Jae's Assignment

by Bernice Layton

  “Why are you still up, Jae?”

  Jae twisted on the tops and after scooping up the jars helped him put them in cardboard boxes on the table. It was a ritual she’d helped with many times. “I couldn’t sleep. I’m not used to partying with a bunch of giggling women and oily guys. Such a turn-off,” she said, turning up her nose. Her father didn’t comment until they’d boxed up all of the jars and carried them into the pantry. Returning to the kitchen, he encouraged her to join him then went to the refrigerator.

  Jae smiled to see him taking out a jug of milk and she knew he was going to make hot cocoa. “Dad, you do know that it’s about eighty degrees in this kitchen.” When he simply nodded and went about making the cocoa Jae mumbled, “Hot cocoa it is then.”

  Minutes later, as they sat at the large kitchen table, her father pushed his glasses up on his nose. “Out with it. Bring me up to speed on that fellow you were love-struck over a while back.”

  Jae’s mouth twisted as if she’d eaten something distasteful. “It wasn’t even that, Dad.”

  “Then what would you call it?”

  “I would call it a flight that never got off the ground. I wasn’t what Byron wanted.” At her father’s raised eyebrows above his cup of hot cocoa, Jae continued. “He wanted something I’m not. He wanted a glam gal, some pouty, fake woman who wouldn’t even think about playing Frisbee like we did the other day. He wanted someone like Nina and Ronnie and Kim and Tarsha.” Jae met her father’s eyes. “Pretty girls, Dad,” she said.

  “You’re a pretty girl, Jae, and you’re smart with a great sense of humor. You get that from me.” He smiled, patting her hand. “Don’t sell yourself short because that Byron was too stupid to see he already had an amazing, beautiful girl. It’s his loss.”

  Jae nodded, absently stirring her cocoa. He was right on all points but it still didn’t make her feel any better knowing the man she’d met and liked wanted someone else. Smiling suddenly, she said, “You’re right, Dad. It’s his loss but I also lost something dear to my heart.” When he patted her hand compassionately, Jae said, “I met Byron at my favorite coffee house and since I’m sure he still goes there, I’m totally missing my favorite cup of java.”

  Her father laughed. “What about the fellow who called the other night? I heard you hightailed it out of here. Is he in the running?”

  “Who?” Jae asked, guessing he was referring to her call with Grainger. “Oh, right. I-I did go to see a-a friend and yes, um, he’s running all right, but not for me.” Jae recalled the moment she’d spotted Trevor Grant in the lounge. She hadn’t recognized him. Clean-shaven, he’d drawn her attention in a way that unsettled her. With her father watching her, Jae smiled drowsily. “I guess the cocoa is working. It always does, you know.”

  “You didn’t touch it. Were you thinking about the friend you went to see?”

  “Uh-huh.” She nodded, taking a sip of the cocoa. “I was glad to see him.” She wasn’t telling a lie but was quick to add, “We just hung out, talking.”

  Jae stood up and let her dad know she was turning in for the night. But before she did, she looked toward the pantry and said, “It’s a punishable offense to sell that wine, Dad, and using Mom’s mason jars makes her an accessory after the fact.”

  “So, what’re you going to do? Turn your old man into the FBI or ATF?” Drew chuckled.

  Holding her breath as she studied her father, Jae croaked, “Not in this lifetime, Dad. But truthfully, I was hurt that Byron wasn’t honest with me because I did like him. I feel like I wasted six months dating him. Anyway, I’m not going to bother dating anyone, that way I won’t have to pretend to be someone I’m not,” she added when her father came and gathered her in his arms.

  When her father told her to just be herself and love would find her, Jae bristled at the idea. “Dad, I’m not looking. I have my work and my friends and, of course, my family, and that’s plenty. So, yeah I’ve been a bit of a tomboy and if the guy finds me, well, he’d better be a fast runner to catch me. And, trust me, I won’t let a handsome man try to change or confuse me again,” she snorted, making a face and couldn’t fathom why she’d been so preoccupied by another handsome man, Dr. Grant.

