Stormy Waters: Book 10 in The Dar & Kerry Series (11 page)

He was qualified and more to do what they were paying him for. If he did the work, then what could anyone say, really?

Kerry felt the irony, though. She knew this was something her father would have done in a bare instant, and in fact, he'd readily approve of her tactics.

She grimaced.

That sure wasn't a nice feeling. Yet Andrew hadn't seemed to object to the task either. He'd agreed readily and seemed to think it was a good idea.

So where was the "right" in all this? Kerry opened her drawer and removed a piece of dried apricot from the bag there, putting it into her mouth and chewing it slowly. Was there any right?

Hmm.

KERRY EDGED THROUGH the construction zone in the middle of the ship, and looked around. She spotted ILS's senior electrical contractor near the other end of the space, and hastened to where he was standing surrounded by ship staff. "Jack.?"

The man turned and saw her. "Ah. Ms. Stuart. Glad you're here." He waited for her to join him. "We seem to have a problem here." Only here? Kerry allowed her public, diplomatic cloak to settle over her shoulders. "What seems to be the issue guys?"

"Are you in charge of all this?" One of the men standing around asked her. "I am hearing this person say he needs to turn off power to several decks of the ship."

Kerry eyed him thoughtfully. "Well, sure," she said. "He has to do that to put in more power, and the cabling we need for the new computer systems. He can't do that with the power on."

"What are we supposed to do?" The man asked. "We live here. Would you like to be in this damn heat with no power?"

"I was, just a little while ago, matter of fact," Kerry said. "No, it's not pleasant. But it's the only way we can get the job done, so what do you think we're supposed to do? I'm sure Jack will work with you and shut down a section at a time, not all the decks at once." She turned.

"Right?"

Jack hesitated, and then nodded. "Right."

"But we've got jobs to do too." The man continued arguing. "I have people to administer, services to fulfill. I can't be without power."

"We can move you to someplace that has it," Jack said.

"Certainly not! I have far too many important things in my office!" The man stated flatly.

Kerry folded her arms over her chest. "Okay." She looked him right in the eye. "I understand."

"Good." The man smiled.

"Just give me your name, so I can go back to Mr. Quest, and tell him why we can't proceed with his project." Kerry smiled back at him. "I'm sure he'll understand, too."

The man blinked in shock, then stiffened. "I didn't say you couldn't proceed!"

"Sure you did. You said you can't be without power. We have to turn the power off to go forward. So if you can't be without power, and you won't move to where power is, then we can't go forward."

The rest of the staff seemed content to watch, their eyes shifting between the man and Kerry as though watching an exciting ping-pong match. They all seemed to be deferring to the argumentative man, whose bearing indicated he was used to obedience and authority.

That was all right. So was Kerry, but in a different way. "So, can I have your name?" She asked gently. "Because Jack and I both have other things we could be doing if we're not going to be able to start up here."

"Right you are, ma'am." Jack stuck his thumbs into his jeans pockets, and rocked on the heels of his work boots. "Plenty of projects lined up.?"

"Unless maybe we could work something out with you--maybe we could have our guys move your stuff when we needed to." Kerry read the man's body language and decided giving him an out was a good idea. "We'd be glad to do that."

Jack scowled.

The man snorted, and lifted a hand. "Fine." He relented. "If you have to, you have to. But you must come to me before you turn off anything, so I can make sure nothing gets disrupted."

"Sure." Kerry said. "Jack, can you assign someone from your office to liaise with--" She looked at the man questioningly.

"Pieter Oshousen." The man supplied. "Staff Captain." He gave them all a nod, then turned and walked off, his back stiff.

"Right." Kerry watched as the rest of the staff dispersed also, their attitudes half amused and half disgruntled. "Oh, this is going to be so much fun." She added, once they were gone. "It's like being in an inhabited construction zone."

"Got that right." Jack sighed, scratching his head. "Where in the hell do we start? Every time I try to put a plan together, I keep running into these roadblocks."

Kerry shook her head. "Yeah, I know. C'mon, I think I found us something we can use for a central core, since my first choice just isn't going to fly." She led the way to the stairwell, and started down. "They don't like this idea either, but it takes space away from passengers not crew, so at least they won't stand in our way, and the overall ship management approved it."

Jack snorted. "Figures." He followed Kerry down the steps, and then though a series of doorways until she stopped in front of one. She pushed it open and stood back pointing inside. With a doubtful look, he stepped past her and entered the space. "Ah."

