[Jennifer Cloud 01.0] The Shoes Come First

by Janet Leigh

  “No, I will talk to her first. McGregor, go to the infirmary and get looked at by a medic. Everyone else, go directly to the blue room. I’ll be in shortly.”

  I noticed a bloodstain seeping through Caiyan’s pant leg about midthigh. Caiyan pushed away from the wall and sauntered off down a long hall to the right, followed by the three suits and Brodie.

  Jake grabbed my arm and ushered me down a long corridor. I felt like I was going to the principal’s office. We turned left and went into a small room.

  There was a desk with a laptop surrounded by stacks of files, a black leather office chair, a gray metal file cabinet to the right of the desk, and a black upholstered metal chair in front of the desk, which Jake motioned toward.

  “Sit,” he commanded as he took a seat at the desk.

  I’m no dog, but I sat anyway, because I felt a fight coming on. Growing up, Jake and I had had our fights, so I knew when he was about to blow. He looked at me, started to say something, then shut his mouth, obviously trying to find the right words. He picked up a blue ballpoint pen and clicked the cap a few times.

  “What are you doing here?” he finally asked.

  “I am a transporter,” I replied smugly. “What are you doing here?”

  “This is my top-secret assignment, babysitting the time travelers.” He stared at me with chocolate-brown eyes that made my heart melt. Avoiding his stare, I looked around and saw several maps tacked to the walls. Some of them had dates back to the seventeen hundreds. Jake tapped the pen on the desk.

  “How did Caiyan take you?”

  On a bed of straw was my first thought, then I realized Jake was asking how I ended up here. I quickly explained that Aint Elma had left me her key and reminded him about the time the outhouse threw him into the yard. This got a small smile out of him.

  “Yeah, that explains a lot about that outhouse. It was pretty funny, but what we do here isn’t fun.” The storm cloud returned.

  “I understand the danger. Hell, I have experienced the danger. Besides, Caiyan and Brodie have given me a brief synopsis.”

  “When did you start traveling?”

  “Well, my first trip was when I was eighteen, but I didn’t know what was happening to me. This would be my second trip.”

  “Where did you meet McGregor?”

  “In Scotland, the year of our Lord 1568,” I told Jake, mocking Caiyan’s Scottish brogue.

  “Did you sleep with him?”

  “Well, I don’t think that has anything to do with the WTF.”

  Jake rose out of his chair, came over, and put both hands on the arms of my chair. He leaned down and looked me directly in the eyes. “Did you sleep with him?”

  “Maybe…”

  “Shit, Jen.” Jake pulled back and paced around the room. “Have you been traveling around the universe sleeping with him the whole time we dated?”

  “No.” Then I went into a brief synopsis about my traveling experience.

  “Jennifer, he is not a good person. He kills people. The only reason he is not behind bars is because we need him to work with the WTF.”

  “He only kills bad people,” I said in Caiyan’s defense.

  “Yes, but sometimes good people get killed in the process.” He put both hands on his hips. “I will not allow you to do this.”

  “No!” I jumped to my feet. The metal chair scraped on the floor in my haste. “You can’t make me quit. It’s my gift. If I get my key back, I don’t need your permission.” I crossed my arms over my chest and held my ground.

  “Where is your key?”

  “The Mafusos took it.”

  He huffed. “I run this operation. If I say you don’t travel, you don’t travel.” He stood firmly on both feet, squaring me off like we were about to have a gunfight. We’d had many disagreements in our long friendship. We were both hardheaded, determined people, and we had battled like this before over much less serious issues. We stared at each other, not saying a word for a full minute. Damn, I could feel my heart beating frantically in desperation. My eyes started to fill with tears of defeat. He looked away and then back at me again, and I could see his eyes soften.

  “Your key is gone,” he said gently. “I’ll arrange for transportation home.”

  “Jake, please don’t take this away from me. I finally have a job I feel is the right one.” I gave him my saddest bleeding-heart, tear-filled eyes.

