered his book and glared at the guard. After a minute, the guard said, "Okay. Just don't take a book that belongs to the company."

Melinda shook her head. She dumped the books into three boxes. They would be heavy, but the guards would get someone to carry them out. When she had finished, she said, "That's it."

Ivan said, "Why don't you two get someone in here to take these boxes to her car?"

Melinda waited for the two watchdogs to leave her office. Once they were gone, she winked at the remaining guard. "Cousin Ivan."

"Cousin Melinda."

-------

"Cousin Steve."

"Cousin Melinda."

"Cousin Shelly."

"Cousin Melinda."

Turning to her entourage consisting of a guy with a dolly and three security guards, Melinda said, "You can set the boxes by my car."

"Yes, ma'am."

Melinda watched them set the boxes down. Once they were gone, she turned to Shelly. She asked, "Were you escorted out?"

"Yes we were," Shelly answered.

"Fortunately, Shelly, Mike, and I had tendered our resignations before you had your little chat with Jack Armstrong," Steve said. He grinned and held up his box. Everything of any importance had been removed the previous day.

Melinda said, "I can't wait to get to work on that submarine."

"We'll make it a family project," Steve said.

"It will be mostly O'Connors," Shelly said.

"O'Connors aren't so bad. They kind of grow on you," Steve said.

Escorted by two guards, Mike walked up to the group. He stopped beside Melinda and nodded to the other couple. He said, "Poor Jack. The fucker at the top of the pyramid didn't even get to fire us."

"I'm sure that ruined his day," Melinda said.

"At least I got to clean out my desk," Mike said looking inside his box.

"That was nice of them," Melinda said.

Holding up his box, Mike asked, "Does anyone need a light bulb?"


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The End
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Posted:  2009-07-01
Last Modified: 2009-07-13 / 08:41:47 pm
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