Kerry entered after them. "Yeah."

Jack turned around. "This is a cabin."

"It is. But it's an inside one and they've actually given me two of them." Kerry agreed. "This one and the one next to it, which is through this connecting door." She shoved the inner door open and looked through.

Both cabins had seen far, far better days. The carpet was an indiscriminate color, perhaps it had once been aqua, and the walls had peeling laminate of an equally grayish hue. There were no beds, but on one wall, a pull down bunk was clamped.

It smelled horrible.

"We'll have to strip both rooms, but I think it's workable, and this wall," Kerry walked over and slapped the inner partition, near the bunk, "backs onto the elevator shaft and all the conduit track ways."

Jack looked measurably happier. "Eh? Do they? Now that's workable." He walked over to inspect the wall, then reached up to push at the ceiling. It gave under his touch, the panel lifting up and showering them both with debris best left undescribed. "Uh...sorry."

Kerry plucked her shirt out, scattering the gunk, and ran her fingers through her hair to send more flying. "No problem." She responded. "Anything up there?"

Her companion flipped a flashlight up and peered into the space. "Lucked out." He grunted. "Not a firewall. This is an easy punch." He turned his head. "Good pick, ma'am. We can work with this."

"Thanks. Now," Kerry put her hands on her hips, "you can start laying cable in, while I get a general contractor in here to make this space livable. I can't even put a rack in here until we put down a substrate and extra AC."

"Yup." The electrical contractor nodded. "I'll get my fiber guy in here, and the cable people. You pick where you want the access closets, or is that a fight too?"

Kerry sighed. "What do you think?"

"Need to know that, 'fore I can have the fiber feller quote the job."

Jack sounded apologetic. "I was going around the decks before you got here. I thought I saw some electrical closets up there you could mount a switch or two in, and they can't use 'em for storage."

"Really? Show me." Kerry followed him out the open door and down the hallway. Could she get that lucky? Electrical closets already had ventilation, and naturally they had power--could she get away with not having to fight the already hostile staff for yet more precious space?

They started up the forward stairs wincing a little as their shoes stuck to the treads. Workmen dressed in ship jumpsuits brushed by them going the other direction without giving them a second glance, but just seeing them made Kerry suddenly wonder about something.

Andrew was in Shari and Michelle's ship. What if they'd put someone in hers? How would she tell? She looked around at the workmen, all of whom looked more or less alike, and most seeming to look right through her in return. Well, she could request all their employment details and have checks run, but?

"Here." Jack led her off one of the stair landings into a side corridor, with cabins on either side. He found one unmarked door and yanked it open, to reveal a small, poorly lit closet with a large breaker box and other electrical piping inside.

It was small and dirty, but Kerry pulled out a tape measure and found a relatively clear spot on one wall of the closet. "We can squeeze a half rack in here," she said. "How many of these are there?"

"Two on each deck."

Kerry snapped the tape measure shut. "Sold." She tucked the tool away. "Put an extra one percent on your estimate, Jack. You solved a huge problem for me. To retrofit space for these things would have cost me a bundle."

A big smile crossed the contractor's face. "Y'know, that's what I love about dealing with you. I never feel like it's always one of us taking, one giving, or turn around." He held a hand out. "Makes my life easier too. I've already got a lot of conduit up there I can use."

Kerry solemnly shook his hand. "Okay. Give me an eight-strand fiber core to each closet, terminating in our snazzy cabin digs, and cable runs to all the places on the blueprints. When can I expect a quote?"

Jack chuckled, as they went back down the hallway. "Tomorrow, maybe. Hey, one thing though, this electrical mostly isn't up to code. Not your gig, but the stuff I have to put in will be. What about the rest?"

Good question. She wondered if that had been part of Quest's plan, since the construction would have to pass local inspection at some point. "I don't know. How about I put you together with their admin people. Maybe they'll let you quote it, if they don't have a contractor already."

"I'd appreciate that." He grinned at her.

Yeah, bet you would. Kerry muffled a smile. She liked Jack but she knew he knew where his best interests lay. However, it certainly wouldn't hurt to have him get more business, and maybe he'd agree to adjust his costs if he could get a bigger volume.

Business was like that. You did a favor, sometimes you got a favor. Sometimes you didn't, but she'd learned that despite what Dar often said and did, you really could get more with honey than vinegar. "Okay, I'm off to go call Roberto. See you later, Jack." She waved at the contractor as they returned to the main deck.