  “How long has Byron been out of the picture, Jae?”

  “Oh, um, almost four months,” she mumbled, confused by her emotions.

  “Well, honey, I’ll just say this. Four months is long enough. You’re a level-headed, smart, and pretty young lady. Now, slow yourself down some and let a nice fellow find you.”

  When her father dropped a kiss to her forehead before turning her around and shooing her from the kitchen, Jae fought against telling him maybe that someone had already found her.

  Chapter Six

  Trevor was staring at The Weather Channel on TV. He wasn’t watching it. He was listening to the jazz music playing behind the weather report. But when the forecast turned to the Rockville, Maryland, area, he became homesick.

  He wondered what had happened to the house he’d bought and never got around to furnishing. He’d purchased a bed and a kitchen table with four chairs, and for a doctor working long hours at the hospital, that was plenty. Then he’d joined the armed forces and forgot all about the house.

  Slumping in the chair in the nondescript motel room, Trevor thought about his family still living in Maryland. He counted everyone as he visualized their faces—his father, Maurice, and stepmother, Madeline. Then there were his two younger sisters, Lynette and Robin, and their husbands, Owen and Allen, and his two nephews.

  He had to think hard to recall how old Lynette and Owen’s boys were now. “Six and seven,” he said. The last time he’d played with them they were barely able to walk.

  Trevor hated his life since being in the witness protection program. He’d prayed to survive the early days of having to constantly be on guard. To him, everyone was a potential threat. Every noise was cause for alarm and a sleepless night. The mundane life he’d been promised was more than that; it was lonely and he hated the quiet.

  He was always on the lookout for the unscrupulous men who wanted the information that he’d discovered during his research in Afghanistan. He’d vowed to himself that he wouldn’t disclose it and knowing its potential if in the wrong hands, coupled with the past five years he’d spent protecting it, he would remain firm. He didn’t have a choice. As long as he stayed dead it meant the people who wanted the formula wouldn’t get it, but the cost had been more than he could take. It meant he had to walk away from the people he loved.

  He didn’t want to do it. He loved his family and they loved him. But now he was a wanted man and he had to keep his family out of harm’s way, regardless of the cost.

  When he’d contacted a friend and former colleague to tell him about the potential success of his discovery, he too had been delighted. But weeks later when Trevor told him about the deaths of the soldiers that had been in his care, his colleague had warned Trevor not to discuss his research with anyone else.

  Just two weeks later, Trevor found out that his former colleague had been a consultant for the FBI and had made some calls on his behalf. But by then word had gotten out about his formula and suddenly there was a price on his head for the final component. Trevor hadn’t known the formula of medication and hypnotherapy could render the tamest of soldiers into soldiers of superior strength. He’d imbedded those thoughts at the precise time within their therapy so that the men believed they were powerful, strong, and fearless. They became supersoldiers fighting a war in the deserts of the Middle East.

  Within a week, Trevor had been placed into protective custody and his world had been turned upside down. His placement into the witness protection program had been kept out of the system and he’d been assured that only a select few FBI personnel would ever know his location, employment, and new name.

  When the meteorologist pointed to storm clouds crossing the northern plains, Trev
or’s mind drifted back to that twenty-four-hour period that had changed his life forever.

  While serving as chief psychiatrist for a behavioral unit in Afghanistan he had been suddenly ordered back to the US.

  He’d been given a three-hour notification.

  When the flight landed in Dulles Airport some twenty hours later, it was 3:20 in the morning. There was no one there to greet him, not his family or his girlfriend, Gina.

  What was waiting for him was four military police officers, standing guard and ready to escort him from the deserted airport terminal. No one would answer his questions, so he waited to see where they would take him. The sinking feeling that had started in his chest escalated as they left the terminal. They didn’t say, but Trevor felt as if he was under arrest and all that was missing was handcuffs.

