We left the kitchen to the discovery of an unpleasant surprise. Three police cars with lights flashing were pulled up outside. I stepped outside, as a group of officers approached Deshavi and Trent on the porch.
“Are you Deshavi Longtree?” One officer asked.
“Yes.” Deshavi answered in a small voice.
“Then it is my regret to inform you that it is my duty to place you under arrest for the crime of theft.”
Trent started forward when they put the handcuffs on, but I stopped him with a strong grip on his arm. In many ways we had become deeply bonded as friends. Surviving Siberia together can do that. He listened to the negative shake of my head and the intenseness of my gaze and let them lead Deshavi away. We watched the cars disappear down the street, until they were out of sight.
Trent shook off my grasp and turned to face me hotly, “If you think I rescued her from a Siberian death camp only to watch her rot in our joke of a penitentiary system you’re wrong!”
“No one is suggesting that!” I replied in kind. I went on to explain, “This is another whole ballgame, with a whole different set of rules to play by! We can’t just write our own way here Trent, as we did in Siberia!”
Ella grasped a hold of her son, “Listen to him Trent!”
Trent looked from her to me the muscles of his face working hard, “You have a plan in mind?” He asked in a measured tone.
“I have to make a phone call.”
I pulled a cell phone free of my pocket and dialed the number I was beginning to know by heart.
“Chantry its Shalako. I need to redeem my last favor.”
There was a pause on the other end of the line before Chantry asked, “Not Siberia again I hope?”
“No something more local this time.”
“I’m having my pilot redirect even now. I’ll be there in a few hours.”
“Thank you Chantry.”
“Don’t mention it.”
Chapter Twenty One
Love Letters
I stared through the glass at Deshavi, “Are they treating you all right?”
She nodded, “Why hasn’t Trent come?” She asked forlornly.
I sat forward, “I told him not to and for the moment he’s listening. He’s on the thin edge of reason right now and I don’t want to make the situation worse by him losing his temper and going off on a guard or something.”
She nodded understanding.
“He is going to write you letters. One for every day. You should start getting them soon. Deshavi I need to ask you something. The theft charges are they all true?”
“Yes!” She responded miserably.
“All right I need you to do something brave for me. I need you to plead guilty to all charges. Don’t try to plea bargain or cop a deal of any kind.”
She nodded, “Okay.” She said, as she began to cry.
“Grandpa?”
“Yes honey?”
“I can’t do this! I can’t survive in here!”
I placed my hand on the glass and she reached out to line hers up with mine.
“Do you trust me?”
“You know I do grandpa!”
“Then you know it’s true, when I tell you that there’s no way I’m going to let you stay in here, for long.”
She nodded.
“It might take a little while, but have faith and be strong. Some prayers wouldn’t hurt either okay?”
“Okay.”
“All right I have work to do to get you out of here.”
I left her then looking hopeful, but there were many hurdles yet to cross in getting her out of jail legally. Two weeks later she pleaded guilty to all charges and was sentenced to thirty years, with the possible chance of parole in ten.
Three months and seven days later
Deshavi sat on the edge of her bunk reading yesterday’s letter, as a soft smile played about on her face. Her cellmate on the top bunk groaned loudly, “Reading another of those mushy letters for the umpteenth time! I’ve had so much exposure to love in the last three months that I could puke for a month full of Sundays!”
Deshavi commented dryly never looking up from her letter, “I’ve never noticed you passing up an opportunity to read one that I’ve given you.”
“There’s precious little else to do.” Groused her cell companion grumpily.
Deshavi was grateful beyond words could express for her fellow prisoner. They’d come in to the prison at the same time together. One week into their stay they’d been cornered by a group of butch’s in the shower area. The four butch’s had hit the deck of the shower stall in varying forms of broken manglement so quickly that Deshavi hadn’t even gotten a punch in. Since then neither of them had been bothered in the slightest by guard or inmate alike.
