The 22nd Secret Page 24

  “We have a guest for dinner,” Bill said.

  “You can’t mean Walker,” a voice came over the radio.

  “I do mean Walker, and he can hear you.”

  “Oh, sorry.”

  “I’m going to stop by the store and pick up a few T-bones. You need fries?”

  “Oh, Bill honey. We can’t afford that. I’ve already got hamburger out. I was planning spaghetti. I can make that stretch for one more. Will that be okay?"

  “Spaghetti’s fine.” Tom said with a chuckle.

  “Spaghetti’s fine. We’ll be there in a couple of hours.” Bill replaced the microphone and began to taxi the plane into position for takeoff.

  “I’m going to assume this day is going to get even stranger before it’s over,” Bill said as the plane lifted off and Walker began to explain.

  Chapter Ten

  Intimacy

  Jim rushed into the lodge and set Pam’s suitcase down, closing the door behind him. He heard the engine of Bill’s plane start as he called out.

  “Pam?”

  He looked around the main room of the lodge, but she was nowhere to be found.

  “Pam, where are you?”

  He walked over to the stairs, thinking she might have gone up there. For a moment, Jim feared all of this might have been a dream. But he could still hear Bill’s plane warming up. That wasn’t a dream.

  “Pam you up there?” he yelled up the stairs.

  “Over here, Jim. I’m in the kitchen.”

  Jim turned to see Pam standing in the opening to the dining room. There was no way a human mind could possibly retain the memory of her beauty. In just the few moments between when he had seen her standing on the porch and now, standing across the room, he had forgotten the image of her beauty. Every time he saw her it was a new breathtaking experience. She was smiling, the happiness and exhilaration she felt beamed from her beautiful magical eyes.

  “I’m starving,” she said. “I haven’t had anything to eat since breakfast and I was too worried to really eat anything then. I’m making us some BLTs.”

  “Great, I’ll take two and some chips. I’ll be right there to help you. I’m going downstairs and turn up the heat.”

  “Good idea,” she called out to him as he walked downstairs. “Build up the fire. It’s too chilly in here for me to take my clothes off.” Jim looked back and she caught his eyes. He suddenly felt the passionate desire that had grown within her over the past year. She disappeared into the dining room, leaving Jim standing quietly alone with the thought of her.

  Jim recalled the huge blaze he had made the night he and Pam were snowbound while he piled wood on the fire.

  “Come and get it,” Pam said a few minutes later, setting the plates down on the game table they had used to eat those few meals together last year. “You want a beer?” she asked, walking toward the bar.

  “Ah, no thanks I had two with Walker. I’ll have bottled water.”

  Pam suddenly stopped and turned, catching Jim staring.

  “Jim, I know what you are thinking. When I said come and get it, I meant the sandwiches. But if you think I meant…well, I’m more than ready.” She unbuttoned her shirt slowly.

  “No, no, let’s eat. I mean, first that is.”

  “Okay, if you insist.” Pam stopped as she unbuttoned the last button, just before she would have pulled her shirttails out of her pants. Jim had trouble during lunch keeping his eyes off of Pam’s exposed cleavage. Every time she moved, he tried with no success to catch a glance of what was hidden just out of view. Pam enjoyed the attention to her chest, and felt increasingly aroused while she ate.

  “You’re gorgeous,” Jim said, staring at Pam as she took the first bite of her sandwich. She giggled a little when some mayonnaise squished out of the sandwich onto the corner of her mouth.

  “I can’t believe this is really happening. I remember sitting here eating breakfast with you, wishing I was lucky enough to have a woman like you, and that was when I thought you were just plain old Paula. I can’t believe you’re what Walker said you are.”

  Pam swallowed the bite of sandwich she had been chewing, picked up a chip and popped it in her mouth. “I’m sure whatever he told you is the truth. You think just because I’m a woman, I can’t be all of those things, like the smartest scientist in the world? You think just because I’m a good looking, sexy young woman, I couldn’t go to China and end the use of computers for murder? Is that what’s really bothering you, Jim? Ask me anything you want.”