  A short time later, he was further surprised to find himself driven into FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. He was then greeted by two serious-looking, sharply-dressed FBI agents in matching black tailored suits, short military-styled haircuts, and shiny black shoes. He escorted him to a steel-gray, windowless room, empty except for a small table and two metal folding chairs. He sat down and looked around. A large two-way mirror was positioned dead center of the wall facing him. He barely recognized his worn haggard face staring back at him. His eyes were bloodshot and weary, and dark stubble shadowed the lower half of his face.

  Exhausted, infuriated, and irritable from the long overseas flight, he was in no mood for spy games and he’d had enough. After he’d banged on the door and demanded to know why he’d been brought there, two officials entered the room asking questions. They were exact carbon copies of the sharply dressed agents who’d greeted him earlier. One sat in front of him, while the other stood slightly behind him.

  Without any preface whatsoever, the agent sitting before him opened a file folder. After a minute, he slid the folder across the table so that Trevor could read the top document.

  Trevor leaned over to examine the document and immediately recognized it as the letter he’d sent to his colleague about his research findings. His stomach dropped when the agents hammered out questions about his research. He cited his legal rights under Article 32, stating he had a right to counsel, refusing to answer their questions.

  Trevor recalled how he’d initially been encouraged by his research and findings. Having worked extensively at several hospitals, he knew firsthand the mental stress, depression, anxiety, mania, and insomnia that soldiers had faced upon returning stateside. He counseled each one before they returned stateside, which meant preparing them mentally for the challenges they would face beforehand. Trevor’s therapy included medication, psychotherapy, and hypnosis.

  Initially, he would prescribe medication for wounded soldiers suffering from major depression or anxiety and PTSD. Their reentry back into civilian life needed a period of adjustment. It was at this point Trevor stepped in and provided intense therapy.

  These soldiers would eventually return to their units and remain under Trevor’s care. He utilized weekly web-based face-to-face Skype counseling along with a regimen of medications. He’d been so encouraged by their progress through detailed questionnaires that he presented his data to a medical panel in Germany to request funding to further the research.

  To his surprise, Trevor received immediate approval for generous funding to immediately expand his therapy and test subjects.

  In a telephone conference between those whom approved the funding, a General Murphy and a Dr. Harmon, and himself, Trevor had been asked to submit a detailed accounting of his findings. He complied, but didn’t disclose the exact formulas or medication doses or the phases of hypnotherapy he’d used. Basically, what he’d done was a form of mind control using hypnosis, psychotherapy, and medication to alter his subject’s behaviors and thoughts.

  After the first few sessions he’d had with five Marines who had been referred to him by their commanding officer, Trevor had been delighted to work with them. But upon reviewing their military records, he’d only picked up brief periods of insomnia—nothing major to warrant psychiatric treatment. There were no signs of adjustment issues, depression, drug use, mania, or psychosis. Following those initial sessions with the soldiers individually, Trevor noticed a troubling pattern. Their answers had been almost identical. It led him to think they had been coached and if so, why. The men shared the same PFC Marine rank and they’d all complained of the same adjustment issues when they’d been deployed home previously. It had been the types of complaints that he’d used as criteria for participation in his study. When he’d reported this to General Murphy and Dr. Harmon, he’d been advised to continue his research on the Marines. In fact, he’d been told they were his priority patients.

  It was during a hypnotherapy session that one particular Marine stated he and his fellow Marines would be going on a secret mission as an elite brand of “supersoldiers”.

  Alarmed, Trevor sensed if what the Marine said was true, then his latest test subjects would be a force to reckon with if he continued with his course of therapy. Ethically, he’d needed to sort everything out, so he immediately changed his therapy by changing the medication doses, decreasing it until only a placebo had been prescribed. Then he sent the soldiers to the lab for blood and urinalysis collection. He needed to be certain the medication was decreasing from their systems.

  He continued to have weekly therapy sessions with the soldiers. Only that consisted of counseling to work through a variety of issues. There was no hypnosis, just relaxation and breathing techniques and placebos.

