It Ain't Paranoia if... Pt. 02 Ch. 04

"She? I hope she's ugly, or you're gonna get hit with a harassment suit."

I sighed. "She's gonna take some getting used to, but she's smarter than Doc. Well, at least smarter than me, which is a good thing in an assistant. Now, show me this pig in a poke you want me to buy!"

It was absolutely perfect, but it was going to cost way too much. I knew I couldn't afford it and the 6400 acre ranch, and I told Ron as much.

"Claude, how much did you say his lawyers wanted?" Ron asked. Claude told him, and Ron asked, "Got that much readily available?"

"Yes, if I cash out on some investments, but that's not near what his place is worth! He'd be nuts!"

"Or desperate," Ron rebutted, "Let's make him a cash offer, payable by Friday, and see what he says?"

"Get to it; you're my agent in this. Just let me know how long he laughs."

"Wanna see the big ranch?" he asked, dangling the keys. "The gate is just down the road from yours."

"Oh hell! Sure - I haven't got anything else to do, like run a few businesses or something!"

After riding the roads for a while, I was glad I didn't have the money to buy it. There was a lot of potential, yes, but nothing had been done except put in a few roads and drop off some cows and Spanish goats so he could keep the Ag value for taxation purposes, or so it appeared.

"Let's get back - I want to be there when the kids get back from school, and I know Felix is chaffing at the bit to torture me first."

The four kids were indeed glad to see me, even though I barely had the energy to sit there and listen to their tales about their new teachers after Felix.

I saw the look on the four amigos faces when I came down to get my coffee the next morning and knew something was up. I filled up and went to join them on the patio. "Claude showed us a few pictures of your new assistant," Chris/Coyote stated with a grin. "Gato say he thought you said she was ugly, and we wanted to clarify your scoring system."

"I said she would take some getting used to, not that she was ugly. Score-wise, I don't know. Are we using a ten-point scale?"

"Yes, and quit stalling."

"Umm, heck I'm not sure. Maybe a 12? 13?"

"Oh, shit!"

I went back for another cup of coffee, and this time it was Ron who was grinning. He held up his phone. "Have you got the money ready yet?"

"What? No, of course not! Why?"

"Because he accepted your offer of lawyer's fees plus $25 grand."

"Damn, we got the Crescent Moon for THAT? Crazy! The bastard must be desperate AND nuts!"

"Crescent Moon and the ten sections," he said with an even bigger grin.

"What the fuck? Now I know he's crazy!"

After breakfast I called my investment advisor. She answered in her most professional voice, which still sounded sexy AF, but that might have been because I was picturing the creature speaking. "Ash, this is Rob. I need a pretty good amount of money by Friday. Some idiot got in trouble with the law and is having a fire sale on some pretty decent property that's nearby."

"Good morning, Mr. MacGregor! It sounds like you're having another exciting day - I wish I were there! How much do you need?"

I told her, and she asked if she could call me back in an hour. I told her of course, and called her dad. "Emmett, this is Rob. How are you?"

"I'm doing okay, Rob, and, before you ask, my wife is as lovely as always, and I'll tell her you're still waiting for her to boot me out."

"Hi, Rob" Anne called from nearby. "Hi, Gorgeous, ready for a younger, hardier man yet?"

"Well, I might be, Rob, but I don't like sharing my men with my daughter. Is she REALLY going to work for you?"

"Well, that's why I called. I need to make sure you guys are okay with that. I'll be honest; she's the perfect candidate, but I'll back off if you have concerns."

"Concerns!" Emmett snorted. "Hell, I don't trust you around my wife for more than a few minutes at a time, and my sweet, young, innocent DAUGHTER wants to go work with you twelve-fifteen hours a day, and travel all over the world with you too? Hah!"

"Emmett, she's about Rob's age, and she's been married before!" Anne interjected.

He started laughing and admitted, "Just giving him a hard time, Darlin'; I knew he'd be worried!

"Of course we don't mind, Rob! It's the opportunity of a lifetime for her, and she's more excited than when I gave her a Mustang for her sixteenth birthday! Just take good care of my little girl."

