Chapter 21

Saturday

This morning, I used the smaller, upstairs study bathroom to perform my morning ablutions, so I didn’t wake the others. After I dressed, I acquired two four-legged followers on my way downstairs and three more once I got downstairs. I’d seen the handlers turn the dogs loose to run and do their business, and I did the same, although I stayed near the back door with the door open. The barking as they frolicked drew three more dogs outside. Juwanna and Mabel just laughed at me as I watched the dogs.

“Now, that’s impressive,” a female voice commented behind me, startling me. Toni was watching an even dozen dogs playing what almost appeared to be a K-9 version of polo, soccer, or hockey as they chased back and forth. I groaned when she shook her upper body, making it abundantly clear that she wasn’t wearing a bra under her T-shirt. “At least it isn’t one of my T-shirts,” I thought to myself.

“Dr. Wagner is right, you are fun to tease,” she laughed right before she went back upstairs and donned the appropriate chest restraint.

I almost pouted when she returned, causing her to laugh at me again. “Sorry, I’m not joining your harem,” she laughed. “My husband might not appreciate it when he gets back next month,” she added. She saw my confused look at her comment.

“He’s in Afghanistan right now, but his enlistment is up next month. He planned to stay in for another tour, but with this job, we can afford for him to get out so we can start a family,” she explained happily.

“Ground pounder?” I asked.

“He’s a Blackhawk pilot, and does insertions and extractions for Special Ops,” she replied proudly.

“Can he fly a Superhawk?” I asked hopefully.

“Among at least a dozen other helicopters he’s qualified to fly,” she answered. Now it was her turn to look confused.

“I watched the helicopter that brought you here yesterday. It holds plenty of people, and I thought about buying one, but couldn’t justify the expense. Jan reminded me that local law enforcement would probably be begging me to let them borrow it for a variety of things, including search and rescue, so I tried to order one last night. I’ll probably have to get the civilian version, though. Still, I need qualified pilots and mechanics,” I explained.

“Just like that, you bought a helicopter?” she gasped.

“Yeah, although I know I’ll have to build a hangar, repair facility, and tarmac, and will need to hire pilots and a mechanic,” I sighed.

“You said that without flinching or grimacing,” she said, almost accusingly.

“Let’s just say that I’ve had more than my share of good fortune in the last couple of months, with the emphasis on both good and fortune,” I explained.

“Captain Reynolds said yesterday that you were directly related to the Lucky Jim from the history books and that you seemed to have inherited his luck,” she commented appraisingly.

“I’ve denied it for years, even to myself,” I admitted. “This last week has convinced me, however, but it won’t change the way I live. My first wife left me after a few months because she thought I’d spend the money on her. She was incensed when I insisted on working every day alongside my employees, getting dirt on my clothes and under my fingernails. She would die if she knew how much richer I am now than a few months ago when I divorced her,” I laughed.

When Toni whistled for her dog, the rest followed, running into the house, trying to shoulder each other out of the way as they ran through the door. I cracked up when three of them got stuck in the doorway for a few seconds. Toni, Juwanna, and Mabel were laughing at them, too.

Not long afterwards, the other handlers came downstairs, still half-asleep. “Wet paws in the face is one heck of a reveille,” one of the Wounded Warriors groused as he petted his dog’s head.

“You should have seen when three of them got stuck in the doorway trying to push their way through at the same time,” Toni started laughing again. “That reminds me,” she commented, running upstairs. I just shrugged, having recently decided that I could never understand what women thought or why they thought it.

“That’s reveille,” I laughed when the rooster began his morning ritual of mocking the approach of a new workday. Breakfast was served a few minutes later, and Toni returned with a huge grin on her face.

“Are you serious about needing pilots and mechanics?” she asked excitedly.

“Yeah, although, like I said, I’ll probably have to buy the civilian version.”

“My husband knows another pilot and two good mechanics, and they all get out in the next couple of weeks. They hoped to find jobs as civilian pilots and rotary mechanics,” she said excitedly.

“As long as they don’t mind living in Mississippi in the middle of nowhere,” I laughed.

She squealed excitedly and ran back upstairs, returning a minute later with her laptop. “Arthur, this is Jim, the man who hired me yesterday,” she said by way of introduction before turning the laptop so I could see it.

“Is this a serious offer?” he asked, using SKYPE. The fatigues and buzz-cut definitely marked him as military.

“Yes, I’ll pay a competitive salary, provide housing, and share whatever food we grow and raise. I still have to get the helicopter, and need to build the facilities for it,” I warned. Arthur turned and spoke to someone out of view, then turned back to me. “Is this offer for all four of us?” he asked. “If so, I need to warn you the two mechanics benefited from the military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell,’ policy.”