  “Don’t use those baby blues on me; it won’t work.”

  Moving around next to him, I placed my hand over his. “I know it’s dangerous, but I can make a difference.”

  The phone on his desk rang, distracting him from our intense conversation. He informed whomever that we would be there shortly and slowly replaced the phone in the cradle. He turned and looked at me again.

  “Jen, you can’t.”

  “Yes, I can,” I said, interrupting. “Besides, they took Gertie, and I have to help her.”

  “God, this just keeps getting better and better. Is Gertie a transporter too?”

  “No, she sort of hitched a ride with me.”

  Jake ran his hand through his hair. “I have to go do a debriefing. You have to come too. I need to hear everyone’s story.”

  “Thanks, Jake.”

  “This discussion isn’t over, but I have a job to do. Follow me.” He picked up a file off his desk and walked past me. “Christ,” he mumbled as we set off to the debriefing room.

  We walked down another long hall in silence. Finally I asked, “How did you know I had slept with Caiyan?”

  “He sleeps with everyone.”

  Ouch, that hit hard. After the kiss in the vessel, I was looking forward to more, but maybe I needed to keep a working relationship.

  “Did you sleep with Bambi?” I threw back at him.

  He looked momentarily confused, and then reality set in. Busted.

  We entered a room decorated with dusty-blue wallpaper halfway down the wall and dark mahogany paneling from the chair rail to the floor. It contained a long executive meeting table. Black chairs lined each side of the table, and a large high-back executive chair was at the end. Caiyan and Brodie sat across from each other, both drinking coffee out of Styrofoam cups.

  Caiyan gave me a smile as I entered the room. I decided sitting next to Brodie might be a wise decision. The three suits gathered at the far end of the table.

  I sat down, and Jake placed a cup of coffee in front of me. Black, two sugars.

  “Hmm…,” I heard Caiyan remark under his breath.

  I avoided looking in his direction and focused on what Jake was saying.

  “I already have Ace’s dramatic revelation of what his part involved. We have Mitchell Mafuso with a partial concussion in a holding cell. Now I need to hear your story.” Jake sat down in the chair at the end of the table. He flipped open the file he was carrying and wrote something down. One of the suits put a small recording device on the table and nodded his head toward Jake.

  Caiyan began explaining how he didn’t know I was his transporter when we met in Scotland, thankfully skipping the part about the barn. He continued through the entire trip to 1915, with Brodie and me adding our parts in as well. When we were done, Jake asked if we had any ideas on how to get Gertie and the key.

  “How do we find the Mafusos?” I asked.

  “We know exactly where they are. Don’t we, Caiyan?” Jake asked accusingly.

  Caiyan looked at me. “The Mafusos run the Staten Island portion of the Mafia.”

  “The Mafia?” I stood, shouting. “No one told me they were the friggin’ Mafia!”

  “Still want to be a transporter?” Jake asked, smirking.

  I sat down. Caiyan continued. “Old man Mafuso still runs the show, but I’ve heard he is training Mortas to take over.”

  “Mortas does almost all the traveling; I haven’t seen the old man go back in years,” Brodie added.

  “They will want Mitchell with his key intact for the trade. But I doubt they will trade Gertie and Jen’s
key. It will be one or the other.”

  “What about our inside help?” Jake asked Caiyan.

  “I’m afraid that has come to an end.” He smiled at me.

  Jake glared at Caiyan.

  “If you know where they live, why don’t you just sneak in there, free Gertie, then steal my key back?”

  “Jen, this isn’t James Bond. We cannot just sneak into someone’s very-well-guarded house,” Jake said.

  “Haven’t you ever seen The Godfather?” Brodie asked. “Breaking into the Mafia is like askin’ for a death wish. They tend to get even.”

  I looked dumbfounded. How were we going to rescue Gertie?

  “I need to go over a few details about the WTF with Jen,” Jake said. “You guys go home—get some rest. We will meet back here tomorrow at oh eight hundred hours.”

  “Roger that, Cap’n.” Brodie stood and saluted.