"That's actually the main reason for this call. You might have heard about a few scrapes I've been in lately." I could hear Emmett snort and Anne chuckle softly. "It seems I somehow made enemies of folks I don't even know. I've got Claude, Clay, and Ultimate Solutions teams everywhere I go, but shit still seems to happen. Sorry, Anne."

"No apologies, Rob; I live with an old goat who can't finish a sentence without a string of Saxon words."

The line was quiet for a few seconds, before Emmett stated, "I trust you and I trust your team. Besides, you boys rained hellfire and damnation across two countries, and don't try to tell me it wasn't your doings! Anyways, you seem to have put a pretty good dent in your enemy base, and now that that god damned sorry-ass Robert is dead, I'll bet things settle down around you!"

I sighed. "I hope you're right about that, for sure!

"Now, let me confirm that neither you nor Anne are opposed to me hiring Ash... Ashley."

"You heard my foul-mouthed husband's opinion, although I have to agree with his language about Robert, so let me assure you I'm 100% fine with it. She's a smart and ambitious girl, and being around someone like you will only benefit her. Take the best care of her you can, and let us know if things aren't working out with her as your assistant. She can be a bit much, sometimes."

"'A bit much'; after meeting her, I'm thinking about making her the CEO and I'll be her assistant. I'm pretty sure everything would be more organized, and profits would go up."

"Buddy, a little female reorganization of your life won't hurt a thing," Emmett assured me, "but don't stop following that famous 'gut' of yours. You seem to know things others don't, even without all the data, so you don't let our hyper-organized, research-loving daughter, who's never going to give us grandchildren until after she's conquered the world... don't let her change you.

"You're dumb as a stump most of the time, but I suspect you're autistic or psychic when it comes to the oil patch and investments. Anne and I wouldn't be living on this ranch in this nice house without it, and Ash wouldn't have been able to go to college for six years without owing a dime! Do not let her change that!"

That last hurdle stepped and the advice processed, I turned to more mundane business dealings. I needed to make some serious money to make up for the pigs in a poke I just bought, for no good reason; therefore, I needed to work my connections and see if a new opportunity is out there.

Turned out it was, but it was out there in a not-so-safe or stable area of Eastern Europe. A company in the upstream & midstream parts of the petroleum business had decided to act on three orphaned pockets of wet gas in the Hungarian portion of the Pannonian Basin. For the uninitiated, "orphaned" means there are no pipelines to the underground reserves; "wet gas" means oil and gas, in undetermined ratios, will be recovered; "upstream" refers to exploration and recovery (drilling), and "midstream" is the transport of the recovered petroleum reserves, usually by pipeline, or pipeline and trucks, to the "downstream" refineries.

Without getting into the politics of Hungary, the hard-right 'communists'* friendly to Russia maintain a slim and somewhat tenuous margin of control, which means the government is not all that stable. None-the-less, it has functioned successfully in this state of being for long enough that my partners think it's worth a try. (Yeah, I know - communists* are thought of as left wing, but in reality they never get to socialism, much less 'communism'; they are always stuck in the 'dictatorship of the proletariat' phase, which is fascism, pure and simple. Think Russia and China)

This is one of those deals where I stand to make a lot of money upfront if I can reach an agreement with the government that allows them to proceed with pipeline construction and drilling. That will be complicated, given that some of the work will have to be 'contracted' with local firms, and certain 'fees' will have to be paid for permits and whatever- no, not bribes! Bribes are illegal!

Assuming I can make a decent deal, I'd make a bunch up front and get an 'override' on the oil and gas produced. The override is where the real money is, over time, even if the override is .5%.

Normally I get .75% or .8%, but this time I'm asking for more money and paid expenses up front, and less after production begins. The override here is non-participating, meaning I'm not investing in the deal, I'm brokering it.

I check my watch; it's almost eleven am. I have contacts in Hungary, and some of them are probably available even though it's nearly six pm over there, but I decide to send friendly emails today and follow up early tomorrow. That gives me time to work out details with the American side today before I decide whether to venture into the swamp (or perhaps cesspool) that is the south-central part of Eastern Europe.

Claude isn't thrilled about the pending deal, but Clay is unconcerned. "I'll go, and I'll only need three others. We'll be fine. There are some shady characters in that region for sure, but unless there is another bounty on Rob we should be fine."