“Not a problem; my policy is don’t ask, don’t care.” I heard laughter from behind Arthur.

“Toni said you were going to be fun to be around,” Arthur laughed. “We have to get going,” he said, so I gave the computer to Toni and they played kissy face for a few seconds before he signed off.

“Yes!” Toni crowed, pumping her fist into the air.

After breakfast, I checked in with Ramón, and then geared up to continue checking tunnels. Since the handlers were all familiar with weapons, I let them pull weapons from my huge gun cabinet. The MP5/10’s were quickly grabbed. “Wow, you’re ready for a serious firefight,” Brent exclaimed.

“You haven’t even seen the ten cases of AK-47s we have locked up,” I laughed. When they all stared incredulously at me, I explained how I came by them.

When everyone was armed, we split up into teams of four. Two handlers, one with a guard/attack dog, and one dog trained to locate drugs and explosives, and one handler acting as an armed guard without a dog went with each team. Sylvia took a team to the Hanley house, and I took a team to the gang house. Martine, the FBI agent assigned here went with the team searching my cellar.

My team was the only one that found anything new. Halfway down the tunnel to the boathouse, there was an eight-foot gap in the dust along one edge of the tunnel. Lulu started whining and scratching at the wall, which is why we noticed the dust missing there. It took three of us half an hour to figure out how to open the solid rock and mortar door. It swung open into the new tunnel silently, which was surprising considering what it had to weigh. When it opened, we could see the arced wear marks in the floor from repeated opening and closing. We also saw a room eight feet wide, seven feet high, and a hundred feet deep filled with bundles of pot that looked like they’d been compressed in a small cardboard baler, and then shrink-wrapped securely.

Leaving the door open, with one of the bales propped in the open doorway to keep it from closing, I asked whoever was on duty in the security room to notify the DEA, and hoped the transceiver at the end of the tunnel picked it up. I got an affirmation letting me know they could still hear us. Nothing else showed up in our exploration, so we returned, leaving the door to the boathouse tunnel open into the cellar of the gang house for the DEA when they got here.

The DEA agents arrived two hours later with two more giant helicopters like the military had used to drop off the shielded vehicle. From looking online at the Sikorsky helicopters, I knew they were the Erickson Aircrane. The third helicopter that arrived was a Superhawk, and dropped off ten DEA agents, as well as an ATF agent and an FBI agent. I heard that the final handler had arrived, so I let the handlers who had been with me lead the new arrivals back to the stash while I went to greet my new handler.

The team searching my home had finished already. They were busy explaining to the latest handler, Rick, what we did this morning, and what we found. They also explained what I was looking for and what I was offering. When I found them, they were relaxing on the patio joking and talking. I assigned two basements of the Civil War era houses for them to search after lunch, and called the people living there to warn them.

Chloe found me and gave me a message. “Someone called for you. They sounded like they were military so we told them you were leading a team searching tunnels for drugs and arms. They said to call back as soon as you could,” she explained.

I didn’t recognize the name, the phone number, or the area code, but called anyway. “Sikorsky Aircraft, how may I direct your call?” a pleasant female voice asked.

“I’m Jim Reynolds. Alex Rudd called earlier and asked me to return his call,” I explained nervously. I hoped I wasn’t in trouble for trying to order a military model of a helicopter.

“Jim, Alex here,” a male voice answered enthusiastically. “I hear you were in the middle of something when I called earlier. Find anything?” he asked.

“Yeah, but the DEA just got here a few minutes ago so we don’t know how much yet, but the total will be in tons,” I explained.

“Great, get that garbage off the streets before it even gets there,” he encouraged. “Anyway, I called about your order. If you want the best helicopter for S&R, medical evacuation, law enforcement support, and want the best electronics package, you want the HH60-AG PAVE Hawk, sans the armament, of course,” he explained.

I explained about wanting the extra seating since I had a big family, lots of employees, and eleven handlers and their dogs.

“I know the economy is tight right now, but your references seemed to think it hadn’t affected you. Your boss was surprised that you wanted a helicopter but assured us you could easily afford it. I could sell you unarmed versions of both the HH60-AG Pave Hawk with all the top-of-the-line upgrades and the Superhawk configured for executive transportation, including all top-of-the-line upgrades for $53 million. I could make it $51 million without the upgrades,” he offered.

“We have the birds ready since the market for big-ticket items went soft. We just need to perform the upgrades, and can have them ready within a month,” he promised eagerly. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I could see this guy in a car lot selling used cars.

“What the heck?” I was wondering silently. Last night, I was trying to justify buying a helicopter, and now they want to sell me two. Aargh! “Do it,” I heard myself saying into the phone. I hoped the girls weren’t too upset with me for spending that much money and it was definitely a boatload of money. Half an hour later, the two copters were bought and paid for, and the paperwork had been faxed back and forth to accrue the necessary signatures.

