After lunch Anne, Troy, Ben and Eric joined the interview. As with Andrew, I was prepared – in fact very prepared.

With all the years of Marine service there was plenty of paper on Anne and I had access to all of it. Her file had lots of records from her time in the JAG office. I had a lot of questions related to some of the cases she had worked on there.

Washington law school sent me all the files on her. Anne was hitting on all cylinders, never missing a beat with her answers. She didn’t miss even when I switch to Pashto; that was listed as the secondary language she spoke. Of course Troy was looking like I had lost my mind.

Ben and Eric – on the other hand – enjoyed the show, especially when the questions and answers required the normal Arab hand expressions to emphasize a point.

I knew right away why General Whitley wrote such powerful comments on her appraisal forms and why she was at the top of her law school classes with Joey.

With her analytical skills she was a perfect fit for the oversight committee and could easily verify that all parties were working to the same goal.

Like me she detested terrorists, what they did, and what they wanted to do. Anne knew what had to be done to stop them, the same as I did.

It was 1500 when we finished and I offered her the position. I made the offer without waiting for input from the others, getting approving nods from them.

Anne went to call some friends to join her at the news conference.

It was in this break that I told Troy that Vicky and I were going back to Portugal in two weeks and that we would be taking heavy security.

“You have a bigger pair of balls than I have, damned if I would be going back! Then again I heard you had a brass pair hidden somewhere,” Troy said.

“You don’t ever have to worry about getting the chance to look for them,” I replied with a laugh.

The press conference had been moved back to 1700 to make sure it made the news cycle as the day’s major event.

The girls – with Jason and Lisa – arrived in plenty of time to see the President announce Joey for the appointment. She would be the youngest person ever nominated for a federal judgeship.

I was proud of Joey; we all were, she had come so far, worked so hard and accomplished so much since she came into our lives. Moving in with Jason and Lisa had been a life saver for her.

It lasted an hour with everyone who thought they were anyone needing to speak.

There was still a long road ahead for the three of them, the Senate process could be vicious and would take a couple months. All three would be coached by a panel of experts on the ways of the Senate process; the highs, lows and worse.

In the meantime my two were going to start immediately. They were going to have offices set up tomorrow and hundreds of files and folders to review. I had requested the approval for top secret credentials be expedited.

I would meet with them on Wednesday to explain their duties and limitations of their position. Until the Senate approved them, there were a few limitations, but not many, as both still had classified clearance.

I was going to need tomorrow to get the ball rolling for the trip back to Portugal. I was sure the meeting to tell the girls was going to be a humdinger. Andy may not be enthused either.

This evening was a party night, Jason and Lisa had decided to hold a party for Joey and several of her friends were invited – including Anne – at our house. The garage was big and we had plenty of tables and chairs. Several men from the special OPS team had set up almost a dozen grills that were ready to go. When we left Washington I called them to start cooking the things that were going to take the longest to cook.

All the family was invited and a few guests; Bobbie, Dan, Frank, Eric, Ben and their spouses. I invited Troy, the President and their wives, not that I expected they would come.

The crabs were running and several bushels were steamed in ‘Old Bay’ seasoning; a shore favorite. There were fresh bay caught rockfish and flounder with 100 pounds of steak, prime rib and fried chicken taking care of the meats. There was also Mac and cheese, sweet corn on the cob, baked beans, cucumbers & onions and cases of beer.

We had plenty of food; if there were leftovers the guest could take them home or the night shift guards were going to eat well.

When we arrived I was pleasantly surprised to see Crash and Marlene (his friend with benefits) sitting at the end of the table talking with Jeanna Destone – Marcy’s mom.

Jeanna was getting ready to shift more of her money – made from the oilfields – as she had in the past. Usually we added more stock to the company and traded stock for the money to make the IRS happy. We always added enough stock so we girls could maintain controlling interest no matter what happened.

The arrangement would work better than ever with the changes in tax rules, estate taxes and the four little ones. Then there was a trust fund she started for us guaranteeing that we would never lose control of JBG. All the stock she had went into the trust.

I needed to fill Crash in on the latest developments for Morton Field but had been so busy that I had not had time, and today was not a good time to get into a lengthy conversation about it. I would add it to my list of other things to do tomorrow.

After the party was over and the guests had left I made the trip to my tray in Robert’s office. There were the normal daily messages between Tiam and Jaed and there were more orders from General Kadar. In two or three more days we would have the site and plans narrowed down, gauging by Kadar’s insistence for details and daily reports. Apparently he had the upmost confidence in the dark web and their encryption methods.

The vacationers at the RV park had sent groups of pictures of people who looked out of place and had been seen more than one day. Progress was being made and progress was damn important.

There was an email in my inbox that the Bell helicopter service department was going to have a couple mechanics look at a couple problems and do upgrades to two of our 407s. Robbie wanted to know if there was anything that Lorrie or I wanted them to do while they were here.

“Yes, have them get two of the Hueys and two of the Cobras airworthy ASAP. Also verify that the two Black Hawks with mini guns are ready to go. I may have a mission for the six to go on in ten days. If necessary have them get additional techs on site. Once all that is done get the other three Hueys ready to fly,” I replied to the email.

Another email went to Lorrie, Jack Rush and his group of four men. Those five had the job of certifying that all of our pilots stayed current on their aviation physicals, flying training, certifications and that the planes met the inspection regulations. Sometimes they went on flights as copilots to do the checks.

The real problems were the pilots stationed at the embassies. Even though they were in a foreign country they still had to be current by FAA regulations.

“Jack, I need to be sure you have four Huey and four Cobra pilots ready in ten days,” the email said.

Edit by Alfmeister
Proof read by Bob W.