"Oh, Ms. Stuart."

Kerry stopped and turned as she saw the chief purser headed her way. In contrast to the hostility the day before, the woman now seemed anxious to be polite to her. Hmm. Kerry waited for her to catch up and wondered if her fencing with the staff captain had gotten around. "Hi."

"Hi." The woman smiled at her. "Listen. I just wanted to apologize about yesterday. I know you're just here to get a job done, and I was totally out of line going off like that."

Uh huh. "No problem." Kerry replied. "I really do understand how strange it must be for you to have us come in here and just start doing things. We really don't know much about how you run everything." She shifted her body language taking a more casual stance. "And now that I've been around the ship, I can see how tight everything is."

The woman relaxed and her smile widened. "Wow, I'm glad you understand. I hear you found another spot for your stuff. Is it going to be okay?" She edged around a little. "Listen, we've got some coffee over in the mess, can I get you a cup?"

Well, when it came to gift horses, the heads were definitely better than the tails. "Sure." Kerry agreed, allowing herself to be lead on by her new friend. "Maybe you can fill me in on how things work here, you know? So we can all get along better."

"Ah. Glad to." Drucilla seemed far more confident. "You just stick with me."

Uh huh. Kerry produced a grin. Let's see where this goes, because sometimes you just never know.

THE CONDO WAS very quiet as Dar slipped inside, too quiet, until Chino came sliding out of the bedroom barking a greeting at her. "Hey girl." She set her briefcase down and knelt to greet the dog and ended up sitting on the floor with Chino climbing all over her. "Hey, hey, hey."

"Growf."

"Hang on." Dar managed to get to her feet and headed for the back door followed by an ecstatically prancing Labrador. Chino stopped halfway, though, and looked back over her shoulder as though missing something.

"Yeah, I know. It's just me." Dar told her, opening the back door to the small garden. "Kerry's not here." She watched the dog trot outside whisking through the evening sun still splashing through the trees. Kerry was at the ship working on her project.

Dar had almost gone there too, but she stopped herself with a stern reminder that she'd turned the damned thing over to Kerry and she needed to butt out already. So instead, she'd just gone home.

And here she was. Dar leaned against the door jam and surveyed the quiet kitchen. Usually she and Kerry came home together, but occasionally Kerry left before she did, and whenever she did, Dar always came home to something nice like dinner, or a waiting hot tub or...

But she had no idea when Kerry was coming home. A note sent earlier had gone unanswered, and so now Dar was at a bit of a loss. She removed her PDA and scribbled a second note, sending it on its way before she turned and headed off toward the bedroom.

Inside, she paused a moment tugging her shirt from her waistband and unbuttoning it before sitting down briefly to remove her boots. She removed the shirt and then her jeans folding them both neatly and putting them on the dresser.

Chino bounded back in and came over to her, wiggling happily against her knees. Dar played with her for a few minutes, and then she got up and retrieved a pair of shorts and a t-shirt slipping into them before she went back out into the living room.

She could watch television. Dar studied the blank screen, and then moved past it. She could go for a swim, or a walk with Chino, or go to the gym.

Or sit in the hot tub.

She went to the kitchen and closed the back door. She could do some work or play with her models. With a sigh, Dar went to the refrigerator and got some milk, leaning against the counter to sip it as she considered all of her various options.

None of them really appealed to her, so she went into the living room and sat down at the dining room table sorting through the basket of mail placed there by the island staff.

No bills, because they handled all theirs electronically. A few bits of junk mail, mostly related to software upgrades or offers of new computer hardware. Dar tossed all these to one side and pulled over a diving magazine that spurred a bit more interest.

She checked her PDA after a few minutes, finding it still silent, and then gave up on the mail. "Hell with it." Dar tossed the magazine and got up. "Okay, Chino, wanna come to the gym with me? You can help me lift weights, okay?"

"Gruff."

"Okay." Dar put on her sneakers, then headed for the back door pausing only to scribble a note on the small white board just to one side of the refrigerator. She'd spend an hour or so at the gym, then see if Kerry was home and stop at the club for dinner on her way back.

Satisfied with her plan, Dar headed off down the path to the gym with Chino trotting along after her. With the sun having set, the heat was dissipating and the breeze off the ocean was almost comfortable. She watched as Chino retrieved a tennis ball from somewhere and raced back to her with it. "Gimme that."

She threw the slimy ball across the beach and kept walking as Chino chased it down. Several tosses later, they were at the entrance to the gym, and Dar cheerfully ignored the glares from two other residents as she held the door open for Chino to trot past.

