HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

Back in Section Twelve I used MTAC to page Robert.

“We got a break – in fact, a couple of breaks. Team Harrisburg placed the GPS unit on the vehicle today and we have tracked it to several stops. The longest was the water park, as we suspected it would be this soon.”

“The second was at a shop on the west side. They stayed there about thirty minutes, but the rest of the stops were short; ten minutes or less. The satellite photo of the shop is on its way to you. It’s not on the list of shops from the Labor department or the OSHA list so it may – just may – be a normal stop.”

“Next on the list is the French connection. There were several messages from Tiam to a new contact in the French group. Twenty of the girls are coming in two weeks – ten to the Norfolk Hampton Roads area. The other ten are going to the to Louisiana area near the Barksdale Air Force Base. They already have partial ownership in the establishments there if I understand the lingo correctly.”

“And get this – the French contact is going to send Tiam all twenty girl’s information. The girls are coming in on French student exchange visas. Each group of girls is coming with two female chaperons, ” Robert said.

“A couple days of tracking and we should have where the bikes are being made or stored, or at least his regular travels unless he is not using the truck after hours,” Robert said.

“If he doesn’t take the truck home, he has a car of his own parked close by. Send the Harrisburg team a couple more GPS units just in case they need them,” I said.

“I can read between the lines. The Iranians want the information first hand and not after ISIS has had a chance to filter it. They will have someone making the rounds to those establishments to collect it. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Iranians don’t take over the thing shortly after everyone is in place. The chaperons will be found dead or not found at all when it happens,” I said.

At 1530 the girls and Jeanna were waiting for me in the White House lobby. We were going to pick up new clothes for the fancy dinner in Portugal since it was described as a State dinner and I had received a list of the VIP attendees for the event.

The best pant suit I owned – Marcy had paid almost five thousand dollars for – had two bullet holes in it and was bloodstained. The girls were determined that Vicky and I were not wearing a pant suits to an official State dinner, even if it was in Portugal.

When you are outnumbered by determined partners and lovers you throw in the towel and say, “OK.”
With my JBG security and a few Secret Service agents we went to the most expensive dress shop in Washington DC. Jeanna had made the arrangements so I knew I had to go with the flow and shut my mouth.

In the shop I changed into the new bullet resistant gear sent by our supplier. It was the new one, an upgraded version of the one that had the bullet holes in it.

It was like a thin sweatshirt made of woven Kevlar, fine woven stainless steel wire and several layers of other top secret materials.

Unlike the first one – which was more like a men’s armless tee – this one has short sleeves to prevent bullets from entering under my arms. This gear also had a tight pair of women’s high top briefs. By design, the two were to overlap by several inches giving complete coverage from my neck to the crotch.

As many times as I had been shot wearing the traditional style vest I had been extremely lucky that none of the rounds had been low enough to penetrate my lower abdomen, an area not covered by the body armor.

I was dreading putting on the briefs, I could just imagine how Kevlar and wire was going to feel in the sensitive areas, but all the girls were there standing and waiting for me – so I did.

I was surprised at how comfortable the two garments felt – I thought they would be movement restricting but they weren’t – and the bloomers did not press pinch or bind. Vicky was satisfied with hers. Then it was on to the dresses. Vicky and I tried on about two dozen before there was a consensus on the right one.

It was by a famous designer, although it did require a few slight alterations. It was well below my knees, flowing when I turned and I was assured it was the dress for official functions and the favorite style of the well to do for the most important functions. Vicky’s dress was similar but in a different color.

The dress was long enough that it could easily conceal the inner thigh holster that I was going to carry.
I didn’t know that I needed new jewelry to go with new dress. A major international jeweler who was in the store next door had things the girls wanted to look at and me to try on.

First was a watch; I didn’t need a watch – I had a phone that gave me time.
I knew that objecting was futile when the salesman said “These are the pieces Marcy ordered.”

The watch was a Jaeger LeCoultre Rendez-Vous Tourbillion – the fanciest thing I had ever seen. Then there was the special made bracelet for my other hand. It was at least one inch wide and thick solid gold with a ring of rubies around the center; on each side of the rubies were rows of diamonds. It was hinged with a double snap so it could open up to go over my hand and fit snugly near my wrist.

As if that was not enough there was a new necklace with six strands of gold chain woven into it – a mighty fine necklace. A single gold pendant hung from the chain, wide and long enough for the birth stones for all of us and the boys surrounded on each side by diamonds. I felt like a walking gold and diamond showroom. But there were bright smiles, ahs, and grins so I said nothing.

Vicky’s was similar and the watch was different – it was a Calibre de Cartier. I was sure I didn’t want to know the price either. Her necklace was almost the same but had lockets instead of the pendant.

The salesman continued to bring out boxes of nearly the same items for each of the girls. They had decided to go on a spending spree for all of us, something they rarely did. Especially Marcy – normally if it didn’t make money it was a no-no. That only meant that she saw all the jewels as an investment or at least someplace to change laundered ‘prince’ money into hard items.

I knew right then we were going to spend time this holiday going to the Washington elite parties that I had carefully avoided last year.

I was glad we had security with us! I would have hated to carry all this down the street in DC as crime-ridden as it was.

We stayed in the store until all six of the Suburbans stopped in the traffic lane as a group in front of the store. With the sidewalk blocked to foot traffic, we were ushered into the Suburbans and left.

At home in the den we laid out the next two weeks; tomorrow was Friday. Tuesday night Vicky and I were flying to Portugal for three full days of meetings and finishing up Saturday mid-morning. The state dinner was Saturday evening and then we were flying back on Sunday. The following Thursday was the Fourth of July; that gave us three days to put the screws on Jaed and his merry men. Plans rarely come together, but I hoped this one did and that Jaed would make a mistake or two before then.

Howie was waiting for me to call. Howie was our pyrotechnics expert. When I needed him for special projects he was there. When he was not working for the special ops team he was working on special projects for me.
The special projects were every single design that showed up on the dark web of explosive devices, every bomb found. I had him make several copies and test them.

I wanted to know how difficult they were to build with limited resources, how effective they were and most of all – countermeasures.

I also had him work on more elaborate designs from his and my imagination and do the same kinds of testing. If we could think of them so would someone else sooner or later. Terrorists were getting sophisticated we needed to as well. We had to try to stay ahead of them.

Howie had taken samples of everything we had collected and the things we had made with the necessary equipment to give demonstrations without the explosives. He was already in Lisbon with the ops team.

Edit by Alfmeister
Proof read by Bob W.