The mail came and went, but there was no letter for her, which was strange as they had been coming faithfully every day. Had Trent given up on her?
“I thought I might be a sufficient substitute for a letter today.” I said softly.
Deshavi jumped up off her bunk so hard she hit her head off the top bunk.
Clutching at her head she came quickly to the bars and in a harsh whisper asked, “Grandpa you’re not here to break me out are you?”
I glanced to the side at the dubiously smiling prison guardswoman, “No, actually I thought it would be for the best if we just walked out.”
The guard stepped forward still smiling and unlocked the door.
“Well, as things turn out all these various pieces of stolen jewelry just happened to turn up and be returned to their owners plus some monetary compensation for their troubles. Now everyone is very happy and the governor after a quite substantial campaign donation thought he should cap the whole thing off with a full pardon. You’re now free to go so to speak. Just head along with this kind woman and she’ll take you through processing.”
Deshavi headed off down the hall with the guard looking very much in a state of shock, as she continually glanced back at me. When she was gone I stepped into the cell.
“Thank you Maria Christina for keeping her safe! You have a personal favor from me whenever you should require it.”
Maria shrugged and smiled, “Chantry doesn’t usually ask for much, but I have to admit that agreeing to this little extended vacation stay was getting old fast.”
“I know what you mean. In a few hours the warden will transfer you and you’ll be free again by nightfall. I really wish you’d let me pay you something for your time.”
“You know we agents don’t work for money. What we agents have need of is more than supplied by the Agency. I have no need of your money and in a way your favor is payment enough. A favor from a fellow agent, retired or not is in its way a priceless commodity.”
Maria gracefully got off the bunk and moved throughout the cell collecting up letters, “Here take these with you. She’ll want to have them to look back on some day.”
I thanked her and handed her a package in return. “From Chantry, with his regards, to help sweeten the remaining hours of your restful vacation stay.”
She snatched the package from my fingers, “Is this chocolate?”
Chantry had warned me about her sweet tooth and I chuckled, as she tore the package open, “I believe it’s your favorite kind too.”
Maria groaned and I shook my head, as I stepped back and swung the door shut. I had started away when she came to the bars, “Chantry told me something about you.”
I looked back into the vast depths of her intriguing black eyes, “Oh, what?”
“He said you saved the world once.”
“Chantry’s been known to exaggerate too.”
“I’ve never known a man that exaggerates less than Chantry does. He tells it just like it is. Tell me how does doing what you did make you feel?”
“What’s important Maria is not what you feel upon accomplishing something truly noteworthy, but rather remaining the same character
driven person that you were to do the deed is what is important. That way you can do something noteworthy again, if life calls upon it. To live in just the moment of one accomplishment is to reach a peak, where you’ll never be as good, as you were before.”
She smiled, as if to herself, “Maybe someday I’ll learn to be humble so I can save the world like you did.”
“Be careful about what you wish for Maria.” I said knowingly.
She smirked slightly, “Learning to be humble or saving the world?”
“Both.” I responded with before heading off down the corridor of cells. She would learn.
I stood beside Deshavi, as they checked back her things to her. The woman behind the counter set down a ring on the counter and gave a soft whistle.
Deshavi stared at the ring in shock and turned to me, “But my ring was taken before I was sent to Siberia!”
I picked the pretty diamond ring up and slid it onto her finger, which had mended well from being broken, “Fancy that, I guess someone wanted you to have it back.”
She stared at the ring for a moment and then about knocked me over with her forceful hug. “Thank you grandpa for everything!”
The woman behind the counter smiled at me broadly.
“Come on don’t you want to get out of here?”
“Yes!”
As the last barred door opened and closed behind us and the long sidewalk of freedom opened up she saw the blue Mustang and the solitary man standing beside it with what looked like flowers in his hand. I watched Deshavi’s breath quicken, as well as her gait, but she curbed it back to match my slower walk.
“You know I’m really glad it worked out this way, otherwise it could have gotten messy and you’d be living the rest of your life on the run from the law.”