Business ceased when the kids returned from school, but I'd gotten a very favorable deal worked out with CCM, Ltd. They would be funding travel for myself, my assistant, and a four-man security team for two weeks, and the bonus for getting a good deal from the government would go a long ways toward paying for the ranches I just bought. Or at least will buy when Ash funds it.

It's been over an hour, so I call her and she has a deal ready. "If you agree, the bank will fund the transaction upon your order, using an equal value of your investments as collateral. The forms are in an email I'm sending; sign them in front of a notary, scan them, and send them back. Courier the originals as soon as you can, please.

"I know you told me to look at selling some of your portfolio to buy the property, but everything is performing so well that taking a low-interest collateralized loan instead will be more beneficial.

"However, if you prefer, I can immediately..."

"No, Ash, this is the better way," I interjected, "and thank you for taking care of me. I'll call you with funding instructions as soon as they are set."

Claude is thrilled about the purchases going through. So thrilled, he wants to 'lease' parts of the Crescent Moon for the use of Ultimate Solutions.

The contents and purposes of the two large warehouse-like structures are still unknown because Ron and Claude can't open them. No key works, and the doors and shell are made of very heavy steel.

Suspicious, and fascinating. Ron is working on the previous owner to get more information and access via the keypads, but we also have an expert in these kinds of sophisticated locks working on it.

What would they have stored inside that requires that kind of security, but are willing to abandon? Suspicious and mysterious.

We actually learned what and why that very night; to be more precise, just after midnight.

Sentinels posted here and there spotted two large helicopters approaching the Crescent Moon from the south, and the sentinels there also saw two trucks approaching on 118 from the direction of Marfa. They woke Claude and Clay, who woke me, and I woke the sheriff.

We met him near the tomato greenhouses on Texas 118; he was in the firing chair of his armored Humvee with his chief deputy driving, so we climbed into the open seats. The vehicle, and the two behind it, stopped and stayed outside the ranch entrance for several minutes.

The sentries informed us the helicopters were on the ground with their engines off, and the trucks were backed up to the loading docks of the two 'warehouses'. When they reported that the doors had been opened and men were going inside, we drove onto the ranch, followed by the two Suburbans with seven men in each.

The sentries had reported that at least a dozen armed men got out of the helicopters, so we were driving with headlights off, using only the red 'fog lights' installed on the Humvee to keep us on the road. The driver stopped before we crowned the last hill before the ranch headquarters, and everyone but the sheriff, his deputy, and me disembarked. The Suburbans were parked at angles across the road, preventing ingress or egress.

We gave those on foot time to reach their designated positions, and then drove over the hill, past the houses, and toward the warehouses. There was an armed lookout leaning nonchalantly on the wall of the first warehouse, smoking. When he finally saw us, he yelled something and targeted his rifle at the armored Humvee. Armed men came running out of the warehouse, looked toward where he was shooting, and began firing.

Stupidly, most had run out the door, stopped, looked around, and were still standing in the open, firing at us. The .50 caliber Gatling made short work of them, and of the two trying to get to the truck. Some of our men were at the first warehouse door within seconds after the firing ended, and others were at the helicopters. There must have been others in side, because we heard more firing from within, and then it stopped.

The driver hustled us on toward the second building, and we again encountered fire from men clustered outside. Before Sheriff Goodson could react, the men began falling, so he fired a burst at a couple or three hiding behind a stack of fence posts off to the right.

I learned something important that night: fence posts don't stop fifty caliber bullets, even if stacked six across.

It was hard to sort out which were 'soldiers', pilots, or truck drivers, because the automatic weapons fire had made bloody mincemeat of their remains.

But the locked doors were open, and we learned something else important; the warehouses were loaded with sophisticated weapons. Unless they had a small army to arm, these were for sale. We discussed possible buyers, dismissing the obvious "drug cartels and gangs" because it made no sense to bring weapons into the US and then sell them to Mexicans; much easier to keep and sell them in Mexico.

Domestic terrorists? Some kind of militia group? No way to puzzle that out with only the paltry clues before us.

There were a lot of goodies in here, but the top prizes were twelve Russian SAM-7s: surface to air missiles capable of bring down anything from a military fighter to an airliner.