  He’d called his former colleague, Dr. Sinclair, in Florida and told him of his suspicion. Dr. Sinclair advised that he was calling in immediate help.

  One week later the rug was pulled out from under Trevor.

  The five Marines had been found dead, all from alleged suicides. Trevor demanded answers but no one could give him any.

  Being an observer by nature, then by profession, Trevor could read people very well and in the weeks the Marines had been under his care he got to know each one and none had a mind to take part in a suicide pact. Grieving the tremendous loss, he’d gone to view their bodies in the morgue before they were returned stateside.

  Left alone, Trevor extracted blood samples and took pictures of their bodies. Each showed fresh track marks of an injection. When he spotted urine specimens that had been collected by the coroner, he extracted small amounts from each and sealed them into new specimen bottles.

  He ran his own tests.

  To his astonishment, high levels of the medication he’d initially prescribed on his test subjects showed up in the Marines’ bodies. In his estimation, the large doses intravenously administered were most likely what had killed them. Trevor shouldered the blame for their deaths.

  But it also confirmed that someone had figured out at least a portion of his formula and had used it on the Marines.

  So deep into his reverie, the music coming from The Weather Channel did little to soothe his troubled soul. Bending down to pick up the TV remote from where it had fallen on the floor, he stopped when he heard a noise.

  He relaxed knowing it was coming from the couple in the next room. They were having sex…again. “Aw, come on now, enough already,” he groaned. He’d heard them twice before and now guessed they were going for an Olympic record.

  Increasing the volume on the remote to drown out the noise of their joyful romp, he decided first thing tomorrow morning, he was getting the hell out of there.

  He didn’t give a rat’s ass about Special Agent Randall’s rant warning him, then threatening him to stay put until she called him in the morning. Though truthfully, he did care. The woman had risked her life and took a bullet for him, and that was something he had to admire her for. He recalled her steadily pressing her well-defined backside into him as a way of moving him out of the line of fire. Danger aside, he found some perverse delight in
how her body felt. Very warm, as he recalled, not to mention, when he’d angled his head closely to her cheek, he’d caught a whiff of her subtle perfume and he liked it, liked her smell.

  In the motel following his quick but necessary surgery her soft moaning during the night that kept him awake, watching her. Oddly, he wanted to know everything about her—and her personal life in particular, like if she had a boyfriend or lover.

  “Damn, I can’t possibly be that hard up for a woman that I’m fantasying about Agent Randall.” But the sudden hammering of his heart was the telltale sign that she stirred a longing in him that he struggled to keep at bay.

  Chapter Seven

  From the chatter and smell of frying bacon wafting up to her old bedroom, Jae guessed everyone was already up and she’d be the last one to make an appearance at the kitchen table. So why disappoint them? she thought and eased stiffly from the bed by rolling onto her uninjured side. The wound still ached, but the sharp, knifelike pain had subsided. After washing up and brushing her hair into a ponytail, she made her way downstairs still in her pajamas and padded into the kitchen.

  “Good morn—” was all she could utter as she stopped dead in her tracks.

  Sitting at the kitchen table, enjoying a plate of blueberry pancakes and bacon with her parents, sisters, and cousins, Kim and Tarsha, was Dr. Trevor Grant. Momentarily forgetting the ache in her side, she reached toward the small of her back where she often kept her weapon. Then remembering she didn’t have her weapon as well as the fact that she was in her parents’ kitchen, Jae was left to gawk at him in disbelief and somehow numbly uttered a stunned, “What the…” before catching herself. She kept one eye trained on the open back door, seeing that the screen was unlocked. Her first thought was, What if someone followed him here? Her family would surely be in jeopardy.

  Not wanting to alarm her family, who’d all stopped talking and were watching her with interest, Jae forced a smile onto her frozen, yet hot face. She hoped if looks could kill, Grant would slump over dead into his plate of blueberry pancakes. With all eyes on her, she had to wing it. “I’m at a loss for words,” she said, carefully enunciating each word. “Well, look who’s here.”