  “No, I’m sure you did all of those things. I just can’t believe any one person can be as perfect as you are. I can’t believe you’re going to marry me and I can’t believe how much I love you.” Jim’s voice grew softer. “What was it like, Pam?”

  “What was what like? You mean China? It was scary. Hell, it was fucking terrifying. Jim, you have no idea what it's like to live month after month knowing that at any moment Chinese security could just walk up to you and kill you. No questions asked, no trials, no one to even care. Except a hand full of people and my parents, and none of them would have ever known what really happened to me.”

  “No not that. I mean I want you to tell me about China and your work someday, but what I meant was, tell me about Pam. What is it like to be you? You told me Paula had kind of a lousy childhood and became Tino’s girl mainly to get away from a dead-end life in Idaho.”

  Pam sipped her beer and ate a couple of chips.

  “Well, I did grow up in Idaho and didn’t have the best childhood. At least that part was true. My father was a potato farmer and I was an only child. I love my parents and we have a great relationship. I told you I wanted them to meet you here at Thanksgiving.”

  Jim nodded his head agreeing with Pam about her parents’ Thanksgiving visit.

  “My parents came from Germany just after the war. They never knew who their real parents were. The farm my father had was pretty remote and until I started school I really didn’t have any friends other than my Mom. She was great. We did everything together. She knew I was special and when most children were still trying to learn the alphabet and numbers from their mothers, I was already reading Shakespeare and anything my parents would give me. Jim, I have what you might call a photographic memory. I can glance at a page of a book and have almost complete retention of every word. By five, I could read a high school chemistry textbook in an afternoon and have almost total recall of every word.”

  Jim stopped chewing. “Damn!” His mouth was full but he was frozen in shock.

  “I also had other special abilities, but I had no points of reference. My parents protected me. They kept me sheltered from other children and people as long as they could. There was no way for me to even know about my psychic abilities. My parents knew I could read their thoughts, but I had no way of knowing what most children my age were like. My psychic powers have been there since birth, and until I went to kindergarten I sort of took them for granted.”

  Jim took the last bite of his second sandwich. Pam stared into her empty plate. “I guess it’s kind of like when a black child realizes for the first time that he’s different. White people hate him for no good reason, just because he’s black. When I started kindergarten, it was a disaster that I really have never recovered from. First, I was already learning above high school level. Believe it or not, I had read my parents’ Encyclopedia Britannicas cover to cover. How do you think I felt, you know? How well do you think I fit into the typical kindergarten classroom? The sudden realization that my wonderful mind made me a freak and brought on the scorn of most of my peers devastated me. Can you imagine the scars left in the heart of an innocent five-year-old girl? I had waited all my life to go to real school and meet some friends. The worst part was the thoughts I read in the minds of my classmates. Little girls can be vicious, especially when they’ve been friends their whole lives. I guess it really boiled down to jealousy.”

  “I’m sorry, Pam.” Jim took Pam’s hand in his.

  “
It got worse before it got better. But when it got better, it got really good,” Pam said with a devilish smile. “The school system didn’t know what to do with me. They tested me and recommended private school, but my parents couldn’t afford it and I was too young to go away to school anyway. So I just stayed out of school until I was ten years old and was mentally strong enough to deal with what I was and how people would react to me. They tested me again and recommended college, but my mother insisted that her little girl had to experience some kind of childhood. So I was placed in ninth grade. While most of my classmates tried to keep pace with the curriculum and struggled to develop the social skills necessary to deal with puberty, I learned to deal with my special abilities among other people in public situations. I graduated high school at the top of my class. I was fourteen and had learned to use my mind to control almost any situation. I went to the University of Idaho with a scholarship. I had the most advanced mind on the planet and the awkward, skinny, boobless body of a fourteen-year-old girl. But by my sixteenth birthday a miracle had transformed my life forever. Almost overnight, I turned into the woman whose shirt you’ve been trying to look into for the last half hour. You want me to take it off, Jim?”