Deshavi looked up at me questioningly, “Trent came up with not one, but three escape plans for busting you out of here. I’ll be able to sleep at night now not having to fear he’s scaling barbed wire walls in a desperate attempt to rescue you.”
She looked back toward Trent. “What are you waiting around here for? Go!”
I shoved her along and she took off running and for the second time I watched her go free.
“Oh Lord I pray that there won’t be any need for another escape!”
She slammed into Trent so hard that the flowers went flying. After a brief torrid moment of unrivaled passion the blue Mustang tore away from the curb leaving a good bit of rubber burned to the asphalt.
I shook my head, “They’ll both be back here traveling at that speed.”
I walked up to the curb, as an older less sporty car pulled up.
Ella leaned down with a smile to look at me through the open passenger window, “Going my way stranger?”
“I believe I am.” I said sliding in beside her.
I looked around at the older style of the car’s interior.
“We really need to get you a newer car, something that looks faster anyway.”
Ella smiled, “Whatever you say money man.”
She examined the ring on her finger as she drove, “You don’t think Deshavi will mind having a double wedding do you?”
“Nah, she’ll probably be tickled about it.”
“Do you really think three days is enough time for her to get ready for the wedding?”
“This wedding needs to happen! Before anything else happens to disrupt it from taking place!”
One week later
Alex’s eyes were glued to the dancer in front of him. She was deliberately taunting him. Oh how she was taunting him! He loved it. He would have her too!
It would be okay. Adriana was out of town with the girls. He had time to have fun with this girl. Her coy erotic sensuality wouldn’t be so flagrant, when he got done with her though. He slipped a note to a backstage attendant and then left to sit in his car to wait. They always came.
They simply couldn’t resist the money that he offered. His chauffeur opened the door and in slid the erotic dancer to sit across from him. Oh he couldn’t wait to get the handcuffs on her and start her education. It had been a long time since he had treated himself to so much pleasurable fun.
Being a family man, not to mention all the mix up with the family business, as of late had absorbed all of his free time, but not tonight or tomorrow or the next day or however long the girl managed to last.
“How about sitting over here honey.
Her smile was full of welcome and inviting wickedness, “Whatever you say master.”
She moved across the car to sit on his lap. He started to kiss her, but gasped, as his tongue seemed to go loose in his mouth. In dazed confusion he watched her pull a needle from his neck.
What was happening? He was supposed to do this part, was his last conscious thought.
Alex shook his head, as thought made its way back in. There was a sound. What was that sound? He was on a plane! A plane to where? His head came up sharply on the thought of that.
“Ahh, Alex I see that your awake.”
Alex looked around fearfully, “Where am I? Who are you?”
“One question at a time please. You’re on my plane, more specifically your somewhere over the Pacific near New Guinea to be exact. As to who I am, I’m Borden Chantry and my lovely apprentice responsible for bringing you here is Maria Christina.”
Maria walked into the picture in a black suit her eyes decidedly unfriendly, in comparison with their former erotic invitation.
Alex stumbled over himself as he spoke, “Why am I here? What do you want with me? I demand to know!” Alex demanded growing more bolder.
“You, I regret to say Alex are a mistake, an oversight if you will. You see I run an agency that works for good in all endeavors. As you can imagine we have a lot of work piled up to take care of. Our back load forces us to prioritize what we work on and what order we get to it. I regret to say your family’s proclivities for abhorrent behavior in regards to your fellow mankind was placed much too far down on the priority list. That oversight has been brought to my attention and I am pleased tell you Alex that you and your family’s enterprise are currently at the top of the list.”
“No please!” Alex begged sensing this was going badly for him.
“This is no time to beg or show weakness Alex. Not if you want to survive.”
“What’s going to happen to me? What are you going to do?” Alex asked, already feeling sick inside.
“Oh it’s not what we’re going to do to you Alex, it’s more or less what your family will do.”