They'd had a problem with that since they'd started bringing the Labrador to the gym. At first, Dar had been delivered with six or seven letters of objection from the condo association over her practice, and she'd even been served with an official summons from the Island's legal office.

Unfortunately for all of them, she had Aunt May's original copy of the bylaws, and nowhere in any of them did it say you could not bring dogs into the gym. It hadn't made her popular with a few people, but Chino was well behaved, and she'd won over most of the residents after a while. "C'mon, Chi."

Unlike Dar herself, apparently. She gave the other two residents a charming smile, and went inside the inner door that lead to the dressing rooms. Inside, she went to her assigned locker and opened it, removing a towel and a pair of weighted gloves that she slipped over her hands and fastened.

They weren't that heavy, only two pounds each, but she found they gave just that little extra bit of punch to her workouts and she'd noticed a bit more definition appearing in the muscles of her upper arms from using them.

Or, well, she hadn't exactly noticed that. Dar went over to the weight bench and settled herself on it. Kerry had noticed, and commented on it in the shower the other day. Then, she'd just laughed, but now she had to sit here and acknowledge just how much she liked having Kerry notice things like that.

Total ego. Dar did a quick couple of sets with a relatively light barbell just to warm up. Total ego, and on the fringes a haunting insecurity she tried very hard to pretend didn't exist. She liked Kerry paying attention to her, and probably that was why she felt so out of sorts having two messages ignored so far today.

Stupid, really. Dar got up and moved to a leg press station sliding a pin into place and waiting for her body to settle into position before she started the exercise. Chino stood up and licked her arm, sliding up and down as she tried to keep her balance. "Chi, down." Dar muffled a chuckle. "Lie down."

Reluctantly, the dog obeyed, seating herself on the rubberized floor at Dar's side.

Kerry was probably busy doing what it was ILS paid her for-- taking care of details and putting her plan into effect with her typical detail oriented style. While it never matched her own, Dar appreciated her partner's very disciplined operating mode.

It matched her usual schedule in the gym. While Dar tended to wander from machine to machine, using whichever one struck her fancy at the moment, Kerry always followed one or two or three routines, studiously using all the machines in it until she either finished or exhausted herself.

Dar kept the image of her partner in her mind as she got up off the leg press and switched to an abdominal machine, lying flat on her back and taking hold of the handles before she started her sit ups. She enjoyed the exercise, though this one was a little harder for her than it was for Kerry due to her longer torso.

For a while after they'd gotten together, Dar had strongly suspected that Kerry was doing gym work more to fit in with her lifestyle than because she really enjoyed it, and it had made her feel a touch guilty even though she'd called Kerry on it more than once.

After all, Kerry had been forced into doing things she didn't really want to do for so long, was it fair that she escape from her family life only to feel obligated to change again to meet what she felt were Dar's expectations?

Except they really weren't her expectations. Dar didn't honestly care if Kerry worked out or not, and she'd tried really hard to convince her of that until Kerry finally just told her she really liked it. Or, actually, she didn't fanatically enjoy it, but she very much liked the results so she was willing to put the work in to get them.

Dar paused to add a little more weight to the machine's resistance and continued her sets. That had finally made sense to Dar, since taking control over her looks had been a big part of Kerry shrugging off her past.

Of course, now it meant that for the first time in a long time, Dar was concerned about what her body looked like, but it seemed a small enough price to pay for having found the most amazing love of her life.

Probably, though, Dar almost chuckled at herself, Kerry would tell her she didn't care what Dar looked like just as insistently as Dar had told her. Both of them probably wondered if the other really meant it, and neither wanted to find out for sure.

So her life was now complicated. Dar exhaled and let her eyes close, her thoughts wandering elsewhere as her body went through the motions. But it was a nice kind of complication and she had no desire to get rid of it, so hell with it all anyway.

Instead, she imagined herself underwater, in the peaceful blue of a dive doing lazy somersaults as Kerry floated nearby taking pictures of sea urchins. She loved watching Kerry take pictures because she'd get herself into the nuttiest positions doing it, usually standing on her head to be closer and get a tight focus on the tiny creatures.

Her hair would float around her head in a halo and she'd cross her ankles, her fins fluttering lightly to keep herself in position. Dar would sometimes get herself horizontal in the water and rest her chin on her clasped wrists, just hanging there and watching the show.