The sheriff was not pleased at the remarkable cache we had seized, because he knew the kind of federal investigation that would be triggered. Our lives would not be our own for the foreseeable future.

I called Tom Yonkers, and wondered if he ever slept when he answered on the second ring. "Sorry to interrupt your rest General, but I could really use your advice, in person. Any chance you could fly over to my place tomorrow? I'll pay."

Tom is not a stupid man; he was silent for just a moment before answering, "If you're asking, I assume this advice is critical to an important deal in which I'm a party. I'm up and ready anyway, so I'll be there in time for coffee and tacos."

We carefully catalogued and video recorded the crates of arms and the dozen missiles, secured the premises, and returned to the Lair to await Tom Yonkers. Two four-man teams remained; one to provide security, the other to stack the bodies in the refrigeration units we found in each warehouse/weapons depot. We closed, chained, and locked the gate when we left.

Tom Yonkers landed at Blue Mountain seven hours after we talked, so he really had left immediately. We had eaten and were on the third pot of coffee, but Maria made fresh tacos when he drove up with Team Blue, the Ultimate Security team assigned to him, which was augmented by two of his own security guards.

Even though the jammers were on, we had talked very little in the interim, even before the four amigos arose. The sheriff seemed to be hoping it was all a bad dream, or if we didn't discuss it, it might go away. I believe he was happier to see retired Air Force General and former Secretary of State Tom Yonkers than I was; maybe he could concoct a plan!

The amigos went to get the kids ready and take them to school, with an escort, so they stopped by to say hello and skedaddled. I let the kids eat, hugged each, hugged Dr. Eva, and rejoined the group on the patio.

Tom said, "Well, I've heard; now I need to see. Let's go!" We did.

Ninety minutes later, Tom observed, "Rob, you're always good for some kind of shitshow, but this is a clusterfuck, and a clusterfuck of epic proportions! Everything in here - and there's a lot - is Russian or Chinese made, and it's all military grade.

"Two problems come immediately to mind. One, what do we do next? And the reason I ask that question is, two, you know they aren't going to believe a word you tell them! After the shootout with North Koreans and the rescue in Mexico, 'Yes, I just bought this ranch, but I had no idea it was a weapons depot' isn't likely fly, at least until AFTER the torture ends!

"The sheriff and I agree that we'd be tempted to set a fire, close it all up, and drive away really fast, but we might lose a couple of mountains and Marfa or Alpine if we do!

"So, do we call the ATF and send you to Bolivia until they work it out, or what? As it is, I'm seeing you, Gitmo, and waterboarding!"

"I've had a little more time to process, so listen and then react. I know it's a harebrained scheme, but give it a listen anyway. First, we do need to get the ATF involved. The United States of American needs to know where this shit came from, who brought it, how it got here, and where it's bound. Second, I've been to Bolivia and Cuba, and I don't like either. Third, and this is where it gets dicey... they left us the trucks and helicopters they were going to transport it in, although I don't believe two trucks is nearly enough.

"Anyway, let's do what they were going to do, and haul it away. I see two trucks being reported as abandoned near Presidio... Del Rio... Fort Stockton... somewhere, and the local cops and border patrol making the find of a lifetime. Maybe including dead bodies?

"I don't want to drive the truck with the missiles, if they even fit inside, so I don't have a plan for them. Unless we use the helicopters... nah, even at night, too dangerous and too likely to be seen.

"So, harebrained, half-baked scheme - what do you think?"

To a man, they were shaking their heads with their eyes closed.

With a mightily perplexed look on his face, Tom finally spoke up. "It's dangerous, it's unlikely, it's crazy! But right now, I don't have a better plan. Claude, Clay, can we keep from leaving DNA traces on things we have to load? On and in the trucks?"

"We have the gloves they were wearing, we have forklifts, we have hazmat suits we can use... maybe? But we can't move too fast and pull it off, and who knows who else is on the way? There are millions upon millions of dollars in sophisticated weaponry here, even ignoring the SAMs. Someone else is coming to get that shit when these clowns don't show up at the rendezvous point.

"My guess is we have until sometime tonight, given that they didn't seem to be in a real hurry."