  Jake rolled his eyes.

  “Before you go, Brodie, summon Ace,” Jake commanded.

  “Man! Not two times in the same day. He’s goin’ to be a mite pissed; he had a date with Elton John.”

  “Get him here. Now!”

  Brodie sighed, put his hand on his key, shut his eyes, and mumbled something.

  Caiyan looked at me and smiled. “See ye later, sunshine.” They both stood and left me with an annoyed Jake.

  Jake looked at me with despair. I looked back, hoping he would cave and let me continue with the WTF.

  “Let’s go get something to eat, and we will talk.” Jake got to his feet, and I followed him down the long hall to a set of elevators. We entered the elevator, and Jake inserted a key fob into the slot on the elevator panel. He pushed the level-one button.

  “The WTF operates covertly underground at Gitmo,” Jake explained. “The bottom floor is ours. The WTF prisoners are held in cells on the same floor. The first and second floors house the maximum-security prisoners for Camp 6, which is where we are now. The staff, prisoners, and any visitors have no idea we even exist below them. The elite Gitmo staff knows there is a top-secret base but do not have access. The camp forms a rectangle and is monitored by computers. The main control access to Gitmo is here. There are many other camps at Gitmo. Some are maximum security like this one; others are medium. There are no minimal-security prisons here. No one but WTF enters Level B.”

  “What’s the B stand for…basement?” I asked.

  “Bottom,” he said with a sad tone that tugged on my heartstrings. It was as if all his time and training ended with him here, among the bottom dwellers of the CIA. I thought being involved in a top-secret project should have been exciting, but I knew Jake, and he would have wanted to be the one with the gun, capturing the bad guys, not the one pushing the paperwork.

  The elevator doors opened to a large room. Jake walked us through an X-ray unit not unlike the ones you see at the airport, complete with big scary security guard. We crossed what seemed to be an intake area for prisoners, then exited out the front door. Jake used his key to open the security gate outside the main door. We walked through; the door slammed shut behind us, trapping us between two large gates. A loud buzz made me jump, and then the gate in front of us opened. A sidewalk snaked between the buildings, leaving the Camp 6 building secured with high electrical fencing and razor-wire tops behind us.

  A military jeep driven by a young private was waiting for us. He took us through another large, heavily guarded gate, and we drove around what seemed to be a small town. As we passed a McDonald’s, I looked curiously at Jake.

  “The military personnel have to live here. There is a school, bowling alley, and movie theater.”

  We turned a corner and came up to a large chain-link gate minus the razor wire on top. There was a guardhouse with two men in uniform manning the gate. When we stopped, Jake produced his identification and a piece of paper explaining my presence, and they waved us through.

  “These buildings are the military base of Gitmo,” Jake said. Several multistory cement buildings were scattered throughout the complex.

  The jeep pulled up to a long, white, three-story building.

  “Thanks, man,” Jake said to the young driver.

  Jake key-fobbed us through the front of the first building, which seemed like an apartment. We took the stairs up two flights, and he used a different key fob to enter one of the doors—Jake’s new apartment. It looked like military-issue furniture: basic brown couch and chair, plain side table, and coffee table. But it smelled like Jake. He had always worn Abercrombie cologne, ever since high school. Sometimes I would nag him for not trying a new fragrance, but truthfully, when I smelled it, a warm, comfortable feeling would surround me like an electric blanket set on just the right temperature. In fact, when he was away at school, I would go into the store just to get that comfortable high. Safety. A feeling I had missed since I began the trip to 1915.

  Jake dropped his keys on the small breakfront that sat in the dining area inside the door. He turned and pulled me into his arms.

  “I thought you were mad at me,” I said.

  “I am, but you are still the most important person in my life.”

  I rested my head against his chest.

  “If anything happened to you, I would feel entirely responsible for allowing you to be a part of this warped mess.”

  I pulled away. “Jake, I am supposed to be a part of this. I can’t describe in words how frightened I have been these last few days, but it feels like my destiny.”