The final order of business was when he asked if I wanted the business name on the helicopters. Without even thinking, a mental image came to mind. It was an image from when I first read the journal of Lucky Jim. “How about a horseshoe surrounding the letter J?” I asked. “Beneath that, add Lucky J.”

“That sounds familiar. I think someone else may be using it,” he warned.

“It sounds familiar from your history lessons. My sixth great-grandfather, Lucky Jim, used it,” I explained.

“So, you’re Lucky Jim, Jr.?” he laughed.

“Something like that,” I laughed in return. I felt my chest swelling with pride thinking that I really was Lucky Jim.

I sought and found Toni. “Next time you talk to your husband, could you ask if he knows a three-man flight crew for a PAVE Hawk, and if the two mechanics know how to work on them?” I asked.

“A PAVE Hawk?” she gasped.

“Yeah, the guy from Sikorsky said it would be better for S&R, emergency medical flights, and working with local law enforcement. I wanted the Superhawk because it carried so many people, so he sold me both,” I said, shrugging my shoulders.

“Both?” she gasped even louder, her voice raising an octave in surprise.

“Yeah, they cut me a deal because they had the inventory and wanted to get rid of it,” I explained. I didn’t explain how small the discount was, although $800,000 is still a lot of money. Besides, they were throwing in the upgrades at their cost.

Surprisingly, Jan laughed at me when I told her. Then she told the others and got them laughing at me. At least they weren’t upset. I laughed thinking that I should fly both over to say hi to Jacqueline. Now she would be majorly upset!

We had just sat down for lunch when there was a mad rush by the dogs to the front door. Several shrill whistles later, the dogs had returned, and were sitting (almost) calmly by their handlers. They were still quite interested in the front door, their ears perked up, and their heads turned when the doorbell rang. Since I was almost to the door, it only took a few seconds before I opened the door.

“Mr. Reynolds?” the older man asked in a perfectly clipped British accent. He was looking nervously behind me, so I turned to make sure none of the dogs had snuck back towards the door.

“Jim, please,” I replied, extending my hand. “The dogs are harmless and perfectly safe. They are all highly trained and the handlers are with them,” I reassured him.

“Guard dogs?” he asked as he shook my hand.

“Most of them are retired military dogs and trainers. The rest are retired police dogs or drug dogs and their handlers,” I explained.

“Would you prefer to come in and eat lunch, or to go look at the house?” I asked.

“The house, I think,” he replied, looking at his watch. I told everyone where I’d be, and left, driving my pickup truck.

“Security?” he asked when he saw the two agents who were on duty.

I explained briefly about having a run-in with people who sold weapons and drugs, as well as the fact that the house had been confiscated, and about the attempted break-in a couple of days ago, so we had FBI, DEA, ATF, and U.S. Marshals here. He seemed impressed.

Within seconds of opening the front door, the man made a beeline to one of the ugly knick-knacks. Seven more caught his interest before even leaving the foyer. “Oh, my, this will take some time,” he said, but actually sounded excited. The poor man spent a day and a half cataloging everything, including things I would have considered trash. He stayed in the house, and I sent meals over to him.

I ate a belated lunch when I finally got home, and then sought my parents. I should have known they’d both be helping with the work, as were my brothers and sisters-in-law. I guess I came honestly by the work ethic Jacqueline hated so much. When I asked if they minded if I renamed the farm the Lucky J, I swear that Dad’s chest puffed up with pride. They all thought it was a wonderful idea.

That meant I had to tell Ramón to get new branding irons, and had to call my attorney Monday to have the name changed on legal and banking documents. I decided that it would be easier and less confusing to change the name to Reynolds Ranch d.b.a. Lucky J.

After an hour of reviewing the numerous irons I had in the fire, I spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing with my spousal equivalents. I noticed Mabel showing another fifty-something black woman around the house, explaining the system she and Juwanna had worked out to keep the house clean.

She introduced me to Twyla, mother of two of the men Ramón hired this week. “Is it true that you’re related to Lucky Jim?” Twyla asked excitedly.

“That’s what my parents tell me,” I answered.

“Oh, wow, you need to lead the charity raids next March,” she exclaimed excitedly. Of course, That comment meant she had to explain what the charity raids were. “Every year, to commemorate Lucky Jim’s raid on Meridian and the surrounding countryside, groups of county residents band together and go door-to-door to collect donations of canned food for the county food bank, and cash for the churches to dole out to needy families. Someone in each group dresses up as Lucky Jim, wearing buckskins, and has a feather stuck in the red wig they wear. At least you won’t need a wig.