  Jim stammered as he realized he was staring at Pam’s chest again.

  “Uh, no, I mean, yes, uh, later. Tell me the rest.” He looked her in the eyes and said with complete sincerity. “I’m sorry. I want you to tell me the rest. I’m really interested in what you’re telling me. It’s just you’re so damn sexy.”

  Pam smiled. “That’s all right, Jim. I like you staring at me. You don’t know how much I’ve missed you. Anyway, for the first time in my life, my body caught up to my mind. I no longer gave a damn about having girlfriends. I had all the male friends I could handle. Men discovered me and I discovered them, all at once. There wasn’t a man alive I couldn’t have. I was in total control of my life and the lives of everyone who came in contact with me. I completely dominated every environment. In every respect, I was the most advanced human on earth. Except for a few months toward the end in China, I am still totally confident and completely satisfied with who and what I am.”

  “You are a very special person, Pam. Tom said my life would change forever if I chose to be with you and he was right. You know what’s hard for me to understand. Why me? You could have any man you wanted. Surely, there were scientists, someone? What do I have to offer someone like you?”

  “Everyone should have someone to be with who understands them. Who knows what makes them tick. I was completely in control and completely alone when I was 16. I told you, I never recovered from that day when I started kindergarten. I was aware enough of the world around me even at five years old to realize I was totally alone. Try to imagine totally alone, surrounded by millions of people whom you have virtually nothing in common with. At the age of 17, I was fully matured physically and mentally, and all alone. My parents tried to understand me, but they weren’t like me. There was no one was like me. I resigned myself to the fact I would never truly belong to anyone. Never truly find another living soul who could understand what it was like to be Pam. Until I met Howard.

  “Dr. Woolum? Tom said something about him.”

  “He’s a brilliant man. He was the originator of the Level 21 technology. He came to my parents’ farm when I was 17 and recruited me to work with him. Finally, I had met someone who could come close to understanding me. We are very good friends, even today, and not just because we worked together. Because he too understands what it’s like to be alone, to be so much different than everyone else.”

  Jim looked at Pam with sympathy. “I’m glad you have Howard as a friend. I’m glad at least you know there’s one person who understands you, who you can share with.”

  “You may not remember this, but I do like it happened yesterday. I had just woken up the morning after the crash. You were giving me the clothes that didn’t fit and I told you, I can’t tell you what you mean to me at this moment in my life. I don’t mean just saving my life but… this is going to sound silly I’ve been waiting my whole life to meet you.”

  “I remember that. Then you made a point of saying can you handle it. Remember? That seemed strange to me at the time, but, somehow, I knew what you meant. You had fallen in love with me the moment our eyes met at the crash site.”

  “It meant that, but as you now know, it meant a whole lot more. You said you remembered sitting at this table having breakfast with me and telling me you just weren’t lucky enough to have me falling head-over-heals in love with you. You weren’t lucky enough for me to call you the man of my dreams. Do you remember what I said when you said that?”

  “No not really.”

  “Well I do. I can remember almost anything that’s ever been said or happened to me, especially every moment and word of that day. I said, Jim don’t underestimate yourself. You don’t understand, but trust me there’s every reason in the world for me to feel the way I do. Jim, I could have spent the rest of my life without sharing intellectually with Howard but once I found you, once I found the only person in the world who could share that most intimate part of me, share my mind the way you can. There was never any doubt from the first moment we met. I was madly in love with you. You were the one man, the one person in the whole world that could truly understand me. The one person that could be my soul mate forever that could be strong enough to possess me, and cherish me. To love me the way no other man can.”

  Pam moved her chair next to Jim’s and put her arms around him. She laid her head on his shoulder and unbuttoned his shirt. She ran her fingers through the hair on his chest.

  “I love you so much. I need you more than anything else in the world. You’re the one that’s special. You’re the one I can’t live without. The hardest thing I’ve ever done, the hardest part of going to China, was leaving you. I was so afraid that I would never get you back. What I thought would never happen finally did happen and I was leaving it behind.”