She could almost hear the bubbles of her own breathing.

So a warm, solid weight settling over her lower body nearly scared the shorts off her until she managed to get her eyes open and her hands untangled from the machine and found Kerry sitting on top of her dressed out for the gym and looking amused. "Bah!" She yelped in surprise, dropping flat on her back again.

"Hi there." Green eyes twinkled. "You didn't wait for me, you punk!"

Dar blinked, trying to get her tongue to work properly after having bitten it. "Abu." She cleared her throat. "Wait for you when? I had no idea you were coming home this fast." She protested. "I thought you'd be later at the port." Jerked so quickly out of her peaceful day dream, her body now didn't know whether to jump or completely relax and she felt like hiccupping.

"I answered your last note." Kerry replied. "I didn't realize when I was in the bowels of the ship my signal was cut off. I got topside and saw I had messages from you." She wiggled the fingers she had laying on Dar's stomach, giving her a friendly scratch. "So I answered them right there on the gangway, and annoyed the heck out of some really big guys trying to move wood onboard."

"Oh." Now that Kerry was here and more than paying attention to her, Dar felt a little abashed. "No problem. I figured you got tied up in details. Thought I'd come over here for a while then grab us some dinner." She looked around. "My PDA's in the locker."

"Details." Kerry eased herself up and off her living bench. "Oh, my god did I get details. I got introduced into the world of people who live on ships." She paused and adjusted one of her wristbands. "Please, please don't tell me the Navy is like this, because if it is, I can't believe your dad survived in it as long as he did."

"Eh." Dar watched as her partner went to the first machine, the bicep curl, and sat down in it, carefully adjusting the weight stack before she fit her hands to the handles and began her exercise. "People. Politics. Can't have one without the other. You know that."

"Hmm." Kerry grunted a little with the effort of bringing the weighted bar up. "More I see people, more I love Chino."

"Gruff." Chino trotted over and licked her knee.

Dar got up and decided she'd had enough of the crunches. She went over to the pull down machine and sat under the bar, sticking the pin into a fairly significant amount of iron plates. Fitting her hands over the handles of the bar, she carefully pulled it downward, wedging her knees under the supports as she tested out how her shoulder was feeling about the weight.

So far so good. Dar flexed her arms slowly and brought the bar down, glad the ache had finally faded from her injury. It had taken a long time, though Kerry had probably been right in telling her it would have been shorter if she'd done the physical therapy she'd been told to.

"How's that feel?" Kerry asked.

"Good." Dar straightened her arms and let the weight up. She pulled it down again, a little faster this time.

"You look great when you sweat."

Dar opened one eye and peered at the triceps machine. Kerry winked at her, and stuck her tongue out. "Everything going alright at the pier?"

"Yeah, it's coming together." Kerry straightened her arms out, forcing the machine lever down. "You find the hacker?"

Dar grunted, and released a little snort. "No, but if he comes back, he'll have a surprise waiting." She said. "But I spent some time in our gateways today and I gotta admit, Ker. I'm a little worried."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Kerry sighed. "Well, to be honest, I'm a little worried about how I'm going to pull off this project competitively, so we're even."

They were both silent for a few minutes, concentrating on their respective exercises. Finally, Dar let her bar up and sighed. "Know what I think?"

"What?"

"Ice cream." Dar got up from her bench and picked her towel up, extending a hand toward Kerry. "We can finish this later."

Kerry got up and took her hand without hesitation. "You're on. Let's go." She followed Dar out the door, not giving the room a single backward glance.

ICE CREAM ACTUALLY turned into dinner on the beach club's ocean facing deck. A nice breeze made it very comfortable sitting outside.

Kerry let her head rest against one of the roof supports, her eyes lazily taking in the waving palm fronds down the beach. "I don't know, honey," she said, "maybe it's a blessing in disguise. If you hadn't issued that challenge, you'd have never found the weaknesses you just told me about."

"Maybe we--maybe I--should have been looking for them before now." Dar was also leaning against the wall supports, one long leg slung over the chair arm.

"Dar, you're the chief information officer of the company. I think a lot of other people, like Mark, should have been looking for this stuff. Not you." Kerry replied honestly. "It's ridiculous that you need to be sitting on the floor in some closet trapping hackers, you know?"

A slightly stronger breeze made itself felt, whipping their hair around. Some sea grape leaves blew across the tile floor, one of them ending up on Kerry's foot. She reached down and picked it up, twirling it in her fingers. "Kinda windy."