Chantry gestured to someone behind Alex, “Temple if you would, remove the trash from my plane please.”
Alex was hauled up to his feet, as the side door of the plane slipped open. Alex stared out in fright at the fast passing wind and the tiny spit of sand down below in the ocean blue.
Maria stepped close to Alex, “Ready to join the rest of your family that’s been involved in your little enterprise? You’ll be the last one to join the party. Oh just as a heads up, if you hadn’t noticed, it’s a really small island. We calculate that its resources should be enough to support one human. Happy hunting Alex! It should be a real fight to survive, every tortured moment of it. Oh I almost forgot.”
She pulled a small bottle of sunscreen out from a pocket and slipped it into one of his. “Don’t get sunburned baby.”
She nodded to Temple, who bodily threw Alex screaming from the plane. Alex’s shoot automatically deployed and he started drifting down toward the uncharted desert island and his waiting family members involved in the business, all the while screaming for mercy.
Chapter Twenty Two
Unsung Heroes
One year later
“Are you sure you don’t mind if we stay out that late? The movie lets out at 10:30, but we won’t be able to be back here till 11:00 and I know that’s late for you guys.”
“Deshavi relax, everything will be okay. Stay out all night if you want.” Ella
said calmingly.
Deshavi glanced at Trent in a mixture of desire and worry at the suggestion, but motherhood won out.
“I don’t think I left enough milk to do that.” She said anxiously.
Ella wrapped an arm around both Trent and Deshavi and started pushing them toward the door gently, but insistently.
“Everything will be fine. We have a crib. You know where it is in our bedroom. You have a key to the house and the spare bedroom is always available to you so stay out and have fun and come back as late as you please.” Ella said, as she closed the screen door on the anxious parents and waved goodbye to them.
When they were gone she turned back to me with a smile and came closer. “Now we get to have fun with our little man here.” She said softly, as she let the little boy in my arms grab her finger. It hadn’t taken long to become a grandfather all over again, only this time it felt different.
I had basically raised Deshavi as my child, but that wasn’t going to be the case for this little tike. They’d had the gall to name the little guy after me, Caleb Jr. They hadn’t had to do that, but who was complaining. I could hold this little boy for hours and I only hoped there was enough good time left for me to watch him grow up and take him fishing, teach him to hunt, teach him about what I’d learned in life that I thought important enough to pass on.
Right now I felt like I could live to be a hundred given such a purpose as that and maybe I’d do just that, God willingly of course. I glanced up at my beautiful wife’s face and her eyes rose from the baby to meet mine.
“Now I feel like Caleb.”
She gave me a quizzical look, “What do you mean? You are Caleb?”
“No, I mean the biblical Caleb that I’m named for.” I looked back down at the baby in my arms.
“All my life it seems that I’ve just gone from one moment of sorrow to the next. There have been moments of peace, even enjoy intermixed throughout, but they always seemed lost in whatever tragedy came up next. When I was having it good all I could expect was to somehow be beaten down, but not now. I’ve seen God work on my behalf, in my later years, like perhaps I’d never seen before or at least I wasn’t aware of in my younger years. I’ve always tried to be like my namesake of the Bible, but I’ve always seemed to come up short. Caleb always seemed so undaunted by everything that came at him. He always relied in his God and felt that nothing was impossible to him. When he entered the Promise Land he was eighty years old, but his skills as a warrior had not dimmed from the time that he had been forty. He was given a possession in the promise land, even though he wasn’t strictly of Hebrew blood. He was descended from Esau, but later adopted into the tribe of Judah. He had a name, he had a place of his own, he had the respect of many, he had faith to move mountains, and he had a family. Specifically he had a daughter that a warrior by the name of Othniel attacked and captured an entire city just to win the right to marry her. Caleb was firmly established and blessed by God for his faithfulness to Him. In this moment I feel like what he must have felt like.”
Agent out of Time (The Agents for Good) Page 17