  Jim took Pam’s chin in his hand and kissed her. He looked deeply into her eyes. She was completely open to him. She felt him inside her mind absorbing her feelings. They were the special feelings they shared with each other, and only with each other.

  “I understand,” Jim said. “I understand everything now. I understand I am the man of your dreams and how precious that is to you, to us.”

  Pam’s eyes were totally absorbed by Jim’s power. Her body was wrapped in his strength. “Make love to me now, Jim. It’s been so long and I’ve needed you so badly.” They stood together. Jim picked her up and carried her to the bearskin rug and the warmth of the fire. A half hour later, Pam lay on her side next to Jim while he lay on his back with his arms under his head. She played with the hair on his chest, twirling it into little spikes before rubbing it back. The fire warmed them, Pam felt truly satisfied for the first time in a year.

  “Walker said you had some money,” Jim said, interrupting her afterglow.

  “Money, what in the world made you think of that?” She propped herself up on her elbows so she could see Jim’s face.

  “How much money? Walker seemed to think you had a lot.”

  “I guess so. I have as much as I need. Why in the world do you care about that?” Pam said trying to find Jim’s thoughts.

  “Well, since we’re going to have to get rid of this place”

  “Get rid of this place? Did Tom tell you that? I told him not to tell you that.” Jim sensed Pam’s anger. “I told him I didn’t give a damn about his ridiculous security. Jim, we don’t have to leave here. We can live here. It’ll be okay. We’ll figure out something. I can’t ask you to give this place up. I know what it means to you.”

  “Tom’s not responsible for you anymore. I am. You know there’s a detachment of Army Special Forces protecting us right now. They’re all round the lodge. Tom said we wouldn’t be able to see them, but they had to be here to protect you. We can’t live like this. We don’t need to live this way.”

  “Ar
my! This is goddamn ridiculous.” Pam rose suddenly.

  Jim wrapped his arm around her shoulders before she could stand up and pulled her back down. He laid her head on his chest.

  “Pam, you’re going to have to accept certain facts about our relationship. You may be the smartest person in the world, but I’m the one responsible for your safety. Call me old fashioned, but there are going to be certain things that I will expect. I decide what’s best for our safety. I decide what measures we need to take to provide for your security.”

  Pam had waited all her life to feel the security she felt lying in Jim’s arms. She spoke softly. “I understand and all I really want is beating in my ear.”

  Jim rolled on to his side as Pam rolled onto her back. He held up his head with his hand and leaned on his elbow. His face and voice grew with excitement. “There’s this place I know of in Colorado. Well, actually it’s more than a place. It’s a 1,000-acre ranch near Glenwood Springs. You know were Glenwood is?”

  Pam shook her head acknowledging her understanding. She became absorbed by Jim’s smiling face and enthusiastic voice as he told her about his plans for their future.

  “It’s near Aspen.” She was smiling with the contentment and security Jim’s strong body gave her. She began to run her fingers through his hair as her eyes darted about his face and mind.

  Jim felt overwhelmed by her beauty and mesmerizing eyes as she lay next to him. “I’ve been there many times. The owners were real good friends of my parents and they’re getting older and want to sell. It’s a beautiful place. It extends from the Aspen Valley up to the National Forest. They ran a dude ranch and hunting lodge, kind of like this. But they’re retired now. I can barely remember when I was real little back in the ’70s, when Aspen was much smaller. It wasn’t that popular as a ski resort like it is now. Glenwood was the town the tourists went to. It had the hot springs and the Hot Springs Lodge. It was one of the most beautiful areas in the world till John Denver sang Rocky Mountain High and the rich people discovered Aspen. Now the problem is the Smiths’ ranch. That’s my parents’ friends. Their place is one of the few undeveloped large tracts of land anywhere near the Aspen Valley. No one can afford to buy the place except developers, and the Smiths don’t want to see their place parceled up and turned into condos. I don’t blame them. It’s the most beautiful land I’ve ever seen. You can do anything there from farming in the valley to skiing in the hills back by where the land meets the national forest.”