  Jake drew his lips into a tight line. “Are you hungry?”

  “Yeah, I guess maybe I am. I can’t remember the last time I ate.”

  “How about a couple of subs? There is a deli on the roof. Let me get out of this jacket, and we can go grab something.”

  “On the roof?” I asked, walking around his sparse apartment. No pictures, nothing personal on the counters. Very different from his cool apartment in Dallas.

  He called to me from the bedroom. “The roof has the best view, so the dining area is up there.”

  I avoided going into his bedroom. That was a complication I didn’t want to have at the moment.

  Jake reappeared without the jacket, sleeves rolled up and shirt partially unbuttoned, revealing his top few sexy chest hairs.

  “Can you walk around without wearing your official jacket?” I asked.

  “I’m on my time now, and the base is pretty casual. Since we are so isolated, it’s not likely the president is going to pop in for a surprise visit.”

  We took another couple of flights up to the roof. Jake was right—the view was amazing. Blue ocean as far as the eyes could see.

  The weather was about eighty-five degrees, and a nice breeze was coming in off the bay. Several tables with umbrellas were scattered about. A walk-up deli was to the right, with a canopy of the same red, white, and blue stripes as the umbrellas.

  Jake walked over to the deli counter. A man who looked Cuban was behind the counter and smiled as Jake approached.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. McCoy and his lovely lady friend, who is so happy today.”

  Geesh. Stupid smiley-face scrubs.

  “Hey, Rubén. Two turkey subs with chips, tea for me, and a beer.”

  “Comin’ right up.”

  Jake paid, and we walked over to one of the tables that overlooked the ocean. I took a deep breath of the salty air. “Jake, this is a nice view.”

  “Looking out that direction is nice,” he said, grabbing my hand. He took me to the other side of the roof. “This direction has another feeling altogether.”

  I saw the tall electric fences with the razor-wire tops. Jake pointed out the Cuban border.

  “I see your point.”

  We walked back around to the table and sat down. Rubén brought us our sandwiches and two big bags of potato chips. I didn’t realize how hungry I was. I devoured my lunch. Jake just picked at his sandwich.

  “It’s one of the side effects of time travel. Since your body thinks it was gone many days, and since you return
into the same time, give or take a few hours, your internal clock gets confused. Usually there is increased hunger, fatigue, and sometimes severe headaches.”

  “I don’t have a headache, but I would really like to get out of these clothes; I feel ridiculous smiling at everyone.”

  The corners of Jake’s mouth turned up. “I could help you with that.”

  The old Jake was back. I laughed but didn’t offer any encouragement, because I was really confused about the men in my life.

  “So, tell me what I need to know to become a good transporter.” I took a big swig of my beer. It was a dark beer, not what I was used to, but it had a deep, full flavor and quenched my dry throat. Jake shifted uneasily in his chair.

  “I can give you history, but you will need training. Intense training that some even with the gift can’t complete.”

  Something to look forward to. My subconscious pulled out her memo pad and began taking notes.

  “Caiyan told me the story his grandfather told him about the history of the gift,” I said.

  Jake sighed. “The World Travel Federation was created in December 1963 by President Johnson. The assassination of JFK by a brigand led to the capture of a defender, Jack Ruby. He was ultimately taken into custody but died in prison before his transporter could rescue him. An alliance was made with the government to assist the time travelers and give them protection from being captured in a past time.”

  “Why Gitmo?” I asked, helping myself to a handful of Jake’s chips.

  “Guantanamo Bay was the best place to hide the covert operation because of its isolated location and the amount of military protection already in place.

  “This alliance, formed by the time travelers, the British Secret Service, and the US Department of Defense, gave more control over what went on in the traveling by establishing a set of rules and giving the time travelers a place to imprison the brigands.”

  “Caiyan told me the Mafuso family are brigands and that there are other brigands as well.”

  The mention of Caiyan’s name caused Jake to wince slightly. “The Mafusos are a family, but there are others who do not respect the code of time travel.”